Kristen Ashley - Own the Wind

“I get you, honey.”

He squeezed my hand, released the pressure and murmured, “Good.”

I looked to the windshield.

Shy drove in silence.

Then he broke it by declaring, “Settled. Three kids and a big shindig.”

“Settled,” I whispered.

“We’re not doin’ any of that ring-shoppin’-together bullshit. I’ll take care of you and you get the question and the time it’s asked as a surprise.”

I liked that. Something to look forward to.

All of it.

“Okay,” I agreed.

“Though I know the answer,” he went on, his voice soft but there was a smile in it.

“Yeah.”

He knew the answer. He so totally did.

“Yeah,” he repeated.

We went quiet.

Time passed, we hit Denver and I called, “Shy?”

“Right here, sugar.”

“Love you.”

He lifted my hand, touched his lips to my fingers, and then dropped my hand to his thigh.

Then he drove us home in silence.

There it was.

He loved me too.

Stuck with Me

Early the next morning…

I heard my cell ringing, my eyes blinked open as I felt Shy’s hand on my behind give a reflexive squeeze.

I sleepily noticed it was still dark.

My cell kept ringing and Shy growled, “What the fuck? Who’s callin’ at three in the fuckin’ morning?”

I didn’t know but to find out, I had to get my cell, and I also had to get my cell because any call at three in the morning was a call you had to take. Unfortunately, this meant I had to roll off him and away, which I did, reaching toward the nightstand. He rolled with me so his front was pressed to my side, his thigh between my legs. I grabbed my phone, looked groggily at the display, and, at what I saw, sleep left me completely.

I slid my finger on the screen and put it to my ear.

“Natalie,” I greeted.

It was the first time I’d heard from her since we had our big fight.

“Tabby,” she replied, her voice small, scared, a way she never sounded and it sent shivers crawling over my skin. “I’m in trouble.”

Oh no.

I knew Shy felt my panic because I was no longer holding my phone to my ear. Shy had taken my phone and he was pressed into me in order to reach out and switch on the light.

I winced in the sudden brightness as Shy spoke.

“You got Shy. What’s goin’ on?” he said into the phone.

I blinked to adjust my eyes then stared at his face which was scary hard.

“Right, where are you?” he asked and his tone sent my hand shooting up to curl around his jaw. His eyes came to me, they were scary hard too, and I held my breath. He kept talking. “How many are there with you?”

Oh no.

No!

“Firepower?” he asked.

Firepower? God!

“Okay, hang tight,” Shy ordered as he rolled over me and got to his feet. I rolled to my side as he kept ordering. “Do not say anything stupid. Do not do anything stupid. But stall ’em. I’m makin’ the calls, the brothers are rollin’ out. It could be thirty, it’ll probably be forty-five.”

I swung my legs over the side of the bed and searched the floor frantically for my nightie even as Shy wound things up with Natalie.

“Woman, hear me. This phone is comin’ with me so you can’t call and freak Tab any more than she’s already freaked. Be smart, for fuckin’ once in your life. I’m takin’ care of your shit once. This is the only chance you get. Don’t blow it now and know you won’t get the chance to blow it later. You fuck up again, even somethin’ not this big, you’re done for Tabby. Hear me?”

This big?

She must have heard him for he touched his thumb to my screen and commenced dressing.

I had my nightie on, and since he didn’t say anything to me, just started tugging on clothes, I called, “Uh… hello? Freaking out here, Shy.”

He looked at me and did the worst thing he could do at that moment.

He took two long strides to me, lifted his hands and cupped my jaws, one hand still holding my phone. Then he dipped his face so he was all I could see.

Okay, I knew this was serious.

Now I knew it was serious .

“She’s hit bottom, and I’m seein’ from your girl that when she does somethin’, she goes big,” he explained.

“Wh… what? What’s she done?” I stammered.

“Not a lot of time. You need to get dressed and to the Compound, which is where I’ll be takin’ her after I get her ass. It’s also the safest place for you if there’s blowback.”

Blowback ! I freaking hated that word.

“Shy—”

He cut me off to lay it out for me. “She got in deep with a dealer. She owes him big. He’s takin’ his money back from her in pussy and when I say that I mean, her eating it, hers getting fucked, and all of this happening on camera. She’s right now dolled up and ready to give her first performance on a porno set.”

“They film pornos in Denver at three in the morning?” I breathed stupidly, focusing on that rather than the fact my best friend was preparing to make her film debut and not in a good way, and Shy stared at me.

Then he said, “Babe, pisses me off fuckin’ more than I am already that you didn’t know that and now you do. This bitch of yours, she’s not teachin’ you any more of these lessons. She shared with me she doesn’t feel like girl on girl or takin’ cock from a guy she doesn’t know and havin’ all that on film. She wants an extraction which means, she’s your girl, she gets one.” His hands pressed gently into my jaws as he emphasized, “ One , Tab. I know these assholes, and Chaos is gonna buy a shitload of trouble for intervening.”

Suddenly, I had scores of worries and one was my mind suddenly dredging up the word firepower .

“What do you mean, Chaos is gonna buy trouble?” I asked but I knew.

Crap, I knew.

I was going to kill Natalie.

“That, I’m not gonna take the time to explain,” he replied, yanked me to him, kissed the top of my hair, let me go, turned, nabbed his boots, his tee, and prowled out the bedroom door.

I stared at the opened door. In order not to focus on the matter at hand which had my heart racing, I took in something that never failed to calm me.

I looked around our bedroom, taking in our new kick-ass bedroom furniture (my old stuff was in the guest room, Shy’s stuff was at the dump).

I loved our room. I’d gotten inspired. It was totally biker meets biker babe from birth. Black furniture. Deep purple sheets. Chrome accents. A black-and-white picture of me and Shy on his bike, taking off from the Compound, my arms around him, my chin to his shoulder, Shy looking badass cool in mirrored shades.

Sheila had taken that picture and I’d had it blown up to nearly poster size, framed in a black-and-chrome frame and it was hanging over the dresser. It might seem conceited to have a big poster of us looking awesome cool on our bedroom wall but I didn’t care. I thought it was the bomb.

Shy did too. I’d kept him away as I was doing up the room and when I unveiled it, he’d shown me he loved the whole thing by starting a marathon session that began on our purple sheets, moved to the floor and ended on that dresser. There was a handprint on the glass of that poster, mine, put there when my hand flew back to steady me as Shy gave me an orgasm. I didn’t have it in me to get out the Windex. I wanted to remember giving Shy a room he liked that much for a good long while. That handprint might stay there forever.

The last touch to the room was a wonky ball of pressed-together Christmas candy wrappers that I’d had put in one of those cases where you normally display signed baseballs. They were the wrappers Shy had cleaned up after my Hitchcock marathon right before what was not officially but still was (kind of) our first date. I’d found that ball of wrappers and saved it. I’d buried the reasons why in my pit of denial but I’d kept it and then had it mounted when we moved into our house. It was sitting on my nightstand.