When he thrusts a powerful thigh between my legs and switches to my other breast, I moan helplessly. He breaks the kiss and licks a path down my neck. I throw my head back, shivering.

Warm water trickles over us. My eyes roll up, finding the huge showerhead that’s spilling a gentle tropical rain over us. My eyes close as he unbuttons my shorts, while sucking on my collarbone, the thumb of his other hand still lost under my blouse, flicking on my nipple.

Overload. I don’t know what to do, how to keep still. I writhe as his hand pushes into my shorts and parts my folds, two fingers pushing into me.

Oh God. I’m so ready, so close to the edge. He pumps his fingers in and out of me, once, twice, and I thrash, coming hard, moaning his name. I grip his arms, the pleasure drowning me.

Next thing I know, he’s ripping my shorts down my legs and then my blouse over my head, and murmurs something as he runs his hands over my naked body. His hard cock bumps into my stomach. He grabs one of my legs and lifts is, spreading me wide. His fingers are back, stroking me, rubbing over my clit, then pushing in and out of me.

“Fuck, if you could see yourself…” he whispers, his eyes dark, the pupils dilated. “So sexy.”

Then he pushes into me, in one, deep, long thrust, and I choke on a cry. He pulls my leg around his thigh, and then the other one, opening me up, filling me up so completely there’s nowhere to run. Filling my world, swamping my senses. I have to surrender—to his cock, his hands under my ass, his body rocking into mine, grinding me into the wall.

It’s rough, and wild, and oh crap, I’m coming again, stronger than before. Pleasure rips through me, and I convulse around his cock, clenching hard, barely managing to hold back a scream.

“Shit.” He hisses, his hips slamming me into the wall, his cock sliding in and out of me, hard and slick and hot. “I can’t… Oh fuck.”

He pulls out of me in one long drag that makes us both cry out, and then he comes all over my breasts and belly, shuddering. Jet after jet of cum hits me and runs down my body, down my hips and thighs, getting washed away in the gentle shower spray.

Braced with one hand against the wall, he’s still shaking with aftershocks, still pressed against me, his softening cock trapped between us.

“God, Ray.” His breath is coming in short gasps. “What am I going to do with you?”

I smirk up at him. “Make me breakfast?”

“I sure could do that.”

“And then take me to bed?”

He groans, the corners of his mouth lifting. “I’ll get rug burns on my dick if we keep doing this.”

“Rug burns?”

He presses his forehead to mine, his eyes closing. “My dick might fall off from overuse. But I’ll take the risk.”

“You’re taking an awful lot of risks lately.”

“You’re worth it,” he says, and wraps me up in his arms. “Told you, babe.”

I say nothing, listening to the steady beat of his heart.

***

“You really think someone is after you, huh?” My mouth is full of cheese-and-ham baguette, so it comes out garbled.

Yet he apparently understands, because he nods and puts down his own half-eaten baguette sandwich. “I know it sounds absurd.”

“More than my story? Please.” I swallow and take another bite. I’m starving. “Though I don’t get why anyone would be after you. Me, I have my dad’s debts on my back. But you?”

He leans back in his chair and taps a rhythm with his fingers on the tabletop. “Fuck, I don’t know. Can’t make heads or tails of it. I mean…” He wipes a hand over his mouth and glares at his plate. “Why? What happened a year ago to change everything?”

“If it’s true.”

“If it’s true,” he agrees. “Fuck. Ray, there’s—”

Thunder booms, rattling the windows, and I jump a mile, my chair crashing back to the floor. “Shit!”

“It’s just thunder.” He gets up and comes to me, drawing me into a bear hug. I cling to him.

“God, I hate thunder. But I love storms. Isn’t that weird?”

“You love other Storms apart from me?” He squeezes me until I yelp.

“You’re the perfect Storm,” I tell him, and he laughs. I love the sound. It makes me smile. I also love the fact he came over to hug me.

He’s easy to love.

“How come you don’t have a girlfriend?” I let him drag me back to the table as the rain starts pelting the kitchen windows and lightning flashes in the night. He straightens my chair, and I sit back down, a little sheepishly.

I mean, who else is scared shitless of thunder at the age of nineteen?

Only me.

“How about you?” he shoots back.

“Yeah, well. I know I’m irresistible,” I wink at him, “but with all the running about, I haven’t been able to keep even a girlfriend, let alone a boyfriend.”

“You’re the prettiest girl on earth,” he says, and I snort, picking up my baguette. God, if I’m not careful, I might even start believing him.

“You haven’t answered my question.” I brandish my baguette at him. “You’ve only been hiding here for, what, a month?”

“A bit longer.” He rubs the back of his neck, mouth twisting. “Haven’t had a steady girlfriend since high school. I went out with girls, messed around, but it didn’t stick. I just couldn’t trust them.”

“You trusted me easily enough.”

His eyes flash at me, a brilliant blue. “That’s because you saved me from the storm.”

“You mean, from yourself.”

He smiles. “That, too.”

We’re both silent for a while, listening to the rain, with his words hanging between us, bright like stars. I don’t know what I meant, but he obviously does, and something about it is twisting my heart.

“Storm…” Another crack of thunder, and I jolt in my seat. Jesus.

“Yeah, it’s just a storm.” His eyes glint.

“And you won’t always be there to hold me.” God, I need to get my wits together.

“Come here,” he says, beckoning, and I find myself rising and walking around the table to him. He pulls me on his lap and holds me there. “We’ll get through this, together. Didn’t I say so?”

“You did,” I whisper.

“Do you trust me?”

So many objections in my mind. So many protests. “I do.”

“Good girl. I promise I’ll find a way out of this. I have a plan.”

“A plan?” I lean my head on his shoulder. Feels safe. Feels good. “And what about your accidents? Or non-accidents?”

“Let me worry about that.”

Unfair. I worry about him. I don’t want him to die, if someone is gunning for him. “Did I tell you that you’re totally nuts?”

“Many times.” He smirks a little, looking pleased with himself. I’m drowsy with my belly full and his warm arms around me, the rain drumming softly on the windowpanes. “Rest. We can talk more later. I’ll tell you everything, I promise.”

A prick of unease in my drowsy mind, and I try to pinpoint it. Everything. Tell you everything.

He hasn’t told me everything yet.

But he will, I think, he promised, and I let myself sink into sleep, trusting him to keep me safe. Which goes to prove that I’m the one who’s crazy, after all.

STORM

She’s slumped on my shoulder, her slight weight sweet in my lap, her arms loosely looped around my neck. She’s letting me in, letting me hold her, soothe her.

It wakes up every protective instinct I own. I meant what I said: I’ll fix this. I’ll tell her everything, and then I’ll make myself go back and get the money to get the mafia off her back.

She’ll know who I am the minute I tell her my given name. These days, everyone knows. My family has been in the news time and again. Deaths, accidents, scandals.

The death of my parents. My uncle taking over until I turned twenty-one. Then me, taking off to live my life my own way, cruising from state to state on his motorcycle and taking odd jobs here and there. My uncle’s death. My so-called accidents.

What should I do? Go back, sure, okay. Talk to the guys, Hawk and Rook. And then what? Visit a shrink? Nobody believes my life might be in danger.