ELEVEN
Harper
If she had any other choice, Harper would have told Cain to take a long walk on a short pier.
She was out of options, and fear prevented her from hoping he’d do nothing.
He’d forced a marriage on her, so he was deadly serious about hurting her family.
“Can we cut the witty banter? It’s late, and I’d like to sleep sometime tonight.” She lied. There was no sleeping for her for the foreseeable. She was making caffeine her entire personality.
“Why are you up so late? Have you been thinking about me?” he rolled the words seductively.
Having two brothers and countless blood-related and non-blood cousins, Harper was well-versed in throwing jibes back and forth.
With Cain, she felt like she’d never win.
The monster would always have her in his chokehold of control.
So she didn’t bother telling him to go to hell.
“That’s why I’m calling, isn’t it?”
“Good girl.” He rumbled.
She was no one’s good girl, but she had to bite her tongue to let him have that one.
“So, you want my body?”
“I want nothing of yours. I’d prefer that we’d never met and you go far away, possibly to poor little Pluto, but you’ve put me in an impossible corner, so I’m working with what I have to ensure the safety of my family.”
“Because you want my body.” He rasped. Once more, Harper bit the inside of her cheek to stop from going berserk.
The man was an impossible psychopath with the emotional range of a clown fish.
Could he even be reasoned with, or was it always going to be his way or no way?
She’d never met a man who couldn’t be flirted with. Would it work on him now if she changed tactics? And could she keep the contents of her stomach by flirting with him?
She heard a noise like a car door slamming shut.
“Right, I’ve stepped outside, so it’s only you and I, Harper. Now, please tell me what you want to do to my body. I’m listening, and don’t leave a delicious detail out.”
“I’m not having this conversation with you, Cain. If you won’t take it seriously, then there’s no point talking.”
“You’re giving me your sweet as fuck body to play with. If you can’t talk about sex, how do I know you’re going to stick to your end of the bargain and enjoy every filthy, deplorable thing I do to you, hm? My wife should know how to turn me on verbally. Just like I want to make you dripping wet from a few choice whispered words in your ear.”
Harper swallowed hard.
How could it be that it would be an appalling man like Cain fucking Emerson giving her all these firsts?
Her first marriage.
And the first time a man talked dirty to her about sex.
She sighed and thumbed into her eye socket.
“I can fake it as well as your last forced wives, I’m sure.” She sassed and heard him laughing low and husky.
“You’re my first and only wife, little girl. But there won’t be any faking it. That’s a hard limit.”
“I didn’t know a man like you had hard limits.”
“Where your screaming orgasms are concerned, there is.”
Oh, god. There was a fluttering low in her belly, and she hated the sensation as she pressed her hand there to will it away. It was probably indigestion, too much nervous energy swirling through her gut, or she’d developed a tapeworm.
It was not lust.
She refused even to entertain the idea that once upon a time, she liked him and wanted to know him better.
Considering that now he was her mortal enemy, she’d continue to look for ways to take him down.
And would not think about him going down on her with epic orgasms.
She stayed silent, and so did Cain.
But he outlasted her because she huffed.
“Well? Is it a deal? You’ll leave my family alone?”
He became serious suddenly. When he once had been all flirtatious only recently, he was now the hard, unfeeling man he’d shown himself to be. A dark warning in his tone.
“You need to think about what you’re saying, Harper. Because once you sign on that dotted line.”
Wait a second, roll back the tape. Did Cain mean a sex contract?
She went wide-eyed.
But he continued to speak.
“You’ll be mine to fuck when I want to fuck you. And the first time I think you’re faking it with me or going through the motions, the deal would be off. You either give me all of you or none of you. This isn’t a light decision when you’re alone and scared in the middle of the night. Give it some deep thought, Harper. We’ll talk again soon. Now, I have to go and be the bad guy.” He chuckled, and the bastard hung up on her.
How could he be reasonable and threatening at the same time?
Letting out all the air in her lungs, she sank into the cushions, pulling a throw blanket over her legs as she reached for the remote and put on a comfort show. Unsolved Murders.
For the next fifty-five minutes, she imagined the unsolved murder on the screen was Cain’s.
And she smiled the whole time.
* * *
It was four of the longest days of her life waiting for that man to call her back.
She didn’t want to sleep with him.
He was lucky he hadn’t been struck by the ugly stick—he always smelled incredible—but now his bogus charm had mutated into something toxic, and she wasn’t about to crawl beneath his sheets with any show of enjoyment. Her decision, however, remained unchanged from four long, relentless nights ago.
She’d give him her body as many times as he wanted it, but only if he gave her absolute assurances that he’d drop this bullshit vendetta for good.
There was a lawyer in the family, but there was no way she could go to Angela for legal advice.
Did people draw up sex contracts?
But then she realized if he went back on his promise, and the unthinkable happened, and he murdered them, she wouldn’t be in any condition to take legal action against Cain.
Maybe he was sinister enough to have considered this loophole and was silently laughing at her gullibility.
Cain called at the worst possible time.
On her hip, she rhythmically bounced the baby, hoping that the movement would quiet his distressed wails.
Unknown lit up her phone, and she nearly let go of her reflexes and dropped the kid.
“Shit.” she greeted, afraid if she didn’t answer, it would be the only time he’d call.
“Hello to you too, sweet baby.” He chuckled.
“I nearly dropped a baby.” She said, securing the wriggling cutie-pie more firmly on her hip as he played with her dangling earrings, offering her a one-tooth, gummy smile.
“Whose baby?” he growled.
“That’s none of your business. You took your sweet time calling. I don’t have time to sit around waiting.”
“Did you miss me?”
Escaping the curious onlookers, Harper retreated to a back room, typically used for children’s naps. Closing the door, she plopped them on a couch.
She ignored Cain’s ridiculous question. Just because she’d had him in her brain twenty-four-seven didn’t mean she’d missed him.
If by missing him he meant she’d envisioned four thousand different ways to kill him, then yes, she’d missed him horribly.
“I want it in writing and witnessed by someone who isn’t your sycophant sidekick that you’ll drop this revenge plan.” She stated, businesslike, while her heart rat-a-tat-tatted out of her chest. Thank god for the sweet bundle sitting on her lap, happily playing with her jewelry, or Harper might have gone into shock at the deal she was making with the devil.
“I’ll have it sent to you,” he said instantly, as if it was no big deal for him to lay his hands on a legal contract.
Who on earth was this man?
He exuded power and was capable of anything, that much she knew.
And his threats carried so much weight she felt ladened down by his disturbance.
In any other lifetime, she would have loved being around a man like that, but in this lifetime, she would hate Cain with her whole being until her last breath.
“Right. Okay.” She replied, for lack of anything else to say.
It was a done deal.
Then why didn’t she feel relieved to know she’d protected her loved ones?
But she knew why.
She couldn’t trust Cain.
Just because he agreed didn’t mean he’d keep to his word.
And that was the worst worry of all.
He was unpredictable.
Like an unpinned grenade.
“It’s good to do business with you, wife. I wish we could sit and filthy chat, get you nice and warmed up for when I see you next, but I’m chasing a sonuvabitch around Buffalo, and I’m about to stomp on his head. You be a good girl, and I’ll be seeing you.”
Once more, Cain hung up without ceremony, leaving Harper feeling unmoored in her skin.
She kissed the baby’s head as he rolled into her chest, sucking on his fist, ready for sleepy time. She’d take him back to his mom in a minute, but right then, she sank into the couch and laid her head back.
What had she done?
She’d not only climbed into bed with the devil, she was giving him her soul.
And for what she knew already about Cain, he wasn’t a man who would nibble her soul. He would bite it down to crumbs and leave her with nothing.
Her mind was dazed, and she slipped out of the room. Not noticing Knox until they were mere inches from crashing into each other. He caught her by the top of her arms, his brow folding in, staring at her.
“Look where you’re going,” he chastised.
“Sorry. Where are you off to?”
“I’m going out back to the shooting range.”
Perfect. “Wait until I drop this monster off with his mom, and I’ll come with you.”
She’d been no higher than her dad’s knees when she first went to the range with him. And she was sixteen when Preacher had taught all the Marinos kids how to treat a gun with respect.
They spent the next hour shooting at targets, wearing matching eye goggles and earbuds.
Each target pinned to a board feet away she pictured was Cain’s head.
She threw her head back, laughing as Knox whistled through his teeth, sending her a grinning glance.
“Never let me get on your bad side, Harp. You’ve been in a weird mood for days. Did you channel it into those bullets?”
She only smiled and blew the end of the gun, securing it by flipping on the safety. She emptied the chamber of the last remaining bullets and tossed them into the bucket for them to be disposed of safely. They then went around collecting the shells to dump those, too.
“Even seeing how skilled I am doesn’t stop you from running your mouth, does it, Alpha?” she teased as they walked back into the clubhouse. Motivated by the future prez mantel, her brother worked tirelessly, determined to prove himself capable and not a reckless leader. When he wasn’t working in the garage, he was busting his butt to learn everything he could about the mechanics of how an MC was run.
“I’m not afraid of you, shorty. Your mouth runs a good game that your miniature legs can’t back up. You’d never catch me,” he boasted. The mouthy shit was tall as a tree, and he was probably right.
Harper got her pint-size from their mom.
Speaking of, there she was as they entered the central area, and Harper had the overwhelming emotional urge to fall into her mom’s arms and have Zara Marinos make everything better.
So that’s what she did.
Though her parents were chatting, Harper just slid in and poured herself into her mom, who instantly latched her arms around Harper.
“Aw, my baby girl.” She cooed, kissing Harper’s head. “Where have my babies been?”
No matter their age, they’d always be Zara’s babies.
“Harps was busting my butt on the gun range. We missed a step with her, Dad. We should have sent her to sniper school. There’s still time. I’ll pack a bag for her now.” He smirked, and Harper stuck her tongue out at her brother.
“That’s my girl.” Smiled Rider, pride in his blue eyes. And then, with a more serious tone, he said to Knox. “I need you on the Rover site. Someone broke in and destroyed the shipment.”
“Fuck,” spat Knox.
“Take Seb with you and check in with Grinder. He’s over that way with Dax.”
“Will do.” Agreed Knox, kissing the top of their mom’s head, already in club brother mode as he grabbed his leather jacket and strode out toward his bike.
“That’s the third time this month, isn’t it?” Zara said, and Rider, tight-lipped, nodded, annoyed.
“Some little punk is trying to mess up the construction over there.”
Harper uncurled herself from her mom’s arms, listening to their conversation back and forth, discussing how an unknown had been causing trouble on their construction sites.
She got a sinking pit in her stomach and wrapped her arms around herself, holding her elbows. Overwhelmed by the suspicion that Cain was the culprit behind the club’s financial problems, she felt paralyzed, unable to reveal her suspicions without exposing the reason.
Later that night, a messenger on a scooter delivered the contract to her apartment door in an official document. Cain had already signed it alongside two witnesses and his lawyer.
The psycho was efficient.
When did he have the time to do this if he was chasing a criminal in Buffalo?
Reading it twice, she couldn’t tell how binding it was without having her lawyer look it over, and she wasn’t giving it to Angela. Not when it stated how Cain would drop all threats to her family for as long as she was in his bed, and he was satisfied. It said that in black and white. The dick. Seething, red-faced, she grabbed a black pen from the kitchen drawer, scribbled her name, placed it back in the brown envelope, and then tossed it into her bedroom safe.
It was done.
She’d sold her soul.
And worse. Her body.
She belonged entirely to Cain now.
And all that was left to do was wait for when he was ready to collect.