Heavy by Cate C. Wells

9

DINA

The Beast, the President of the United States’ limo, can withstand a biological attack because every inch is hermetically sealed. Except the driver’s side window, which can roll down three inches. It can keep rolling on its steel rims if the Kevlar on the wheels is punctured. The metal plate running under the carriage can absorb the impact of a land mine.

My pussy’s sore, and as I soak in the jacuzzi tub, lounging between Heavy’s tree trunk thighs, it occurs to me that people talk about vaginas like the Beast.

Yes, a woman’s vagina can stretch to pass an object the size of a watermelon, and sure, it’s impressive, but it’s not like a good thing. It’s not a marvel of modern engineering. Like, I would enjoy seeing the Beast take a direct hit from a grenade and keep going. However, I am extremely ambivalent about whether I want to take Heavy’s cock again.

It’s poking me in the back right now. How can he be so hard again so soon? His giant noggin rests against the tile, and he’s snoring. The bath was his idea, and he lasted five minutes.

I poke my swollen pussy lips. They feel raw. Inside, I ache. It’s not unbearable by any means, but there’s also a strange feeling low in my stomach. Not hunger—although I could eat. Not cramps even though I’m still spasming now and then. It’s more like when a cool evening breeze runs over your skin when you’re damp from the pool. It’s a goosebump feeling. A delicious chill.

The bath water is lukewarm, and Heavy’s massive chest is hot against my back. He smells like hotel soap and muted colors—burnt orange, Air Force blue.

His faded tattoos blend into the dark hair matted to his arms and calves. A skull with hammers. A rifle above a dreamcatcher in green, yellow, and red, the word “Twitch” on a feather drifting loose below. A horned devil on a motorcycle encircled by the words: Fléctere si néqueo súperos, acheronta movebo.

If I cannot move heaven, I will raise hell.

My skin is a blank sheet of paper in comparison. I line up my forearm against his. The faint blue of my veins against his ink, the intricate barbed wire and thorns surrounding a coat of arms with a bare foot crushing a serpent, its fangs embedded in the heel.

I trace the snake. The image is from Poe. The story where a mad man walls up his enemy in the catacombs for revenge. The Cask of Amontillado?

This man is a book. It’s in the ink on his skin.

What am I?

A snail crawled out of its shell.

I had a purpose when I went to him—I still do—but it’s so complicated now. I’m so far out to sea. It’s like his gravity supersedes my momentum.

It makes sense. He’s the much larger mass.

Do I like him?

My “people I genuinely like” list is relatively short. Rory. Mia, my brother Kellum’s long lost kid. She’s me when I was little—all ears and eyes with nothing to say for herself. I don’t mind my brother Jesse. He’s quiet. Mia’s mom Shay is good people.

I love my parents and Kellum and John, of course. And Cash—sometimes. But do I like them?

The people I like are still waters that run deep. Heavy’s deep enough, but he’s not still. He steams through life like the prow of a ship.

He’s smart. He reads books. I like that.

He says what he means. And he doesn’t do small talk. I really like that.

So, yeah, he goes in the “like” column. For now. We’ll see how the quid pro quo unfolds.

I prop my feet up on the edge of the tub and curl my pruned toes. I don’t usually stay in the tub after it cools to a certain temperature, but I’m a little obsessed with laying on Heavy’s chest. It’s like lounging on top of a bear’s belly. Each time he inhales, my whole upper body rises.

Heavy is an experiential kind of dude. His bass voice rumbles, his grip feels like paws, and he smells so freakin’ good.

He should be too much. Everything is too much unless I measure it out in the right doses, filter it through one of my many life cheats. Reflections, sunglasses, earbuds. Intellectualization, compartmentalization, conscious denial.

But with Heavy, I enjoy his muchness. It gives me a thrill. Like watching a lion prowl in real life, but from a safe distance.

What happens after he helps me kill Van?

We go our separate ways. We’re co-conspirators. And he’s an MC president and CEO of Steel Bones Construction, and I’m a cybersecurity contractor who still lives at home.

Folks rely on him.

I am allergic to people.

He’s the man in charge. I’m—

Frequently not in full control of myself.

The water is getting too cold. I raise myself, careful not to slosh too much. Heavy snuffles, but he doesn’t wake up. I grab a fluffy towel on my way out of the bathroom and dab myself dry. It’s almost noon. There’s no sound from the living area except an occasional smoker’s cough.

I pick out the softest outfit I can find, a white cotton raglan tee and black leggings. No bra. My boobs are still tender from Heavy’s touch. I can hardly stand the whisper of fabric across my puffy nipples.

I’m unsettled. Drifty. So I text Rory. She texts me back emojis of a coffee cup and bacon. She’s at her waitressing job. I knew she would be, but I guess I wanted to reach out. Touch an anchor.

What does Heavy think about me?

I have no idea.

He seemed to dig the sex. And we danced, which was weird, but nice.

He seemed concerned about my vagina afterwards. He kept asking if I felt okay “down there.” I bet he read that novel where the woman won a guest editor gig at a fashion magazine in New York City and hemorrhaged the first time she had sex. That shit horrified me too when I read it in tenth grade.

I’m standing by the bed, staring at the bathroom door, lost in my head, when Heavy emerges, buck naked and dripping onto the carpet.

“There are towels,” I point out. “They’re on the shelves under the sink.”

He grunts, cracks his neck, and stretches his long arms, throwing the lines of his massive biceps into relief.

I stare at him, arms folded.

He sniffs, wrings out his hair—again, right on the carpet—then casts me a glance. “Don’t make it weird.”

“I am weird.”

“Then go make me a coffee.” He rolls his shoulders and ambles toward the dresser.

Yeah. I want coffee. “I’m going to make myself a cup,” I tell him, turning toward the door.

He ignores me, rooting through his duffle. He scratches his sculpted, muscular ass.

“I’ll make you one too, I guess.”

“Atta girl,” he says. “I take it black.”

That’s so messed up. Do I get pissed?

I mean-mug him, and his lips curve, dark eyes sparkling. We’re joking. That’s what this is. He’s teasing me, and I’m playing along.

I hike up my chin, straighten my spine, and sashay out the door. He chuckles behind me.

We’re flirting. I’m flirting. I like it.

* * *

The flightback to Pennsylvania is uneventful. I know what to expect from an airport now, so it’s no big deal. I pop in my earbuds and follow Heavy. He navigates everything.

The guys don’t travel with us. They’re all passed out when we leave. Heavy says they plan to hang out for a few more days, take a helicopter ride to see the Hoover Dam. One of them is gonna fall out.

Rory and I meet up in Elfin Quest on the plane, but Heavy doesn’t join us this time. He spends the whole time on his laptop and phone, barking orders and sighing like my dad used to when he was “disappointed” in Cash.

A prospect picks us up, but we don’t go back to the clubhouse. Heavy tells the guy to drive us to the cabin.

As the miles pass and we head further and further into the country, my stomach starts to bother me. I’m not hungry. It’s nervous energy. What happens now?

Heavy and I are married. The next step is for me to hand over the evidence against his enemies, and then he helps me kill Uncle Van.

I can do it. No doubt. But am I ready to do it?

I watch the corn and soybean fields go by and half-listen to Heavy conduct business on his phone. It sounds legit and boring. Lots of talk about material costs and permits.

I flick my thumb with my forefinger, rubbing the skin raw. If Mom was here, she’d nag. She was the best mother a kid like me could have, but she’s never accepted that stimming isn’t a bad habit.

If it’s a bad habit, it’s one I need at the moment. I don’t want to kill anyone. I don’t expect I’m going to feel good once Van is gone. It’s not as if I’m fueled by vengeance, and I’ll finally be able to rest once he’s dead. I sleep fine now.

It’s just fallen to me to pull the trigger, that’s all. If I don’t, Van Price will hurt more women. He could go after Rory again. He’s never had to pay for a single thing he’s done, so why would he stop now? I saw the video of what he did to Rory. It wasn’t a crime of passion. He knew what he was doing.

They say I have tunnel vision, but my family has blinders of their own. Eventually, they’ll let Van crawl back into their good graces, and then what will he do? Kellum won’t let him near Shay or Mia ever again, but what about Cash? Cash thinks anyone who drives a truck is a decent guy by default.

My family can’t conceive of a world where there are real villains, but I’m the one with a faulty theory of mind. They’d let him come around. Feed him at our table. Try to reconcile him with Kellum and Shay. And Mia.

My stomach clenches. I won’t let that happen. Van goes nowhere near Mia. She doesn’t have the words yet to tell if something bad happens.

As a human being, I have a lot of glitches, but if I have a strength, it’s that I know myself. I’m introspective, and from what I saw at the regional program where I went to school, that’s maybe not the norm for people like me. But I understand how I work. I know what I’m capable of.

I can kill Van Price, and I’ll be able to live with it. I wish Kellum would have figured out some legal way to get justice for Rory and stop Van from hurting people, but he hasn’t. Rory won’t testify. She flat out refuses.

There’s no other solution. No one else is going to do what needs to be done. I’m at peace with the decision I’ve made, but still, it won’t be easy. I want to get it over with.

But instead of hashing out the logistics, we’re heading into the countryside. We’ve turned off the single-lane highway onto a dirt road, and we’re bouncing over ruts and winding up a gently sloped foothill. The trees are tall and old growth: oak, chestnut, and hickory with some pine and hemlock interspersed. It’s different from the woods at home—thicker and darker. It’s a fairy tale forest. It suits Heavy.

He’s talking to someone new now. He’s silent for long stretches, listening, firing off occasional questions, his face growing craggier with each drawn out reply.

After about a mile, we come to a log cabin in a clearing. It’s big, but it’s not huge like my parent’s lodge. There’s a wraparound porch, a separate three-car garage, and what looks like a wood shop around the back. Unlike my parents’ place—which is very much log cabin chic—this place is rough-hewn.

“Did you build it yourself?”

Heavy holds his phone away from his face. “Pardon?”

“Did you build the cabin yourself?”

“Yeah. With the club.”

“It’s nice.”

He pauses a moment. “You like it?”

I said I did. The car rolls to a stop, and Heavy goes back to his conversation. I hop out and wander up the front walk, breathing deep. It smells like him here. Not the exact notes, but his palette, if that makes sense.

I trip up the wood steps to the front porch and turn to survey his kingdom. He’s high enough on the hill that the woods and fields beyond spread before him, but the incline is steep behind his cabin, so the place feels nestled and private, not above it all.

Heavy has climbed from the car, but he’s standing in the drive, staring up, his phone dangling at his side. Whoever he’s on the line with is still talking, but his eyes are on me, his brow knit and his mouth turned down.

“I have to go into town,” he says.

“Okay.” I shrug and hop back down the steps. He shakes his head.

“It’s club business. You gotta stay here.”

He’s leaving?

And he’s leaving me here?

“No, I’ll go with you.” I like this place, but—my stomach is going to hurt if he goes. I’m not sure why, but it’s already tightening.

“You can’t. It’s club business. I’ll leave Wash here.”

“Who’s Wash?”

“The prospect.” Heavy jerks his head at the guy who drove us.

“I don’t know him.”

Heavy’s body tenses. “He won’t go near you.”

“Then why are you leaving him here?”

None of this makes sense, most of all why I’m arguing. Why do I care if Heavy goes? This place is fine. Peaceful. I’m not under a deadline. And I don’t care if there’s a skinny dude in saggy jeans hanging around or not. I’m good with my own company. I prefer it. Besides, I’ve been with people for days straight at this point. I should need alone time.

“He can keep an eye out.” Heavy’s almost bristling now, shoulders squaring, chin lifting. Is he mad?

“For what?”

Heavy doesn’t answer. He glares. If it were anyone else, there’s no way I could maintain eye contact. But since it’s him, I stare right back.

I’m about to tell him where to get off when I register the roar of an approaching engine. It’s loud, and it’s coming fast.

Heavy slides his phone in his pocket as he moves to block the porch stairs, his hand tucked under his shirt and resting on the small of his back. There’s a bulge. A gun.

What’s going on?

Wash trots over. His hand’s also behind his back.

Do I run?

Before I can decide, a massive chopper rounds the bend—extended front wheel, long body, twin tailpipes. Cherry red trim. It’s my brother John.

He skids to a stop, and in one fluid movement, he releases the kickstand, dismounts, and strides over, halting mere inches from Heavy’s face. John’s shoulders are heaving. He’s out of breath—like he’s been running, not riding.

“Hi, John.” I move to join them, but Heavy sidesteps, blocking me.

John doesn’t answer me or glance my way. He’s glaring at Heavy. Angry. Furious. It’s crystal clear.

Shit.

I flick my thumb. Heavy’s hand drops to his side, but Wash’s is still hovering near his gun. My adrenaline spikes. I don’t know how to defuse this situation. All my words are twenty feet deep.

“You have ten seconds to explain,” my brother says. “And then I’m gonna kill you.”

I can only see Heavy’s wide back. It’s straight, but not tense. “I married your sister.”

John’s entire bulk swells. He’s a big guy. Until I met Heavy, he was the biggest guy I’d ever seen in real life. Watching the two of them confront each other is like the denouement of a superhero crossover—the Wall versus the Giant.

I’m fascinated, but I’m also terrified.

“Bullshit,” John spits.

Heavy doesn’t answer.

Time stretches. A blue jay calls from a nearby pine. Sounds like someone stepped on a squeak toy.

Finally, John coughs and breaks the staring contest to glance up at me. He holds out his hand. “Come on, Dina. I’ll take you home.” His lips peel back from his teeth as he turns back to Heavy. “I’ll deal with you after.”

“She ain’t goin’ nowhere.” Heavy’s voice is even, but then again, so is John’s. Wash’s hand hovers behind his back.

I’m stuck in my head. I don’t want to go home, but I don’t want anyone to get shot. I should say something. Definitely. Words. I flick my thumbs faster. What do I say?

“Dina, come on.” John snaps his fingers twice.

Like I’m a dog.

Oh, bullshit.

“No.” I stop flicking and cross my arms.

“Dina.” I know that tone. I’ve done something wrong.

I hike my chin.

John sighs. “Dina, what’s going on? Are you scared? It’ll be okay, I promise. Just come on. I’ll take you home, and I’ll sort it all out.”

“I said you ain’t takin’ her nowhere.” Heavy’s voice is a touch less even.

“Fuckin’ watch me,” John says.

“I’m not going home,” I blurt. Heavy’s shoulders lower.

John lets his arm drop, but he doesn’t step back. If anything, his chest puffs wider. “Explain it to me, Dina. What’s going on?”

I’m not telling him about Van. I’d never make him complicit. He’s a good guy. A dad. Ex-firefighter. He’d never go vigilante.

I have to lie.

I suck at lying. What else is there? I guess the truth. “Heavy and I got married.”

“Why? Did he—are you—?” His face flushes bright red, and he chokes. “You’re a dead man.” He’s frowning at Heavy again. More than frowning. Aiming.

I rush my words, and it all comes out in a jumble. “We went to Vegas. We got married. Then we went to a strip club. And now we’re back.” I shrug and force a smile.

John’s forehead crinkles, and the muscles in his neck pop. His fingers twitch at his sides. “You took my sister to a fuckin’ strip club? Did you touch her?”

He’s asking Heavy, not me, but I’m the one talking to him. Talk about bullshit.

I hop down the stairs, ducking past Heavy. He’s distracted, and he moves to block me a second too slow.

I’m now more than a foot shorter than them both, instead of being taller. They both bend their necks to look at me. Wash shuffles, uncertain.

I deal with him first. “You. Take your hand away from that gun. You’re not shooting anyone.”

Then I glare at John. “Yes, he touched me. We’re married. I’m twenty-four. We had sex.” I tilt my head. John’s stance doesn’t change. He bristles even more. What does he want to hear?

“It was good. Mostly.” I consider. “Like—four out of five.”

Wash wheezes.

John closes his eyes. “Four out of five?”

I swear I can hear Heavy’s teeth grind.

“It kind of sucked at the beginning, but then it got good.” I think for a second. “Like Breaking Bad.”

John lets out a long exhale, and he looks at Heavy. “I came to you. Told you she was missing. You didn’t say shit.”

“She called home,” Heavy says.

“What’s going on, man?” John shakes his head. “You know she’s—” He cuts himself off and compresses his lips.

My throat tightens. It always comes down to this, doesn’t it? Dina is special. Dina has ASD. Dina is different.

Everyone knows better than Dina even though no one can understand her.

Bullshit.

I sidle closer to Heavy so that we’re both facing John. “I’m what?”

I glare at my big brother. He shuffles in his boots and scrubs his thick neck.

“Dina, you know what I mean. Let’s just go. We’ll talk about it at home.” He reaches for me.

A strange, indistinct sound comes from Heavy’s chest, and his whole torso kind of inflates. Without thinking, I lay my hand on his forearm. John’s gaze drops to where I’m plucking Heavy’s shirt.

“I’m not going home. I’m where I want to be.” I enunciate.

Heavy stills.

The crease between John’s eyes deepens. “When did you meet him?”

“At the clubhouse.” I didn’t answer his question, but I’m betting he doesn’t notice.

“What were you even doing there?”

“Can’t I go out? Do I need your permission?” I’m on a roll now, spitting truth. “News flash. I’m a grown ass woman. I have a job. I have a fucking 401K. You’re out of line.”

John stares at where I’m grabbing Heavy. It seems to throw him.

“You’re my little sister.”

“She’s my wife,” Heavy interjects, and shivers race down my spine. He glares at John, intent, menacing.

I squeeze Heavy’s forearm.

“I don’t like this, Dina,” John says.

“You don’t have to.” I make myself smile. I try for sweet and innocent.

“I’m gonna beat the shit out of you,” John says to Heavy. “Later.”

Heavy grunts.

“If you hurt her, I’ll kill you.” My brother and Heavy lock eyes, and there is a drawn-out silence. Then, John turns to me. “You have my number. Anytime. Day or night.”

“I know.”

John hesitates a few moments longer, and then he heads back to his bike. Before the engine roars, I hear him snort and say, “Four out of five.”

And then he’s gone, and Heavy shakes off my grip, all business. “Well, that’s settled for now. I gotta go. Get inside,” he says. “Eat something.”

For a second, I consider arguing again, but now I’m well and truly done. I need quiet. I nod and head back up the stairs.

Heavy snaps and opens his palm.

Wash throws him the keys.

“Watch her,” Heavy says, hoisting himself into the driver’s seat. “But give her space. Don’t touch her. Don’t talk to her.” He revs the engine. “But watch her.”

He peels out, and he’s gone in seconds.

Wash gawks at me, wide-eyed. “So do I watch you or not?”

“You heard him,” I say and wave him away as I let myself into the house. I make it three steps before I fall back on my heels, my breath whooshing from my lungs.

Heavy lives in a treehouse.

It’s the kind of treehouse I always imagined when I played in the very nice, but unambitious one my dad and brothers built for me as a kid. They wanted to stop me from climbing dangerously high in my favorite pine when I had freak outs. It worked. I couldn’t climb my pine anymore. There was a treehouse in the way.

This house isn’t a shed on stilts, though. It’s magical.

There’s a tree growing in the middle of the cabin—an elm based on the canopy visible through the skylight. From the outside, the tree must look like it grows behind the place, but the trunk is in the center of a great room, surrounded by a metal grate. Floating wood stairs lead to the second floor, a high-ceilinged loft, and everything is open and soaring and filled with light.

There is a stacked stone fireplace, and through a doorway, there’s an office with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. The kind with a rolling ladder on a rail.

A few mounted buck’s heads hang on the walls. Two with twelve points, one with fourteen.

This place is nothing like Heavy’s room at the clubhouse. It’s polished and uncluttered and has a distinctly un-lived in vibe.

I wander into the kitchen. It has everything. Professional gas range and hood. Butcher block countertops and farmhouse sink.

I open the fridge. Beer and condiments. I check the freezer. There’s nothing but meat wrapped in butcher paper, labeled in black grease pencil. I grab the package that reads “Topside Sirloin.” If I’m going to be here awhile, I might as well defrost lunch. I’m not making a meal out of horseradish and Worcestershire.

Since that’s going to take a while, I keep exploring, noting the big screen hanging in the main room and the overstuffed leather sofas. This isn’t a bachelor pad. It seems designed for company. There’s a full bar, a pool table in a nook leading to a huge deck surrounded by towering trees, and—I peek out the French doors—an enormous hot tub and grill.

This is an amazing place. For a vacation rental.

I finally check out the office, saving the best for last. It’s more like a library. Twelve-foot ceilings. Three walls of bookcases. A framed painting of a pin-up girl with her hair in a red handkerchief, propping her foot on the peg of a motorcycle, offering up her huge bare boobs. And a massive oak desk with nothing on it but a closed laptop and an old tin can filled with pens and pencils.

There’s a modem on a shelf behind it.

I could work.

I finished all my open projects before I left, but it’s weird not having an iron in the fire. I get a lot of work based on winning various hackathons and coding competitions, and there are some “impossible” challenges I like to work on when I have the time.

I have time now.

What’s the other option?

Am I so pressed to murder my uncle?

With the high windows and the leaves fluttering outside and the quiet indoors, the whole endeavor seems a million miles away. A fever dream almost.

Am I really going to kill a man?

Emotion doesn’t drive me. At least it never has. Is that what’s driving me now?

Why did I appoint myself judge, jury, and executioner? That’s never been my thing. It’s the opposite of my thing. I don’t worry about other people. I have enough on my plate with myself.

Have I gone nuts? How would I even know?

I miss the world making sense.

I miss Rory.

I miss texting her and meeting at the barn for a ride whenever. Six a.m. on a Tuesday. Five p.m. on a Sunday. If she was home, she’d meet me by Orange Blossom ‘cause she won’t ride any other horse. She wouldn’t canter, and she’d never leave the trail, but she’d be there, happy to see me, content to listen or be silent.

And now she’s gone. I rub my chest. It hurts.

Heavy has dozens of people. They call him constantly and fly to Las Vegas for him and do what he tells them to do. I had one person, and she’s gone, and she won’t ever come back.

Despite the peacefulness, my brain is buzzy. Consternated. Work would help, but I can’t bring myself to open the laptop. I could probably guess Heavy’s password in less than three, and that’ll just piss me off.

I wander the bookshelves. Here at last is something in this house that isn’t in perfect condition. The scent hits me a foot away—paper and binding glue and whatever in the atmosphere that the pages absorbed wherever they were kept before this place.

Spines are broken, dust jackets long gone. I take down a dog-eared copy of Machiavelli’s The Prince. There are passages underlined in pencil. Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.

I re-shelve the book, evening it up with its neighbors. There are thousands of them, and I can’t make out the order. Not alphabetical. Not the Dewey Decimal system. A manual on motorcycle repair is shoved between The Kama Sutra and The Thornbirds.

And there, on a low shelf in the corner, is a worn box. It’s a plain shoebox, but big, like it held work boots.

I know snooping is wrong, and to be honest, I don’t think I’ve ever bothered poking into other people’s stuff before. I never wanted to know what Cash kept in his drawers. Gross.

But I want to know what’s in that box.

It’s not right to invade other people’s privacy, but that is a very convoluted principle. I don’t care if people look at my stuff. I don’t know why they’d want to, but how does it hurt me? It took me a long time to master the nuances. Mom had to make me a list—don’t open closed bathroom doors, even after you knock, don’t go looking for a pen in Pastor Don’s drawers, but it’s fine to look in Grandma and Grandpa’s drawers, but only in the kitchen, not in their bedroom.

Shoeboxes on bookshelves weren’t on the list.

I meander closer. “Photos” is scrawled on the top in block letters. Photos aren’t private by definition, right? People share photos, and then they expect you to click “like.” That’s the whole point.

I sit down cross-legged and wince as my tender pussy hits the wood floor. I’d forgotten my little aches and pains. I readjust so my weight falls on my thighs and not my sit spot and ease the box onto the floor.

A delicious shiver runs down my spine. Invading Heavy’s privacy is kind of a cheap thrill.

I take off the lid. There is a mess of loose photos, hundreds of them. Some are Polaroids; some are more recent, like the prints you buy online.

On the top, there’s a faded color photo of a woman with a perm in a string bikini clinging to a big man in a cut. He has long, wild black hair and a bushy beard. He’s shorter and thinner than Heavy, but the resemblance is unmistakable. He must be his dad.

The couple are at a picnic. There are other men in cuts and 80s-rific biker chicks hanging around in the background, smoking, laughing, frozen in time.

I carefully flip through the stack. There seems to be no order at all. So, of course, I systematize.

There are a handful of black and white pictures. A military portrait from World War II. The same man in a white T-shirt and jeans, straddling a motorcycle no bigger than my first dirt bike. There’s a wedding photo. The woman is all smiles in a beehive and cat’s eye glasses.

Then there are photos that look like my mom and dad’s pictures from when they were kids. Christmases and backyard gardens and chubby toddlers in puffy snowsuits plopped in front of snowmen.

And then more pictures of Heavy’s parents. They’re always surrounded by people, but as the years pass, the pose changes. The dad’s hairline recedes, and then he shaves his head. His mom goes from bikinis to tank tops and short shorts to collared T-shirts and mom jeans. It’s about that era that she starts wearing a cross on a gold chain.

And as time passes, the space between them grows. They’re holding hands, and then they’re standing next to each other, and then the mom is holding a little girl on her hip, husband rigid at her side. Now she’s got a chunky baby boy. Then she’s clutching the boy and girl to her waist while she cradles a baby.

The dad’s face is always stern and impassive. The mom’s smile is wide and unchanging and not Duchenne.

The kids’ expressions vary. The girl always has her hands propped on her hips, her eyes on the little one, but sometimes she manages a tight lip curve—so not Duchenne—and sometimes she just glowers at the photographer. The boy—Heavy—laughs or mean mugs or smiles gently. He’s big, sometimes with a layer of puppy fat, sometimes stretched almost thin.

He touches the others. He slings an arm around his father’s shoulder. Gives his sister a noogie. Carries the baby boy on his shoulders. Piles into a heap with his friends, a bunch of shaggy haired boys, almost always shirt and shoeless.

There’s a picture where his mother’s hair is shorn. He squeezes her hand as she barely manages to wrap her thin arms around his burly chest, peeking from behind him, a faint but real smile on her face.

It’s strange, and it takes me a second to figure out why. Heavy’s not like that. He’s not a toucher. He’s not physical like my brother Cash who takes every opportunity to invade a person’s personal space.

Heavy looms. He stands alone, above. He leads the way.

Except he touches me. He holds my hand. He’s always picking me up.

He follows me.

Tingles skate across my skin, almost goosebumps, but not quite. I don’t know what it means. I refocus on the photos.

I have to start a new pile. The mom and dad are gone. Most of the pictures are action shots now, badly framed, some blurred. Strips from photo booths.

I line them up, reconsider, flip a few. My legs are cramping, so I stretch them out, ignoring the increased pressure on my sore lady parts.

A teenaged Heavy posed in front of a motorcycle. Maybe fourteen or fifteen. Spine straight. Face sober. His hair dusts his shoulders, and he has a patchy beard and mustache. Off to the side, the girl—his sister—holds a little boy about four years old on her jutting hip. In the foreground, there’s a handsome man grinning straight at the camera. He looks like the 1970s personified, although this has to be the early ‘00s going by the girl’s pink velour tracksuit tucked into furry boots.

The man has a full sleeve on his bare arm, a helmet resting on top of a rifle, a naked lady in an old-fashioned nurse’s cap, the SBMC skull and hammers. There’s a dream catcher in yellow, green, and red, like the one that Heavy has that reads “Twitch.”

He’s tucked a greasy rag into the pocket of his worn jeans. And the expression he’s giving the camera—if he were in front of me, there’s no way I could stand to look, but since this is a picture, I stare and stare, trying to figure it out. I’ve been leaning hard on my grade school lessons in “this is what feelings do to faces.” At this point, I’m operating at my peak.

The man—he must be Twitch—gazes at the camera in pure delight with whoever is taking the picture. He’s speaking with the sparkle in his eyes and the soft smirk at the corner of his lips, and even I can hear. Love. Joy.

It’s clear the picture is meant to show off the bike—maybe it’s new, or from the greasy rag, it could be a finished restoration. But Heavy and his siblings and the bike all fade into the background because of how the man looks at the photographer.

The tingles seep deeper until they’re a swish and swirl in my core. Heavy looked at me like that. When we were dancing in the hotel room. Same sparkle. Same quirk of the lip nearly hidden in his beard.

The rest of the pics aren’t posed. It’s mostly Heavy and his band of brothers. A shot of them sitting on their bikes, everyone except for Heavy smooth-faced or with those smudged upper lip mustaches boys had in high school.

There are pics of parties. Concerts. Bonfires. Raised beer bottles, girls in belly shirts and coochie-cutter shorts hanging off the guys. Pictures of tattoos in progress. There’s a rotating cast of secondary characters—including my older brother John and a man who’s older than Heavy, but looks like his identical twin, albeit fifty pounds lighter—but the core four are always there.

There’s a pretty guy with a man bun. A wiry dude with angry eyes. A tall guy. A muscular man with stiff posture. He disappears from the photos first. And then the tall guy goes.

And that’s when the composition of the shots change. To this point, the guys were all clustered together, no consistent order, but they were a group. A pack.

Then Heavy starts to stand out. He always did because of his size, but now, there’s space between him and the others. No matter what the group is doing—laughing, smiling, glaring with hard faces—his expression is stone cold. Aloof. Disconnected and set apart.

Like me.

I sink back on my hands and shake my legs. They’re going numb from sitting on the floor. How long has it been? The daylight is dimming. It must be early evening. I’ve been looking at pictures for hours.

I need to pee. And my butt cheeks have gone numb.

But I don’t want to put the pictures back in the box quite yet. I want to stay with this sensation a little longer. I don’t know the name for it, and I’ve never experienced it before. It’s brisk. Rich. Expansive.

I know how Heavy feels in those pictures. I don’t know why he’s separate or what happened to make him other and apart. But I know the hollow echo, the sensation of floating off into outer space, of looking through a peephole at real life while you’re inside, alone, with only yourself.

I know that.

And that means—even though he may not realize it—he could know me.

Not the autistic girl, the idea cobbled together from an 80s movie, a sitcom, and whatever he’s read about Temple Grandin.

Me.

I forget to breathe for a second.

A car door slams at the front of the house.

I quickly, but carefully, gather up the pictures and return them to the box. In neat stacks. In chronological order.

Lucky for me, it takes a while for Heavy’s boots to sound in the entrance way. Already, I know the weight of his step. It’s like barbells dropped on a concrete floor.

I go to him. I rush.

He’s standing in the middle of the great room, shoulders slumped. When I come out of the office, he straightens. His eyes find mine. A thrill zaps through my chest. He comes to me. I wait for him.

He lifts me up, takes my mouth, his tongue twining with mine, and it’s not too fast. The transition isn’t jarring. He’s been gone too long, and now he’s back, and that’s as it should be. A bolt slides home. An arrow finds its target.

He walks me backwards, heading for the stairs, and I wind my legs around his waist, kissing him back, digging my fingers into his wiry, bushy hair. He smells faintly like sweat, and I like it. I like his roughness and how his lips are cold and taste like soda pop. I love how he holds me so tight to his chest it almost hurts.

“Were you good today?” he growls, kicking open the door to a bedroom.

“I looked at your pictures.”

He drops me on a bed. A California King. “You snooped in my shit?”

“I organized them for you.”

He chuckles as he peels his black T-shirt off. “Get naked, baby.”

I’m not exactly aroused. My nipples are tightening, and there’s a soft pulsing between my legs, but mostly I’m into this connection I’ve discovered, and how now he’s here, and how thrilling it is—like Christmas Eve when you’re a kid, like the moment in a magic show right after “Abracadabra.”

I tug down my yoga pants.

He sits on the foot of the bed to untie his boots. “Is your pussy sore?”

“Yeah.” Even more so after so many hours sitting on a hardwood floor.

He grunts, unbuckles his belt, and unzips his jeans. “Plan B, then,” he says, and flops on his back, tucking a pillow behind his head. “Saddle up.”

Huh?

He grins. Eyes shining. My lips rise to mimic his. It’s automatic.

“Sit on my face.”

Oh. Uh. I still have my shirt on. Do I take it off?

“Come on. Hop to.” He clicks his cheek twice. Giddy up.

There’s a twisting low in my belly, and the pulse becomes a throb. His face is going to be between my legs. His nose. His beard.

I huff out a breath.

“If I gotta put you on my face, I ain’t gonna be pleased.”

His cock is hard, and he’s stroking it idly, thick root to ruddy tip. It draws me. I approach him from the side. Do I just swing my leg over his face?

I kneel beside his head and squat. He grabs my ass and holds me steady. It’s like saddling up on a grizzly bear, all bristly on my thighs.

“Good girl.”

The words make my pussy clutch on air. I like being called a good girl. Which is weird. In general, I’m not motivated by praise.

I am short, and his head is huge, so I don’t have to lower myself very much before his tongue finds my folds. He reaches between us and holds my lips apart, and then he’s licking, delving into my hole and lapping me up. It’s a lot—it’s too much—and then it’s not enough.

I rock. He moans. His beard grazes my clit, and I grind. His nose nestles in the wet curls above my slit, and my skin heats every time he exhales. He’s grabbing my ass, urging me on.

He’s muttering something, but I’m riding his tongue, and it’s too muffled to make out. Then his hands are gone, and he’s moving underneath me like an earthquake.

I’m so close. My abs are spasming, the heat inside me is coiling, and it feels so good. His tongue is so thick. He fills me. Owns me. He sucks a lip into his hot mouth, and I explode, buck against him, squeeze my knees against his hard head.

He laughs, and the vibrations send waves of pleasure chasing the receding delicious ache of my orgasm. I have never come so hard alone as I have with Heavy. He’s a different level.

I flop back, exhausted and pleased, and my back whacks his hard dick. He oofs.

“Oh, sorry.” I flip and wriggle until I’m upside down and beside him on the bed.

He’s grinning. “How about you return the favor?”

He’s still working himself, but not furiously. I don’t think he’s close to coming. He’s massive. And I have a gnarly gag reflex. I’ve never given a blow job before—obviously.

What does it even taste like?

I reach out and stroke him with my fingertips. The reddish purplish skin is soft, but what’s underneath is harder than muscle. I climb over his calf to kneel between his legs, and he widens them to give me room. He shifts backward so he can prop himself up on a stack of pillows. To watch.

A thrum of excitement reignites in my chest.

He wants to see me take him in my mouth.

I like that. It makes me feel like he’s under my spell. I’m not the Little Mermaid. I’m Circe.

I peel off my shirt, and his gaze drops to my breasts. He licks his lips.

“You gonna show me those pretty little baby apple tits while you suck my cock?”

I arch my back so they’re on display. He groans.

“Please, baby. Stop teasing. I’ve been waiting all damn day.” He grabs my forearm and gently draws me forward until my palms are braced on his massive thighs.

“I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“You can’t fuck it up. I promise.”

I lean down, and I dart out my tongue to taste him. It’s earthy. Hint of salt. Not too bad.

I wrap my mouth around the head. He moans. I try to lick, but there’s not much room to maneuver. Also, I’m kind of concerned about my teeth. I can’t retract them, so there’s no way to prevent a scratch here and there. I guess if it hurts, he’ll pull out. He isn’t. He slowly eases deeper.

My jaw is as wide open as it gets, and it’s starting to ache. He’s not even halfway in. I’m also slobbering a lot. When I back off to the tip, strings of spit cling to my lips. He groans.

I must suck, but his sounds don’t sound unhappy. They come from deep in his chest. And he’s muttering under his breath. I focus in on his words.

“Oh, yeah. That’s it. You’re fuckin’ amazing. Your mouth is so sweet. You love to suck my cock, don’t you, pretty girl? You want it, don’t you?”

I do. Not the dick in my mouth. This is a C, C minus, experience at best. But I want him like this—barrel chest heaving, taut as a bowstring. Mind blown. By me. This giant is under my control. I’m the beast master.

“Yes,” I mewl, and he kind of shouts. He takes my hand, wrapping it around his base and guiding it, up and down, squeezing hard. I suck, and he moans. Loud. Unreserved.

“I’m gonna come in your mouth, baby,” he pants. “You gotta back off if you don’t wanna swallow.”

I really don’t. The cum leaking from him to this point has been salty and hot—which is gross. I hate pretty much all warm, wet foods.

But I bet he’d love it.

I want him to love it.

I want him to feel good.

Because I want to feel good.

And there’s a link. A circuit. I can’t understand it, but I know systems, and you don’t need to know why if you know how.

He feels good, and I like that.

I ease off to say, “Do it in my mouth.”

He shouts so loud it rings in the rafters, and he jerks, grazing my teeth, and spurts of hot, salty cum flood my mouth. I gag—hard—but I get it down. It tastes awful. I swallow several times, and he laughs, deep and warm. It’s wonderful in my ears.

“Didn’t like that, did you?”

“It’s so nasty.”

“Want to lick me clean?”

I kind of hack as if I have a hairball, and he laughs louder and drags me to his chest, cradling me there, smoothing my hair. I relax when I realize he was joking.

We lay there a while. He traces my spine and the tips of my ears. He likes to jiggle my ass, too, like he’s testing the firmness. At some point, his dick stiffens, but not all the way. Just enough to poke me in the belly.

I sigh and let myself be lifted and lulled by the rise and fall of his chest.

I’ve almost drifted off when he whispers, “Did you miss me today?”

“I was looking at pictures. I lost track of time.”

He’s quiet. His body tenses. My shoulders hunch like they do when I know I got it wrong, but I don’t know what I should have said.

“Did you miss me?” I ask him. Sometimes if you turn the question back around, people will tell you the right answer.

He coughs, and he’s silent a moment. Then he says, “I need your help with something. Hacking a cell phone. Can you do it?”

“Yeah.” That’s pretty 101 if it’s a civilian. “Whose phone?”

“A guy named Rab Daugherty.”

“What’d he do to you?”

“Disappeared.”

It’s a few seconds before I figure out he’s not going to elaborate.

I raise my eyebrows.

“That’s it. Disappeared. Can you do it or not?”

I take a second to consider. “Not.”

“You just said you could.”

“Then why’d you ask again?”

He draws in a very deep breath. “This isn’t a game, Dina.”

“I don’t think it is. The answer is not if you won’t tell me what’s going on.”

“It’s club business.”

“Okay.”

Again, there’s a pause, like “club business” is some kind of explanation.

“We don’t involve females in club business.”

“A female does your books.” I hacked Steel Bones’ financials pretty early on. Deb has beautiful spreadsheets. She’s gotta be high strung. “And females work at your strip club. And your lawyer is a female.”

He huffs. “We don’t involve outsiders in club business.”

“Okay.” I’m not going to point out that he just asked me to hack a guy’s phone—which is club business. He must see the flaw in the logic.

He adjusts his pillow. Rubs his belly. Adjusts his dick. Then he says, “Rab’s the VP of a rival club. He knows where to find a guy we wanna talk to.”

“Who’s that guy?”

He sighs. Very loud and long. “Knocker Johnson.”

“The driver who got busted with the guns?”

“The driver’s son.”

“Do you want to kill him?”

“Why would I want to do that?”

I shrug. In the movies, that’s what “talk to a guy” always means.

“You don’t need to know this,” Heavy says. His tone is curt.

“I don’t want to help you kill anyone.”

He barks a laugh. “You just want me to help you kill a guy.”

I ignore his valid point. “I need his phone number. Billing address. Whatever personal information you can get me.”

“Okay.”

“And when you finish your business we’ll get to mine?”

“I’ll get the number,” he says, sitting up and cracking his back. He swings his legs over the bed, lumbers to his feet, groans, and shuffles toward the bathroom.

All of a sudden, I’m cold. He didn’t answer the question. I grab my shirt and tug it over my head, working over the conversation to see where it went sideways.

He asked if I missed him today.

What was I supposed to say? I didn’t miss him. I was looking at pictures.

Should I have lied?

I don’t like second guessing myself. I learned a long, long time ago that if I fall into that hole, that’s all I’ll ever do. You just have to accept that people are unknowable, communication is a crap shoot, and ultimately, people are going to do and think how they want regardless of what you’d prefer.

Heavy wants me to hack a cell phone for him.

I want him to help me conceal a murder.

It’s a transactional relationship.

I should be comfortable with that.

Why does my stomach hurt?

Why am I lonelier now than I was all day by myself, sorting photos on the floor?