Knight Errant

Here's another scene from my WIP, Southern Shields.

Alex looked up to find a patrol car in her rear-view mirror. She blinked as it pulled around to pace her on the narrow street. Frank gestured, and she lowered her passenger window. His face was expressionless, and he gave her cold cop's eyes. The kind of stare you'd give somebody caught doing a hundred in a school zone. But I wasn't speeding, she thought in pure knee-jerk reaction, and immediately realized he wasn't really pulling her over.

Not to give her a ticket anyway.

Which was why he hadn't used his blue lights and siren. That would have automatically activated the car's dash cam. Alex had the feeling neither of them wanted this little encounter recorded for posterity.

"Pull over." He stabbed a finger toward a set of tire tracks that led off into the woods between one house and an empty lot. She blinked, hoped her beater of a car was up to it, and drove off the street and onto the tracks.

A set of tall, ferny plants grew in a cluster across the trail, but she drove through them, trusting that Frank knew what the fuck he was doing. The plants bent in front of her hood, then sprang up again after she was past, only to bend again for the patrol car.

They'd provide a dandy screen to hide them from any curious neighbors who might otherwise wonder what a cop car was doing pulling somebody over in the middle of the damned woods.

Alex's mouth went dry. She had a feeling she was in for a rousing game of Bad Cop.

She'd had fantasies like this when she was younger. Not so much anymore—she knew too many cops, knew how relentlessly religious and conservative most of the local guys were. But she wasn't exactly averse to acting out those fantasies now. Especially with Frank in the starring role.

Alex bumped along the rutted track as it curved through the trees until Frank flashed his headlights at her. She braked and looked around. They were well into the empty wooded lot here, with trees and brush screening their cars from the road. It was the kind of place no smart woman would ever have allowed herself to be pulled over by anyone, even a cop. "Why, officer," Alex purred aloud in her best Scarlett O'Hara drawl, "whatever do you have in mind?"

She rolled down her driver's side window as he swaggered up to the car. Big, brawny, and black-clad—her fantasy Bad Cop come to glorious life.

Her panties were already soaked, and he hadn't even started yet.

Frank wore a pair of mirrored aviator sunglasses and a scowl. Jesus, he looked menacing. "Get out of the car, please."

She put on her best Don't give me a ticket, I'll do anything, expression. "But sir, I wasn't speeding."

"I didn't say you were," he told her coldly. "Get out of the car."

She'd always loved role-playing, so she gave him big, worried eyes as she obeyed, closing the car door as softly as she could. That thump might carry otherwise. "I don't understand. I haven't done anything!"

"Quit trying to play me, lady. There's a warrant out for your arrest." He stepped right up against her, pinning her between the car and his massive frame. His voice dropped down into a low rumble she felt against her breast. Her nipples tingled, drew hard and eager. Dragging her over to the trunk of her car, he whirled her around as though to start searching her. "Says you're armed and dangerous." Pulling her little .38 from the pancake holster on her belt, he showed it to her with a threatening flourish. "And look here —you are."

She swallowed. Had he been anybody else, she might have broken out into the giggles right about then. But it was Frank. Frank who towered over her when damned near no other man did. Frank, who'd pinned her down and fucked her into a screaming orgasm just last night.

It was as if this silly fantasy scenario played out the same kind of inner truth. As if her body now recognized Frank as Dominant, maybe because he'd bested her the night before. Her instincts demanded she yield to him, as if he'd imprinted himself on the cellular level.

"I can explain," she said in a hoarse, ragged voice,

He gave a short, nasty laugh. "I'm sure you can." His voice hardened. "Hands on the trunk, feet apart."