Chapter 1

You know that feeling when everything is right with the world?

You wake up five minutes before the alarm goes off and ease out of bed. A quick shit, shower & shave and a cup of coffee before you are out the door into a crisp, clear morning. Traffic is flowing just fine and you hit every green light in town, even getting the nod at the single stop sign as you head in to work.

At work, your boss is out on vacation and no one is looking over your shoulder. The machinery all works as it should, the parts are readily at hand and no one has borrowed a tool and forgotten to return it. Someone brings in bagels, and there is even your favorite onion & garlic, still slightly warm from the oven.

Lunch is at a local pub and that waitress you have had your eye on stops to chat and slips you her number. The day ends early and you are on the road before rush-hour, heading to your favorite watering hole for a couple of beers.

Yeah. Deacon’s Monday was nothing like that.

Oh, it started out pretty well, he got up without hitting the snooze more than two or three times and made it out the door after only cutting himself shaving twice. Traffic sucked, but he really didn’t expect anything different, and even though he knew he was going to be late, he stopped to get a soggy breakfast sandwich and lukewarm coffee to settle his slightly hung-over stomach.

Things started to look up when he rolled into the parking lot at work and his boss’s car wasn’t there yet. He remembered thinking that today was his lucky day after all and he could sneak in without getting the stink-eye from that fat fuck.

Nope. The fickle finger of fate, having fucked you, moves merrily on.

The boss was not only there, but he had come in early because his car had refused to start and he had to get a ride with his shrew of a wife. Somehow that was Deacon’s fault. That the pig had not had time for his usual six course breakfast was also, somehow, Deacon’s fault, and he walked out of the boss’s office having been docked for two hours wages along with an official warning, and an almost overwhelming desire to choke the living shit out of the pig with his own, coffee-stained paisley tie.

When he got to his station and checked to see what was in the order basket for the day, he actually had the temerity to think his day was looking better. There was a custom order in for new design of drill head for the oil platform, and that meant he could play on the new three-axis mill.

Oh man, if he had a spare half million laying around, he would love one of these in his own shop!

Deacon had grown up following dad around after school, and farting around in his father’s private shop on the weekends. He had cut his teeth on mills, busted knuckles on lathes, and the smell of oil and hot metal was like a memory of home. When Deacon had gotten sick of the politically correct New Army, he went back to his first love and started dropping applications at every business in the area.

He loved taking raw hunks of metal and turning them into beautifully machined works of art, and though he fucking hated his pinheaded boss, this place paid extremely well and he got to play with the coolest tools.

Karma, having noticed that he was starting to unbury himself from the pile of dung that was his morning, decided that fun was not in the cards. The power went out at about 10am, and it wasn’t something as simple as a circuit breaker. When they finally got the story, it turned out that there had been some kind of accident at the switching station that feeds their area, and the estimated repair time was hovering at about twelve hours.

“Fuck me.”

With the dock in pay, he had gotten out of bed, gotten chewed out by his own version of Dilbert’s pointy-headed imbecile of a boss, and for fuck-all.

Home again, he gave serious thought to crawling back between his sheets and trying to sleep until tomorrow, but he knew that all he would accomplish was a short nap and a complete inability to sleep tonight. Then he would be late again tomorrow and he knew, with every fiber of his being, that another scene like the one in the boss’s office this morning would end with Deacon being unemployed or in jail

So, he did the responsible thing. Deacon wandered out to his shop, grabbed a beer from the fridge, and started sketching out an idea he had rolling around in his head for a new drop-seat frame. There was Sportster motor that had been sitting on the rear work bench for almost a year, and it needed all the other bits to turn it back into a motorcycle. He had bought it on a whim, after seeing it on a local want-ad website. It had turned over by hand easily enough, and was in pretty good shape for an early Evo, so he brought it home.

Deacon had a love/hate relationship with Sportsters, ever since he was a kid, and currently owned four, if counted the two non-running Iron Heads in the rear of the shop. Five if you counted the motor without a home. The other two were newer bikes, one an ‘05 and one an ‘11.

Once he had the frame sketched out, and the measurements down on paper, Deacon spent the rest of the day fabricating a frame jig that would let him do the actual build. Night had fallen while he wasn’t looking and his grumbling stomach told him to pack it in.

Rolling the 2011 XR out of the shop, and locking up, just took a couple of minutes. Then he was rolling down the road, the evening air a good twenty degrees cooler than it had been that morning. No matter how old he got, there was still something thrilling, atavistic, about running down the road on two wheels. It was exceedingly rare that even a short ride didn’t leave him without a shit-eating grin on his face.

Tonight was no exception.

His destination was only about twenty miles away, a little wanna-be redneck bar that catered to beach goers and the guys from the Devil Canyon Nuclear power plant. He had worked there as a bouncer for a couple of years after he had gotten out of the military, and had a soft spot for the big-breasted brunette named Katie who ran the place.

The fact that she ate more pussy in a year than he had in his entire life never stopped him from hitting on her. Her reactions never failed to make him laugh, and she had even surprised him once by grabbing his ears and kissing him in front of the entire bar. He might have gotten his hopes up that night, if she hadn’t followed the kiss by whispering in his ear.

“How’s that taste? Can you tell which waitress I was just counseling in my office?”

She was one hell of a gal.

Parking his bike by the door, in the clearly marked ‘No Parking’ area where he knew the bouncers would keep an eye on it, he nodded to the bruiser on duty and pushed through the genuine, imitation western saloon half-doors.

It was a calm night, only twenty or thirty customers in the whole place. Katie was sitting in a table near the end of the bar with what looked like a salesman. She caught Deacon’s eye with a little wave, then turned back to the paperwork in front of her.

Turning towards the long bar that dominated the right wall of the room, Deacon could see three of the four bartenders were stocking the coolers or cleaning, and only Sarah was making drinks for the waitresses.

Sarah was married to the head bouncer, the fifth man to hold that slot since Deacon had been the headman almost a decade ago. Her husband Sam was a retired oil worker who was almost as wide as he was tall. He had biceps almost as large as Deacon’s thighs and Deacon was no lightweight.

Sarah, on the other hand, might have weighed 90lbs if she was carrying a case of beer at the time, and was as cute as a button. A pixie cut hairdo, just a little makeup, and a smile that could light up a room, she made most of her tips from the male patrons while fending off more offers per minute than any woman he had ever met.

Sarah was so short that she had an empty beer crate, turned upside down, that she stood on during her shift so she could reach over the bar. Deacon had seen others tease her about it, but the tape-wrapped foot of steel rebar she had tucked away under the bar was no laughing matter. He had seen her lay out three guys faster than you could blink one night, and return to wiping down the bar with the same smile she had worn all night long. She and her husband made a formidable, though comedic looking, pair.

“Evening Deacon!” Sarah beamed, setting a Jack & Coke on the bar in front of him when he sat down.

“Hello beautiful. That ugly husband of yours around tonight?”

“Yeah, he’s out back, watching the plumber. Had a problem with a busted pipe in the kitchen.”

“Damn.” Deacon sighed, putting on a sad face. “So, no hope of me sweeping your off your feet tonight then.”

Sarah smirked, hitting him playfully with her bar towel. “If I thought you were ever serious, I might send him home with that l the new girl he has been eyeing and give you a shot, big man!”

“Wait, there’s a new girl?” Deacon mugged, looking around like a kid in a candy store. “She cute? Single?”

Sarah just held up her middle finger and wrinkled her nose. “Men!”

Deacon smiled, then continued, ignoring the impudent gesture. “I need food, I am damn near wasting away while you tease me! How about a burger, some fries, and maybe a slice of that cherry pie that Katie always has stashed away in the kitchen?”

“Sure thing, sweetie!” Sarah hopped down off her box, almost disappearing behind the tall wooden bar. Just the top of her head showed as she scooted back towards the kitchen to put in his order.

Deacon just shook his head, picturing, for the millionth time, what she would look like if she ever got serious about their flirting. Deacon was three inches over six feet tall, and weighed in at about 260lbs, most of it still in muscle, though his waist was not as trim as it once was. Sarah was tiny, trim, and might have topped out at about four foot eight.

It was one of his favorite fantasies, finding that elusive elfin nymphomaniac that liked older men.

Turning on his barstool to survey the room, he let his eye pass over the familiar features. There were twenty booths covering two and a half of the four walls, and about as many tables, mostly towards his left, nearer the door. There was a stage to his far right, and a dance floor large enough for about thirty couples, more if they danced close. The decor was decidedly truck-stop western with rough-cut tables & chairs, deer antler chandeliers and pictures of half naked cowboys and cowgirls on the walls.

There was sawdust and peanut shells on the floor and a bucket of unshelled peanuts at each table, heavily salted of course, to induce the patrons to buy more drinks. On the whole, it was a nice place disguised as a hole in the wall and it pulled in an ungodly amount of money each week. Deacon knew that Katie pulled down a salary that allowed her to live in a huge house, nestled in a gated community up in the hills, and she was just the manager!

Deacon had a lot of fun working here, and had stayed on even after he had found steady work in a local machine shop. He had only stopped when his gray beard started attracting more young tough guys who though gray meant soft. The result was that he got a lot of exercise on weekends, but it wasn’t the image the bar needed.

Deacon had turned in his bar shirts to an understanding Katie, and had gotten one hell of a private sendoff by a pair of the waitresses who were, at the time, without boyfriends. It was one of his favorite memories during the dry times to come. The knowing leer on Katie’s face as she loudly, and publicly, gave the two the night off with instructions to not come back if Deacon was still able to walk in the morning, was another.

Deacon made it a point to come in at least a couple of nights a week. He had few enough friends these days, and the ones he had, he treasured. This place had been a second home for more than a decade now.

The next two hours were a parade of waitresses, bouncers and regular customers stopping by for a quick word, a shake of his hand and even, to his great pleasure, a few kisses. It was a Monday night and things were pretty quiet, just the locals leavened with a mix of vacationers that were sticking around for a few extra days of beach time.

“So, are you a local celebrity?”

Deacon swiveled on his bar stool, and looked down, and down further. Standing near his right knee was a tiny slip of a girl with a midnight black, pageboy haircut and a low-cut sleeveless blouse. Deacon had to pause and recalculate. The tiny lines at the corners of her eyes, the laugh lines, this was no girl. If he had to guess, she was mid to late thirties, but the fire in her eyes and the sardonic grin on her face made her look a lot younger.

The grin told him that she knew what he was thinking, and had watched the train of thought derail when his eyes passed her face and crashed into her cleavage. Deacon could tell she was not offended, but amused by his reaction. She had a confident stance, and it was obvious she was aware of how good she looked.

“No Ma’am, not a celebrity, except in my daydreams. Just a local on friendly terms with the world.” Deacon grinned back at her, refusing to pretend he was embarrassed to be caught looking. “Care to join me?”

At her nod, Deacon stood, and motioned towards the nearest table. as the woman turned, he couldn’t help but notice the trim waist and tight little ass. This woman was perfectly proportioned, just on a smaller scale! He pulled out a chair for the her and, at her smile, ducked his head as if to say “My pleasure!”

“Can I get you a drink?”

“Bourbon, rocks, a little water please.”

Deacon turned back to the bar and placed his order, musing that her voice was a sexy as she was. A surprisingly husky contralto where he would have expected a higher tone, like Sarah’s voice.

Speaking of the devil...

“So, Deacon. Who’s your friend? And here I thought you were pining for me, and you go and find a brunette version? Gonna break my heart, you are.” Sarah teased, making the drinks.

Deacon raised an eyebrow, and keeping his voice even and earnest, “I was just looking for a third. Hell, it would take two of you, tiny as you are, to handle a big man like me!”

Deacon was chased back to his table, drinks in hand, by the pealing laughter of the diminutive bar tender.

He sat down, pushed one of the glasses over to the raven-haired woman, followed by his hand. “Deacon Taylor, local nobody.”

The woman took his hand in hers, her voice filled with humor, “I am Stephanie Little, and if you laugh, I will surely kick you in the shin. Higher if I can find a stool.”

Deacon didn’t even try to keep the grin from showing, but he didn’t laugh. He liked his shins unbruised! He didn’t reply though, his thoughts filled by the shock he had felt when he took her hand. It was soft, and warm, and something about this woman had his whole attention. Well, something besides the obvious.

“So, tell me a little about you, Stephanie. You aren’t a local, I am sure that I would have heard about any angel sightings in town.” Deacon wagged his eyebrows, going for a quick laugh.

Stephanie rolled her eyes dramatically, but with a smile on her face. “Oh, aren’t you the silver-tongued devil? If you play your cards right, we might even find out.”

Deacon had a feeling that he was outclassed here, but no way was he going to give up without a fight.

“What brings you to Billy’s?” he asked, waving his hand to indicate the bar.

“I am in town to visit an old college chum. When I asked at the hotel, the man told me that Billy’s was a fun place with surprisingly good food.”

“Rekindling an old flame, are you? Or just taking a walk down memory lane?” Deacon asked, hoping against hope that it was the latter.

“No old flames. In fact, I finally got the embers of the last fire doused a few months ago, after years of fighting the fire! I decided to retire early and I am simply traveling, reconnecting with old friends, seeing the country. I have been back and forth across the nation by plane a hundred times, but this is my first trip by road, actually seeing all the things I missed in the air.”

Deacon was surprised, “Retired? You? You aren’t near old enough. Hell, at your age you should just now be hitting your stride. What did you do before you retired?”

Stephanie smiled, a little sadly Deacon thought. “I was a corporate attorney. Thank you for your gallant words, but I am no spring chicken, I just age well.” She winked at Deacon and continued. “I started early. Graduated high school at fifteen, got my law degree at twenty and realized my marriage was headed for divorce by age thirty. When I saw forty just around the bend, I divorced the bastard, cashed out, sold my piece of the partnership and hit the road.”

“Well I, for one, am impressed. But that brings up a whole other set of questions, though not ones I usually care to dwell on.”

“Oh? Cat got the silver tongue?” she teased.

“I am many things, my dear lady, but overly sensitive is not one. I am well aware of my station in life and how I look. I am firmly blue collar and love working with my hands. I am over-the-hill, a little over-weight and my tattoos and motorcycles don’t scream ‘corporate boardroom’ in any language.”

“So why did I walk up to you, you mean? Did you think I might be looking for a little walk on the wild side?” She laughed, her eyes alight with good humor.

“Deacon, you are every bit as charming and funny as Katie said you would be.”

It was Deacon’s turn to laugh. A setup! He turned and looked to where he had last seen the bar manager. There, at the end of the bar, Katie was blowing him a kiss and laughing.

“Are you really a college chum of Katie’s or was this all part of her little joke? Oh, and remind me to find something really mean with which to pay her back, would you?”

Stephanie was still chuckling, but her smile was warm and not mean-spirited. “Deacon, everything I told you was the truth, and I am most certainly an old college friend. We were roommates for three years at Cal State San Diego. Though I don’t have the same ... appetites that consume our Katie, we were very close and have remained friends ever since.”

Deacon relaxed a bit. He liked a good practical joke as much as the next guy, and gave as good as he got in most exchanges. He liked this little lady, in more ways than one, but he should have known that he was out of his league before he even sat down.

“Ah well. If you had told me you were a nymphomaniac, I probably would have had a heart attack.”

Stephanie cocked her head, curiosity written across her face. “A nympho?”

Deacon looked shocked, and not a little embarrassed. “Um, well ... I am guessing that Katie didn’t tell you. Damn.”

He sat for a second, gathering his wits, then forged on. “See that little blonde barkeep? Her name is Sarah, and she is married to the head bouncer, Sam. They have a very happy, very monogamous marriage and I have been friends with both of them for a long time. So, of course, that means that I hit on her every chance I can, and tease Sam about stealing her away from him. He knows, and she knows, that it is all in fun, and they give as good as they get. The standing joke is that if I could find a short, stacked nymphomaniac who isn’t already married to a human fire plug, I could die a happy man.”

Deacon’s face was scarlet red and he wondered if she could feel the heat from across the table. He watched her face, hoping she would not take offense.

Wide-eyed, she started off with a giggle, and that devolved into a full-blown attack of side-splitting laughter that left her breathless and with tears running down her cheeks.

While Deacon waited for her to wind down, he was very relieved. That could have gone either way and tears of laughter were better that anger any day of the week.

“Deacon, what the hell did you do to Steph? Slip something in her drink? Show her your little wiener?” Katie was standing by the table, fists perched on her plush hips and a grin on her face.

“Katie, you know better than that. I simply told her that you and I were happily married, and that she should stop hitting on me, my love!”

“You probably would, too, you jerk.” Katie leaned over and kissed the top of Deacon’s head and pulled up a chair.

“So, what did he say?” she asked Stephanie, looking amused and intensely curious.

Stephanie, wiping her eyes again, looked at Deacon first, as though asking permission. At his nod, she told Katie what had been said, and it was Katie’s turn to pound the table and laugh.

“Deacon, you idiot, I point you out as a hell of a good guy to my best friend in the whole world, and you go and ask her if she is a nympho? What the hell is wrong with you?” Katie’s grin took all of the heat out of her complaint, and she shook her head, turning towards Stephanie.

“I should have known better. He really is a nice guy, but too damn glib, and too honest, for his own good. To be fair to him though, I did have him, and his tastes, in mind when you said you had finally gotten rid of Roger and were coming for a visit. I figured if you weren’t going to finally switch teams, that Deacon was the perfect person to get your mind on the right track.”

She grinned over at Deacon, noticing his discomfort, but plowing on anyway.

“He won’t talk much about himself, but I have known him for a decade and you pick up things. He’s a great guy, a veteran with a lot of experience. He’s a hands-on guy who works because he loves to work, not because he has to. I know he has more money that sense, and could probably do what you are doing if he had a mind to.”

“Katie...” Deacon scowled at her, willing her to stop.

“Hush, baby, adults are talking.” she replied, unrepentant. “Go get us a drink if you are embarrassed.” Dismissing him, she turned back to Stephanie again.

Deacon took the hint, nodded to Stephanie, and headed to the bar, torn between annoyance at being talked around, and gratitude that he hadn’t made a fool of himself.

“He doesn’t know that I know, and has sworn just about everyone else to secrecy, but he is kind of an unofficial Santa around here. Hell, he handed Sarah and Sam twenty grand last year when their house flooded. Just handed them a check and walked off. They call it a loan, and have been paying him back, but he has never mentioned it even to them. I doubt he would blink an eye if they never gave him a dime in return. “ She paused, thinking.

“I think he got a big settlement from his parents’ estate, and just invested it. He’s got a nice bit of property, but dresses like he hasn’t bought clothes in a decade. He’s obviously educated, but pretends he is this big bad biker type who dropped out of high school. He’s an odd duck, Steph, and a lonely one, but you won’t find a nicer, kinder guy.” Katie finished, a little hitch in her voice and her eyes damp with unshed tears.

Stephanie didn’t reply, but her eyes were on Deacon as he stood at the bar and chatted with Sarah and a muscle-bound man that had to be the legendary Sam. Even without Katie’s tale, she had been fascinated from the very first. He had something about him, something in his eyes that touched her. When he shook her hand, she felt it all the way down to her stomach, and even lower.

She flicked her eyes back to Katie, and grinned. “I thought you were firmly in the carpet munching game, roomie! I seem to remember that you were very, very good at it too.” she teased, with a lusty grin. “If I didn’t know better, I would think you have a thing for this man.”

Katie scowled at her, but couldn’t make it work. “I adore him, Steph, and I won’t say I never entertained a few fantasies about taking him to bed, but it wouldn’t have been fair to him. He’s a good one, and needs a woman who wants him, and not just a stiff dick. It would never work out anyway, as tempting as it may be, he doesn’t have the equipment I really need to be happy. You, on the other hand, refuse to be converted.” Katie licked her lips suggestively, then grinned again. “So, I figured the two of you might just hit it off, and maybe, just maybe, if you get an itch, you can invite me to play some time!”

Stephanie laughed, and laid her hand on Katie’s arm. “You never know, roomie. I know I sure enjoyed being your roommate, but unlike you I need that male meat to be happy.” She winked, then excused herself. “I think I need to see what’s taking so long with those drinks!”

It was midnight when Deacon said his goodbyes. They had sat and talked for hours, and Deacon couldn’t remember a single topic. He had sat, trading stories and jokes, lost in her bright green eyes and infectious smile. He was smitten with the diminutive brunette, and as the evening wound to a close, knew he wanted to see her again, and soon!

When he got up to leave, she had accompanied him out the door, her hand sliding in to his as if it belonged there. She gave him her cell number, and told him she was staying at Katie’s house. They made plans to meet for dinner the next day and, before he climbed on his bike, she slid her arms around his waist and lifted her face to be kissed good night.

Deacon leaned down, his hand lightly touching the silky hair on the back of her head, and pressed his lips to hers. He marveled at the softness of her lips, and the heat that speared right through him. When her tongue darted out to lightly touch his lips, he opened up and felt like he was being drawn in to a furnace. His cock was almost instantly hard and pressed painfully at the seam along his inner thigh. This woman was amazing!

Stephanie tasted his tongue and her nipples crinkled, being painfully hard under her brassiere. She leaned against him, pressing as much of her body to his as possible, though her chin was barely up to his sternum. She could feel the heat and the length of his hard cock pressing against her stomach, and would not have been surprised if the wetness in her panties was soaking the front of her jeans.

They separated, and stared at one another, lost in the moment. There was definitely a connection there, and they both felt it...

Deacon, regretfully, dropped his hands to his side, and then impulsively kissed her again, this time on the cheek. “I am really looking forward to seeing you again, Stephanie. I’ll call you tomorrow, ok?”

“You damn well better!” Stephanie replied, a smile lighting up her face. This, she thought, was going to be very interesting.

Stephanie

Stephanie pushed a few stray hairs off her sweaty forehead and sighed, looking around the room with a sad expression. Hoisting herself up on the marble countertop, she reached above and behind her to pull a wine glass from the overhead rack, then reached for the bottle of wine she had opened earlier.

It had taken a long time, almost a year, but the last tangible link to her old life belonged to someone else now. The sale of her quarter of Thomas, Thomas, Mason & Shield was complete, netting her enough to retire and live comfortably. The divorce was finalized, and she got the city house, her ex got their vacation place up in the mountains.

She had sold her house to some Texas oilman, and his trophy bride had been so enamored with the decor that he had offered her a half million more if she would sell completely furnished.

Her house held a few good memories, but more painful ones, and she didn’t even blink as she signed over everything. Well, almost everything.

Her personal effects, a few heirlooms, some art and a couple of cherished bits of furniture had all been professional and adroitly packed away. Carried off to a climate-controlled storage unit, her possessions would stay there and await the day she would come for them. Everything left in the house now, besides a last box of trinkets and her final suitcase, belonged to the new owners.

This house had once been a dream of hers, one realized before she learned that dreams came at a price.

Stephanie had been something of a prodigy. She had a voracious mind and parents who pushed her to be the best she could be. She was blessed, or cursed depending on her mood, with an almost eidetic memory and an unbounded curiosity about the world around her. Excelling at school had been child’s play and she graduated high school just after her fourteenth birthday. After spending almost a year in Europe with her maternal grandparents, traveling and spending time just being a kid, she returned with a renewed sense of purpose and enrolled in college.

Her first year in college was almost her last. She felt alienated from the older students and, because of both her diminutive size and her age, was an easy target for those students who felt threatened, and those who would take advantage. She had insisted on living in the freshman dorms and would not take no for answer when her parents argued that she should live at home.

She wanted to live like all of the other students, and follow the same rules, have the same experiences as her classmates. Freshmen were required to live int the dorms, and though the college was willing to waive that requirement for their youngest student, Stephanie was not willing to be so easily dismissed.