Chapter Thirteen – Sasha
I watched from the other side of the club, as that guy circled around the bar and tried to catch Jo’s attention once more. My hands curled into fists at my sides – shit, he was really, really, starting to piss me off.
Ever since the conversation I’d had with Jo the other day, I’d felt even more protective of her than I had before, and seeing this guy try to force himself into her line of sight at every opportunity was getting under my skin. Especially since Jo couldn’t have been making it more clear that she wanted him gone. It was the same guy from the other night – I wasn’t even sure how he had managed to get in, given that I had told the guys on the door to keep an eye out for him, but here he was, prowling for Jo’s attention once more, and I could see how much it was getting to her.
I had been busy handling a few other issues throughout the night, but now, she was the only thing I could pay attention to, and I would be damned if I just stood back and let this guy run the show. He hadn’t done anything wrong exactly, not yet, but that didn’t mean that he didn’t intend to – I could see it written all over his face, how much he wanted to close the distance between himself and Jo, and she was doing her best to duck his attention as she tried to keep on top of her work for the night.
It was busy at the Flood that evening, packed out with people, but she was the only one I could pay any attention to. After how kind she had been to me about our conversation the other day, I felt as though I owed her my care and protection; I was hyper-attuned to everything that was going on with her, and I didn’t want her to think that I was going to turn my back on her and leave her to deal with this all alone.
I pushed my way over to the bar, but, by the time I got there, the guy who had been giving her hassle had already backed off. Jo grimaced at me, as though she already knew what I was doing here.
”You okay?” I asked her, and she nodded.
”I think so,” she replied. ”He’s just...he’s not going as hard as he did the other night. I’m more worried about what he’s going to try and pull when I get off my shift...”
Her voice trailed off, trembling slightly, and I wondered how many times she’d had to put up with assholes like that imposing themselves on her when she was just trying to get home at the end of a long shift. These assholes, they thought that because a woman was kind to them for an evening because she had no choice – because she was stuck behind a bar and couldn’t go anywhere else – they were just gagging to get closer to them.
”Wait for me before you leave,” I told her. ”I’ll walk you home.”
”Oh, you don’t have to do that-”
”I want to,” I told her firmly. ”What time do you get off...?”
In the following hour or two, I kept close to the bar, doing everything I could to move that guy along, but he bristled every time I got close to him – and, at least, seemed to accept that he needed to keep his distance from her. Though he tried to engage her in conversation, I knew I couldn’t kick him out for that, it would look bad, and raise questions for the rest of the patrons; no, the best I could do was protect her from him when her shift was done, a question he seemed determined to know the answer to, judging by the way he was peppering it into the conversation.
Finally, she seemed to breathe a sigh of relief as she slipped into the back staffroom, and, sure enough, the guy hurried outside the club – did he know about the back entrance, the one the staff used to come and go? Had he been staking this place out just to better his chances of getting her alone? Fucking creep...
I stepped into the staffroom just as Jo was slipping on her coat, and she pulled a face at me.
”You don’t have to worry about me,” she told me. ”I’ve handled worse than him. He just needs me to tell him how it is, then he’ll leave me alone...”
I shook my head.
”I’m walking you home,” I replied firmly. ”At least some of the way. If he sees me with you, he’s not going to try any shit.”
”You’re not going to take no for an answer on this, are you?” she asked me, smiling slightly. I shook my head.
”I’m not,” I replied. ”I’m not putting your safety at risk, I don’t care how harmless he seems.”
She lowered her eyes down for a moment, as though she wasn’t used to this kind of care and attention.
”Thanks, Sasha,” she murmured to me, and I shrugged.
”You don’t have to thank me,” I replied. ”I’m just doing my job.”
”I thought your job was keeping the Flood safe,” she pointed out. ”Not the people who work here.”
”You’re not getting out of this,” I fired back at her, and she laughed.
”I’m not trying to,” she assured me. ”Come on, I want to get home, I have to let the sitter off-”
As soon as those words came out of her mouth, she seemed to stop dead in her tracks. She glanced over at me, and I cocked an eyebrow.
”The sitter?” I asked her. She nodded.
”I...uh, yeah,” she blurted out. ”I have a babysitter. To look after my daughter.”
”You never mentioned that you had a daughter,” I replied calmly. It didn’t bother me, but it seemed odd she would have kept something like that from me.
”I know,” she admitted. ”I don’t talk about her a lot at work, what with...well, knowing what kind of stuff most of you are involved in.”
”You think we would be a threat to her?” I asked, surprised, and she shook her head.
”No, nothing like that,” she replied. ”Well, not you, anyway.”
I grinned. That was the best I could hope for. After what I had shared with her, what I had let her see about me, I was just glad that she didn’t view me on the same level as everyone else in here.
She pushed open the door and stepped outside – and, as I followed her, my jaw tensed when I saw that guy hanging out and waiting for her.
”Jo, it’s so good to-” he began, but then, his eyes roved towards me, and he stopped dead in his tracks.
”You should go,” I told him, taking a step towards him. He stared at me for a moment, as though considering if there was any point trying to push through this – but then, he seemed to think better of it. He muttered something to himself, and then took off down the alleyway and out to the other side, leaving her be.
”Oh, thank fuck,” Jo sighed, clasping a hand to her chest. ”I don’t think I realized how much he was bothering me until you said something.”
”You have to deal with that a lot?” I asked her. She nodded, and started to walk – I followed her, keeping pace with her, glad to have some time with her outside of the confines of the club. It was quieter here, and more intimate, somehow – my mind briefly flashed back to the image of her and Avda in the car, and I brushed it off. I wasn’t meant to know about that. I wasn’t going to bring it up, I knew she would have freaked if she found out I had seen her like that, even if the sight of it had well and truly burned itself into my brain.
”Yeah, guys get it into their heads that just because I’m polite to them, I’m into them,” she explained, shaking her head. ”Drives me crazy. It’s so common, every girl I know who’s done bartending in New Ruska has had at least a few of them.”
”That’s crazy,” I muttered. I wondered how many of them had had to make their way home, shooting looks over the shoulders, worried that they were being stalked by someone who wanted nothing more than to get them on their own.
”Yeah, it’s way too normal,” she agreed, slipping her hands into her pockets. ”I hate to think about what it’s going to be like for Kyra, when she grows up...”
”Kyra?”
”My daughter,” she replied, her lips curling up into a proud smile when she spoke her name. It was obvious how much she adored her, just from the way she reacted when her daughter came up; hearing her speak like that about her, made me happy. I hadn’t had the easiest time with my own family, with my mother and my sister, and sometimes, I wondered if it would have been easier for them if I had just kept my distance, but I tried not to let it get to me.
”How old is she?” I wondered.
”She’s just about to turn six,” she gushed. ”I have a whole basketball-themed party planned for her...”
”Oh, she likes basketball?”
”She’s obsessed with it,” she replied, shaking her head fondly. ”I don’t think there’s anything in the world she would rather do than go out and shoot some hoops.”
”She’s five, how the hell does she reach them?” I laughed, and she shrugged.
”Hey, she’s got a strong arm on her, what can I say?” she remarked.
”You still with her father?” I asked, doing my best to keep my voice casual, though I was sure she would be able to see right through it.
”It’s...kind of complicated,” she replied. ”I guess...no. He’s not really been a big part of her life until now.”
”I bet you don’t even need him around,” I remarked. ”You’re a great mom, I can tell.”
She shot a look at me out of the corner of her eye.
”You only just found out I have a daughter,” she pointed out, laughing.
”Yeah, but you’re so sweet,” I replied. ”And so accepting. I don’t think there are many things your daughter could tell you that you wouldn’t support, that’s not the case for a lot of people, you know...”
”You sound like you’re talking from experience,” she remarked, as we turned the corner onto a quiet street.
”Maybe in some ways,” I admitted. I was surprising myself with how vulnerable I felt I could be with this woman; normally, I would have done everything in my power to cover up those parts of me that were vulnerable, those parts of me that might have been too much for her to take in, but I knew she wasn’t going to try and turn around and use them against me. I knew she wasn’t that kind of person. And the way I felt safe around her, so sure I could trust her...yeah, it was pulling things out of me I would never have thought to share.
”You know you can talk to me about that, right?” she remarked, and I turned to her.
”You’re always so accepting,” I told her. ”Your daughter’s really lucky to have that kind of trait in a parent...”
She shrugged, shaking her head.
”Shit, I figured that the best way to go about raising her was to do the direct opposite of everything my parents did with me,” she replied, laughing slightly.
”Oh, they weren’t...?”
”They kicked me out when they found out I was pregnant,” she replied, her voice dropping. ”I...I came to them looking for support, but they just treated me like this whore, like this slut who they couldn’t have associated with the family. I always knew they were old-fashioned, but I didn’t figure it went as deep as that...”
”That’s fucked,” I muttered. ”They didn’t try to support you? Or your daughter?”
”They didn’t want anything to do with us after I told them I was keeping the baby,” she replied. ”And even if I hadn’t...I don’t think I would have been able to repair that relationship, you know? I had seen something in them that I’d never expected to see, and you can’t just go back on that. You can’t just pretend like you don’t notice it. The kind of people who would be willing to do that to me when I needed them most, they’re not the kind of people I want near me or my daughter anyway.”
”See, I told you,” I pointed out. ”Good Mom. I knew it.”
She giggled.
”I try,” she replied, and she turned another corner and came to a halt.
”Well, this is my street,” she remarked, glancing around at me. ”Thanks for walking me back. And getting rid of that guy. I feel better now I know he’s not going to try anything.”
”You’re welcome,” I replied. ”You ever need help with something like that again, you tell me, okay?”
She looked up at me through her lashes. I could see something in her eyes – maybe just the reflection of the streetlights around us, or maybe, just maybe, something else. Something more demanding, something more pressing, something that seemed to nag at the back of my mind.
”I will,” she murmured. ”Would you mind walking me to my door? Just in case, I mean...”
”Sure,” I agreed, and, as we walked, I felt her fingers skim briefly against mine – was that deliberate? I didn’t want to overstep any lines here, but there was a part of me, a part of me I couldn’t ignore, that felt a tingle run up my arm at the sensation of her touch.
I reached for her again, my hand sliding against hers, and she spread her fingers so I could wrap mine around her – neither of us said anything, but I could see her smiling out of the corner of my eye. Fuck, I knew this was a bad idea, and yet, I couldn’t seem to pull my hand away – I couldn’t seem to let go of her, to ease up on touching her.
She paused outside the door to her apartment building, and turned to face me – there it was again, that look in her eyes, that look that told me how much was going on inside her head.
”You okay?” I murmured, as I shifted to face her properly – our bodies were just a few inches apart, her hand still wound around mine, still holding on to me.
”I don’t think I’m ready for you to go yet,” she breathed. And, all at once, her gaze shifted down to my lips – and I knew what she was thinking. I knew what she needed.
And, right now, it was exactly what I needed, too.
Slowly, I lifted a hand to her cheek, cupping it there for a moment before I closed the distance between us and planted a kiss on her mouth. A soft one, gentle, not pushing things any further than they needed to go – I wanted her to take the lead here, her to tell me just what she needed, because I wasn’t going to hurry this along. When I pulled back, I stared down at her, and she looked back at me steadily – and then, all at once, moved into me again, and kissed me properly.
I couldn’t hold back, All the want I had been feeling for her all this time rising up to get the better of me. I grabbed her waist and pulled her into me, parting her lips with my tongue and kissing her hard, not caring who in this quiet street might have seen us – how could I care, when she felt as good as this, when her touch seemed to light me up in ways nothing else did? I couldn’t think straight. I couldn’t even come close. I ached for her, needed her, needed to feel her close to me, more than anything in the world, and nothing was going to come close to sating me until I had.
She pushed the door to the apartment building open and the two of us tumbled inside of it together, hands all over each other, grabbing for one another as though we couldn’t get enough. I knew this was risky, and I knew I really should have known better than to get in on Avda’s woman, but I didn’t care in that moment. I couldn’t care. I couldn’t give a damn about anything other than the feel of her hands pushing beneath my skirt, skimming over my lower back, her fingernails dragging against my skin.
I lifted her from the ground and pressed her back against the closed door behind us – the small windows in it that looked out onto the street outside seemed to try and warn me that things could so easily go wrong, we could so easily be caught, if we weren’t careful, but how could I care about any of that? How could I care about anything but her right now?
”Fuck,” she gasped against my mouth, as she hooked her legs around me. I could already feel myself stirring against her, my body demanding more. My mind was filled with images of her and Avda together, of the look on her face when she had reached her release, and how much I wanted to push her into that pleasure herself – nothing would satisfy me like seeing her give in to the way I could make her feel, watching her go over the edge and into that release she needed so badly.
I pushed her skirt up over her hips and reached between her legs, tearing her panties off and stuffing them into my pocket – couldn”t leave them on the ground where someone might find them, no, I knew we had to be a little more careful than that.
”You want me to fuck you?” I asked her, and she nodded, pressing her forehead to mine, hands on my shoulders, fingers digging into my skin. Her eyes were blazing with want, flecks of gold spattered about in that deep green that I could see now I was this close to her.
I unzipped my pants, sliding a hand beneath her ass to keep her up, and took it into my hand. I wanted her to feel me, and I wanted to take in the look on her face as I slipped all the way inside of her for the first time. Nothing else would satisfy me. I gazed at her as I planted myself at her entrance and then, finally, I began to push myself into her.
I fed my cock into her for the first time, and watched as her face reflected the sensation - her jaw slackening, her eyes half-lidded, her body trembling as she tightened her grip around me, pulling me in even deeper. Her ankles were hooked behind my back, drawing me in, drawing me close, like she couldn’t imagine anything better than this – couldn”t imagine anything she wanted more.
”How does it feel?” I asked her, brushing my lips against hers as I held myself there inside of her, pushed into her up to the hilt.
”It feels...” she breathed, and then swallowed hard, like she needed a moment to gather herself. ”It feels so fucking good...”
That was all I needed to hear. I began to move into her properly, taking her in long, deep strokes, knowing that we didn’t have much time before we risked someone walking in on us like this. If I wanted her, I had to take her now, before we were busted in the act – and, fuck, no matter how stupid and reckless it might have been, it just made me want her more.
I kissed her hard as I fucked her, my tongue in her mouth, her teeth catching on my lip, as she slid her hands up to my hair, fingers pressed against my scalp. We were breathing in each other”s breath, gorging ourselves on one another, unable to get enough, unable to even come close to imagining getting enough – Ididn’t care what kind of trouble it might have landed us in, this need between us was too intense to deny, and I wasn’t going to let anything get in the way of it.
I pressed myself against her, driving myself into her as deep as I could go, and she rocked her hips back against me, taking as much of me as she could with every thrust. I could tell she was getting close, could feel her thighs starting to twitch against me, and I wanted to see her go over the edge – no, I craved it, from someplace deep down inside of me, I craved it like nothing else in the world.
And, all at once, I felt it – the unmistakable sensation of her body convulsing around mine, of her pussy tensing against me, squeezing me tight, like every part of her was trying to pull me in close. I pushed in deep one last time and held myself there, letting her feel me filling her as she came, but it didn’t take long till the sensations pushed me over the edge, too.
I could feel her breath, shaky and helpless, against my mouth, both of us doing all we could to keep our voices down and keep the neighbors from being alerted as to what was going on here – all it would have taken was one of them opening their door, and I would have been caught, pushed deep inside of her, filling her with my seed, right then and there.
But I couldn’t care less, as the pleasure crested and broke inside of me, long, deep waves of it coursing through my entire system. I knew I had just made things a whole lot more complicated between me and her – and me and Avda, for that matter – but when it felt this good, I couldn’t have cared less.