Page 54 of Kings Have No Mercy

“Then don’t cry later when I shut you up with my dick down your throat.”

I rev the engine and take off.

16

SYDNEY

As I climbonto Mason’s bike, it’s easy to overlook one important detail: I’ve never ridden before. My decision to join him is so impulsive that it doesn’t cross my mind ’til I’m seated behind him and he’s warning me to hold on tight.

“Wait… maybe this isn’t… ahhh!” I shriek as I’m drowned out by the rumble from his engine.

We’re off in the next moment.

Plumes of dust rise up on our path across the parking lot. I close my eyes and squeeze my arms around his torso. He quickly becomes my anchor as I press myself against him.

Anxiety churns in my stomach and makes the rest of my body tingle. The situation feels outside of my control. Anything can go wrong, and I’d be SOL.

On the back of Mason’s bike, I’m completely at his mercy.

I’m at the mercy of everything around me. The open road. The bike we speed away on. The very wind that rushes by and blows back the sheets of my hair.

Mason would probably laugh if he knew how freaked out I am. He’d tell me this isn’t fast. This doesn’t compare to the speeds he was doing earlier outgunning the truck.

But I’ve never felt more vulnerable. I’ve never been so unprotected.

We ride down the highway, crossing the vast Texas flat land, leaving behind the penitentiary and everything else Mason’s running from.

I must squeeze him too tight the farther we go, because he calls out to me over the static of the wind.

“Syd!”

“Yeah?”

“You good?”

I shrink against his back, treating him as a living shield. “Yeah,” I mumble into the center of his spine. “Why?”

“’Cuz you’re damn near suffocating me.” He sounds amused. The rumbling engine and staticky wind can’t even disguise it.

“S-sorry. I’ve never…” I trail off there, my cheeks warming up from more than the summer heat.

“You wanna stop?”

I shake my head in answer.

Mason must understand because he doesn’t question me again for another few miles. It occurs to me that this is the second situation where I’m coming across like a punk, curling up in fear. First the thunderstorm situation and now this.

My fault for being nosy and following him.

I’m settling into my safe spot against his back when he pulls me into another exchange.

“Let go,” he says.

“Huh?”

“Let one arm go. Raise it up. Try it. You’ll feel better.”

“Mace—”