Ferocious (IOU #6)

by Leslie McAdam

At 5′4″ in shoes and a hundred and mumble-mumble pounds, I’m no one’s definition of a big, buff man. But if you call me a twink, I’ll cut you.

what I look like. “I got jumped by a twink,” I blurt. “Fuck you,” he growls.

Charlie’s eyes trace me up and down, and it’s the sexiest look I’ve ever been on the receiving end of. “Is that you? A bad thing in a little package?” Fuck yes. “Yup.”

How can one chance meeting change everything? Rowan feels like a tropical storm. A force of nature. He may have a gravitational pull, for all I know.

“The problem is, he doesn’t fit into my ten-year plan.” “You’re still doing that shit? Fuck your plan. Explore shit with the murder boy.”

Charlie’s intent on helping me find my fifteen-year-old plant. He’s not laughing at me or complaining. Just walking next to me, doing whatever he can to support me. So, yeah. Just like that, in a roadside ditch, I fall in love with Charlie Cooper.

“I think it’s one of those fantasies I’m not supposed to have. Having your choice taken away in real life is truly awful, but the fantasy of ‘Oh, no, help’”—he says this part flatly—“‘I’m being taken against my will by these really hot green dudes with big peens.’” He fans himself.

I have no idea how much money the St. Thomases have, but I know one thing for certain: I’m in bed with the heir to billions. Rowan’s not a guttersnipe—he’s a prince.

“Are we going to get a happy ending?” I ask Charlie sleepily. “Why wouldn’t we?”

My eyes widen. “That must be why I trust my father: He kidnapped me. Maybe good things only happen to me in connection with crimes.” “Uh, no,” Charlie says firmly. “We’re not going to have that be part of your personal narrative.”

I want him to scrape me up. I want to rip at him. Let this be my Goblins Cave. He can claw hash marks into my ass to count how many times he takes me.

Apparently all I had to do to get proper zzzs was have Charlie chase me through the manicured woods of a coastal estate, clean me up, then make love to me again, then confess that he loves me. It’s a magic formula, I guess.

Rowan’s more than an addiction, like I thought before. He’s an essential part of me. We don’t say we’re addicted to oxygen or water or other natural needs.

On Christmas morning, I wake up, as I have all month, in Charlie’s arms. It still feels like a present to be with him. I know that sounds cheesy, but whatever. I was waiting for him my entire life.

“I don’t make the rules. Besides, cats aren’t like dogs. They don’t require as much attention. We had some in a few foster care homes, and they were mostly fuzzy slugs who lay in the sunshine. With a little chaos.”

I didn’t know him very long,” I whisper into the dark. “But I wanted him my entire life.”