Page 9 of Dark Surrender

Something’s always been off in our relationship. That’s never gonna change. But, yeah, sure, I’ve been… I don’t know what. Watching a lineup of women murdered execution-style, with no power to help them, bothers the fuck outta me. Sure, I’ve always lived my nomadic biker life rubbing elbows with powerful men who lost their conscience along the way. Which happens more than you think in these circles. With money comes power, which feeds corruption and the endless, glutinous cycle of the need for more, more, more.

Now, I’m more than just a visitor in enemy territory. I’m in so goddamn deep with an organ trafficking piece of shit that I don’t know how I’ll ever get out. When I agreed to marry Penelope all those years ago, I knew the day might come when I’d be sucked into the life. No longer a man pretending to be something I’m not, by brokering art deals or whatever else they needed for rich douchebags just so I can get a foothold in their world. Now I’m becoming the very person I’ve always hated. I don’t even recognize myself in the mirror anymore. Without my anchor to my past life and my club, I’m lost. The women and children I’m here to help are ending up dead. If I can’t save them, then I might as well be the one pulling the trigger.

Which, I suppose, I do. Now.

Ya know those family members in the hospital who are announced brain dead? Let’s just say that part of them aren’t. Or the person who comes in with a GSW who died on the operating table? That’s not always the case. Each hospital Harold is on the board of allows him to have his own organ-extraction team. Each month, they have quotas to meet. The bigger the city, the more opportunities there are. It keeps him from having to run back-alley deals and his own facilities. These people already have injuries or are hospitalized for various reasons. He doesn’t just pull anyone off the street. But there’s a damn good chance that if you’re poor and uninsured, the hospital is more than happy to cut its financial loss by selling you and your organs to the highest bidder in town, and you don’t need more than one guess of who that is. I’m employed by him.

I’m the bastard who brokers the deals, while Penelope handles the official sit-downs to sign the contracts. A pretty face always helps soften the blow when you’re handing over millions to save a loved one.

When we arrive at the penthouse, Tony follows us up with all of Pen’s bags hanging from his arms. He sets them just inside our place, and Pen thanks her driver with a kiss on the cheek before she steals my hand and drags me to our bedroom.

“Clothes off, now.” She snaps her fingers and kicks off her pink heels. One ends up under the bed while the other hits the wall. Then her dress falls to the floor, and I’m greeted with a blonde, leggy model, eager to take my cock. She flashes me the sauciest grin and rips the scrap of fabric she calls underwear down her legs. Her sweet little slit is a sight for sore eyes as she removes her bra and sprawls out on the bed.

Bottom lip pushed into a pout, she rubs her tight little nub. “Max,” she whines like the needy cockwhore she is.

I take my time undressing, and she’s halfway to coming by the time my shirt hits the floor, exposing my abs and the sheet of ink covering my body.

Penelope licks her lips. “Fuck. You’re delicious.”

Ignoring her appreciation, I jack my limp cock. It takes a bit. It almost always does with her. Standing at the end of the bed, I close my eyes and picture someone else. Not Kali, or Penelope, or my new assistant, or even Abby. This woman is bare for me. Legs spread. Her snatch is wet. She’s faceless, but our connection’s an invisible tether. She sees past all my bullshit and loves me anyway.

My heart aches for a woman like that.

Someone just for me.

Someone who understands.

Sweat beads on my forehead as I focus on the woman until I’m panting and my dick is rock hard. Only then do I climb onto the bed, between Penelope’s spread thighs, and sink myself into her slick heat. I bury my face in the side of her neck, where she smells of roses and vanilla, as I rut her like a goddamn beast. Her nails score my back, and the heels of her feet dig into my ass as she moans my name.

“Max!” she cries in my ear. Her pussy clamps around my cock as her breasts arch against my chest, and she comes. I keep going, knowing she’ll detonate again soon enough.

By the third orgasm, she’s delirious.

“Oh. I love you. I love you. I love you… and this big cock,” Penelope wheezes between broken moans.

By the fourth, my shoulders are bleeding.

But I don’t stop.

As I grip our ridiculously expensive comforter in my fist and fuck her harder, deeper, I cling to the elusive woman in my soul. She keeps me hard. She fuels my inner fire. She’s everything.

Once my wife is truly spent, I sit back on my knees. My throbbing cock stands proud, covered in her juices. A flushed, panting Penelope digs her heels into the mattress as she writhes in a post-orgasmic glow, laughing. I know I should feel a sense of pride that I did that. I put that smile on her face. I made her come on my cock. But I’m so far removed from her pleasure that I’m numb when I move on autopilot and climb off the bed to shower.

The hot water washes away the sins. Unfortunately, my stupid dick doesn’t get the memo that it’s time to sleep, even if we haven’t nutted, so I smack the useless appendage. It ricochets to the side, slapping me in the thigh, before going back to his usual post. A bead of precum bubbles from the tip, mixing with the water, as if he gets off on the abuse.

With a frustrated growl, I grit my teeth and scrub my skin with some fancy-ass soap until it burns. When I get out, I wrap a too-fluffy, snow-colored towel around my waist and leave damp footprints across the tile as I enter my attached closet, where I shut out the world. My appendage is still a solid bar of steel as I pull on a pair of boxer briefs to keep it confined. It doesn’t flag when I take one of my fancy suits off a hanger I never placed it on. Hired help does that. The cooking. The laundry. The driving. All of it. While most people would appreciate it, I don’t. I hate that my clothes are washed, dried, and hung by a stranger. I hate this pretentious life. Dressing head to toe in black, I layer on every piece like armor.

Once I emerge from the closet, Penelope is long gone, doing who the hell knows what. She got what she needed. A warm body with a cock.

With a hollowness echoing in my chest, I leave the penthouse, not bothering to check in with her. It’s not like it matters. I have work to do.

In the elevator on the way to the garage, I text my driver to pick me up. Then I do what I should’ve done all week and catch up with my family.

Punching out, guilty text after guilty text, a lump forms in my throat as I stand in the underground box of concrete, waiting to be chauffeured around like a rich prick.

To Kali: Just checking in. I’m alive. How are things?

To Pops: You good?