Debbie drew in a hard breath and earthy-tasting smoke billowed inside her mouth, pouring down her throat. Preacher’s tongue came next, sweeping through her mouth, while his hand slid into her hair, cupping her head. Smoke trickled out from between their lips as they kissed slowly, deeply. Debbie’s thoughts grew fuzzy and muddled from either the drugs, or the man, or both.
“I haven’t seen a movie since before I got tossed in the joint,” Preacher whispered, after releasing her mouth.
“What movie was it?” she murmured.
He glanced away, considering. “Jaws,” he finally said. “I think. Wait, no… coulda beenDeath Race. Don’t remember which. What about you?”
Once upon a time Debbie had treasured going to the movies. Before her mother had remarried, she’d worked odd jobs and strange hours, and with Debbie’s school schedule they’d rarely seen one another, with the exception of Sundays. Every Sunday they’d go to their local theater for classic movie night.
Unlike most mothers and daughters, Debbie and her mother had never been close. But every Sunday it had felt as if she’d almost had a mother—at least for a couple of hours. The tradition had continued until her mother had remarried, and then Sunday movie nights were no more.
The only movie theaters she’d been inside recently had been ones she’d snuck into for warmth and to catch a few hours of sleep.
She shrugged. “I can’t remember.”
“You wanna go, then?” He watched her through lazy, half-lidded eyes, his pupils noticeably larger. He appeared relaxed, the only remaining sign of stress was the subtle tightening around his eyes. At some point he’d lain his hand on her thigh and was now toying with the hem of her shorts. His fingers started up again, dancing a drunken path up and down her leg.
“Sure,” she breathed as she shivered beneath his touch. The movies, New York City, in that moment, Debbie would go anywhere with Preacher.
The corner of his mouth lifted, and any remaining strain in his expression vanished.
• • •
Being bad felt damn good.
This was something Preacher had learned from a young age. It had started out innocently enough, disobeying his parents or lying to a schoolteacher. Tiny acts of defiance that made a small boy in a world of men feel not quite so insignificant.
At ten years old he was shoplifting from the corner bodega and slipping money out of The Judge’s wallet. At thirteen he was placing illegal bets in the back alley behind the neighborhood butcher shop.
And by the time Preacher was in high school, he’d graduated from shoplifting to jacking neighborhood cars and joyriding with his friends.
Even after his father had brought him into the club and illegal doings had become a way of life, Preacher had still found ways to get his kicks. Taking another man’s girl to bed just because he could. Skimming money from business associates, or snagging some junk for himself. It was never enough to cause notice—just enough to satiate Preacher’s appetite for rebellion.
In Preacher’s mind, those tiny bits of rebellion had kept him fresh. Awake. Alive.
He’d since grown stale in prison. He’d forgotten what being him felt like. He’d forgotten how much he loved to push boundaries. To break rules. To bend them to his will.
He remembered now and he had Debbie to thank for that.
It wasn’t that being with Debbie was necessarily bad, only that Preacher had deemed it not the right thing. He’d drawn a line.
And then he gave his conscience a swift kick off a tall bridge and dove headfirst right over that line.
And yeah, it felt damn good.
Crouched inside his tent, Preacher zipped the door flap closed and turned toward Debbie. Seated cross-legged on top of the sleeping bag he’d laid out, she looked up at him with a nervous, expectant expression. Moonlight filtering through the tent’s windows bathed her in an almost angelic glow, emphasizing the dark of her eyes.
Was that a little bit of fear he was seeing, too?
It might have given him pause… if he hadn’t been so drunk. And high. And three times as keyed up as he could ever remember feeling before in his life—an uncomfortable combination of angry and horny that desperately needed an outlet.
Not bothering to kick off his boots or remove his cut, Preacher moved swiftly across the tent. Cupping the side of Debbie’s face, he claimed her mouth. And as his tongue plunged past her lips, he used the weight of his body to push her onto her back and maneuver himself between her legs.
While his hands were busy skimming the length of her, Preacher thrust his hips forward, rocking himself over the sweet spot between her thighs. She jerked at the contact, gasping softly into his mouth. He continued mimicking sex until her legs were wrapped around his waist and she was grinding against him the same way she kissed him—absolutely inexperienced, but at the same time, so crazy into it.
This girl did not think, not when it came to him anyway, and Preacher fucking loved it.
A breast in one hand and a handful of ass in the other, he broke their kiss and moved to her neck, licking, sucking, biting his way across the soft skin there.
