Her lips brushed against my cheek. It was light and innocent, but earthshattering. I barely kept myself from falling to my knees and pledging myself to her. Such a simple gesture, and yet monumental. Especially for her, because she’d never touched me before.
She took my hand when I held it out to her, like when I’d helped her stand, and she let me hug her when she was upset, and there was more than one occasion when I’d carried both her and Samantha to bed after they’d fallen asleep watching a movie. But she’d never been the instigator before. Not like this. Maybe it was my stupid, fucking brain, but it felt like it meant something.
“Mahalo,” she said, staring into my eyes. It had taken almost two weeks of encouragement before I got her to stop bowing at each of us. In the Japanese culture, there were three bows, casual, social, and one for deep respect. I had tried repeatedly not to notice that she only used the last one with me. But eventually, she stopped, only slipping up on occasion.
“For what?” My voice sounded like I’d swallowed a handful of sand.
“For everything.”
Yeah. There was no way around it. On my knees or standing above her, I was fucked. Well and truly fucked, and she had no idea. I was her puppet, and she my puppeteer. There was nothing I would not do for this woman.
Nothing. That should have terrified me…but it didn’t.
“Motherfucker.”
The snickering beside me lightened my mood, but I did not let it show. I was not making a fool of myself for her enjoyment. Even after a week of trying, I still couldn’t knit a single line without getting the yarn tangled around my fingers like I was the world’s most absentminded man. I’d even taken my needles to work with me to try to learn behind Caroline’s back to impress her, and that failed so much that Hops, one of my club brothers, had to cut me free.
Caroline leaned over my arm, covering my hands with her much smaller ones. I should have felt proud that she was so comfortable with me, a large man, that she didn’t hesitate to reach over and touch me. But instead, all I could think about was how wonderful she smelled.
For years, the only scent she’d been able to wear was cherryblossom. Personally, I thought a lot of Weatherby Dalton-Jones IV’s tastes ran a little stereotypical, and even racist at times. Like he never actually learned the Japanese culture, only adopting what he saw on porn sites or on television shows.
Now Caroline was trying out a variety of scents, wanting to learn what she liked best. When Saga, our Secretary, complained within earshot of Caroline about how many different lotions, soaps, shampoos, and conditioners now littered the communal bathroom, I’d taken him out back and beaten him to a pulp.No onemade Caroline feel bad or guilty. No one.
Bloody, and missing a tooth, I’d dragged Saga back inside the house and made him apologize to Caroline. She accepted his apology, but insisted on caring for his wounds. I wouldn’t let her, as I couldn’t stand the idea of her touching another man. I also noticed that she’d taken out the bottles she didn’t like, and later that day, she, Holly, and Lu donated that product to a women’s shelter down the road. She now switched out the bottles when she tried a new scent instead of leaving them in the bathroom.
She said it was only polite, but I was still pissed Saga had said anything at all.
Whatever she was wearing now was musky with a hint of citrus. It was nice, though I had yet to find a scent I didn’t like on her.
“Like this,” she said, easily unknotting my fingers and then moving my hands in the proper motion.
Caroline turned her face to look at me, and froze when she realized how close our noses were. A flush heated her skin. Maybe it was only wishful thinking, but I could have sworn her eyes flicked down to my lips.
Laughter and clapping made us both jump, and Caroline quickly retook her seat beside me. Samantha was sitting on the floor in front of us, her eyes glued to the televisionscreen.Shimajiro, a children’s show that helped teach Japanese to English, held her attention.
“Samantha-chan.” Caroline’s voice was slightly higher pitched than normal as she called out to her daughter. When Samantha turned to look at her, Caroline put space further between us, patting the cushion. She said something else in Japanese, which I roughly translated as an order for Samantha to come join us.
Samantha hopped up, running to the couch. I put both needles in one hand so I had a free hand to guide her up with. Settling into the giant couch cushions that looked like it could swallow the little girl whole, she returned her attention back to her program.
After a moment, she laid her head against my arm with a long, drawn out sigh. “Tangy…”
My heart swelled to an immeasurable amount. I carefully rearranged myself so she was under my arm and against my chest as I resumed fucking up what I no longer had hope of calling a blanket. I wondered if Bacon needed a potholder, because that was likely all the knitting gods were getting out of me.
Chapter Four
Yooko Ortega was a hefty man in his mid-fifties with long, black hair, a bushy mustache, and a double chin. His shoulders were so wide that he had to twist to fit through most doorframes. At seven-two, he probably weighed somewhere around four hundred and fifty pounds. Though his parents immigrated from Mexico when he was a child, he was asKama?ainaas I was.
He owned a trucking company east of Kahalu?u Beach. It was housed in an old building that had weathered hurricanes, tsunamis, big storms, and a lot of years in the blazing sun. The ceiling tiles were cracked, the linoleum was stained, and the reception counter was held together by duct tape.
But no one came toTruck on the Gofor the esthetics.
Yooko and I were business associates before the club partnered with his trucking company. I used Yooko’s trucks to move my guns when needed and Yooko used my men as extra security when he hosted certain events. When he wanted to film festivities, he would rent camera equipment from Aloiki’s porn studio.
Yooko might make a pretty penny renting trucks, but his realbusiness was sex. In the simplest of explanations, his utility trucks were a brothel on wheels. To cover the profits he earned at the brothel, he made fake rental agreements to launder the money. It really was ingenious. He had one hard and fast rule: no kids.
I supported that unequivocally.
Yooko’s flesh trade was completely consensual, and he had both men and women workers of varying sexualities. He’d actually rescued a number of his workers from the streets, gave them three meals a day, access to healthcare, and provided them with a roof over their heads. He was good people, who looked after his workers. And he didn’t judge. Some people just liked sex with strangers, and he provided a safe way to do it.