Her breath rose, matching mine, her big blue eyes sparkling. Same beautiful eyes I wanted to be looking at when I rocked her ass and spilled my load deep inside her.
She looked at me with that mix of disbelief and desire a woman gets when her body's begging for my dick, but her mind's screaming no.
I rammed my hips into hers, one quick, long stroke, just enough force to make the crappy leather beneath us rock with our combined weight.
“You're mine as long as we're married, woman. That means you follow my lead, and you stop talking back. You start calling me by my proper road name, and you forget all about that troubled kid you grew up with named Austin. He's dead as a fucking doornail. Doing the shit I do makes a man grow up, turns him into a beast.” She squirmed as I pushed my face lower, not stopping 'til our foreheads touched. “Baby, you gotta forget the past. So do I. We need to make this work for peace between our charters and our own damned sanity. Forget all about Austin. You're Asphalt's now. And don't you ever think you can get away with fucking me over or running your mouth with disrespect just because I went soft on you years ago. Got it?”
Her eyes narrowed into a message I heard without the words.
Fuck. You.
Whatever, at least she wasn't giving me shit from those sweet, plump lips anymore. I resisted the urge to crush my mouth on 'em again and devour her, pushed myself up, and staggered back against the mirror. Didn't bother hiding the raging warhead in my pants, about ten minutes of hard fucking away from exploding deep inside her as soon as I ripped her clothes off.
But not here. Not today. As long as she got the fucking message, we could get by – all we needed to make this sham marriage work.
“You heard what I said. Put the lightning on her and do it right.”
Ink Man got back to work. I folded my arms and watched, loving the way he put them around her brand, perfect carbon copies of what I'd worn on my face for years.
Now, she was truly, uniquely mine. Maybe not forever, it was true.
Rings could be taken off. Divorce papers could be signed. Tattoos could be scrubbed away with tears and salt.
But today, I owned her completely. Only a matter of time 'til I took over the rest of that sweet body too.
“Come on, babe. Don't hate me forever. I had to show you who's boss back there for good reason, and now that it's through, we can have some fun. Let's make the most of this fucked up honeymoon.”
She wasn't holding me as tight as we rode toward the lodge, just a short jump outside Redding proper. The girl hadn't made a peep since I'd walked her outta the tattoo parlor and back to my bike.
I wasn't worried. I could deal with her shit, especially the silent treatment, just as long as she'd internalized what I'd told her.
Something about little Ell-Bell was different. Couldn't quite pin it down, but she wasn't the same woman anymore.
She'd grown up. Blossomed like girls do when they add brains and experience to their beauty. She didn't flirt, didn't give me those sappy doe eyes, not even when I tipped her back and gave her the kiss I'd been waiting years to plant at the church.
She'd changed, ripened like a rare delicacy I wanted every fucking piece of. The girl was gone. When she wasn't bathing me in pure hate rays, she looked at me like a woman who wanted to fuck. Not a nervous virgin living in daddy's shadow who didn't know what the fuck she wanted.
If I played my cards right, I'd use my dick to slam the hate right outta her system. I'd show her exactly what she wanted. I'd fill every hole 'til she couldn't do anything but scream my name, and I had an Ace up my sleeve because I was Asphalt, the bastard she'd loved before she changed from baby doll into beautiful broad.
Half an hour later, we pulled up at the big lodge. Place was a little too fancy for my tastes, but it had an awesome view. Maybe seeing Mount Shasta would get her extra wet.
“Come on. Helmet off. Let's check our asses in.”
I helped her take off her headgear and then threw it in the back, not missing an opportunity to slap her ass beneath that pretty white fabric.
She glowered. “Don't. I'm not afraid to hit you back if you start treating me like a piece of –“
“Aw, come the fuck on, babe. If you were a piece of ass, I'd have fucked you half a dozen times by now. I'd slap those sweet cheeks three times harder. I'll do whatever the hell I want, and you can try and stop me.”
I grinned, putting on my King Asshole face. Fuck, if I didn't know any better, the look she gave me said she had a dagger hiding between her tits, ready to come out and shank me in the guts.
Good. I wanted to test her limits. I wanted to fuck with her, make her come at me, anything to make her lose control and give me all her hate so I could turn it into sopping wet sex.
Hell, I was already giving her more patience than I'd ever doled out to any girl. They might as well call me King Fucking Midas for turning everything to gold, and if she finally gave me a chance, I'd make her sparkle on my arm for good.