Heavy by Cate C. Wells
8
HEAVY
The first time I bumped into someone and knocked them on their ass was in seventh grade. I shoulder-checked a teacher, a young guy with a slight build. Mr. Anscomb. It was completely unintentional. I was walking down the hall, and my growth spurts had outpaced my spatial awareness. I got put out for three days even though my mom went toe-to-toe with the principal.
In retrospect, I probably got three days because Mom went toe-to-toe with that asshole.
No one believed the long-haired son of the local MC president was innocent. And in a sense, I wasn’t. We young’uns weren’t raised on sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll, but we sure as shit were raised with ‘em. Brawlin’, huntin’, and ridin’. Flashed titties and polishing off beers left unsupervised. It was the life. Charge, Nickel, Scrap, Forty, and I were all doin’ time at Petty’s Mill Junior High, and everyone knew it.
Ever since that incident with Mr. Anscomb, I’ve known my size. There was a time I reveled in it, flexing on the football team, walkin’ towards a gang of wannabes at the carnival, gettin’ my jollies by watchin’ as they parted to flow around me, a rock in their stream. Or taking a sudden step toward a dumbass with a big mouth just to watch him jerk back and duck.
If you want my origin story, that’s it—shoulder checking a history teacher. Not the legendary father, gone too soon. Not the mother, gone even sooner.
Not the Blown Job or when the baseball bat cracked my little brother’s skull or when the guidance counselor sat across her desk from me junior year, flipping through my file, forehead furrowing as she realized the sixteen-year-old greaser with the full beard had a 4.5 GPA and a perfect SAT score, and she said, “Well, you could go to a pretty good school with these grades. What are you into?”
The beginning was an accident. An unintentional swing of the arm, and from the consequences, I came to understand that I am a force whether or not I want to be. From October until June, I watched Mr. Anscomb flinch every time I raised my hand in class.
I am stronger than other men. Bigger. I see further. I’m the guy my brothers look to—at first only because my voice boomed the loudest, and I stood two heads taller—but later, because I was the one who knew his own strength.
Because my brothers followed me, I lead. I’ve stumbled. Made mistakes the club is still paying for. But I don’t knock into folks by accident anymore. Haven’t for a long, long time. But people have never stopped making way.
I am a legend. They see me coming, and they clear out of my path. Everyone.
Except Dina Wall.
This fun-sized woman has careened into me at least a dozen times since I had the limo let us out at the intersection of Tropicana Avenue and Las Vegas Boulevard. She has the spatial awareness of a bumper car. Every time she collides with my side, she goes “oof” and grumbles. Cracks me up.
I inhale cooling desert night air, and my lips twitch.
I needed a walk to get myself under control.
Back in that VIP room with Dina shivering in my hands, stage whispering in my ear, paying me hardly any mind although I was caressing her titties like a fuckin’ potter at his wheel, there’s nothing I wanted more than to unzip my jeans and coax her to ride my cock, too.
But that’s the rub, as Shakespeare said. There is no coaxing Dina. My wife.
My tipsy, clumsy, oblivious wife.
She’s still wearing my cut. Never thought I’d take it off, but now I’m not sure I want it back. I like it on her.
She’s still wearing her sunglasses, too, as she gapes at the fountains and palm trees and electronic billboards. It’s late enough that the crowds have thinned, and the other tourists give us a wide berth, flashing me the usual wary glances.
Back at the clubhouse, when I woke up with her on my bed, Dina avoided eye contact. Then she started sneaking peeks. Now she meets my eyes, and it’s like looking into a glass-bottom boat all the way to the floor of the deep, blue sea.
What goes on in this woman’s head? She never reacts how I predict. I never know what’s going to come out her mouth, but there’s always an unassailable logic to what she says.
I know people. I play the tune. I’m the puppet master. The mastermind.
Dina doesn’t give a shit.
I’m a fisher of men, and she’s a brown trout. Too canny to catch.
There’s a weightlessness to being powerless. A mellow high. I like it.
So even though my dick’s half hard, and my heart has not stopped ka-thunking at the idea of unboxing her, I slow my stride. The roller coasters aren’t running. The only thing she’s ridin’ tonight is me.
A few blocks from our hotel, Dina stops to stare at the side of a casino. It’s a three-story high LED billboard advertising one of those acrobat circuses. The performers are naked except for thongs and painted in make-up to look like fantasy creatures—unicorns, griffins, centaurs, and dragons.
I loom beside her. Her jaw is clenched, and her body’s vibrating. Or squirming. I slide her sunglasses on top of her head ‘cause I’m curious. Her hand reaches to snatch them back, but it gets twisted in mine, so I grab her fingers and hold on.
She frowns, squinting, but now I can see her gaze track the acrobats and then drop to the concrete sidewalk, as if she needs to rest between ganders. The blue feathers and green sequins and red scarves reflect in her black pupils. She’s taken. Utterly taken.
Lightly and carefully, I nudge her with my elbow. “What?” I ask. She’ll know what I mean.
“I wish I could see this.”
“We can.” I’d planned on flying home tomorrow, but no reason we can’t take in a show before the flight. We aren’t gettin’ an early start. Not with what I’m gonna do to her once we get to our room.
“No, I can’t.” She bops her sunglasses down with her free hand and tugs me to get a move on.
We’re still holding hands.
Ain’t never done this before with a woman. It’s an awkward height differential, but—I’m not letting go. I can guide her so she’s doesn’t bang into shit so often.
“Why not?”
“Too much stimuli.”
“Even with the sunglasses and earbuds?” I saw her struggle at the airport, but I figured it was like jumping into a cold pool, and she would grow accustomed. At the strip club, she seemed fine, and that was a lot of stimulation.
“Yeah.”
“But you were okay back at the club.”
“I wasn’t okay.”
“Could have fooled me.” She was entranced. I’ve never been more turned on in my life than watching her lick her lips as another dude’s cock slid in and out of a messy, pink pussy. Ain’t a kink I thought I had, but I like to watch my wife get excited watching another chick get dicked.
Wife.
Should have a false ring to it, but it doesn’t.
“I was Little Mermaid-ing,” she says, like that’s a whole explanation.
“Come again?”
“Yeah. You know the original? The Hans Christian Andersen story?”
“Where she dies at the end?”
“Yeah, that one.”
“That story is morbid as shit.”
“I know, right? It’s awesome.” She tilts her head back and grins at me. “In that version, when she grows human legs, she says it’s like walking on knives and sharpened needles.”
“And that’s what it was like? Back at the club?”
“That’s what it’s always like in public—at the grocery store, restaurants, the mall.”
“You didn’t say. We could have left.”
“I didn’t want to leave.” She wriggles her hand loose, and trip-dances a few steps ahead, turning to face me and walking backward. Jesus. She’s gonna fall and crack her head open on the sidewalk. “I wanted to see the world. Enchant a prince. Earn my immortal soul.”
I scrub my chest. An unpleasant burn rises in my throat. Indigestion. “What prince?”
She snickers. “I don’t know. I’m not particular. Doesn’t have to be a prince.”
I see we’re talking about me now. About her, and me, and what I’m about to do to her. “So anyone who can bury a body would do?”
“Not anyone. I have standards. I want a good time.”
“So I’m a good time? A walk on the wild side?” That’s good. That’s fine. That’s what this is.
“I don’t know. So far, all you’ve done is put a ring on it and bought me stuff.” She grins. Imp. “And now we’re taking a leisurely after-dinner stroll. Not really wild.”
Bullshit. “I held you at gunpoint and made you come so hard you quivered like a kitten in a bathtub.”
She tosses a slender shoulder. “Yesterday’s news.” Then she wrinkles her nose. “And don’t put kittens in bathtubs.”
And then it happens—like I knew it would. Her heel lands wrong, and her arms windmill. Before the shriek escapes her lips, I’ve plucked her up. Without hesitation, she wraps her legs as tight and as far around my waist as she can get them. I hoist her higher, and now she’s smiling down at me, arms circling my neck. I keep on strolling.
She slides her sunglasses on top of her head and gazes down, so I stare up into her wide blue eyes. Beyond her upturned face, the hazy night glows orange from the light pollution. I squeeze her ass so her pubic bone grinds against my linea alba. Her knees dig into my obliques.
It feels like when my boot heel clicks into place against my bike peg.
“You’re going to carry me all the way?” she asks, short of breath.
“Don’t want you walking on knives.”
Her fingers find my hair, combing, fisting. She studies me, and I’m reminded of the quote attributed to Nietzsche, the warning that when you stare into the abyss, the abyss stares back.
The abyss is beautiful. Delicate. Mysterious. Ballsy and neurotic. Not like any woman I’ve ever known before, but also somehow as familiar as the crisscrossing on my own palm. I carry her, and I feel light. My knees don’t click. My back doesn’t ache.
“You’re a prince among men, eh?” she teases, her soft fingers moving to my face, my wind-red cheeks, the lines at the corner of my eyes that I’ve had forever.
“I’m gonna carry you over the threshold, wife.” We’re a block away, and my pulse is kicking up. I’ve picked up the pace. I want her touch everywhere. I want her softness all over my rough, work-worn skin.
“We’re not really married,” she says.
“You signed the papers. You said, ‘I do.’”
She rolls her eyes. “There’s more to marriage than that.”
She brushes the tip of her nose across the tip of mine and then nestles it beside, inhaling. It’s so strange on the one hand, but on the other, I want to nuzzle her pieces, too, breathe her in, see how far I can push this moment before it deflates back into everyday proportions. Right now, it feels huge. Huge and fragile and impossibly sweet.
“Like what?” I ask.
She chews her bottom lip. “I don’t know. The marriages I’ve seen up close—the only common thread is cohabitation.”
“Exactly.”
“Exactly what?”
“Who knows what marriage is?” For my parents, it was lying in the bed you made. “Could be anything. Could be two co-conspirators making a deal not to snitch on each other.”
“I’m pretty sure there’s supposed to be love involved.”
I’m not. “And what’s love? Exactly?”
She grins ear-to-ear. “I have no idea.”
And I’m grinning back at her. “Me neither.”
I’ve always subscribed to the Greek way of thinking, the idea of many loves—the love of God for man, affectionate love. I’m aware of eros; I’ve read Plato’s Symposium a few times. It’s always paled beside philia to me. The love of brothers—that I understand. Loyalty. Common purpose. Complete trust in another man’s character.
“You don’t have to carry me,” she says, interrupting my thoughts.
“You don’t weigh anything.” She doesn’t. Carrying her, my back is straight, my steps lighter than they’ve been in a long time.
“Yeah, I’m not heavy,” she says, and emits a peel of laughter—a cackle of pure, odd delight—and I extend my neck, wanting, seeking, and she comes closer, black eyelashes fluttering to her cheeks, but I keep my eyes open and watch while she kisses me. Inexpert. Soft. Quick, off-center, and I groan, and she does it again.
And again.
Learning her way. Growing confident. Exploring.
My dick throbs.
I lengthen my stride, navigating the automatic doors, the echoing casino lobby, the hall to the elevators, shoving down the impulse to reach out and punch the side of the drunk dude’s head who gawks and sniggers. We’re making a scene; it’s only natural that people should stare.
Dina is a vine, fingers tangled in my hair, thighs squeezing impossibly tighter, pelvis pulsing. She’s trying to get it, and I don’t think she’s even aware, or maybe she’s past caring like I am, past everything but the need. Like when you see a lush field of trimmed grass and you gotta run, or when there’s a stretch of empty road, and you have to open the throttle.
I jam the “up” button on the elevator until there’s a ding and the shiny door slides open. Dina’s making sounds now, beautiful sounds—needy whines and whimpers.
“We’re almost there, baby,” I pant into her mouth. She’s experimenting with tongue now, slipping hers past my teeth, licking, tasting, darting away when mine gets demanding. I let her lead. I want to follow where she goes. I want to trip along behind her into this space I’ve never been before, a place where I don’t give a shit about anything other than her sweet mouth and soft skin.
I’ve got the key card in my hand when we get to our suite. There’s a beep, and I throw the door open and stride across the living area, into our room. I kick the door shut, peel her loose, and toss her onto the bed. Before she bounces twice, I’ve ripped my shirt off, and I’ve got my belt undone.
“Oh. Okay. This is happening,” she mumbles, and she tears off my cut, tossing it off the side of the bed. Her dress follows, static spiking her hair. She wriggles backwards to the head of the bed, unhooking her bra and flinging it aside. It lands on the night table. Her eyes are glued to my cock, ruddy and veined and ready to go.
Shit. I dropped my jeans without takin’ off my boots, and now I gotta bend over buck naked to untie the laces. With my bulk and abundance of hair, it ain’t graceful nor quick.
She can’t change her mind. If she does, I’ll fuckin’ lose it.
When I finally get my legs free, Dina’s ditched her panties, and she’s got her hand jammed between her legs, rubbing her clit, knees up, propped against the pile of pillows at the headboard. Her eyelids are half-mast like a drowsy cat, and she’s panting fast.
“Oh, no. You don’t come until my cock is in you.” I lunge, grab her naughty hand and pin it to the mattress beside her hip. Her free fingers flutter up to kind of pet my chest. I’m wired. Taut. Vibrating with energy.
Alive.
“You don’t get to make those decisions unilaterally,” she says.
I bark a laugh. How could I not?
“Like hell I can’t.”
“This marriage is a partnership.” She smirks and tickles those soft fingers down over my clenched abs, and wraps them experimentally around my aching cock. I hiss.
“So now we’re married?” I grit from clenched teeth.
“I signed a paper,” she sasses. “I said ‘I do.’” She’s cracking herself up, and then suddenly her smile fades.
No. Nothing is stopping this. I lean closer to take her mouth, turn off that clockwork brain of hers, but she’s too quick. She takes her hand from my cock and shoves against my chest.
“We need to talk.”
“We can talk after.” I slide my palm over a smooth hip, softer than a kitten’s belly, but she’s got her thighs jammed together now, knees locked.
Guess we’re talkin’.
“Okay. Go on.”
“Do you have a condom?”
We’re not using a condom. There’s going to be nothing between her and me; I’m gonna feel that cherry burst and her channel flutter when she comes on her first cock.
“We talked about this. I’m clean.”
“But how do you know?”
Jesus. I’d call it a mood killer, but apparently, there is nothing that can turn me off. She wants to talk STDs? I’m down. There’s nothing about our bodies and our bodies together that I don’t fuckin’ dig.
“No symptoms. Last time I got tested, I was clean.”
“When was that?”
“I don’t know. A year or two back.”
“You could have caught something since then.”
“I haven’t.”
“But you don’t know.”
“I’m reasonably certain.”
“Do you have a condom?”
“We’re not using a condom.”
“You sure as hell don’t get to make that decision unilaterally,” she says.
The corners of my lips twitch. I can’t believe I’m having this conversation. I’m on top of her. I outweigh her by an easy buck seventy-five. She knows what I am capable of. And she does not care.
It ain’t courage. Ain’t ignorance either. It’s something else. Something particular to Dina Wall. She knows her own strength, too. Just like I do.
I try persuasion. “I don’t want to use a condom. I want to feel you.” I brush a tender kiss across that pouty lower lip.
She narrows her eyes, flicking her gaze down to where my thick cock is wedged against her hip. “I want to feel you, too.”
And like that, I’m even harder. My cock jerks against her soft skin. I need the contact, need to reassure myself that I will get to feed this hunger so I can keep the need in check just a little longer.
“I wouldn’t harm you,” I vow.
And it’s true. Deep in my marrow, independent of conscious thought, I already know my body won’t let her be hurt. Never. In any way. It’s not an epiphany; it’s a revelation of what’s somehow already existed—maybe since I first saw her. I don’t know. It’s all a mystery.
I am helpless against the power of a good mystery.
She clears her throat, all prim. “Your good intentions aren’t a prophylactic.”
I bust out laughing. “Aw, baby. You’re gonna make me say it?”
“Say what?”
I lower myself closer until her small, pert tits brush my pecs and whisper in her ear. “Ain’t been with no one for at least two years.”
“Why not?”
Oh, this ain’t goin’ in the right direction. “I don’t know. Tired, mostly.”
She scrunches her head back into the pillow so she can give me a look. “But you’re not tired now.”
“No, baby.”
“Not with me,” she says.
I let her feel the weight of my hips. She sucks in a breath, and then she smiles. “You like me.”
“I do.” Why would I lie? I got her where I want her.
“You aren’t afraid of your feelings.”
“To the contrary. I’m fuckin’ terrified,” I murmur, and it’s true. Somehow, I end up confessing everything to her. She’s got some mythical Greek kind of magic. An Achilles heel. Icarus’ wings. The reeds in the story of King Midas and the Ass’s Ears.
I’m a sailor, and she’s a siren, and I don’t look, I leap.
Her blue eyes darken and her smile fades. “I’m scared, too. It’s going to hurt.”
Shit. I guess it will. Before—when this moment was theoretical—I shrugged it off, figuring it’d be uncomfortable for her, a little painful, but I’d make it up to her, and ultimately, it’ll be nothing.
Now—I see it differently.
How can I hurt her? I can’t. I just can’t.
I push up to my knees. She stretches out to rest her hands on my bulky thighs, stroking my dark leg hair. Our bodies are so different. I’m big, tanned and weathered from the grime of the garage and construction sites, hairy as shit.
She’s slender, and pale, and smooth as a moonstone.
And she rules me.
My body thrums for her. My mind contorts. I got a million things I need to worry about, and I can’t remember a fuckin’ one of them ‘cause now she’s kneeling on the bed with me, back arched, tits high and proud, bare ass resting on her delicate feet, kneading the same spot above my knee over and over with soft fingers, like a cat taken female form, confident in her own superiority.
Her head cocks. “Do you have lube?”
I swallow a cough, gaze dipping to her pussy. “Babe, I can see from here your thighs are slick. You don’t need lube.”
“Everyone says to use lube.”
“That’s if you’re not wet enough. How wet are you for me?” My abs clench.
She kind of walks her knees apart and peers down at her herself, canting her hips up to see between.
Sweet lord. She parts her pussy with two fingers. She’s slick and plump and pink, her little clit popped from its hood, shiny with her cream.
She slips a finger inside, and I suck in a breath. “Pretty wet,” she says.
My throat is bone dry.
“I’ll go find some lube if you want.” The holy grail. The one ring to rule them all. The secrets of the universe. I’ll get her whatever she wants.
She makes a noncommittal hum. “I’m wet. It should be fine.” Her gaze rises to mine. “If it hurts, how long will it hurt?”
“If it hurts, I’ll stop.”
“I don’t want you to stop until it’s done.” She settles herself back against the pillows again and lets her knees fall to the sides. “But if I say stop, stop.”
“Okay.” I go to her, my small autocratic queen, and I kiss her. I taste her, slow and thorough, until she’s inhaling me like I’ve noticed her do. The tension in her frame eases. Her hips pulse in a rhythm. Her hands explore me, two skittish critters that can’t stay put, stroking my wiry chest hair, testing the tautness of my ass, playing tentatively with my balls until my cock is tempered steel.
“Okay,” she pants, her fingers curling around my length and drawing it to her tight, wet hole. “You can do it now.”
I don’t fuckin’ know if I can. If she cries, what am I gonna do? I can’t beat my own ass. Fuck.
I almost look around the room for help. I’m the man with the answers, but sweet lord, I want to pause time and read a how-to book. Drink a shot. Phone a fuckin’ friend.
“Come on,” she whines, notching me to her entrance.
“Gimme a second,” I pant, grabbing her hands, twinging our fingers, pressing them to the mattress on either side of her bed-mussed head. Her eyes are bright. Trusting.
My wife. Mine. I don’t have to share. I don’t have to sacrifice for the greater good. She belongs to me.
Inside me, something shifts. Cracks. It’s tectonic. And silent. The work of a moment, and the landscape of my soul is changed.
“I want it now,” she demands, chasing me with her hips.
I focus. Quick and be done with it is my general philosophy, but not here and now. I cannot hurt her.
“Heavy,” she whines, squeezing my hands, raising one knee to open herself even more.
She wants it. Oh, Lord, do not let me fuck this up.
I steel myself and push in. Only the tip. She’s so tight. So hot. I freeze, every muscle aching from restraint. “How’s this?”
Her chest is rising and falling rapidly, her eyes glued between us where my fat cock is nocked in her stretched pussy. There’s a sheen of sweat on her forehead.
“I don’t know. Do I really need to talk now?” Her thready voice is tinged with irritation. “Just keep going.”
I kiss her while I push in more—inch by inch—because I’m a coward for her, and I don’t want to see pain in her eyes. Except for her heavy breathing, she makes no noise.
“You’re doing so good, baby,” I mutter to her as I fight the urge to plunge deep in her wet heat. I force myself to work it in patiently, pausing for her to acclimate.
“Open up. Take my cock. A little more. Good girl.”
Finally, hours later, I’m sunk in her to the hilt. She’s taking all of me, and her ribs rise against my chest, her hip bones notched into the furrow of my Apollo’s belt.
I keep kissing her, quick brushes, and somewhere along the line, I let go of her hands to cradle her face.
I don’t notice how still she’d become until she starts to move. She begins by readjusting her knees, raising them higher and lower until she must find an angle she likes. Then she rests her heels on my ass.
She taps my shoulder. “You can move now.”
I don’t know if I can. I don’t know if I can take the next level. It’s so sweet now. I’m sunk in sugar, immersed in it, high as a kite on it.
It feels so good. Can you freebase magic? ‘Cause that’s what this is. Her feel, her sounds, her growing response to me.
She kicks me in the butt and rocks her hips. “Come on, Heavy. I want to keep going.”
Okay, then. I thrust. Gently. Not my whole length, only a few inches. She bucks to meet me and grunts. It’s a good grunt.
I pull out farther, almost to the ridge of my tip. She whimpers. A happy whimper. I slide back in, and her pussy grips me, hungry, and hot.
“It’s good, isn’t it? Your virgin pussy loves taking my hard cock, right baby?”
She doesn’t answer. She’s wriggled her hand between us, and she’s working her clit, watching my cock plunge into her pink folds, panting heavier and heavier, raising her hips to meet me.
I want to lose myself, let myself go, but I won’t. I keep the reins, speed up as she flicks herself harder, but I maintain control. I need to ingrain the moment she comes in my memory. I need to sear the image like a brand.
“You’re gonna come for me now, baby.” I cup a sweet tit, stroke the stiff nipple with my calloused thumb. She moans. Her skin is slick with sweat, her abs tensing so I can make out individual ribs.
I tilt her head up. “I want you to look me in the eye when you come.”
Her gaze flies everywhere. Back between her legs, the ceiling, my lips. I tighten my grip on her chin. “Try for me.”
And then her blue eyes find mine and stay.
“Good girl.”
Her pupils blow as her pussy clenches my shaft like a fist, and I come hard, in waves, filling her. She lets out an exultant grunt, and then she splays her arms and legs like a starfish, and I swear to God, she makes the exact same sound they make on soda pop commercials after they take a long swig on a hot day.
I laugh. “You liked that.”
She grins like the Cheshire cat. “It sucked at first, but then I got used to it.”
“And you liked it.” I throw myself down beside her on my back. She’s not freaking out about the cum like she did last time. Still, once I catch my breath, I’ll go get her a warm washcloth.
“It felt good.” She looks over to me, her expression approving and more than a little dopey. Prickles dance across my chest.
I grin. “I’m the best lover you ever had.”
She snorts. “When you’re the only guy in line, you’re first and last,” she says.
“Wasn’t in line,” I say, hauling my drained carcass up. “I was in your tight, wet pussy.”
She snorts again. I trudge to the bathroom, flick on the light. I don’t know why my body is so wrung out. All told, it wasn’t a vigorous fuck. I’m feeling it, though. There’s a burn in my biceps and thighs, and my abs are sore. From holding back?
I’m off center. My brain’s dopey, too, and I don’t like leaving her in the bed. I make quick work of wiping my dick. There are smears of blood on it. My stomach churns. Is Dina hurt?
I wet a washcloth and go back to her. She’s still sprawled on her back. She doesn’t seem to be in pain. She blinks at me when I kneel on the mattress. And she smiles.
My heartbeat trips.
“Knees up,” I say, more gruffly than I intended. She complies, unbothered. I gently wipe the mess from her rosy folds while she watches me. My curious cat. There’s not much red on the rag. She doesn’t seem to be bleeding anymore.
“How are you feeling?” Again, my voice is deeper, rougher than I meant. She’s oblivious.
“Thirsty.”
I guess she’s fine. I amble back to the bathroom, rinse out the cloth, and get her a glass of water. I’m halfway back to the bed when there’s a ruckus in the main room. A door slams and raucous voices fill the room—women and men—and the radio begins to blare. Death metal. Dina curls in on herself. In an instant, she’s on her side, hugging her knees to her chest, shoulders hunched.
Oh, hell no.
I stride to the door, throw it open, and bellow at the motley, drunken crew of my brothers and strippers—and one random bro in khakis and a button down. “Turn that fuckin’ music off!”
Bush hops to, fumbling at the phone he’s got hooked up to speakers. The room falls quiet.
“I ain’t never seen his dick before,” Bush mutters in hushed tones.
A stripper whistles.
I give her a chin dip and turn back to Dina, shutting the door behind me—less vigorously this time.
She’s still curled in a ball, but she’s peeking up, and her lips are curving.
And then the music starts again, a new song, more mellow but just as loud. I made myself clear. I square my shoulders, preparing to kick prospect ass.
Dina’s smile broadens. “Oh, I love this song.” She stretches, straightening as she rolls onto her back, pointing her toes.
I guess Bush can live.
Elvis sings “Can’t Help Falling In Love,” and Dina sings along, off-tune, kind of bopping her head. She climbs to her feet, unsteady on the mattress.
I stalk to stand at the foot of the bed, holding my arms out to her. She stumble-dances toward me, hips swaying in time with Elvis’ crooning. She wobbles, straightens, and then darts forward.
I reach out, she tumbles, and then I’ve got her. I tuck her in my arms, my beard crushed against her tits. Her fingers trail through my tangled hair, combing idly through knots. She hums off-tune, happy, without an ounce of self-consciousness. My chest warms.
There’s no way she’s getting her hands bloody—no fucking way anything ugly is getting near her ever again. The truth of this slams through me—it rocks me to my core—and I force myself to breathe. Relax.
This isn’t an emergency. I can control one weird little woman. The world rearranges itself for me. That’s not arrogance; it’s plain, observable fact.
Dina Ruth is mine, and I’m going to keep her. She’ll fall in line, let me handle the ugly shit. Like everyone else. But for her, it doesn’t feel like a burden. It feels like my right.
Beside us, the window shows the cityscape illuminated, a yellow glow rising from the horizon, the sky beyond lightening to an impossible, vivid blue.
The world is still. My ribs crack open. I ain’t never felt this way before.
Dina’s hair smells like my sweat. My scent clings to her clammy skin, too.
In the room beyond, there’s a dull chatter punctuated by playful shrieks.
I hold this wisp of a woman, and for a moment in time, I owe nothing to any man. I’m not tethered to my brothers, my club, my business, my flesh and blood. I carry no weight at all. I’m free and easy.
There’s far-off laughter and softness in my arms. My eyes drift shut.
I let it all go, and I dance with my wife.