Rev walked through the jungle like he’d been born there. The road was barely a road at all, a scant reminder that we were still a part of society. Our neighbors were expatriots from all over the world. There was a guy from Ohio, a couple from Minneapolis, and people from Toronto, Juarez, and San Jose. They were all very, very nice. And they thought we were very, very nice, too. I wasn’t going to try and correct them on that account.

I watched Rev raise a hand to Tito. His skin glittered with the ocean, but it was drying fast in the heat. He’d gotten his improvised denim shorts wet, too, the ones he ripped from his skinny jeans. Now they clung to him in a way I could only describe as unholy. Tito held out a green coconut and Rev said something to make him laugh. I smiled, because Tito’s laugh was infectious even when you couldn’t actually hear it.

Standing at the window, watching Rev get closer, I was stirred by the way he licked his lips to clean them of the sweet coconut milk. He would taste like it, and salt. I’d chosen to nap instead of go to the beach. Sleep had been a struggle for me. Even locked in his arms, knowing we were safe, with a jungle orchestra of frogs and birds and bugs to distract my mind, I had trouble closing both eyes at the same time. I wondered how long it would be until that was no longer the case.

The door hinges screeched. It was my low-budget alarm system. Rev brought the heat in with him, in more ways than one.

“Sleep well?” he asked, wrapping me up from behind. He smelled wet. He trailed sand in the house, and it rubbed against my skin, heated friction. He was a sloppy, inconsiderate man. Who do you think was gonna end up sweeping up that sand? And the only coconut milk he saved me was lingering on his tongue, so I had to part my lips against his to taste it. So terribly thoughtless.

My head dropped back on my neck to rest on his chest. His hands were rough from his new hobby, canoeing, but he ran them up my silk slip anyway, and squeezed them past the straps to cup my breasts. Awful of him, really. The way those callouses rolled over my nipples and turned them into hard, tender pebbles. He got his lips against my ear and sucked, nibbled, asked the question again.

“How’d you sleep, baby?”

“Alright,” I moaned. “Had dreams.”

“Bad dreams?”

“No,” I said, slipping my hand behind me, finding his hardness in his tattered denim shorts, still wet enough to stick to his skin. I unsnapped the button, then fought the zipper down to its base. Rev groaned into my ear when my hand closed around him and tugged. “Not so bad...”

“Not so bad?” He struggled to talk while I toyed with his arousal, squeezing the shaft, cupping the tip.

“Mmm,” I said, closing my eyes, letting his fingers distract me, their purposeful pinching shooting energy straight to my clit. He teased and rolled my taut nipples with an expertise borne only out of intense study. Since crossing the border, we’d had nothing but time to learn the mechanics of our bodies. He switched from one ear to the other, this time starting with the nibble and following with the lick.

“Want to talk about it?”

“Yeah,” I moaned, squirming in his arms until I could turn around, hand still sheathing his cock, slip straps falling down. “It started like this…”

I put my lips to his chest, kissed the ink and salt and sweat, felt the rumble of his groaning. He grabbed my ass, squeezed it, and lifted me up. Squealing, I wrapped my thighs around his waist and my hands around his neck. His black eyes flashed, his mouth covered mine, and the room spun with each step he took towards our bed. He dropped me, towering like a beast about to taste a virgin sacrifice, ripping my panties away and sliding between my legs. One hand fisted in my hair, the other slipped to my delta and cupped it.

“Hot,” he growled, words a hot wind whipping in my ear. One finger parted my lips and slid across my sex. “Wet.”

“Yeah,” I breathed, bucking as his finger slipped inside me. “A lot…like this…”

He silenced me with his mouth, biting my lower lip. My skin was flushed, running cold and hot, sweat dripping from my temples and between my breasts. My stomach was a coiled rope that began to unravel as he fucked me with his hand. His palm ground into my clit, he slipped another finger inside me, tugging my head back by my hair, demanding my body’s response.

“I’m gonna make you come,” he warned, pulling away, more weight pressing his fingers into me. They dove, digging for the tender chamber that held my need. “And then I’m gonna fuck you so hard you can’t tell if you’re coming or breaking…”

“Oh,” I whimpered, feeling him slip into place, his lips tightening in a smirk as he offered me the first gentle thrust. Stroking hard enough to tighten me, but not enough to let me go.

“…and then I’m gonna pull your hair and make you beg…”

Harder. His palm grinding. His fingers stroking. Harder. Harder.

“…you know what you’re gonna beg for, baby?”

“Mmm,” I moaned, mind going fuzzy as he built a fire inside me, fingers crooked and pressing into me, pumping. My pussy clenched, dripping, suspended in carnal anticipation. “Tell me…”

“You’re gonna beg for me to come,” he murmured, watching the effect he had on me. “Just so you can think again. Just so you can speak again. You’re gonna beg me to fill your tight…”

Toes curled. He hooked me between his palm and fingers, pulled me closer.

“…little…”

My eyes closed and all I saw was white. The coiled rope of my stomach suddenly pulled taut, tightening to the point of pain.

“…cunt.”

I exploded. He made me so dirty, I came just to feel clean again. My pussy clenched around his fingers, massaging them, soaking them in my pleasure. My thighs snapped shut around his wrist, hips jerking; I bit down on the back of my hand to keep myself from disappearing into this ecstasy. He watched it all, and waited until it began to wane before pulling his hand away and flipping me over onto my stomach.

“Rev…” I moaned, grabbing at the sheets, feeling him push and pull my body into position. A hand between my shoulder blades, holding me down. Another on my hip, pulling me up. His cock nudging at my soaked slit, spreading me wide with just the tip.

“What, baby?” he asked, tender now, for the moment. I turned my head, looked over my shoulder at him. This bad, bad man. My pussy twitched, not done yet.

“Fuck me.”

He entered me hard and fast, a single thrust splitting me in half, driving him against my womb. He put both hands on my hips and used them as leverage to fuck me harder, knowing what I needed to come again. Pain danced with pleasure each time he stabbed into my center; reaching down, I found my clit and rubbed it, my pussy tightening around him as I did.

“Fuck, yeah, baby. Come for me. Come on my fucking dick. Show me how much you love it.”

My response was a howl that rivaled the jungle outside, another climax sweeping through me, a wave I could only ride until another one followed, and I was struck dumb in disastrous bliss.

“Tell me, Misty,” Rev demanded, never ceasing his feral pace. “Want more? Tell me what you want.”

“C-come,” I begged, unable to take another stroke, not sure I’d survive another orgasm. “Please…”

It was all he needed to unleash inside me, moaning as he buried his cock deep and let it pulse against my womb. His hot, thick seed filled me in bursts, massaging my tender walls, bringing me down from my peak. He groaned and leaned forward, nearly collapsing on top of me as he shuddered out the last of his cum. Together, we rolled panting onto our backs, fingers twining lazily - we couldn’t cuddle, too hot, too sweaty. But our eyes met from pillow to pillow and that was enough.

“Was that…really…what you dreamed of?” he asked, breathing heavy.

“No,” I laughed. “I had a dream about the goats we saw in Domincal.”

“Well then I’m very glad we didn’t reenact that dream,” Rev smiled, making me laugh. I sighed, unable to help my contentment, and rolled my head to face the ceiling.

“So what do you think?”

Three weeks, three towns, three houses. We tried San Jose, Domincal, now the outskirts of Limon. They were all alike, and all very different.

“I like it,” I said carefully.

“You’ve liked all of them,” Rev teased.

“Yeah, but…I do like it here.”

I opened my eyes and looked at him again. He was considering me, eyes thoughtful.

“You’re tired of moving,” he said. I nodded.

“So is Purrloin,” I pointed out, which was very true. Tough as she was, my old gal needed some stability. Even though she now lived in a predator’s paradise, with more mice and critters to hunt and kill than she knew what to do with, I could tell she was fed up with stalking a new house every week.

“Okay,” Rev said, rolling over so he was just close enough to plant a kiss on my cheek. “So we stay.”

“For now,” I said.

“For now,” he agreed. The overhead fan clicked, captivated me for awhile.

“Do you think I could make money selling canoes?” Rev asked.

“Uh…”

“I mean, making them and selling them. To tourists. You know. ‘Hand crafted from local cedar.’”

“Where are you going to learn to make canoes?”

“Betro gave me a book,” Rev said.

“I think you can sure try,” I said, rolling onto my side to face him. “Why, though? We don’t really need the money…”

He was silent for a moment.

“It’s more than just the money. I’ve got no reason to drive fast anymore, but I still do it” he said. “A guy needs his hobbies. In a canoe you’re the engine, and the brakes, and the steering wheel. You’re the radio. You’re the windshield wipers.”

Ah. That made sense. Rev and his machines. I smiled. I could see it now: in a year or so, coming home from my own work, whatever that might be, spying on him as he labored over a bowed boat, his muscles rippling and shining in the tree-dappled sunlight.

“I think it’s a great idea,” I said. Even if it turned out to be a waste, there was no reason not to try. Dad’s money would last for a long time, but it’d be smart to start thinking about the future.

Besides, Rev hadn’t changed his mind about the seven million babies. I let my hand drift to the soft swell of my tummy, wondering what we would name the first.

Life was good. We were Kit and Holly Hamilton of Modesto, California. Ex-pats with adventurous spirits and passports to fill. The ring on my finger (purchased in Guatamala) was real, even if the marriage certificate (printed in Odessa, Texas) wasn’t. More importantly, the man lying beside me was real, and his heart was real, and his love was real.

As real as my own.

Rev reached for me. His thumb rolled along my cheek.

“I wish I could help you sleep better at night,” he said.

“It’ll get better,” I said, sure that I was telling the truth. It had to get better, didn’t it? Look at us. In our open-walled living room, where hummingbirds zipped past your head all day. Where we shaded ourselves with fruit trees, banana and guanabana, and mangosteen. Where ginger and heliconias scented the air whenever the sea breeze didn’t bring the salt and foam. Where the sunsets bathed everything in pink, and the fish was fresh and still laden with ocean salt. Beautiful women, smiling men, Hispanic and Jamaican voices mingling, breeding, birthing something entirely new and musical.

And my love at my side.

The question wasn’t how could it not get better; the question was how could it possibly be any better?

“Well, if we’re going to stay, I have a present for you.”

Rev lifted himself up and stepped into another room, returning with a large brown cardboard box with a big red bow on it.

“Where did you get this?” I asked, sitting up straight.

“I had it shipped down from the states,” he replied, laughing.

I pulled off the bow and opened the box, reaching inside and pulling out one of the awkward shapes from its depths. A flash of pink hit my eyes as I held it up.

“I thought it might make you feel more at home,” Rev said. “Do you like them?”

I laughed, setting the pink plastic lawn flamingo aside.

“It’s perfect. I love you.”

“I love you too. Now and forever.”

Did you love Baddy? Are you hungry for more? Don’t stop now because I’ve included some extra special bonus novels just for my most loyal readers! Turn the page for Taking Beauty, Fall Into Me, and some surprises you won’t expect! You are the reason I write!

-Nikki xoxoxo