Page 17 of Wild Card
Fuck me or leave me alone, he’d said. Which was exactly what I had to do.
It really should be the latter. But with my fingers still dripping cum, it was hard to put much confidence in my self-control.
CHAPTER 5
Axel
I wokenaked and overheated from the bodies pressed against me. None of them were Dalton Harvey, which was a damn shame. After he pinned me to his car—and kissed me like he was as horny as I was—I wanted him even more.
Knowing Dalton, I wouldn’t be getting him anytime soon. But eventually, he’d break. Men like him always did. Desires could only be bottled up for so long before they escaped. He was fighting a losing battle, and I’d gladly claim the spoils when the time came.
Maybe I’d hit the pool hall tonight and look for a temporary fix to get me by until then. Last night had been a bust in more ways than one.
I stretched, my cheap sheets scratchy beneath me.
As soon as I moved, a tongue licked my cheek, and hot doggy breath washed over my face.
“Good morning to you too.” I shoved Loki away. “What have I told you about kissing without asking?”
Taz pranced over my gut. I grunted and scratched behind his tiny ears. He yipped once, sharply.
“That’s right, Taz. Consent is important. Good boy.” I picked up the Chihuahua and let him give me a quick lick.
Loki whined. I dropped my hand to pat his tan head. “Just gotta ask.”
My border collie, Oreo, bounced around the foot of the bed, eager to go outside, and Sugar’s stubby tail thumped against the floor.
“Good morning, ladies,” I said. “How are we doing today?”
Sugar made a show of looking around the bed, then running through the RV—which took about ten seconds—then returning to me. She tilted her head in question.
“Aw, you’re such a good mama bear.” I rolled out of bed and grabbed a pair of jeans and a tee off the built-in shelf on the wall. “Banshee is still at the house.”
Sugar was the first pooch I’d taken in. She’d been with me for six years. The rottweiler had really adopted me, rather than the other way around. One day, she’d turned up in the junkyard while I was working. She’d followed me around for hours, and when night fell, she’d found a spot to sleep under a totaled Honda Accord.
I didn’t have the heart to boot her, and when my foster dad asked me about her, I lied and said I’d gotten her to guard the place.
Technically, the junkyard was his, but I’d already taken to spending most of my time there, while he spent most of his passed out drunk. It was an arrangement that worked for both of us.
I checked my phone. It was already seven, which was late for the dogs.
“How many times did you kiss me before I woke up?” I asked Loki.
His ears perked up.
“Uh-huh. That innocent look doesn’t work on me.”
The dogs trotted behind me as I filled their dog bowls with kibble and grabbed a garden hose to refill a couple of large buckets for them to drink out of during the day.
Sugar and Oreo fell on the food, but Loki and Taz made a game of trying to catch the stream of water from the hose. They jumped around, snapping their jaws and looking like fools until I turned it off and dropped it on the ground.
They lost interest and returned to the food bowls. While they chowed down, I crossed to the far side of the junkyard to put out food for the feral cat colony that had taken up residence. I’d put up a fence to keep the dogs from bothering them in the deeper reaches of the junkyard.
Of course, sometimes the orange hellion I’d named Fireball would come out and rile everyone up for fun. That was his prerogative, I figured.
Cats came running from every direction as I poured out food. I only gave them dry food to supplement the field mice and birds they caught in the wild.
“Okay, I better go get Banshee. Who wants to come with me?”
