We were so close now.
Sweat broke out all over my body, a light mist that slicked our flesh and made every touch that much more exquisite. Puck paused. I moaned, digging my fingers into his flesh, and he laughed.
Then he dropped his head and gave me a long, slow kiss.
“I like fucking my old lady,” he said, eyes taunting me. I squeezed him deep inside, payback for that little cruelty, and he laughed. “Just keep punishing me like that, babe. I’ll suffer through, somehow.”
I slapped his ass and he bucked, but it got the job done. He started moving again, long, slow strokes now. The angle was exactly right and his pelvic bone pressed hard against my clit each time, right to the point of pain.
Then he’d pull back, starting the cycle over again.
Each time I got closer, but not close enough. An eternity passed as I twisted beneath him, gasping for breath.
“Please . . .” I moaned, although I wasn’t sure who I was moaning at. Did it matter?
Then he changed his pace, pushing inside before pausing for a twist. By the second time it was all over. I blew apart with a gasp of relief, my mind clear for the first time since I’d gotten the phone call about my mom. Puck came with me, groaning and shaking as his seed pulsed into my depths.
Then he collapsed over my body.
“We should fight more often,” he managed to say after a long pause. I nodded.
“Yeah, definitely.”
“You’re still my old lady.”
“If I say yes, will you listen to me?”
“Sure.”
“I don’t want you to kill Teeny.”
Puck stilled.
“What do you mean?” he asked, his tone guarded.
“I want to kill him,” I whispered. “You have no idea how much he’s made me suffer. I need to do it, Puck. I want to see the look in his eyes right before he dies. I want him to feel as much fear as I did. Give him a taste of what he did to my mom. Then I want him to beg for mercy right up to the instant I shoot him in the head.”
Puck rolled to the side, throwing an arm across his face.
“And you called me the sociopath,” he muttered. “You got no idea what you’re talking about, Becca. It doesn’t matter how much someone deserves to die—when you take a life, you lose some of yourself, too.”
“I’m going to do it,” I told him. “Do you really think you could stop me? Sooner or later I’ll find a way if you don’t help.”
He sighed.
“Let me think about it.”
That was it. In that instant I knew I’d won. I couldn’t wait to see the look in Teeny’s eyes when I shoved the gun into his mouth.
Three thousand dollars.
He just had to get greedy.
PUCK
“Boonie, you got a minute?”
I’d found my president downstairs, arms crossed as he leaned against a cement pillar. I’d been down here enough to know it wasn’t a pleasant kind of place. This was where the Reapers took their prisoners. Some came back out. Some didn’t.
I had no idea which category Jamie Callaghan fell into and I didn’t care.
The metal door leading to one of the rooms opened, and Picnic stepped outside.
“We got a problem,” he said to Boonie. “Or at least a complication.”
“What’s that?”
“Callaghan says he’s got something on Shane McDonogh. Something big. He’s taken precautions—if he disappears, it’ll blow up in his face.”
“Kill McGraine,” Boonie said. “That should settle Jamie down.”
Pic shook his head.
“I think there’s an opportunity here,” he said. “We broker a peace between Callaghan and McDonogh, it could buy all of us the time to find a long term solution.”
“The valley can’t afford to let Callaghan live.”
“He’s just one of them,” Picnic said. “You kill him, another one will pop up in his place. Changes nothing. If we let him go now, he’s willing to shut down the Vegas Belles. Not only does that take out our competition, but it sets him back in terms of ability to siphon cash off the mine.”
“We should run it by McDonogh,” Boonie said thoughtfully. “I can see the value, but we need his buy-in.”
“Why?”
Boonie sighed, looking tired. “Because it’s about more than your fucking strip club, Reese. We’re playing a long game here and the entire valley’s at stake. I want to talk to him before we make a decision.”
“Email Malloy,” I suggested. “McDonogh’s tough to reach, but maybe they can sneak you in like they did me.”
“I don’t think I’ll blend in quite as well,” Boonie said, his voice dry. I shook my head.
“Doesn’t matter. You meet him in the woods behind his building, nobody will see you anyway. That’s where I went before. Anyone could’ve done it.”
“I’ll give it a shot.” Boonie pulled out his phone and turned it on.
“Hey, I still need a minute,” I said, wishing I didn’t have to interrupt him. “The situation with Becca. It’s serious.”
“What’s up?” Picnic asked.
“Her mom’s dead. That’s why she lost her shit earlier today. Becca’s convinced her stepdad killed her, and she’s decided to hunt him down and put a bullet in his head.”
Suddenly I had their full attention.