Strength & Courage (The Night Horde SoCal Book 1) Read online

  “He would never hurt him. He would take good care of him.”

  “And I should believe that because you say so? Who the fuck are you? What did he call you? ‘Muse’? ‘Demon’ and ‘Muse’—these are the strangers I’m supposed to trust?”

  She was getting excited again, and he wanted a calm discussion, so he kept his voice low and reasonable. “They’re just names.”

  “Yeah? And how did you come by those names? Did your parents give them to you?”

  “I got mine because my last name’s Musinski. My parents gave me the name Darren. I like Muse a whole lot better.” He’d leave Demon’s road name unexplained—she’d already gotten the Technicolor presentation, anyway.

  His explanation slowed her down a little. “Oh. I thought it was something like you were the thinker of the group or whatever.”

  Compared to Demon, everybody was a thinker. “Maybe a little of that, too. I don’t know. I’m not usually much of a talker.” He wanted to get back on point. “Why not let Tucker go with Bibi? Not with strangers. With family.”

  “Bibi—that’s the woman from today. If I could have, I would have, but she’s not family, and she’s not licensed for foster care. You can’t just walk in off the street and take a child home with you! Jesus, how am I the bad guy here?”

  She’d been taking a couple of mugs off a stand on the counter, and she slammed them down as she spoke the last sentence. One broke in her hand, slicing her palm. “Fuck! Fuck, fuck, motherfucker fuck!”

  Her mouth was certainly not dainty.

  She shoved her hand into the sink and turned the faucet on. Without thinking about it, Muse jumped up and went to her, grabbing a dishtowel off a drawer pull as he came up to the sink. She was really bleeding. He took her hand in his and pulled it out of the stream of water to get a good look. When she tried to pull her hand away, he held on.

  “I’m fine. I don’t need—”

  “Shut up and let me see.” He flattened her hand gently, ignoring her hiss. “I don’t think it needs stitches, but a cut on your palm is gonna want to open up if you’re not careful. You have a first aid kit?” He wrapped the towel around her hand.

  Again, she tried to snatch back, and again he held on. “Yes. And I’m capable of putting a Band-Aid on my own hand.”

  “Don’t think a Band-Aid will do it, hon. Let me help.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you’re bleeding and I’m here. I’m good with first aid. Had some practice.”

  “Jesus, you’re pushy.”

  He laughed and looked down at her. Her eyes were almond-shaped and deep brown, set off by high cheekbones. Still not doing much thinking, with her towel-wrapped hand still firmly in his, he bent down, not quite realizing he intended to kiss her until she gasped and leaned back.

  “What are you doing?” Her tone was breathy, not outraged. Just curious.

  “Well, it looks like I’m gonna kiss you. ‘Less you stop me.”

  She didn’t.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Sidonie had no idea why she let him kiss her. Obviously, she was having a bad-choice-apalooza here in the predawn hours of this Friday. Running out half-naked with a gun, letting this guy into her house at all, now letting his mouth descend and cover hers. Oh—and getting drunk at her boss’s house. Pretty much where the fall into insanity had started, she thought.

  But his lips were warm and firm, and his scruff of beard was just long enough not to be bristly. It was soft and felt amazing. It was mostly grey, though. He was mostly grey overall, his salt-and-pepper hair more salt than pepper. She wondered how old he was. It didn’t matter. He was tall and broad-shouldered and had the most piercing blue eyes. And his lips. Soooo nice.

  While her head shouted at her to stop this foolishness at once, her body sighed and relaxed against his chest—oh, muscles. He was wearing a hoodie, so she hadn’t been able to tell what kind of body he had. It was good. His chest was hard as a rock.

  And that wasn’t the only hard thing. When she relaxed, he grunted into her mouth, and his hand—big and hot and rough—gripped her waist, pulling her even more tightly to him. His erection pressed against her belly and her hip.

  She should seriously stop this. It had been hours now since she’d had a drink; she’d pretty much lost the tequila excuse and would have to own any stupidity from this point forward.

  He was a stranger. A stranger who’d scared her, not long before. Well, no, not exactly a stranger. She knew his name. Darren Musinski. That was a nice, normal name. And even his nickname—Muse—wasn’t bad. Not scary. Thoughtful. And it hadn’t been him scaring her, had it? No. He’d been holding the scary guy back. Keeping her safe. Even when she’d had a gun on him, he’d been calm.

  His mouth moved from hers and dropped to her neck, nipping a light trail down and over her shoulder, then back in across her collarbone. Oh. Oh, God, she loved that.

  He stopped and brought his head back up to look at her. He was smiling, just one corner of his mouth turned up. “Sidonie. Does anybody call you Sid?” His voice was deeper, rougher than it had been, and his eyes were a darker shade of blue.

  She tried to remember how to make words. “Um, yeah. Almost everybody. Not my parents, but everybody else.”

  His smile ticked up another notch. “Okay, Sid. We should fix your hand. Then, if you don’t mind, I think I want to get you naked and under me.”

  At his gruff words, her pussy spasmed, and she felt her juices release. But this was so stupid. World-class idiocy. Words. She needed to make more words. “I…we…but…”

  “You got a man?”

  She shook her head. Nope. No man. Not for months.

  He pushed his hand under the waistband of her pajama bottoms, into her panties, between her legs, and his smile became a grin. His fingers slid smoothly between her folds, and she gasped and fought the urge to sway back and close her eyes, to just give in to him and how good his callused hand felt against her bare, wet, swollen flesh.

  “Ah, Sid. I can help with that. And you can help me.” He kissed her again, his tongue pushing into her mouth at the same time that his fingers pushed into her, and she stopped trying to decide anything. She gave in—to him and to herself.

  He must have felt it happen, because he groaned harshly, and then everything changed. He grabbed her bottoms and pulled them off her hips, pajamas and underwear at the same time. Then he lifted her and set her on her kitchen counter, stepping between her legs and gripping her so that he could slam their hips together. His jeans felt rough between her bare thighs, against her bare pussy. She tore away from his mouth and took a great, gasping breath.

  “’Less you say stop, I’m not gonna.”

  Stupid it might be, but she didn’t want him to stop, so she hooked her legs around him. Chuckling at that, he opened his jeans and fished a condom out of his pocket. She watched him roll it on a beautiful—little bit scary, size-wise—cock. He wasn’t wearing underwear.

  That was gorgeous. She wanted to see more. “Take your vest and sweatshirt off?”

  His eyes sparkling, he did what she asked, taking off the leather vest first and laying it on the counter, then pulling off his hoodie and the beater that was under it and tossing them to the floor.

  And sweet Jesus, he was amazing. He looked younger shirtless, the skin on his chest taut and smooth over the most perfect muscles she’d ever seen. He even had the little scallops over the sides of his ribs. Rapt, she put her hands on his chest, surprised to find one hand wrapped in a towel—oh, right. She’d cut herself. Yeah. Whatever. She dropped that hand to her lap and ran the other over every swell and ridge—his flat belly, his thick hip muscles, then up again and around the left side of his neck, where that elaborate bird tattoo was. It swept down, over his shoulder, and blended into a full sleeve of ink covering his left arm, all the way to his wrist. So many different images, all seeming to blend into the tail of the bird—was it a phoenix, maybe? Its wings seemed to embrace his shoulder. Wow.

 
; On his right forearm, he had the word HORDE tattooed in ancient-looking letters, wrist to the crook of his elbow. That was the name of his motorcycle gang. Or club—they called it a club.

  “You like what you see?”

  At his question, she brought her eyes back to his. He was watching her, his expression amused. She nodded.

  Sliding a hand down her arm, he gestured between them. “All dressed up and no place to go, hon.”

  Oh, right. He already had a condom on. “Sorry.”

  “We still good?”

  Last chance to use her brain. But she wanted to use his cock instead, and the way he was checking in with her, making sure she was still into it, only made her hotter. She put her arms over his shoulders and slid her fingers into his short hair.

  “Good girl.” He pushed his hand between her legs, and she felt his heavy rings scrape lightly high on the inside of her thigh as his fingers played along her slit. “Still so wet,” he murmured. Then his hand was gone, replaced by the cool slick of his protected cock.

  He pushed in—and ow. Shit, ow. She’d been right to think his size was too much. The stretch was intense enough to really sting. “Wait. Wait, wait, wait.”

  “You’re tight, baby,” he groaned. He stopped but didn’t pull back. Instead, he wrapped his hands around her thighs, just above her knees. “Let go, hon.”

  She relaxed her legs and let them drop away from him. He pushed them wide open and then held for a second. She took and released a breath, and he thrust his hips, hard, once. And he was fully buried inside her.

  That hurt. She cried out and threw her head back, hitting the cabinet behind her. That hurt, too. But fuck, he was deep, and she could feel her body adjusting, accommodating, making way. He held again, watching her, his breath making his chest rise and fall rapidly.

  As she began to relax again, his hips started to move—just pulses, really, gentle and steady. The sting faded, the stretch eased, and the muscles and nerves deep in her belly began to flutter and warm. She moaned.

  “That’s it. There ya go.” He picked up his pace, lengthened his strokes, and one hand released her thigh and moved up and around to slide under her ass, holding her just at the edge of the counter. His other hand pushed up under her beater and bra. “Gimme one of those tiny titties.”

  She hated her flat chest, but he’d uttered that sentence with such a hungry, animal growl that she felt flattered and even more turned on. His hot hand covered her completely, his thumb flicking back and forth over the hard point of her nipple. Her heated core caught fire, flames of sensation licking through her veins all the way up to her head and down to her toes.

  “Oh, fuck, fuck. I’m gonna come. Oh, oh, fuck me. Oh fuck me!”

  “That’s it, baby.” He set aside gentle patience and pounded into her, his hands wrapping around her hips, his thumbs digging into the skin around her hipbones. “Fuck, you feel good. Oh, Christ, sweet fuck!”

  His words were growling breaths in her ear, but she’d lost the capacity for speech. She held on to him, her arms locked tightly around his head, and let the waves and spikes of perfect pleasure rock her insides.

  He finally groaned and went tense. Then he relaxed all at once, and his head fell to her shoulder. They stayed like that until their heaving breath returned to a more normal rhythm. He kissed her forehead and leaned back, pulling slowly out of her, making her moan and twitch as his softening cock moved past tender places.

  “We should fix your hand now.”

  Her lust sated, mostly, now Sid felt sheepish and awkward, and like a huge slut. She did not have quick fucks with strange men. Dangerous, strange men. She knew better. Boy, did she.

  But here she was.

  She squirmed, and he stepped back and helped her off the counter. “I can take care of it. You can go.” Without looking at him, she pulled her bra and top back into place and bent down and swiped her bottoms off the floor. His hoodie and t-shirt lay in a heap right next to them.

  He pulled the condom off and tied a knot in its end. “Is that what you want?”

  Unsure how to answer that question, and feeling defensive, she stopped. “I don’t know. I’ve never fucked a stranger on my kitchen counter before. Is there an established etiquette for that?” A memory skittered in the dark corners of her head, but she shooed it away.

  “Don’t be like that. Just tell me what you want.” He looked around, found her kitchen trash can, and disposed of the condom. Then he put himself back in his jeans but left them open. That was…a good look. Distracting.

  But he was putting her on the spot, making her feel even more vulnerable and dumb than she already had—and that was quite an achievement. “You tell me. What do you want?”

  His smile was wise and condescending, It pissed her off and still managed to be hot. “I want to fix your hand, like I said. Then, if you’re up to it, I still want to get you naked and under me.”

  That was not a remotely romantic sentence. It was coarse and presumptuous and rude. But it had set her pussy fluttering the first time he’d said it, and now, with some knowledge to give her an idea of what he might look and feel like, naked and on top of her, desire hit her so hard she almost moaned aloud.

  “What d’ya say, hon?”

  She nodded. “Yeah. That’s what I want, too.”

  Grinning broadly, he slid a hand around her neck and stepped up to her, his body touching hers. “Sid.”

  She looked up at his blue eyes, sending him a question with her look.

  “Say my name.”

  Her mind blanked utterly. And then she remembered. “Uh—Darren.”

  He shook his head. “Say my name.”

  Oh. She smiled. “Muse.”

  “Good girl.”

  ~oOo~

  At the unfamiliar sensation of the bed moving while she was not, Sid woke and opened her eyes. Bright sunlight filled her bedroom, and as her eyes adjusted, she saw Muse walking naked out the door. He stood in her hallway for a second, then turned, and she heard her bathroom door close.

  God, he was gorgeous. The muscles in his back rolled as he walked. He had a long, nasty scar that ran diagonally from just under his left arm to the small of his back, but that somehow made him more perfect, not less. He also had vaguely round scars on his left thigh. She was pretty sure those were bullet holes.

  So she’d been right that he was dangerous.

  She rolled to her back and fluffed the pillows under her head. The action reminded her that she’d hurt her hand, and she looked at it now, neatly bandaged with gauze and tape, then wrapped, crisscrossing around her palm and wrist. He’d been honest when he’d said he was good with first aid.

  Now for the awkward part. They’d spent hours having the best sex of her life, and then had apparently collapsed into an unconscious heap together. It wasn’t her first one-night stand, but she didn’t exactly make a habit of them. She’d had a few first dates that had ended up in bed. Usually, she’d just felt gross and depressed afterward. And she’d never had a one-night stand spend the whole night.

  But she didn’t guess that Muse had, either. Not officially. It had been only a couple of hours before dawn when they’d started, and getting light when they’d exhausted themselves. They’d only slept for a few hours.

  So…now what?

  Now, he was probably hoping she was still asleep, so he could get dressed and get lost without some awkward scene. Is that what she wanted, too—for him to get lost, no awkwardness? Would that not be awkward? Or would it just feel gross and sad?

  The bathroom door opened, and Sid had to make a choice.

  When he came in, she smiled. “Hey.”

  His eyebrows went up, but he didn’t look disappointed. “Hey. I wake you?” Her room was not large; three strides, and he was at the side of her bed. He sat down.

  “I guess. It’s fine. It’s probably late.”

  “Eleven-thirty.”

  She rose up onto her elbows. “Fuck!”

  “You late for work?
”

  “No. The office is closed today—furloughs. It’s just…half the day is gone.” She looked out the window…and that made her remember looking out in the early morning and seeing Tucker’s father—Demon—out there. Waiting for her. To do her harm? She didn’t even know.