Roar (Military Bad Boy Billionaire Romance) (Soldiers of Fortune Book 4) (18 page)

She's riding me, her hands on my knees and her hair tossed back as she bounces that perfect ass up and down my length, milking me. My hands slide over her hips, one staying up to her breasts to tease and roll her nipples between my fingers, the other diving deep between her legs to the place we connect and pressing against her clit.

Lost time? Fuck it; in our minds, we're going to make up for a full year of this without taking a single damned break.
 

We do of course finally drop from exhaustion, and it's then that we take the time to right the wrongs of our past.

There are tears.

She's crying when she tells me about that
Goddamn
syringe in my bathroom that night; even more when I tell her about Danny. And just like that, the sins of the past are brought bleeding and bloody to the surface, only to be shoved away; healed with the now.

It doesn't matter who was wrong, or what was said or wasn't anymore, because it's forgotten. It's pushed aside in favor of the now, because the now is the only real place we can be. We don't exist in the past, only here and what's to come.

But for now, it's just her and I under this big, big sky, and for now, that's all I need.

"So, what now?" The muffled, half-asleep voice against my chest mumbles.

I grin as I lean down to kiss the top of her head; "Well I think it's safe to say date three is off with Anderson after you
slept with
the guy that kicked his ass." She giggles into my skin, the rumbling of her happiness making me grin; "I mean there's only so much a guy can take, Peyton, even a desperate douchebag like Anderson."

She laughs and pokes me in the side; "I
know
that plan is off, dummy. I mean
now
what do we do?"

I shrug; "Now we should talk to Sasha again."

 
I can feel her bristle beneath me; "Anyone ever tell you you've got a teeny bit of a jealous streak, Miss Rivers?”

"As long as that bitch keeps her hands and her eyes off of you, we'll be just fine."

I laugh as she playfully nips at my skin; “Tonight we lie low and get some sleep, and tomorrow-“ She looks up at me, and my jaw tightens; "Tomorrow we get Logan back."

“C’mon, wake up.”
 

I frown as I open my eyes and drag down the blanket I’ve pulled up over my face against the morning sun; “Hrmmr?” Some women, mostly characters in movies, wake up clear, alert, and ready for the world, with perfectly sexy tousled bed-head.

I am not those women, and I need fucking coffee, now.

I blink my eyes again and focus on a fully dressed, obnoxiously awake Bryce leaning over me. I grumble and start to pull the covers of the lighthouse keeper’s bed we’ve commandeered for the night back up, but he yanks them out of my hands and leans down to kiss my forehead; “Here, become human, oh bleary one.”
 

I frown in confusion until I look down and see the paper cup of black, strong-smelling Turkish coffee in his outstretched hand; “You’re…you’re a
saint
,” I mutter, smiling at him as I take the coffee from his hand and gratefully sip it; “Where did you even get this?”

“You sleep late; I went out to the market.”

I arch an eyebrow at him, glancing out the window at the sun low on the horizon; “Late? What time is it?”

“Six-thirty.”

I roll my eyes, grinning as I take another necessary sip of the drink in my hands; “Yeah, day’s-a-wastin, huh soldier-boy?”

He grins and tosses me a pastry, followed by my clothes; “Here, eat up and let’s go.”

“Where?”

“I want to show you something.”

I raise my brows again; “Can’t we just stay here? Maybe sleep some more?” I add, hopefully.

“The lighthouse?” Bryce smirks; “I’ve heard mixed things about the continental breakfast.”

I laugh, almost getting coffee up my nose in the process.
 

“C’mon, seriously.”

I make a face as I stick the honey pastry in my mouth and start to pull my clothes on, feeling the glow spread through my cheeks as I feel his eyes roaming over my skin.

“So where are we going?” I say through pastry-stuffed cheeks as we walk back out of the lighthouse - our lighthouse - towards the bike.

“There was this thing, from when I was here before. I just want to see if it’s still-”

“Wait. when were you in Turkey?”

He looks up at me as he swings his leg over the bike; “Have I seriously never told you about that?”

I finish swallowing the rest of my breakfast and shake my head at him; “Well
well
, Bryce Connors; international man of mystery.” There’s a lot of him I know already, but even back before, there were times when I’d suddenly discover a whole new part of him for the first time, and it was like discovering a new, secret chapter in your favorite book. He’s told me about the Marines, obviously, and leaving, and about joining up with Blackriver later. But it’s the in-between that’s still a hazy mystery.

And apparently we’re covering that particular chapter today.

Bryce grins; “Long story; hop on.”

We tear headlong through the busy morning streets of Istanbul before moving onto the main highway out and roaring away from the city entirely. I look back into the morning sun to watch the minarets and the criers, and the dome of the Hague Sophia drop away as we climb the sloping hills of the countryside.
 

It’s already crazy, coming from some place like New York that seems so old compared to the shitty trailer-park next to the mega-mall that I grew up in back in Texas. Except this place exists from before New York was even a thing; from before the ships that came to it were even a thing. Hell, this place is older than
old
York. We’re passing villages that are over a thousand years old, moving past arched aqueducts that the
Romans
built two-thousand years before.

We’ve officially left Kansas, Toto.

This place has history from before history was written, which seems an appropriate setting for two people like us. Two people for whom history is both everything and also better left in the past.

I hug him tighter, pressing my face into his back as if to remind us both that we’re here and now, and that’s all that matters, and he roars the bike forward as if in response.
 

We drive past another small town, but this time Bryce takes us off the main road and begins to slow. He drives us carefully through the ancient stone town, past shops owned by the same families for the last millennium, past fields tended and grazed on since the fights between faiths that took place here a thousand years before.

We eventually drive down a small, rock-paved lane to a small stone house on the edge of the village. Bryce cuts the engine, and I look up to see that the wide, two-door garage next to the house is open, and there inside is a myriad of carefully and meticulously organized car parts.

No,
motorcycle
parts.

He kicks the stand out on the bike as he helps us off, only pausing when he sees the grin on my face; “What?”

I roll my eyes, smiling at him; “Of
course
.” He gives me a questioning look and I shake my head; “You are far less mysterious than you’d like to think you are, Mr. Connors,” I say, nodding towards the sign hanging on the side of the garage. I can’t read the Turkish, but I recognize the Harley-Davidson logo next to the silhouette of a bike.

Behind the garage is what some might call a junk-yard, but I know to people like Bryce, it’s a
goldmine
; a yard filled with all manner of treasures to tinker with and explore. Two old VW busses painted with bright hippie flowers sit up on blocks, and my eyes suddenly go wide as I focus on the giant metal behemoth sitting behind them; a stark contrast to the two peace-buses.
 

“Is that a-?”

The door to the house opens then, and a frail-looking, shawled old woman steps out. She peers at us, frowning slightly with a blank look, before suddenly, her whole face lights up with what looks like recognition; “Bry-see! Bry-see!” She’s smiling widely as she hobbles down the steps of her house towards us, and he’s grinning as he runs towards her and scoops her into a hug.

“You go so long!” She says in a thick accent, carefully choosing her English words. Tears frame her eyes as she pulls back and brings hand up to stroke the stubble of his cheek. She glances past him towards me, her eyes bright as they dart between us.

I can see the love and pride in his eyes as he turns and beckons me closer; “Peyton, this is Fairuza Kartal;
büyükanne
, this is Peyton Rivers.”

She beams at him then me, the look almost grandmotherly; “Ah, love?” She smiles at Bryce; “Love yes?”

I blush and she grins wider. Bryce looks at me and slowly nods.

“Oh
good
! Very good, Bry-see!” She wraps her arms around his waist and hugs him tightly.

Bryce suddenly looks around, frowning; “Where’s Arkados?”

Fairuza’s smile fades to sadness, and I watch as Bryce’s shoulders droop suddenly; “Oh,
shit
.”

*****

The gravestone is set back a ways from the house, up a small grassy slope of  field under a tree. I hold Bryce’s hand, his other arm around Fairuza’s shoulder as he looks solemnly at the stone; “I’m so sorry;
başınız sağolsun,
” He says quietly to the woman next to him.
 

She nods, patting the hand draped over her shoulders; “He was…” She nods, finding her words; “There was no pain,” She says, turning to smile at Bryce; “He talk about you, all the time.”

Bryce grins as he nods; “He was a good man.”

“Yes. Very, very good man,” She says with a sad smile.

Later on, Fairuza brings us tea and we sit outside with her at a little table next to her small garden.

“The shop?” Bryce gestures towards the garage next to the house.

Fairuza smiles; “My cousin, he runs it now.”

“And you’re taken care of?”

Her face lights up; “Oh, Bry-see! I need tell you! I win!” Bryce grins a small smile; “Yes! I win the prize, the…the…I don’t know how to say.”

“Lottery?”

“Yes! I win the lottery; three years ago!”

Bryce just nods, smiling at her; “That’s wonderful, Fairuza.”

I turn to stare at him, suddenly realizing what’s going on here. I see the proud twinkle in his eye and the easy way he just takes in news like this, and I know suddenly
exactly
where that money came from.

“Yes, everything is paid for now, money is no problem.”

He grins, and looks back at the shop; “May I-?”

“Oh, please!” Fairuza gestures to the shop with her tea-cup, and Bryce takes my hand as he leads me over.

“This place- ” He shakes his head as we step into the shop; “I worked here.”

“
Here?
”

He nods; “Yeah, in Arkados’s garage. I mean, we had
shit
, Peyton, when we came through here. No money, no passports, no identities. I was strung out and desperate, and the cops busted me trying to boost a bike on the outskirts of Istanbul. I mean they were all over me, and ready to throw me into a cell or beat the shit out of me right there, but right then, Arkados happened to walk by. He told them I was his helper, that we were
fixing
the bike, not trying to lift it.”