Page 216 of American Hellhound
Not that Ghost had the patience for that.
He lifted his head and reached for the front of her shirt, popped open the snaps down the front. He caressed her belly – her rhythm stuttered – gentle and reverent, and then reached up and pulled down the cups of her bra, freed her breasts, heavy with pregnancy.
Her hips kicked faster, watching the way he looked at her, a helpless sound catching in her throat.
His hands moved to her hips, holding her steady, and he lifted his own, driving up into her with a powerful thrust. Taking over, setting a stronger, faster pace.
Maggie surrendered to it, hands braced on his skin, overwhelmed by the sight and the feel and the strength of him.
“God,” she chanted. “God, God…”
He sat up, pulling her down hard on his cock, kissed her roughly. It was too much: the friction, the heat. Her belly between them, a reminder of what they’d created together.
They came at the same time, panting into each other’s mouths.
Maggie bit his lower lip, hard enough to taste copper. “God, I love you.”
His hands smoothed down her quivering sides, tape rough on her skin. Lapped up the blood she’d left on his lip and gave some back to her with a long, thorough kiss. “Love you, too.”
~*~
He must have blacked out, because one moment Roman was lying on the cold concrete with Lean Dogs standing over him, the crowd cheering, and the next he was aware of something soft beneath him. A bed. He smelled detergent and furniture polish. He was in a dorm, then.
His eyes didn’t want to open. At least, one of them didn’t. The right one cracked, his vision blurry, and he squinted against the warm glow of lamplight.
“Roman,” a quiet, female voice said. “Can you hear me? You awake?”
Kris.
“Yeah,” he said, but it came out an indistinct mumble.
The bed dipped and he felt her sit down at his hip, heard the soft sound of her jeans brushing up against his. Something cold touched his face, an ice pack, he figured, going by the way it burned. He hissed and tried to pull back, but there was nowhere to go, his head already pressed into the pillow.
“You alright to be alone with him?” someone asked over by the door. It sounded suspiciously like that giant blond Texan who’d been outside earlier.
Roman made a face – which hurt like hell – when he recalled that guy. Tall and broad, and golden-haired, an Adonis. He didn’t like the thought of anyone who looked like that within Kris’s presence. Not that he was currently in a position to do anything about it.
“It’s fine,” Kris said, and he could tell by her voice that she was giving that small, shy smile of hers, the one that was all politeness, but never touched her eyes. “Thank you.”
“Yell if you need anything,” the Texan said, and Roman heard the door shut.
Candy. That was his name. Candyman. He’d been just a kid the last time Roman saw him. Jesus.
The ice pack lifted off his face. “Roman, I know you’re awake,” Kris said.
He made a monumental effort to focus, to blink his vision clear and prop up on an elbow. The room swayed a moment before it settled, and then he saw her worried face just in front of his.
“I think you have a concussion,” she said.
“I think you’re right.”
Her expression was unusually stern. “Lie back down.” When he didn’t, she pushed at his shoulder. “You have a black eye; I need to put ice on it.”
With a sigh, he flopped back and let her put the cold pack on him again, wincing at the sting of the cold. “What happened?”
“Ghost beat the shit out of you,” she said, matter-of-factly. “You’re not a very good boxer.”
It was the boldest thing she’d ever said to him, and he wanted to smile in response. He couldn’t, though, because it hurt to know that she was bold because of these people – because she wasn’t under his care anymore. And because the Lean Dogs were using her. That wasn’t how her happy ending was supposed to go: a vessel passed from Dog to Dog until she grew lined and haggard, a washed-up groupie smoking two packs of day, a litany of stories to tell her illegitimate children.
