Greatest MC Romance Box Set

by Blair Grey

  Lyle took over, “This man is a bad seed. But you should know that he’s been trained in ways that make him a hard man to take down. If it was easy, he would’ve already been taken care of. So, if this task is too hard for you, just say so.”

  I knew he was baiting me to see if I would courteously refuse the president’s wish. With a slight nod, I acknowledged Lyle’s words.

  Blowing out a puff of smoke off his cigar, Carl asked me one simple question, “So, you got this for me?”

  Do I have this for him?

  I knew what he meant. Would I kill this DEA agent?

  Would I kill the man then deal with the aftermath of that? Would I be able to do everything it would take to kill a Drug Enforcement Administration agent and get away with it?

  Lyle was right. The task wouldn’t be an easy one. The man would be well-trained in hand to hand and mortal combat. But that wasn’t the only risk. Killing a federal agent held stiff penalties from the government. Getting caught by them meant I would have to take all the blame on myself and never let a soul know that anyone from the MC had called the hit or had aided in it in any way.

  Doing time came along with being a part of an organization like this one. So, I might actually get caught and the sentence for murdering a federal agent would be stiff. Maybe life in prison.

  Carl knew that. He knew everything that could go wrong and what that would mean to the man who’d committed the act. The job wasn’t easy. It wasn’t even the tiniest bit safe. It would make or break me.

  I could do the job and earn my patch a lot faster than most had earned theirs. Instead of being envious of how much faster I’d earned mine, they would be inspired and even in awe of me.

  If I made it out alive and didn’t get caught.

  Those were a couple of big ifs. And I wasn’t sure if I could pull off such a thing. There was the moral part of me that told me I couldn’t kill a person if I didn’t know they had done something to deserve it.

  Maybe I’m not cut out for this.

  As that thought zipped through my head, it zipped right back out of it. I’d been through some shit. I could handle anything that came my way.

  I’d been physically fighting off people much bigger than me since I was a kid. I’d been fighting mental battles since then too. Not only did I want to belong to an organization full of men who understood the dirtier side that life can have, but I also wanted to be able to hold my head up high, feeling proud of things I’d accomplished.

  Not many people in what I’d come to know as polite society thought the things I’d fought for or had gone through were morally acceptable. What I’d gone through wasn’t acceptable at all. And those demons still haunted me at times.

  Sometimes, it takes living in the darker part of the world, making dark things more ordinary to you, which helps you understand the ugliness in the world. Whatever it was, I wanted in. I wanted the chance to live amongst those who knew pain the way I did. I wanted the chance to hold my head up and not feel like those around me looked down on me or thought me to be weak.

  I need to belong to something that’s bigger than me.

  “Not a problem, sir. You can count on me. I’ve got this for you.” Now to figure out how to pull this off so I don’t spend the remainder of my life behind bars - or dead.

  Chapter Two

  Nicki

  Ninety percent of any type of work in law enforcement is paperwork. Even as I backspaced for the umpteenth time to correct a misspelled word, I still didn’t bitch about it. It was the ten percent of pure adrenaline when I made a bust that made the monotony of paperwork worth it.

  Getting accepted into the Drug Enforcement Administration isn’t easy for anyone. But I had good reasons to keep working for the goal I’d made when I was just fifteen. When you almost lose someone you care about to drugs – or people who are in the business of making and selling drugs – then you tend to want to be a part of the solution rather than part of the problem.

  After gaining a bachelor’s degree in computer technology, I was ready to make my application to the DEA. A year later, I was let into the organization I thought I would come to love.

  I could not have been more wrong.

  While the job was everything I’d dreamed of and more at times, politics within the organization left much to be desired. I’d been done wrong and no one on the inside seemed to give a flying fuck about that.

  As I sat at my desk, typing away, a cold chill blew into my tiny office as the door opened. “Working hard or hardly working?” the biggest motherfucker on the planet said with a joking tone to his monster-like deep voice. Uninvited, fellow DEA agent, Dean Strong, took a seat on the small chair meant for people I wanted to meet with – which he was not. “I saw your light on and being that’s it’s past midnight, I thought I should make sure you haven’t turned into a pumpkin.”

  Oh, how thoughtful of you, antichrist.

  I had no idea how the man had gotten away with the shit he’d gotten away with. But I was sure the devil had something to do with it. And that was no joke.

  Three years ago he took my already damaged life and psyche and put some more huge gashes in them just for kicks. My first year in the agency and his fifth year, they put him on as my mentor.

  Why they would put a man with his arrogance and above the law mentality over a naïve young woman was beyond me. He thought his overbearing, overstepping, over-sexual nature was – of all things – attractive and what every woman wants.

  As if every woman’s dream is to be tied up and beaten.

  Even when I told him repeatedly that I wasn’t a woman who wanted to be treated like a plaything, he thought I was just being coy and childish. In his mind, every woman likes to be touched when they say they don’t want that at all.

  In his mind, no means, please do. In his mind, ripping a woman’s clothes off who is screaming at him to stop, is called foreplay. In his mind, I wanted him to keep on moving forward as I struggled to get away from him.

  I did not want that at all. But proving that to the people over our heads wasn’t a thing I had managed to do. They called it a miscommunication and gave Dean a slap on the wrist for taking what was mine to give without my permission and against my will.

  One measly year of probation within the agency was his punishment for taking my security and putting my mental state back into the garbage can that I had worked so hard to get it out of before applying for the job of my dreams. For the period of one year, following the assault, I was free of Dean Strong’s forced company. That was it.

  That year went by way too fast and the last two years he’d been able to be around me anytime he saw fit. Without any of our higher-ups giving two shits about my discomfort.

  Gritting my teeth, I tried not to sound too bitchy as he loved to lecture me about how that tone I could get put people off. “I’ve got to finish this report because tomorrow morning I have to check in with the Baltimore Police Department about a mysterious car that was left in a Walmart parking lot with a trunk full of drugs.”

  “Funny. That’s something I wanted to run by you anyway.” He leaned back in the chair, raising the front two legs off the floor, and put his hands behind his head. “I’ve got some problems with a biker gang in Baltimore that I need help with. They’ve got their greedy hands in all sorts of shit that I can’t quite pin on them yet. You can help me out. They’ve got multiple strip clubs that I’m sure you could get a job in, being that you’ve got a fit and tone body and your dance moves aren’t half bad either.”

  “I’m not going to be in Baltimore to try to find a job stripping. But thanks for asking.” Is anything with this man not about getting me naked?

  Changing positions, he leaned his elbows on my desk, getting his face closer to mine than I cared for it to be. I could smell the remnants of mustard and ketchup from the burger he’d eaten earlier. Not that the putrid smell was the most disgusting thing about his proximity. “Look, this is important to me, Johansson. I’m making it my missio
n to rid the East Coast of every biker gang that I possibly can. The Iron Cobras have been on my shit-list for the last couple of years. I’ve been letting them slide by for far too long. It’s time to end them. I’m done playing around. I mean it.” He slammed his fist on my little, metal desk, making it shake.

  For a moment, my heart stopped and sweat beaded on my forehead. “I’m not about to work in a strip club.” I didn’t want him to see that he’d rattled me. The one thing I had was the way I could hide my trauma over what he’d done to me.

  Not a tear had been shed where he could see. Not one word of how he’d made me feel weak and stupid was said to him. I didn’t want to give him that satisfaction. As far as he knew, I was pissed that he’d forced me into doing something I had no intention of doing.

  Pissed.

  Not afraid. Not sad. Not devastated.

  Just pissed.

  The other things were not for him to know.

  “Too good?” He winked at me. He’d used that on my before, to try to taunt me about not wanting him to stick his dick into me.

  As if anyone needed to feel they were too good not to want some asshole’s dick crammed into their bodies. “I’m just not going to do that.” I stopped trying to work on the report that was on my computer screen as getting him the fuck out of my office was much more important to me at that moment. Turning my chair to face him, I placed my hands on my lap to help partially cover my tits. It didn’t matter that I wore a shirt that was buttoned all the way up to my neck, I could still feel his hot stare on my chest area. “So, if that’s all you came in here for, then you should get going. I’ve got that early morning I told you about. This report is about an hour away from being done. Not much time to chat. Sorry.”

  Getting up, he acted like he was about to leave, but then put both hands on my desk and leaned way over, so his face was only an inch away from mine. With the small room, I had nowhere to go as I was already as far back in my chair as I could get. “How long are you going to be in Baltimore?”

  I didn’t want him to know that. He’d never stop bothering me if he knew just how long I was going to be there.

  The operation was going to be a long one. The agency had rented me a furnished apartment in Baltimore. The whole thing could take a year or even more than that.

  I’d been pretty excited about getting away from Arlington and Dean Strong for an extended period of time. If I told him how long I might be staying in the town he wanted to make some priority to him, then he would never leave me alone.

  “I don’t know.” Evasive answers seemed best.

  “You won’t be able to solve that case in a day or even a week.” He stood up, giving me enough space to breathe again. “You staying in a hotel or did they get you an apartment?”

  I hated that he knew so fucking much about the way things went with our agency. “It’s an apartment. But I might not be the one to stay on the case. They probably got it so that anyone could stay there if need be.”

  “A two-bedroom?” I hated the look on his face as he stepped back, leaning against the wall, crossing one foot over the other as he contemplated how he could get assigned to the same apartment I was.

  “No.” Thank God. “It’s an efficiency. Really small from what I understand. The instructions said to pack only what I need. They’re going to have the clothes they want me to wear already there. So, you see, they’ve got an identity already prepared for me there. I couldn’t possibly crossover to help you out.” Even if I wanted to. Which I don’t.

  “I think that’s not the case at all. You’ve got blonde hair and light blue eyes,” he pointed out. “You can wear contacts to change your eyes to any color in the rainbow. And wigs are things strippers wear anyway. I can make it worth your while, you know. A little cash on the side is always a good thing to have. I think you’ll have fun. You need to loosen up anyway.” He smiled and my stomach twisted on itself. “If you let me help you, you can learn how to unwind. Letting go isn’t a crime, you know. Everyone is expected to give in to their desires.”

  “You can stop now.” I wasn’t about to let him talk to me about desires of any kind. “You’ve got your answer. It doesn’t matter that I’ll be in Baltimore. I’m not going to be able to help you.” I thought that sounded a little weak, so fixed it, “No, I don’t mean that. I am not going to help you because I don’t want to. I don’t like spending time with you, and you know that.”

  “What I don’t know about that is why you don’t like spending time with me. Lots – and I do mean lots – of women love spending time with me.” He turned to walk away. “It’s actually me who doesn’t like spending too much time with any of them. But you’re different. Once you mature a bit, I think you’ll see how good we can be for each other. I’m a man who knows what he wants. And you’re still young enough not to have figured out what you want yet. Not all females are mature by the time they’re twenty-five. As a BDSM Master, I know a thing or two about the mind, maturity rate, and physical maturity of the female body. I’d thought you were there, but not yet. Soon, though. Soon, you will be.”

  BDSM Master – my ass! Rapist – and that’s it!

  I knew I didn’t want him. I knew I hated him. I knew he deserved more than a slap on the wrist for what he’d done to me. But more than anything else, I didn’t want the man to know how much he’d adversely affected me. “Don’t wait for me to come around to your way of thinking.” It will never happen. “I’m apparently not the woman you think I am.”

  “Woman?” A deep, utterly obnoxious laugh bubbled up from somewhere deep inside of him. “You’re not mature enough to call yourself that yet. But one day you’ll grow up and start thinking like an adult.”

  It was late and I apparently was way too tired to find fury at what he’d said. Either that or I was finally getting control over my emotions where the asshole was concerned. I’d been through shit he’d never dealt with. And he’d been one of the people to hand me one of the piles of shit I was still dealing with. “Yeah, you’re right.” I went back to filling in the report, ignoring him.

  “So, that’s it then.” I watched him nod out of the corner of my eye. “Well, you be careful in Baltimore. It’s not as safe a place as Arlington is. Whatever locks they have on the door to that apartment they put you up in, add a couple more. And if you go out after dark, be careful and keep a keen eye on your surroundings. Don’t ever go anywhere without your gun at your back.”

  I hated the way Dean Strong could act like he cared about me - or anyone for that matter. “Yeah, I’ll keep my gun at my back and a knife in each boot, ready to grab and slash. I have been through the same training that you have.”

  “Yeah, but you’re not as good at it as I am. I proved that to you.” With that, he exited my office, closing the door behind him.

  I was sure he’d left just so he wouldn’t have to watch my face turn red and my chest stop moving as my breath ceased and my heart raced.

  Pointing out how he had held me down while stripping away my clothing then forcing himself on me had done it. I’d had one fleeting moment of him not being able to get to me and he’d seen that.

  He had to bring that memory back up – as if it was ever that far away from my mind at any given time. He had to remind me that once – just once – but still, once he’d been able to physically handle me in a way that had made me a helpless fucking victim.

  And in the end, while I was shaking and crying – dying inside – he’d told me that he’d taught me a valuable lesson.

  I’d thought the lesson was to trust no one. Supposedly, that was not the lesson that night. No. He’d told me that the lesson was that no one had the power to stop Dean Strong once he’d set his mind to something.

  But one day I will have that power if God is willing and I can ever fully believe in myself again.

  Chapter Three

  Garrett

  Going to a legitimate therapist wasn’t a thing that someone in a biker gang could do. So, I had to settle for an
anonymous online session with a not-so-legit therapist.

  Wearing a facemask to hide my identity, I also had signed up for the therapeutic site under an assumed named. Paul Glass is who I became. It helped me delve into my psyche much better as an outsider looking in anyway.

  A moment of only the green background then Javier was there, smiling in a very professional way and wearing a white lab coat. Something about that coat made me feel as if he was smart. “Hello, Paul. How are you doing this fine day?”

  “I’m doing okay. I’m getting to my goal. And it’s a little faster than I had anticipated. But I’ve got to do something that I have to build myself up for, to achieve this goal. And I need to make it right in my mind.” I couldn’t very well tell him that I had to kill a guy to become a member of a biker gang.

  From the way he nodded, I sort of thought he’d read my mind – at least a little. “In this life, we have challenges. It is meant to be this way. We might not think we’re ready for them, but they come to us anyway. Challenges do not care if you are ready for them or not. They have their own timeline and care not about yours. So, how do you plan to ready yourself for this particular challenge?”

  “If I could find something to make this,” I hesitated on the word I should use, not wanting to give any human characteristics to what I had to do, “situation seem like it’s worth doing, then I think I could do it with ease.” As easy as it can be to kill a trained agent.

  “Sounds like you must do some research, Paul.” He ran his hand through the air and that meant to clear that problem off my slate. “So, onto you, personally, Paul. Have you been sleeping okay this last week?”