Rock Chick Revenge

  His face was buried in my neck, his mouth moving there with no purpose or intent, just a post doing the nasty affectionate touch, a sexy post doing the nasty affectionate touch.

  My hands slid up his back. “I have to brush my teeth,” I whispered.

  His head came up and he looked down at me, eyes ink, and he stared at me one beat, two then three then more. I didn’t know why he kept looking at me. What I did know was that his face looked less hard than normal, partly with satisfaction, partly with something else I couldn’t decipher.

  Okay to be perfectly honest, I didn’t want to decipher.

  Goddamn.

  Finally I said softly, “Luke.”

  He gave me a half-grin and even in a lying position I felt my knees wobble.

  There I was, lying in bed, Luke on top of me, still inside me, my limbs wrapped around him.

  Hell and damnation.

  How did I let this happen?

  What happened to my vow?

  How was I ever going to go back to my vibrators now?

  I took my arms from around him and shoved his shoulders. “Get off.”

  The grin turned full-fledged, he bent his head, touched my lips with his and then rolled off.

  I hightailed to the bathroom.

  Crapity, crap, crap, crap.

  Now how was I going to get out of this mess?

  I couldn’t just get on a spaceship and float around the earth. That was too close. I needed to beam to another galaxy. Since Star Trek technology wasn’t possible in the non-TV realm, I decided I needed to find a plastic surgeon and have my face altered so I was unrecognizable and move to Guadalajara for good measure.

  Then I realized I was naked in the bathroom and had nothing with me to put on.

  I was such a dork.

  A black, zip up sweatshirt was hanging on the back of the door and I fell on it like a starving man at a feast. I zipped it on and looked in the mirror.

  I’m happy, Good Ava told me, grinning like a loon. This is what we’ve ALWAYS wanted.

  Bad Ava had her arms crossed, was scowling and she was strangely silent. But I knew what she was thinking.

  I did my morning business and walked out of the bathroom. Luke, naked (and looking fine by the way), was heading toward it as I walked out. He nabbed me at the waist, pulled me in for a quick, hard kiss then let me go and went into the bathroom.

  I stared at the door in a mini-Luke Lip Fog for a few beats. Then I found my underwear, pulled them on and wondered what to do.

  I needed to get out of there and soon. I needed to find a quiet place to let my head explode. I needed to shove all this down, bury it, forget it happened.

  Bad Ava’s unspoken advice was the only thing I could think of. I needed to find a way out before this all turned to shit. Like it always turned to shit.

  Always.

  Instead of doing any of that, I went to the kitchen, nabbed a diet, tidied the cookies, put away the forgotten in the sex-a-thon last night groceries and started to make toast.

  Luke came out when I slid down the lever on the slices of bread. I heard him moving around but I stared at the toaster as if I was certain it would animate and start dancing around like all the stuff in the Beast’s house in that Disney movie and I didn’t want to miss the show.

  He came up behind me, wrapped his arms around me and touched his lips to my neck. This felt good. Sweet, nice, intimate and wonderful.

  Ava, Bad Ava’s sharp voice was a warning.

  What? Good Ava asked innocently, as far as I’m concerned, Luke could hold us all day.

  Fuckity, fuck, fuck, fuck.

  “You want toast?” I asked, not moving my eyes from the toaster.

  He moved closer. I pressed against the counter, he pressed against me.

  “Yeah,” he said against my neck.

  “Okay, I need to get the butter.”

  He let me go. I got the butter and put it on the counter. I did all of this without looking at him.

  I was going for a knife when he moved in again, getting in front of me, pressing my bottom to the counter this time full frontal, arms sliding around me. I tilted my head back to look at him. He was smiling down at me, amused about something.

  “What’s funny?” I asked, not thinking anything was funny, at all, in the whole universe.

  “I don’t know yet,” he answered.

  I stared at him, blank-faced. Then I said, “What?”

  “Just waitin’ to see what you’re gonna say next.”

  “Why does that make you smile?”

  “‘Cause I’m thinkin’ whatever it is, it’s gonna be good.”

  “Why?”

  “You’ve had a full ten minutes to think about how you’re gonna get out of this now that you and me are together in a way you can’t deny. I’m lookin’ forward to hearin’ what you’ve come up with.”

  My blank look turned into a glare.

  One, two, three, four, five, six… there, temper under control.

  I took a deep breath and I blurted out the first thing that came to me, “Simple. We stop seeing each other immediately.”

  He burst into laughter, his arms got tighter and his face went into my neck. He laughed into my neck for what seemed like a long time as my body went stiffer and stiffer in his arms.

  “I wasn’t being funny,” I pointed out what I thought was the obvious.

  His head came up and he looked at me still grinning. “Babe, you’re hilarious.”

  “It’s just sex. We’re not ‘together in a way you can’t deny’,” I told him.

  “Ava, after I made you come, you fell asleep with my cock inside you. That’s about as together as two people can get.”

  I did do that.

  Shit!

  “It’s just sex,” I pushed it.

  His face got closer but he didn’t look any less amused. “It isn’t just sex and you know it,” he returned, his voice soft, gentle, affectionate.

  He was right. It wasn’t.

  And he was using The Voice a lot these days.

  Crap!

  Then I hit on a plan. It was a stupid plan but it was all I could come up with at the time. I knew he’d never go for it but at least it was something.

  “We’ll be fuck buddies,” I told him.

  His grin disappeared, his chin jerked down and his brows drew together. “Come again?”

  “Fuck buddies. You know, like they talked about on Sex and the City. Guys you know that you sleep with. Just sex. No entanglements, no relationship, just mind-blowing sex.”

  The grin came back as his face relaxed. “Mind-blowing sex?”

  Oops. I probably shouldn’t have used that adjective.

  “Or, you know, good sex,” I tried to cover.

  His body started shaking with laughter.

  I started getting angry again. “Luke!” I snapped.

  His hands pulled the sweatshirt up over my behind and went in, sliding across the skin of my back.

  “I could do fuck buddies,” he said and I blinked.

  I thought he’d say no. In fact, I was certain he’d say no. That was why I suggested it.

  “You could?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” his hands started moving up my back (taking the sweatshirt with it, by the way).

  “Seriously?”

  “Yeah.”

  Okay, now what had I gotten myself into? I’d just become fuck buddies with Luke Stark.

  Worse than that, it was my idea!

  I like that idea, I think it’s fab, Bad Ava had lost her warning vibe and now sounded dreamy.

  I hate it. It stinks, Good Ava had lost her happy vibe and now sounded pissed.

  “With rules,” Luke said.

  Uh-oh. Here we go.

  “Fuck buddies don’t have rules. It’s like being in a fight club. The first rule of fuck buddies is, there are no rules.” I was making this up as I went along. I had no idea if fuck buddies had rules. I’d never had a fuck buddy. I’d never even wanted one.


  Hell I didn’t want one now!

  Especially not Luke.

  The inky went out of his eyes and they got scary shiny. “We’re gonna have rules.”

  I thought, considering his scary shiny eyes, it was probably best I at least listen to his rules.

  “What are the rules?” I asked on a sigh.

  “First, we’re the kind of fuck buddies who spend time together, not fuckin’.”

  “Luke, that defeats the purpose of fuck buddies.”

  Again, I was making it up.

  He ignored me. “Second, we’re exclusive fuck buddies. No one else touches you while I’m fuckin’ you.”

  That one wouldn’t be hard.

  “Let’s go back to the first one,” I said.

  “Ava, that’s the deal, no discussion.”

  “What kind of time would we spend together?”

  “Ava –”

  “No, I want to know.”

  His eyes dropped to my mouth and his arms wrapped around me so his fingers were resting on the sides of my breasts.

  Then he muttered, “Maybe we’ll just fuck.”

  I felt my knees wobble as my lungs expanded. “I could spend time not fucking,” I blurted.

  He grinned.

  Foiled again!

  I glared.

  He caught the glare and his body started shaking with laughter again.

  “Honestly, I hate you,” I told him.

  “No,” his mouth came to mine, his eyes not leaving my own, “you don’t.”

  Against my will, I started sliding into a fog. My head tilted back further, his slanted and he started to kiss me when the buzzer went. He disengaged from my lips but kissed my nose, then walked away.

  In another fog, I watched him move. He’d put on another pair of sweatpants, these black with three black-on-black stripes up the sides.

  Not surprisingly, his chest was bare.

  I noticed, not for the first time but with my Luke Sense significantly more honed after our sex-a-thon that he moved well. He moved like he was in absolute command of every centimeter of muscle, sinew and bone in his body and there were a lot of them. I sighed at the sight and even I had to admit it was a contented sound.

  Damn it all to hell.

  He picked up the door phone and said, “Yeah?” Three seconds later, his eyes cut to me.

  Whatever it was, I knew by the look of him was not good.

  He listened for another couple of seconds then, without a word, he put down the phone. I watched him walk back to me and since he had a funny look on his face, as if he didn’t know whether to laugh or yell, I didn’t watch the way he moved just his expression. I was waiting for him to decide.

  He came into the kitchen and leaned his hips against the counter opposite me, putting his palms on it at his sides.

  “Santo Mancini wants you to know he’s ready just in case you wanna go somewhere,” he told me calmly neither laughing nor yelling (which was a relief).

  I stared at him. “Who?” I asked.

  “Santo Mancini.”

  “Who’s San…?” Oh shit. Ren’s bodyguard.

  Again, I wanted someone to tell me, why me? My life was so complicated, I couldn’t even keep track of all the fucked up shit that was happening.

  His voice started sliding into the “going to yell” zone. “You wanna tell me why the guy who kidnapped you a few days ago is buzzin’ up to the loft tellin’ me he’s waitin’ for you downstairs?”

  No, I actually didn’t want to tell him.

  “Um…”

  “Ava,” he said low.

  What the hell. “Well, I told Ren what was happening and he kind of arranged for Sissy and me to have bodyguards.”

  He stared at me a beat then his head dropped and he might have been staring at his feet or he might have closed his eyes. I couldn’t see which one and it didn’t matter really. He was in another masculine position of reflection, this time likely wondering what in the hell he’d gotten himself into when he got mixed up with me.

  I thought it best to carry on with breakfast. The toast in the toaster had long since come up and wouldn’t be hot anymore so the butter wouldn’t melt. I hated non-melted butter on toast. I decided to let Luke have the non-melted butter ones, exchanged toast for bread and pressed down the lever.

  “Ava,” Luke said from behind me.

  I turned. He was now sitting on the counter, eyes on me.

  “Come here,” he said softly.

  Don’t ask me why, but for some reason, I went. He opened his legs and I walked between them. He closed his thighs against my sides, wrapped a hand around the back of my neck as I tilted my head back to look at him and his face came close.

  “You’re lucky,” he told me.

  “I am?” I asked.

  “Yeah. You’re lucky I’ve fucked you. You’re lucky it was mind-blowing. You’re lucky I think it’s fuckin’ sweet-as-hell that you would nestle into me and fall asleep with me inside you. You’re lucky I like you movin’ around my kitchen wearin’ my sweatshirt. You didn’t have all that, babe, I gotta tell you I would likely be pretty fuckin’ pissed Zano assigned one of his thugs to be your bodyguard.”

  “Well, I didn’t –” I started to say in my own defense (really, I didn’t, it wasn’t my idea for Ren to give me a bodyguard) but Luke’s lips touched mine and I stopped talking.

  “Don’t try your luck,” he warned.

  I thought about trying my luck. I did this while looking in Luke’s eyes. I decided not to try my luck.

  “You want toast or what?” I asked kind of bitchy.

  He did a half-grin, his hand slid in my hair and he gave me the kiss he meant to give me five minutes before.

  In the end, my toast had non-melted butter too.

  * * * * *

  Luke and I went to the hospital to see Bobby.

  Santo Mancini followed us in a black Volvo. Glancing out the back window of the Porsche, I noticed he was one of my kidnappers, the driver. Well, at least it wasn’t the other guy. I didn’t think the other guy liked me.

  My phone rang on the way to the hospital. It said “Sissy calling.”

  I flipped it open and put it to my ear. “Yo,” I said.

  “Some big, beefy guy is here,” Sissy informed me, sounding kind of breathless. “Says his name is Lucky and he’s my bodyguard. He doesn’t look like one of the hot guys. I just screamed in his face and closed the door. He’s outside, standing by his car. What do I do?”

  Damn, damn, damn.

  “Ren set it up,” I told her. “He’s not one of the Hot Bunch. He’s one of Ren’s um… people.”

  “Oh. So he’s okay?” Sissy sounded less panicked.

  That was a question I couldn’t answer. “I think so,” I said.

  “Did they find the Hot Bunch guy that was missing?” she asked.

  I bit my lip and watched Luke drive for a few beats.

  “Ava?” Sissy called in my ear.

  “Luke and I are going to visit him at the hospital now.”

  Silence then quietly she said, “Shit.”

  She could say that again.

  “Dom’s a dickhead,” she whispered. “He started all this and now someone is in the hospital. Someone we don’t even know.”

  “Did Dom call you?” I asked, remembering my conversation with Dom last night.

  “Yes, like, five times,” she said, now sounding pissy. “I didn’t answer.”

  Shoo. At least that crisis was averted.

  “Well, don’t answer if he calls again. We have to talk. I’ll call you after we get done at the hospital.”

  “I want to know everything. What a date with Ren is like. How Luke was when you got home. Everything. I’ll meet you at Fortnum’s,” she said.

  There was something about Sissy calling Luke’s loft “home’ that freaked me out. I didn’t feel like freaking out in Luke’s Porsche with Luke in it (again or ever really). I needed to freak out privately with lots of bags of cookies available.

>   “Sounds good,” I said instead.

  I was about to say good-bye when I heard her say, “Ava?”

  “What?”

  “Did Luke give you the business?” she asked.

  I looked at Luke again. He was driving, calm, casual, practiced, eyes on the road, seemingly oblivious to our conversation.

  I looked away. “Yeah,” I answered quietly.

  She screamed so loud I had to pull the phone away from my ear. I glanced at Luke when I heard him chuckle.

  Fuckity, fuck, fuck, fuck.

  * * * * *

  I stood outside Bobby’s hospital room facing the wall, forehead resting against it.

  Just a minute before, I saw that Bobby was a big guy and looked like a younger Tex, except less crazy (though how would I know if Bobby actually was less crazy, considering he was lying in a hospital bed in a coma). I couldn’t help but feel the blame that Big Bobby was lying in a hospital bed. Still, I vowed sextuple revenge against Dominic Dickhead.

  I felt a strong hand slide under my hair and rest at the back of my neck then, “Babe.”

  I straightened, turned and looked at Luke but he didn’t take his hand away. Lee had been with Bobby when we got there and now he was standing by Luke but his eyes were on me.

  “What’s in that head of yours?” Luke asked quietly.

  “I just vowed sextuple revenge against Dickhead Dominic Vincetti,” I told him.

  One side of Luke’s lips went up. Lee’s eyes did an amused crinkle.

  “And I feel it’s my fault,” I went on.

  Luke’s grin faded and so did Lee’s eye-crinkle.

  “If I hadn’t walked into your office –” I started to continue.

  “Quiet Ava,” Luke said softly.

  Lee spoke more words. “Ava, most of the time, my men volunteer for their Rock Chick assignments and do them on their own time. Bobby was on his own time, a favor to Luke. He knew what he was doing and he wanted to do it. It isn’t your fault that some shithead brought you trouble. Don’t take it on your shoulders, it doesn’t belong there. What happened to Bobby belongs on the shoulders of the guy who hit him in the head with a baseball bat.”

  Well, that was honest, succinct, to the point and made sense.

  Still.

  I closed my eyes and Luke turned me into his body by putting pressure on my neck. I put my hands to his waist and rested my forehead on his chest.