Sebring

  “At least he didn’t take us to a trendy country setting that’s really a suburb. We are firmly in a country setting that is not trendy,” she assured the dog absurdly. “But there are no horses to be raised in sight.”

  Nick still didn’t move as she disappeared into the living room but he heard her go on.

  “Ooo, you’re a boy. We need to name you.” Her voice rose. “Nicky! We need to name him. Come in here and do not touch the food. I’m cooking dinner and I’m not taking your shit.”

  Nick continued to stand still until, slowly, he turned his head to look to the door to the garage. He then turned back to look into the kitchen.

  “Whiz.” He heard her say. “You move like lightning. No, Punk.” He heard the dog whine. “You don’t like Punk? Okay, but you can’t be Spot, you’re not spotted.”

  He looked back to the garage door.

  “Nick!” she called.

  He stared at the threshold at the bottom.

  Fuck, he hadn’t noticed.

  “Sweetheart.” He heard her again and knew she was back in the kitchen. “Our dog needs a name.”

  He looked to her to see she was bent over, ass in the air looking fine in her jeans, putting their new puppy on the floor.

  It jumped back in her arms.

  Now, he noticed.

  There he was.

  He’d made it.

  He’d fucking made it. With his own hands, sweat, balls, gut and brains.

  He’d made it and he’d earned it and there he was…

  Living it.

  His perfect world.

  * * * * *

  The Next Day

  He didn’t gag her. He wouldn’t ever gag her. He liked the noises she made too much.

  But he did blindfold her.

  And he strung her up.

  She took it all, his Livvie. Even if he’d intended to break her in slowly, she writhed against the leather straps around her wrists hung from the hook on the wall, her naked body arching, seeking, inviting, the noises she made telling him where she was.

  That being that she wanted more.

  And more.

  And more.

  He gave it to her, his cock pulsing with each fall of the crop, his balls tightening with each red welt that rose against the beautiful skin of her ass and thighs.

  She even rode the handle of the crop like he ordered.

  His princess at his command.

  He watched her work the crop in and out of her wet cunt, her teeth sunk into her lower lip, her tits bouncing, the nipples he’d worked first, taking his time doing it, hard and straining.

  So fucking pretty.

  She gave him that, he gave her what she’d needed and never been able to have, he’d give it to her again.

  Now, enough was enough.

  So he pulled the crop out of her, tossed it aside, wrapped an arm around her belly, cupping her pubis with his other hand to tip her back for him, and he drove his cock home.

  Her held fell back against his shoulder, her lips whimpering, “Nicky,” she came for him the instant he filled her.

  He fucked her strung up, holding her tight to take it, after she came down going after her clit to make her come for him again.

  She did.

  Then he did.

  He didn’t move, stayed buried, his arms wrapped around her as she hung for him, filled with him, her head still back, turned, her forehead in the side of his neck.

  “You good?” he murmured.

  “Yes, Nicky,” she murmured back.

  “Good they had a decent hook at the hardware store,” he teased.

  He felt her smile against his skin but she only replied, “Mmm.”

  He slid a hand up to her breast and cupped it.

  “Who do you belong to, Livvie?” he asked.

  “You, Nicky,” she whispered, pressing her forehead in harder.

  “Who do you love?” he asked.

  More of her whisper, “You, sweetheart.”

  “Whose heart do you own?”

  She shifted her head back and he tipped his chin down, lifting his hand from her breast to pull the blindfold away so he could catch her eyes.

  Her beautiful voice wrapped sweet around the word, “Yours.”

  That was when he kissed her, slow and wet.

  He’d barely broken their kiss, his lips still to hers, when she murmured, “You forgot my plug, master.”

  Nick caught her eyes.

  Olivia, naked, strung up, red-assed from his crop, still full of his cock, he couldn’t hold back.

  He burst out laughing.

  Pressing her face into his neck, he heard it and felt it when his girl did the same.

  * * * * *

  Four Days Later

  Nick was tossing a log into the fireplace when he saw movement in his peripheral vision.

  He looked that way and caught it as Whiz entered, doing it galloping, puppy ears flopping.

  Not long after, Olivia came in holding a shoe.

  “You are correct,” she announced haughtily. “He’s fast. The name Whiz suits him.” She shoved the shoe toward him, a shoe he now saw was chewed to shit. “I’m also correct. He’s also a punk.”

  Whiz made a whining sound.

  “He doesn’t like Punk, baby,” Nick told Liv something she knew because the dog spoke fucking English and whined every time that word was uttered in reference to him.

  “Then he should stop being a punk, sweetheart,” Liv shot back.

  Another whine from Whiz.

  “He’s not a punk, he’s a pup,” Nick pointed out.

  “The closet door was closed,” she returned. “He’s not only a puppy punk. He’s a puppy magician punk.”

  Fuck.

  He’d gone in to get a flannel to wear when he brought in wood and hadn’t closed the closet door.

  Liv read him and her hand dropped to her side as her eyes went to the ceiling.

  “Nick,” she snapped at the ceiling.

  “I’ll buy you another shoe.” He grinned. “Two of them, if you’re a good girl.”

  She returned her gaze to him. “You’ll need to. This shoe,” she shook it at him again, “isn’t suitable to country living. But when we’re back in Denver, I’ll need it and the meager other selection I brought with me that didn’t go up in smoke.”

  Taking in the strappy sandal that was minus a number of straps, some of a spike heel and a good deal of its sole, he mentally considered a visit to the vet as he advised, “Best to stock up for country living. Time we’re in Denver, you won’t need that many of those type of shoes.”

  “Sorry?”

  He looked to her. “Does Whiz have half your shoe in his belly?”

  “No, Punk decorated our bedroom floor with half this shoe so it’s now in the garbage.”

  Thank Christ for that.

  Whiz whined.

  “Nick,” she called.

  He turned his attention back to her, straightening from the fireplace to take his feet.

  “The time we’re in Denver?” she asked.

  “Yeah. We should think about when we can go back. A visit. Knight’s gettin’ impatient and Kasha’s definitely—”

  Her head tipped sharply to the side. “A visit?”

  “A visit,” he confirmed. “Maybe a week. But we gotta think of Whiz. Whether he comes with us, which means drivin’ with a puppy, which might be the seventh circle of hell. Or he stays, which means we don’t have him for very long and then we take off on him. I don’t think that’d be cool. So we should wait a few weeks, a month, long as I can push it with Knight and Kash, and then not be gone too long.”

  She stared at him so long it was his turn to call, “Liv?”

  “A visit,” she said.

  “Yeah, a visit,” he reiterated. “What the fuck?” he asked when she kept staring at him.

  “What about your Jag?” she asked.

  “Jed is gonna drive it out. He’s lookin’ forward to it. He’ll fly back. We got you your Le
xus, so we don’t need it. He can do it in the spring.”

  She didn’t move and began again to stare at him.

  “Jesus, Liv, what the fuck?” he asked.

  When she spoke, her voice had changed. There was something in it he couldn’t read.

  “We’re not moving back, are we?” she asked.

  She thought they were moving back?

  He’d bought that house, she knew that.

  Her painting was there.

  Whiz was there.

  Liv was there and she loved it there.

  “You wanted the mountains,” he reminded her. “You wanted to be away from it all.” He swung an arm out. “So we’re here.”

  “Your business is in Denver. Your life is there. Your family—”

  He cut her off. “You’re here.”

  She snapped her mouth shut.

  Whiz attacked the rug under the coffee table.

  Nick went to his woman and wound his arms around her.

  “You like it here?” he asked.

  “I love it here,” she answered.

  “So we’re stayin’.”

  “But—”

  “We’re stayin’.”

  “Nicky—”

  He squeezed her.

  She shut up.

  “You get the perfect world, you don’t leave it. You love it here. I love you. We live here.”

  She pressed her lips together but that didn’t stop her eyes from getting bright with wet.

  She unpressed them to ask, “What are you gonna do here?”

  “We’ll figure it out.”

  “What am I gonna do here?”

  “We’ll figure that out too.”

  “Your family—” she tried again.

  “Livvie, we’re in Tennessee, not Timbuktu.”

  She shut up again.

  Then she quit shutting up. “I love you, Sebring.”

  He grinned.

  “Back at you, Shade.”

  She smiled.

  Then she stated, “I’m still calling our dog Punk.”

  Whiz whined.

  Liv pressed into him and giggled.

  Nick listened to her giggle, feeling her body moving against his.

  Oh yeah.

  They were staying here. He’d die a slow death by hamburger recipes, copious use of salad dressing and Olivia’s driving need to add crumbled Reese’s cups to every dessert she made here. He’d be anywhere and do anything that made Liv giggle, openly happy.

  That said, he was not calling his dog Punk.

  * * * * *

  Livvie

  Seven Months Later

  Six O’clock in the Morning

  Thirty Minutes after Dawn

  I sat on Nick’s knee.

  “One, two, three…” I whispered into his ear, watching surreptitiously.

  “It’s still five, babe,” Nick stated, sounding like he was smiling.

  Five.

  Yowsa.

  Little Sylvie pushing that many out.

  I watched her with the swaddle in her arms, holding it second nature, sitting and gabbing with Anya.

  I turned my eyes back to the mayhem of our yard. Adults, but mostly kids, everywhere. Kids going crazy because their wedding gift from Nick and me were Nerf guns. Kids going crazy because it was way early and they’d had donuts for breakfast. Kids going crazy because Whiz liked kids (and showed it) but Whiz might like Nerf darts better (and showed that by trying to eat them, something Kat was in charge of making sure he did not do, a job she took very seriously if her stern eyes on our prancing puppy were anything to go by).

  “Hanna and Raid gonna stop at three?” I asked.

  “According to Hanna, yeah. Raid wants another baby girl,” Nick answered.

  “Cassidy and Deacon just the two?” I went on.

  “Just the two girls. Like Knight and Anya, gonna stay that way, if you ask Deacon. Though Cassidy wants a boy. I had to guess, she’ll be knocked up soon. Deacon doesn’t say no to his woman very often.”

  I knew how that went.

  I watched the mayhem, feeling a little bit guilty (but only a little bit) because I’d caused that mayhem, forcing these families to get up early, buying the kids’ everlasting love through Nerf guns and unlimited access to a Labrador mutt puppy, all so I could marry Nick at dawn.

  My eyes went back to Sylvie.

  One day.

  One day it’d be second nature to me too.

  I sat in my simple (but elegant) strapless, chiffon wedding gown on Nick’s knee, wondering—even if I’d lived through every second—how I got there.

  How I found my way to happy.

  It hit me.

  I’d gone to a sex club and essentially jumped Nick.

  On that thought, it started slow, just with my body shaking, but I didn’t try to hold it back.

  I didn’t hold anything back anymore.

  I didn’t have to control it.

  I was free to be me.

  It built to chuckles, sitting on my husband’s lap in my wedding gown on our wedding morning, laughter bubbling inside me.

  “Shade,” he called.

  I didn’t answer.

  “Shade,” he called again, this time on a squeeze.

  I kept my gaze to the mayhem and again didn’t answer.

  “Baby,” he called, lifting a hand to my chin and turning me to face him.

  The instant my eyes hit blue, I corrected, “Sebring.”

  That blue lit like the ocean on a cloudless day, bright and sparkling.

  And his voice rumbled through me, echoing how I felt at that moment, a way I’d feel for eternity—proud and happy—when he replied.

  “Sebring.”

  This concludes The Unfinished Heroes series.

  Thank you for reading.

  Read an excerpt from Own the Wind,

  the beginning of Kristen Ashley’s Chaos Series!

  You Don’t Know Me

  His cell rang and Parker “Shy” Cage opened his eyes.

  He was on his back in his bed in his room at the Chaos Motorcycle Club’s compound. The lights were still on and he was buried under a small pile of women. One was tucked up against his side, her leg thrown over his thighs, her arm over his ribs. The other was upside down, tucked to his other side, her knee in his stomach, her arm over his calves.

  Both were naked.

  “Shit,” he muttered, as he lifted and twisted himself out from under his fence of limbs. He reached out to his phone.

  He checked the display and touched his thumb to the screen to take the call.

  “Yo, brother,” he muttered to Hop, one of his brethren in the Chaos MC.

  “Where are you?” Hop asked.

  “Compound,” Shy answered.

  “You busy?”

  Shy lifted up to an elbow and looked at the two women passed out in his bed.

  “Not anymore,” he replied.

  Knowing Shy and his reputation, there was humor in Hop’s tone when he stated, “Tabby Callout.”

  At this news, fire hit his gut, as it always did when he got that particular callout. He didn’t know why, it made no sense, he barely knew the girl, but always when he heard it, it pissed him way the hell off.

  “You are shittin’ me,” Shy bit out.

  “No, brother. Got a call from Tug who got a call from Speck. She’s out on the prowl, as usual. She’s closer to you than me, so if you can disentangle yourself from the pussy you got passed out in your room, it’d be good you go get her.”

  There it was. Hop knew Shy and his reputation.

  “I’m on my bike. Text me the address,” Shy mumbled, shifting from under the bodies to put his feet on the floor at the side of the bed.

  “Right. Under radar, yeah?” Hop returned, telling him something he knew, and Shy clenched his teeth.

  Three years they’d been doing this shit with Tabby. Three fucking years. It was lasting so damned long, he knew, unless she got a serious fucking wakeup call, that girl would never
learn.

  But no one was willing to do it. The Club didn’t normally have any problems with laying it out no matter who it needed to be laid out for, but Tab was different. She was the nineteen-year-old daughter of the President of the Club, Kane “Tack” Allen.

  That meant she was handled with care. That also meant when they got word she was out carousing and needed someone to nab her ass and get her home before she bought trouble, they did it under radar. In other words, they didn’t tell Tack. And they didn’t tell Tack because the first time it happened he lost his shit, but worse, his old lady took off to extricate Tabby from a bad situation and nearly got her head caved in with a baseball bat.

  No one wanted a repeat of that kind of mess, so the brothers kept an eye on her and took care of business without getting Tack involved.

  “Under radar,” Shy muttered then finished, “Later,” and touched the screen with his thumb.

  He rooted around on the floor to find jeans, tee, underwear, and socks. The women in his bed didn’t twitch when he sat down next to them to pull on his boots.

  Dressed, he turned off the light to his room and headed down the hall and into the common room of the Club’s compound. The brothers’ rooms were at the back, doors opening off a long hall that ran the length of the building. A doorway in the middle of the hall led to the common area, which had a long, curved bar and a mess of couches, chairs, tables, and pool tables. Off to the side through another door was their meeting room, a kitchen, and a set of locked, reinforced storage rooms.

  As he moved through the common space he saw Brick, one of Chaos’s members, flat on his back on one of the couches. He had one foot on the floor and was dead to the world. He also had a woman draped on him, dead to the world too. She had a short jean skirt on, and Shy saw that Brick was sleeping with his hand up the hem, cupped on her ass. Shy also saw the woman wasn’t wearing any underwear.

  Other than that, the space was empty and currently lit only by a variety of neon beer signs on the walls.