Wicked Man (13 page)

How long he stood there, he didn’t know, but a noise from the

front door reminded him that Abbott needed help. With that

realization, all the dead emotions he’d held trapped broke free. He

flipped off Billy’s corpse then turned away, hurrying back to Abbott.

He whipped out his cell phone and called for an ambulance. He didn’t

have to worry about any EMT reviving Billy Walker. Wick knew

death when he saw it, knew how the yellow wash to his flesh was

from the blood draining from the top of his body as gravity pulled it

down. It was all the confirmation he needed to know the asshole was

truly gone.

As Wick knelt beside Abbott, the sound of distant motorcycles

could be heard and he knew Kix was coming. It didn’t matter.

Nothing mattered except Abbott. Her skin was still red, and a rash had

started on her arm, but the sweating seemed to have subsided and she

was breathing. That’s all he cared about. Picking her back up, he

walked out the front door and waited, carefully sitting own on the

porch step to wait for help.

About twenty minutes later, the sound of an ambulance rent

the air. It was time to put the past behind them, start fresh. He’d lost a

lot when he let go of her the first time, but never again. He held his

future in his arms.

“I love you, Miss Abbott Carney,” he whispered close to her

ear. “And I’ll tell you again when you wake up. So you better wake

up, baby. Hear me?”

He kissed her forehead as he watched the ambulance, and the

other bikes, approach.

Heart hugged his aunt tightly, wishing he could stay longer,

but she had practically pushed him out the door, stating she needed

alone time with Uncle Tim’s ghost. Heart wasn’t sure if she was being

serious or not, but she was a stubborn old bat, so all he could do was

hug her back then get on his bike and cruise home.

“You be good, hear me, boy?” Aunt Terry said sternly.

“I’m always good, Aunt Terry.”

She harrumphed and slapped his shoulder. “You young boys

think you invented lyin’? I’ve done said every lie in the book, so

don’t you be tryin’ to fool me.”

He mashed his lips together in an effort not to smile. She was

a tough Missouri woman, born and raised in the same small town

where she had resided with her husband for fifty years. Terry had

been his grandfather’s sister, and had taken Heart in when his father

had decided to almost beat him to death in a drunken rage. To say she

and Uncle Tim had been his guardians was an insult to how they’d

instilled honor, integrity, and loyalty into him.

“No lies,” he said solemnly. “You know Wick doesn’t stand

for that.”

“I do,” she said with a sniff. Aunt Terry gently patted his

cheek. “I told him a long time ago to make sure you live up to your

potential. Now go on, scat. You don’t need to be babysitting some old

broad and her ghostly husband.”

“Don’t
say
that,” he muttered. “Spooks me the hell out.”

“Ah, ghosts don’t bother me none,” she said. “It’s the living

that causes more pain and suffering. Death is just going to sleep in

one world and waking up in another.”

He sighed, knowing it was time to get the hell out of there

before she pulled out the Bible and started reading scripture. Every

punishment he had in life began the same fucking way, with a lecture

from one of the Apostles. Heart raised one of her fragile hands and

kissed the knuckles.

“Love you, Aunt Terry,” he said.

“Love you more,” she replied. “I’m older.”

It was something she said to him all the time. He gave her one

last hug before turning and heading to his bike. The engine fired up,

the roar echoing through the hills as the powerful machine vibrated

with life. He gave her a last wave, flipped up the kickstand, and began

the long drive back home to the Forgotten Rebels.

Summer in the Ozarks was usually hot and humid, but the

shading provided from the tall trees helped keep him cool. He stopped

at noon, to fill up with gas and grabbed a bite to eat before continuing

his descent through the mountains. As twilight fell, he decided to stop

somewhere for the night because he didn’t like being hit with a ton of

bugs wanting to commit suicide.

The next morning, he headed out early. His shades helped

keep the sun out of his eyes. As he rounded a bend, he throttled

through the turn when suddenly a doe jumped from the underbrush

directly in his path. The doe froze, eyes wide with fear, and Heart had

nowhere to go but down.

“Fuck!” he yelled, just as he turned his front wheel too

sharply. It was either hit the stupid animal or take his chances with the

asphalt.

As he went down, his last thought was he never thought his

life would end by a fucking deer. Of all the idiotic ways to die, this

one topped the cake. His half-helmet banged on the unyielding ground

as his body flopped like a rag doll. Blissful oblivion had him escaping

the pain, and he knew no more.

Two weeks later…

Abbott sat astride Wick’s legs, completely naked, her hair

flowing loose around her face and shoulders. The position thrust her

breasts out, toward his mouth, and he eagerly accepted the invitation.

His lips and teeth took over the delicious torment, sucking on each

nipple until they stood raw and turgid.

He collected her hair in one hand and yanked her head back,

not causing pain but allowing him better access to slide up with his

tongue, taking nibbling bites along the way until his mouth met hers.

His tongue swept in to duel with hers, as if he were trying to exert

some type of dominance. But Abbott was more than happy to

surrender to such bliss.

He trailed his fingers over her hips and then across her thighs

to find the warm wetness oozing from her pussy. Abbott shuddered,

and his fingers delved deeper to find her special spot. Her hips rocked

and she could feel his hard cock sliding between her crack while his

fingers teased her clit.

His body was big, all hard muscles over smooth skin. His cock

jutted between her thighs like a steel rod. She reached behind her to

grasp it, tracing the lines and contours, learning how it responded to

her touch. She captured some of his pre-cum with a finger and

brought it to her lips. She loved how he tasted.

He reached over to the nightstand and opened the drawer to

pull out a condom and then guided her to kneel up so he could slip it

over his cock. Then he helped lower her down.

Excitement gripped her stomach as she sank down, her pussy

practically grabbing and pulling him inside. He held her still for a

moment, to allow her to adjust to his girth, before his hands moved

her hips. Back and forth, very tenderly and slowly, until her

passageway eased at his girth.

Needing to move, she rocked her hips. Wick made a moaning-

hissing noise that she took as a good sign, so she rocked her hips

again and leaned over to snip his earlobe which jump-started his hips

to pump faster. In and out they hammered each other, and Abbott

wasn’t sure if it was him out of control or her, all she knew was how

incredible it felt to be with him. His balls slapped against her ass as he

moved her faster. She gripped her pussy walls around him so tightly

there was a sucking sound as he pulled in and out.

“Ah, Chadwick,” she breathed just as her climax hit, coursing

through her body with exquisite pleasure.

“Abbott,” he gasped just as his body surged against hers,

shuddering with each spill inside her. After a moment, he relaxed

back down and pulled her sweaty body with him. She could feel both

their hearts beating frantically.

“It just keeps getting better and better,” she murmured, kissing

his chest.

“Yeah, it does.”

She took a deep breath. She needed to talk to him. See if he

found her disgusting. “I want to tell you why he hunted me.”

His hands tightened imperceptibly on her. “You know I don’t

care.”

“I care,” she said. “I need to purge the guilt.”

“You have nothing to be guilty of.”

Her stomach clenched with anxiety. “Yes, I do. A few months

after I ran away with Billy, I discovered I was pregnant.”

He flinched and her heart almost shattered.

“I couldn’t have his baby,” she whispered, feeling the shame

and dread wash over her again, like it had so many years ago. It was

an ache she probably would never be able to get rid of entirely. “He

was a monster. Doing and dealing heroin. I knew he made money

illegally, but I didn’t know about the computer hacking. Now it made

sense why he had a dozen laptops but back then I was oblivious. Lost

in my own misery. All I knew is that I couldn’t be a mother to a child

I would end up resenting because he or she would tie me to him. So I

made an appointment at a clinic and I … I aborted it.”

She took a deep breath. She wouldn’t cry because she’d cried

buckets years ago, when she lay in the stirrups and knew she was

making such a monumental decision to end the life a baby. All the

pro-lifers had it dead wrong. It wasn’t an easy outlet for her mistake, a

quick way to fix a problem. She had died a little that day, and any

lingering innocence had been stripped away. She had left that clinic

with a broken heart.

“What do you think of me, Chadwick? Do you think I’m a

horrible person?”

“For what?” He snorted. “Deciding not propagate that

asshole’s DNA?”

“I killed a child,” she said again, and this time, she couldn’t

stop the soul wrenching shiver.

His fingers buried in her hair and he gripped it firmly,

bringing her face up to his so he could kiss her deeply. When his lips

left hers, he shook his head.

“You
aborted
a fetus, not a child.”

“Semantics.”

He covered her lips with a finger, silencing her words.

“You’re a good person, Abbott. Never doubt that. Don’t let

him take anymore away from you than he has. Don’t give him any

more power. You are
not
a killer. Sometimes good people have to do harsh things, but it doesn’t label you a bad person. Understand?”

“I’m trying,” she said.

“What you did, you had to do to survive. Given the choice I

would’ve preferred to slice Billy Walker apart, inch by inch, and I

would’ve enjoyed doing it.” He shook his head. “I’ll do anything to

protect you. I’ll kill, I’ll lie, and I’ll steal. I didn’t fight for you eleven years ago, but there’s nothing I wouldn’t do to keep you now. I love

you so damn much, Abbott. I don’t care about the choices you made

in the past, all I care about is a future with you because I can’t live

without you.”

The vacuum holding her hostage finally broke and tears

flooded her eyes. So much time wasted. So much pain and suffering.

Deep down she knew Chadwick was right. She
wasn’t
a killer, but it was going to take a lot of healing to get past what she’d done. Being

on the run hadn’t allowed her time to grieve.

One thing was certain, though, was that the world was a

brighter place without Billy Walker there to darken it.

Wiping her cheeks, she hurried off the bed to her backpack,

searching inside for the little box she’d been carrying around for

years. In a separate zipper compartment, she found what she was

looking for. The paper had long since fallen off, but she had salvaged

the long faded bow and had super glued it on the plain box.

She held it out to him. “It was your Christmas present, that

day.”

“Oh, Abbott,” he said as he took it.

She held her breath as he opened it and stared at what lay in

the center of the white tissue.

He reached for it and held up a gold ring. “Were you going to

ask me to marry you?”

“Back then it was more of a promise ring,” she murmured.

“But yeah. The meaning was the same.”

He held it out to her. “Put it on me.”

With trembling fingers, she took it. He held up his left hand.

When she went to slide it on, he halted her.

“Ask me.”

She licked her lips and stared him in the eyes. “Will you …

ah, will you marry me, Chadwick Edwards?”

“You bet your sweet ass I will.”

She laughed and slid the ring on. Then he linked their fingers

and kissed her knuckles.

“I fucking love you, Abbott. I always have and I always will.”

“I love you too,” she said softly. “I’m yours, Chadwick. Now.

Always.”

He smacked her ass playfully. “You better believe it. My old

lady. And I’m going to take proper care of you for the rest of our

lives.”

“Promise?”

“Oh, it’s a promise.” He cupped her pussy. “I’m going to

make this pussy purr.”

And he did exactly that.

The End

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