Max

 

If I’d known how eager Lucy was for a cabin, I’d have bought her one years ago. We had the money. Maybe it had been tighter than usual lately, but my money wasn’t all tied up in the club. I had my own set aside and I’d been saving it for a rainy day.

 

The haunted look in Lucy’s eyes seemed pretty damn rainy to me.

 

She had the place picked out within days of asking me for it. She’d probably been looking for longer than that, waiting to ask me until she had a good argument. I never mentioned to her that she didn’t need a good argument. It would have been my pleasure to give it to her no matter what.

 

I was headed there now, going to meet her as she finished up the paperwork with the place, and as I drove towards the cabin, I decided I liked the idea. Not just because it was something Lucy really wanted, but because it was a good idea. A place in the hills, away from the streets and the city and the crime. A place where I could step away from the club for a minute and just be the guy Lucy needed.

 

Sounded damn near perfect.

 

As I drove, I considered the other things an isolated cabin might be good for. I thought of Lucy standing in the kitchen naked, unconcerned with who might be looking through the window, because there was no one. Just trees and forest. I thought of how I could come up behind her and fondle her breasts, pinching her nipples. I could slide my hands lower, too, slipping over her slim waist and belly until I found her clean-shaven mound. My hands could dip lower and slide between her thighs to find that sweet spot between her lips.

 

And not just that. I could sit her on the porch without a care and let her sunbathe naked. I could fondle her until I was so damn hard that it hurt.

 

I could fuck her on the porch if I wanted. I could drive myself inside her over and over again, each time receiving a piercing scream of pleasure that echoed through the trees, because dammit no one would hear it.

 

Our lovemaking had always resulted in the kind of animalistic sounds that made our neighbors call in noise complaints and scared people into thinking I was murdering her.

 

But she loved every minute of it, and I did, too.

 

Out here, we could do that and no one would question or complain about it. I could have as much of her as I wanted.

 

The thought made me harden and my balls ache. It caused the rest of the ride there to be a little uncomfortable, but I didn’t really care. I’d ride as hard and as far as I had to with thoughts of Lucy in my head to reach her.

 

I pulled up the long driveway to the place not too much later. It was quiet and peaceful, I supposed, but there was something off about the whole thing. Not the cabin itself, but the way the air felt around it. I couldn’t say what it was until I stepped up to the porch and saw the man leaning there against the frame.

 

“What took you so long?”

 

I did a quick inventory of him, but I didn’t need to. I knew who he was. He wore the jacket marked with the Slayers’ logo, and I recognized him already as one of the men Blade had brought to the negotiations the other day. One of Blade’s lieutenants.

 

Frowning, I said, “What are you doing here?” My hand had already begun to move around my back. I didn’t have to ask to know something was wrong. I desperately wanted to look around to find Lucy, but I didn’t dare take my eyes from the immediate threat right in front of me. Getting myself killed wouldn’t do her any good.

 

The man grinned broadly, and for a second I thought he might be related to Blade with that same expression on his face. “I’m just here to give you a friendly message. You’d better start running girls, Riley, if you ever want to see your pretty little girlfriend again.” He took a step off the porch, closer to me. “Oh, and if you say no, I should tell you that you might see her after all. In a movie. The first little porn shoot Blade decides to film, staring none other than the Preacher’s Daughter. I’d watch that, wouldn’t you?”

 

He was still grinning when I pulled the gun and put a bullet in his head.