Sometimes, I wonder just how many people inhabit my body. Do you have any idea what I'm talking about? Probably not. After all, we're just getting to know each other and I haven't exactly let you in on much, have I?

Well, then let me try to explain. See, there are times when I'm left to wonder if I will ever leave behind that little person inside of me who likes to take chances ... even though when I'm taking them, there's a 'me' who knows I'm being incredibly stupid, foolish and foolhardy. You know who's telling me just how stupid, foolish and foolhardy I'm being? It's another person inside me who knows better. The 'me' who knows that someday soon it'll all come back to haunt me. And there's even another person who stands there shaking her head at me making a move that another person inside me is already regretting. There's still another person inside and she's already figuring out how she'll mitigate the damage.

Now, here's a truth.  Wouldn't you think I'd be old enough to have learned not to make dares? Even in jest? Especially when they border on a death wish? Even when I know I'd never really have the guts to go through with them? Even when just the thought of going through with them scares me yet still manages to excite the part of me that likes danger?

I really had just been joking when I'd answered his dare with this flip answer that some part of me knew he'd take as a challenge.

He sent me a welcome message. It said, "Hmmmm. Fresh meat."  He sent it the day after I joined this group of women who knew of his existence. Well, his and the other men. I hadn't even met Terry at that point. Now, not in a million years did I really want anything to do with Hando. Well, at least not that early in the game, anyway. Especially not when I finally answered him, toward the end of the week of meeting Terry and when I wasn't feeling very brave after making a few unfortunate rules violations that were making some of the other women wonder just how comfortable they were with admitting me to their world.

Long before joining this group, I'd written little fictional stories about Hando and just that was enough of an exploration of his unique persona to tell me that I'd never handle it with him in reality. But, see, I was still learning that what you say to the Crowe Brothers on this board the group has set up to exchange messages is real. And this was going to teach me a lesson about that; a lesson I hoped I'd remember the next time some part of me decided to be stupid.

So, just which part of me do you suppose it was that sent him the reply message saying, "Fresh meat, indeed. Sweetheart, I'm looking forward to it. Bring it on."

It was just a joke. A bit of bravado more for the women's amusement than anything. Do you suppose, though, that there was a part of me who really was getting off on being aware it had just issued a challenge to him? And that the dominant side of me, the one that hated confrontation but would still never want to show fear, would have to deal with it?

Less than 24 hours later, he used his one phone call to reach out to me. "Oi. Come bail me out of this shit hole."

I stared at the phone, shook the receiver to make it work right and then put it back up to my ear. Heard this irritated breathing on the other end. Said "Who is this?" even though I knew who it was instantly.

"You fuckin' with me? Get yer arse down here. Now."

Oh, holy shit, I whispered to myself. How in fuck's name had he even found me? And then trying wildly to remember where Terry was. Fuck, fuck, fuck, I was chanting inside. My sweet K&R man isn't here and I'm on my own. Then thinking, well, hell, I'll call Terry and wherever he is, he'll come back and ...

And what? Just how awkward would it be to admit to Terry that whilst I'm enjoying our first time together, whilst he's proving to me that what happened between us meant something special to us both and that we were destined for a bond unique to us ... that during that magical time, I'm hatching some rendezvous with not just another Brother, but this one? The one the good Brothers warn us about? The one the good Brothers cannot for the lives of themselves figure out the attraction he holds for so many of the women?

I flipped my cell phone shut and put my head in my hands. Christ. I have to live in this town, I moaned inside. I work in this town. I absolutely cannot be mixed up in something with a nasty little Nazi, rabble rousing hate machine. Not in this town.

Almost without thinking, I was already dialing another number. He picked it up on the second ring and I could hear my voice shaking. Cleared my throat and started over. Told him about the phone call and what I assumed it meant.

"You invited Hando to visit you?" Bud asked me. His deep voice was stern and unhappy. "Why would you do that?"

"Okay, Bud, I know I goofed up. I didn't exactly invite him ..."

"Then he can't come see you. You had to invite him or he wouldn't be there."

"Yeah, well, see, I was just joking and ..."

"You don't joke with him. You might be new to this game, but you do know enough about him to know that much. I have half a mind to ..."

"Please, Bud? I really need some help here." I sighed into the phone and I heard him utter a soft curse. "I cannot call any of my contacts with the NOPD to find out what he's charged with. I was just hoping that you could pull some strings. You know? Another cop calls them and they're likely to tell you why they picked him up and maybe even just let him off with a warning if you tell them I'll come get him and make sure he stays out of trouble until I can get rid of him."

"Why can't you call cops you know?"

Making me admit it. Knowing why I couldn't call any of my police contacts but wanting to rub it in enough to make sure I'd know that he knew that I knew just how big of a mistake I'd made. "Bud. He's a Nazi skinhead. And, he hates gays and just about everything ethnic moving on the streets. Can you even imagine how well that attitude will go over in New Orleans? I cannot have my name hooked up with someone like that."

"You have a reputation to protect and all."

"Yes, Bud. That's right. I do have a reputation here and I do need to protect it."

"You shoulda thought of that little detail before you invited him."

"I thought ..."

"No. The point is, Ann, you weren't thinking." Then just not saying anything; making me sweat as I hung on the line and wondered if he'd help me in my damsel-in-distress mode or if he'd simply let me stew in my own juices.

And, speaking of juices, will you think I'm really a crazed pervert if I were to admit to you that just hearing Bud's voice was making me wet? I closed my eyes and got this mental image of him walking in that way he has and of him getting that tender, hungry expression on his face when he looks at a woman he wants.

"Help me. Please, Bud?"

Pissed off click of his tongue. Hard voice saying, "Fine. I'll make a few calls. Stay where you are and I'll get back to you."

He made me wait forty minutes. I was in my car and almost at the city prison when he called me. He'd made contact with the detective who'd written up the report.

"Two patrolmen responded to a drunk and disorderly in the 800 block of Bourbon," Bud said.

I shut my eyes and pictured the bars in that block. Gay celebration central in the French Quarter. I could just imagine a drunk, disoriented and pissed off Hando on a rampage there. It couldn't be worse, I thought.

But it was. "One of the patrolmen was black. His partner was Asian; a woman."

"Oh, shit."

"Fucking A-one right, Ann. You're lucky he's not dead."

"What did he do?"

"Resisted arrest," he told me, and an instant later he started chuckling. "He's never messed with New Orleans' finest before, honey. Believe me, he won't be doing it again. Me, on the other hand, I'd fit right in with your cops. Anyway, he's been sitting in that jail cell for about 15 hours. Him and a bunch of blacks. The cops ... the detective said they 'forgot he was there' until tonight when they let him make his phone call."

"Oh, shit."

"You know, this is really the first conversation I've had with you and you're not impressing me with your range of vocabulary. I thought writers didn't like repeating themselves."

"Sorry. It's just ... well, it's hard to think of anything appropriate to say when all I can think of is 'oh, shit.' So, Bud, what's the upshot, here? I have to go bail him out? What's the legal situation and all? Oh, God, but the others are going to kill me. I just keep breaking all these rules and ... They'll kick me out before I even get to see you."

That made him pause. Even long distance, I caught the way that made him feel. His voice was so much softer when he spoke to me. "Look, I talked to the detective. They feel like they've taught the little shitbag a good lesson but they want him out of New Orleans. I promised them you'd come get him and put him on the first plane out. Send him to Teener or someone who can actually handle him, Ann. Okay?"

"Yeah, okay. I'll pick him up and take him to the airport." And at that moment, that was all I was going to do. The city prison building at the corner of Broad, where they did the intakes and held those arrested for arraignment, was coming into eyesight for me as I was driving carefully down Tulane.

I felt this wave of emotion wash over me. Most of it was just gratitude that Bud had turned out to be the man I thought he would be - the one whose best instincts were to help women.

"And, Ann? When are you going to ask for me?" Saying it with this curious Bud White mixture of gruffness and softness. 

"As soon as I stop feeling like an idiot, Bud. And I hope by then you'll be ready to give me another chance to prove I'm not a total screw up."

"It's okay, sweetheart. Take your time. And, listen, these kinds of things can happen to the new women. Just learn from this mistake. And whatever you do, don't start joking around with Sid because he's even worse than Hando."

So, I don't know, maybe all things considered, it wasn't really that awful that this had happened. I mean, Bud and I had just shared a nice moment together and when I finally met him in person, we'd be almost like old friends. And he'd boosted me up enough that I could march right in the big old building, get Hando out of the clutches of the New Orleans Police Department, scoot on over to the airport and put his ass on a plane for somewhere, anywhere.

And then, something happened. Something unexpected. A jailer led Hando into the squad room. It was the first time I'd seen him in person and let me tell you, he's a revisionist God made flesh.

I gulped. Out loud. Hando's eyes were blazing and focused on me. He was reading every scared, girlish, evil thought that flashed across my face. He didn't miss a thing. And I didn't miss that telltale flush of anger lighting up his entire body. I'd already heard from Teener about just how much more dangerous he was to deal with when he was angry. I felt the strength Bud had just given me begin to ebb away and in its place was ... curiosity about Hando at his worst. About how and if I'd be able to deal with a man like this.

And when I jerked my eyes from Hando's, the detective, who was leaning back against his desk and observing me, was glaring at me. "Don't even think about it, Ann.  Head westbound on the I-10 to the airport exit."

I nodded my head at him. He shook his head at me. Scary how well cops learn to read deviant human behavior even before it happens.

No paperwork to sign. No money to leave as bail. No promises to do anything but get Hando out of the city limits. In New Orleans, it isn't what you know. It's who you know. And it's who can do you favors. This wasn't a fix, getting Hando out of jail with no record and no charges. This was a favor this detective was doing for Bud. And the pot sweetener was that the detective knew I knew people.

Course, the flip side of that was that the detective just might mention this to some of the people who knew the people I knew. But what other choice did I have? Plausible deniability, I thought. They could speculate all they wanted, but with no record, there was no proof.

Besides, who would ever picture me with a Nazi skinhead? No one who knew me. 

I led Hando out and used the big old marble stairs to get down to the first floor because I disliked the idea of anyone seeing us together in the elevator. I almost raced out of that building and Hando just kind of moved at his own pace behind me. Unless you were really clued in, I thought, you'd probably never guess we were together.

At my car, I clicked the lock opener and I was just getting my hand on the door handle to get in behind the wheel when he stopped me. How he'd covered the distance between us and overtaken me without me realizing it was a mystery.

But he was right behind me. His big, strong hand on mine, mashing it into the handle, stopping me from opening the door. Then he leaned his body against mine, pushing me right into the car. He used his chin to move the hair at the side of my face out of his way. His mouth against my ear, saying, "What's your rush, Ann? You act like you're ashamed to be seen with me. This the way you show how happy you are that I've come all this way at your invitation?"

And then I felt his tongue. Swiping down my neck and when I shivered against him, he chuckled. My eyes swept the sidewalk in front of me. I'd parked on the side of the big building and I was hoping not to see anyone I knew.

But the harsh glare of the street lamps didn't illuminate other people on that block. There was no one else there. Just me. And the skinhead. The body behind me that was making me sweat in places I didn't know you could actually sweat.

"I ... I promised to get you on a plane and out of the city. It was the deal I made to get you out of jail," I told him, hearing the little wavering in my voice and hoping he wasn't catching it.

"Do you always do what you're told?" A definable threat in his tone. "Something tells me you just like people to think you're a good girl. Because a good girl would never have invited a bad boy like me."

Gulping again because he was pressing into me and he was hard behind me. It was obscene. It was horrible. 

It was something else.

"I didn't really invite you here."

Both his hands were on my thighs, inching the bottom of my skirt up. He was lightly rubbing his hardness into the crack of my ass. He was sucking my ear lobe into his mouth and then simply breathing hard into my ear.

I shoved my hands down and tried to pry his off my skin. But it just made him more aggressive and before it even seemed possible, he had my skirt hiked almost up to my waist. His open long coat flapped around my sides, and I knew it would be impossible for a casual observer to really see exactly what was happening since it was hiding my skin and his hands.

"You invited me. You told me to bring it on, Annie. I've done just what you asked. And now, I expect you to show me a good time."

"It was ... Hando, I was just ... Stop. Now." Trying hard to wriggle out of his grasp and forcing him to wrap one arm around my waist to keep me in place.

"Yeah? Stop? You sure? Cause, I don't think that's really what you want." And I felt his mouth press in so hard against my neck. Knowing that what he was doing was going to leave a mark that would be impossible to hide. Fleeting images whooshed through my mind as I tried to remember if I owned any turtlenecks. "Now, sweets, if you really had wanted to get rid of me ... if you really didn't want to make it with me, then you wouldn't have worn something I could get into so easily, would you?"

You know, what he said had a certain ... well ... logic to it. And maybe a truth that I would never have admitted to myself.

Because, despite my words, my body and spirit were ambivalent. My soul was so scared. My heart wanted to run away. My brain was shutting down. But my libido was performing an aria that Amadeus would have loved to have written in his moments of madness.

And my clit seemed to be in charge. When his hand reached my panties, he found them damp. When his fingers snuck under the damp fabric, he made me moan.

I leaned back against him and turned my head in toward his neck.  "This is so wrong," I whispered against his skin.

"That's why you like it." Now inserting a finger into me with this soft grunt of success. "You like doing the wrong thing just to remind yourself that you don't do it often enough."

"Don't ... No. Don't make me come. Not here. Not like this." Reduced to soft pleading.

"You might be kicking my arse outta your town, Annie, but not without first admitting you want me to fuck you. Say it."

"Oh. God." Trying so hard to clamp my mouth shut even as he worked on me. 

"Say it. Tell me what you want me to do. Say it out loud so everyone knows. No more games."

"No. I won't."

"Say it."

Oh. 

Soft voice coming breathless on the cusp of coming. "Hando."

Say it. Say it. Say it. Say it. Say it. Say it. Say it.

Fuck me. Fuck me. Fuck me. Fuck me. Fuck me. Fuck me.

"I want you to fuck me. Now. Here. And then you're leaving." Panting out the words. "And ... don't call me Annie."

All I heard was his evil chuckle and then he was opening the back door and pushing me into the back seat. Scrambling, first in the instant intrusive blaze of yellow from the dome light, then in virtual blackness as he shut the door behind him. Feeling his hands dragging me to face him.

His mouth at my ear, telling me ... ordering me ... nothing particularly rough about him in that moment of dominance but he wasn't letting me off.

Straddling his lap at his instructions. Eyes wide open, just like he wanted me. Looking right into the face of danger unlike I'd faced in years. Then returning his kiss. Doing it right. Being right about being wrong. Relapsing to a wild period of my youth I'd thought I'd always regret.

And no other excuses. I just wanted to be wrong. Sometimes, deep in the recesses of our mundane days of adulthood, don't we just want to revert to those days when being bad was its own reward? When we didn't lie to ourselves about such things having deeper meaning?

"You ready for me to fuck ya, Annie?" he whispered in that low, commanding voice of his. The one soaked with mean desire.

"I told you not to call me Annie. I don't like the way you say it." That nickname. It sounded dirty when Hando said it. Not like when Terry had uttered it, his voice making it sound like a loving secret we were sharing.

"Yeah? That right?" Almost tender voice that caught me off guard. His free hand stroked down my cheek and his eyes were calm for just a moment before this spark seemed to flicker back into some mean flame. His voice was harsh then, saying, "After I make you come around this big cock of mine, you won't care what I call you. You'll just be begging for more."

"Bring it on," I whispered back to him, the night taking me. 

Now rough with me. Just getting to it. Shoving his zipper down, pulling out his rigid cock, moving my panties aside and swiping the swollen head through my slick wetness. The only contradictory motion he made was gently stroking my back when I shuddered at the feel of it. Then his mouth clamped onto my throat and he almost growled as he began to move into me below. Sucking hard with his mouth while he was pushing his cock into me with absolute determination.

Strong hands on my hips, ramming me down firmly until he was fully inside me, then moving me, setting the rhythm, dictating the rise and fall, encouraging the response of my body to his.

At first, even as I felt the rippling stroking through my abdomen, I thought he didn't care too much if I came or not. Like he was just using me instead of his right hand. Because he just seemed to keep fucking me and fucking me. Relentless. But then, as my breathing got so ragged and heavy that it wouldn't have taken the rocking of the car for passersby to know what we were up to, he started talking.

"That's right, love. You're doing good. Fuck but you're gonna come soon, aren't ya?" Pausing to kiss my lips and knead my breasts through the shirt he hadn't even bothered to try to take off me. "You gonna scream for me, love? Gonna scream my name when you come?"

Shaking my head even while I sighed out his name. And from nowhere, I was coming. This loud voice ... but his hand over my mouth stopped me. When I asked him later, he said he didn't want anyone to think he was killing me so he'd stopped me from crying out any louder. How flattering, I thought, whenever I remembered it.

His arms tight around my hips had me pressed so solidly to his chest and it almost choked the breath out of me. But it still felt so cool - the way we were responding to each other. He was coming so hard and totally into it. So into it that he wasn't even aware of his need to hold on to me that firmly. Like he didn't have the control I'd always imagined he had, even during that time of total, primal release.

I have thought back on that pivotal moment many times since this happened. I don't think about what it means that I never knew there was still a part of me that would have enjoyed coming in his arms. I don't ponder whether or not I came harder for him or Terry. I don't care that I was willing to take a risk like that for a man like him. None of that matters.

What I do think about is the way he was more surprised than I was about what seemed to pass between us, not just in the actual heat of coming but in the unexpected warmth of the afterglow. And that in the end, it was Hando who was doing the cuddling. And that when he caught himself, he seemed to grow so quiet and unsure.

Who knows but that the part of me that had set this whole thing into motion hadn't known that I needed to take this step if only because if I hadn't, I would have always been left with a strange hunger for him that might have gotten in the way with other men I knew I'd relate to in more lasting ways.

He looked back at me after he went through the security gate at the airport. 

Thanks for coming to see me, I mouthed to him.

I got a fleeting grin in return, that move he makes where he dips his head down and looks back up at you from under the fringe of his eyelashes. He tries to look so innocent and adorable. Like he'll fool you into forgetting the kind of man he really is. But we knew each other by then and if I ever invited him again, it would be on purpose.

And, so, here's another tale for you. You and I, we're getting to know some surprises about me, aren't we? 

Or are you? After all, I'm in charge here of the words that get written. Aren't you wondering what's been left unsaid?

Some day, I promise. Some day, you'll look back at this entry and be a better judge of how much I've really shared with you. But not just yet. It's still too soon.