"Olivia?" I ask, catching up to her.
Her hand lashes out, the envelope in it smacking me in the chest. Dropping it to the ground, she goes to her bike for her cigarettes.
Stooping, I pick up the envelope and flip it over. It's addressed to her, care of Ravage, whose real name is apparently Todd Harris. I chuckle. Todd. Not that I'd ever say anything like that to his face.
The return address is from Mercer Reynolds at Lewisburg Penitentiary—Olivia's father.
"Why didn't you tell me your dad is in Lewisburg?" I wouldn't have been in such a hurry to leave. Lucy, either. Not that I would've been in a rush to meet him.
She glares at me through a cloud of smoke.
"You didn't know," I say.
"He's been there this whole time." Tears slip down her cheeks.
Tucking the card into my cut, I close the space between us. "Hey." I thumb away her tears. "You didn't know. We'll just go see him."
She laughs, pulling away. "You've already met him."
I shake my head. "No one from the club ever approached me when I was inside. I was a naive kid. I didn't even know my father was President. I've seen him, but I don't know him."
"Well, he knows you," she tosses at me.
"He was my father's VP. I don't really remember him." I suppose I could have met him at some point. Birthday parties, cookouts . . . Who knows.
"Damn it, Cliff." Her free hand clenches into a fist. She lunges forward and hits my chest with the softer side of it. "He's inside because of you."
"No, baby," I say. I wrap my fingers around her wrist in a loose hug and draw it away from my chest. "I don't even know him."
"The club took a vote," she hisses, words dripping with venom.
"Why?" I shake my head. It doesn't make sense.
"Because someone had to watch your back."
I run a hand through my hair. "What are you talking about, Olivia? No one was watching my back except me." I hold my hands out to her, knuckles up. Even in the waning light, the scars dotting them are stark against my skin.
"Not according to Ravage," she says, stabbing her cigarette into the air between us. "Because of you—because of the club—my dad was taken away from me. And now I can't even start my job. How am I going to help Esther from out in fucking Amish country?" The tears drip from her cheeks onto the pavement, leaving dark splotches.
"Slow down," I soothe, taking a step toward her.
"No!" She sidesteps me, then whirls around. "You don't get to make this better."
"Okay." I hold my hands up. Dropping them, I take a few steps back until I'm leaning against the wall. "All right." I reach for my beard, but my fingers close around empty air. Again. "Why can't you start your job?" I ask, voice haggard.
"You haven't heard? Mercy is getting out on Monday, and I have to go get him. I have to call my supervisor. I don't even know what I'm going to tell her. She's going to fire me before I even start. I'm going to miss my first day!"
Damn. The last thing I want to do is question my President, but that was a bad call. "Ravage should've known better, but he's just trying to help. He probably just thought you'd want to be the first one to see your dad."
"I guess." Her shoulders drop a little. "Still doesn't help me keep my job."
"I'll talk to him," I promise. "Donny and I need to bring Esther's problem to the table, anyway. I'll make him see that he needs you here, in that DCF office."
"How the hell are you going to convince the club that Esther's problem is a club problem?"
Pushing off from the wall, I hold my arms open to her. She shakes her head at me, but steps into them. "That's for me to worry about."
11
Cliff
Unless there's anything pressing, the River Reapers usually have Church on Sundays—someone's sense of humor, I guess. We typically discuss business, such as The Wet Mermaid's fiscal budget, upcoming charity events, things like that. I've got less than twenty-four hours to figure out how I'm going to convince my brothers to help Esther.
I bend down and kiss Olivia full on the mouth, my lips moving against hers automatically. I suck in her lower lip and she sighs, a dreamy, evanescent sound. Sometimes I wish I could record certain things about her, that way I never have to forget. Like the exact pitch of her moans, the soft exhalations that come out in wave after wave when she's coming.
Then there are the things I could never forget, like the mischievous look in her eyes that first night as she tried car doors. It seems like ages ago and yesterday all at once. It's only been three months, but they've been the best three months of my life.
She presses against me, arms encircling my neck. Because she's so much smaller than me, she always has to stand on her tiptoes. Or I have to support her. I like the latter better.
Gripping her thighs, I lift her from the ground. She squeals, another Olivia sound that I can't commit to memory but appreciate every time I hear it. It's a short, surprised laugh that lilts at the end, an exclamation but not a protest.
"Wanna go upstairs?" I whisper against her lips.
I know my Olivia, my ol' lady. Sex is her language, her go-to no matter the occasion. Finding out her father's been in prison all this time indirectly because of me has to be stressing her out.
I can't change what happened. I'd never undo what I did to save Lucy. Eight years old or eighty, my cousin is my whole world. She's my best friend, might as well be my sister.
I just wish I hadn't hurt Olivia in the process.
The least I can do now is help her keep her job. Give her a safe place to work out her stress. Stop pressuring her to make this more than what it is. If it's meant to be—if Olivia and I are supposed to be together—it will be.
She wraps her legs tight around me. "Yes."
I carry her back into the strip club, by brothers who smirk knowingly, past Donny and Esther—who are probably on their way upstairs, too, judging by how seldom their lips part over at the bar.
Muscles straining, I take Olivia up the stairs, careful to watch her head as we pass under the low ceiling of the stairwell. I open the door to my room, kicking it closed behind me as I back her toward the bed.
"Uh-ah," she chides, unwrapping her legs and falling onto the bed. She hooks her thumbs in the loops of my jeans. Sitting up on her knees, she tugs me down with her, nudging me onto my back. With a wicked grin, she straddles me.
I'm already straining against my jeans, but then she rolls her hips. Even through all the denim between us, I can feel the heat of her. It burns just under the surface of her skin, shimmering in her eyes. I suck in a ragged breath.
She's going to burn me alive, whether I'm careful or not.
I'm not even sure I care anymore.
She leans forward, her knees cradling my ribs, thighs flush against my sides. Her back curls, breasts settling against my chest. She captures my lips with hers, and I'm content to let her do as she pleases. This is as safe for me as it is for her. Only with Olivia do I feel truly alive and free, as much myself as ever.
She takes my bottom lip between her teeth, pulling it into her mouth, running her tongue back and forth across my flesh. I place one hand on each of her hips, pressing her tighter against me. While her lips work mine, she lifts up enough to slide a hand between us, fingers ghosting across my stomach. She finds the hem of my T-shirt and slips her fingers underneath it, down to the waistband of my jeans.
I shiver as her fingernails trace the border between skin and denim, back and forth, teasing me because she's only inches from wrapping that hand around me. She must love torturing me, because she does this all the time.
Not that I mind the anticipation.
With the slight space between us, I have room to do my own exploring. I slide my hands up underneath her tank top, past the barrier of underwire and lace, palming her breasts. Her spine arches and she grinds harder into me. I grin against her lips.
Two can play at this game.
She uses the opening to penetrate my lips with her
tongue, sliding into my mouth and gliding her tongue against mine. The contact feels so good, I get a little high, forgetting to control the rest of my body for a moment. She wakes me up by unbuttoning my jeans, her deft little thumb freeing the button from the slit of fabric in one quick motion.
Little thief.
I ease my grip on her breasts, rolling my palms over the nipples until they pebble and poke up. I don't need to see them to know what they look like: berry red and round, ripe for my mouth. She keeps me pinned down, her hand moving lower and lower until the pad of a finger brushes my crown, flitting over the tiny opening and dragging a wet line down my length.
As much as I want to flip her over and tear off her clothes, my job is to let her do what she wants, to give her whatever she needs. Her fingers close around me, pumping slowly up and down. When she reaches the base, she releases me only for a second, cupping my balls and drawing her nails across them until they're tight, aching.
I'm gonna have to move this along a little before I explode in her hand.
Releasing her breasts, I slide my hands down the silky flesh of her stomach, pausing only long enough to trace her bellybutton. Her thighs clench against my ribs, and I grin against her mouth.
I know which buttons of hers to press just as well as she knows mine.
I pop open her jeans and, holding her hip with one hand, slide the other hand past the lace and cotton, palming her throbbing heat. A whimper escapes her lips, floating in the breath that passes between us. I splay my fingers, keeping my index and middle finger together, and slide against her slick wetness until I reach the other little berry that gets her going. I press the pads of my fingers against it only for a second before sliding my fingers back down, running up and down her length.
She wriggles away from me then, releasing me from her grip as she rolls onto her side. With her lower lip between her teeth, she tugs off her jeans. I pull off her cut, tank top, and bra, tossing them onto the floor. She kneels in front of me in only her panties, vulnerable anticipation in her eyes.
Straddling me again, she pulls me free from my jeans. Each side of the zipper is a dangerous border grazing my sensitive skin. Pushing her panties aside, she rubs my head against her, following the same route my fingers took only moments ago.
Sometimes she plays this game, too, letting me in only enough to make me crave more, then pulling me out again.
I hold her hips in place, shivering as she rubs me against her bundle of nerves. The slickness of her almost makes me come undone. One thrust and I can be inside, but I have to be patient.
Let her work it out.
Releasing me, she grinds up and down my length, making me slicker, slippery. I twitch against her as blood rushes through me, my balls hot and tight. I'm impossibly hard, almost uncomfortably so. When she reaches my crown again, I arch up against her, an invitation, a plea.
Rolling her hips, she lets me in, taking me all the way inside her. I keep hoping that, if she lets me in like this, eventually she'll let me into her heart too.
I close my hands around her breasts, rolling my palms against the tender flesh, the tight nipples. She shifts, leaning her body toward mine, deepening the angle. I let her find her rhythm, her hips grinding against mine as she makes little circles, then slides almost completely off me. She sits back down, taking me all the way again. I let go of one of her breasts and catch her hand in mine, pulling our linked hands up over my head. Grinning, she pins me there, riding me while I pass my thumb over her nipple, cup her, then reach across her chest to stroke her other nipple.
I match her thrust for thrust, watching each subtle change of her face. I catch the moment she lets go, the way her shoulders fall, her eyelids fluttering closed. Her lips part and she tips her chin back, shouting my name to the ceiling, to the heavens.
She shivers and bucks against me, and I let go too, falling into the sky with her. The room inverts, hazy gray clouding my vision. Olivia collapses on top of me, her cheek resting against my chest. I twitch inside of her, still filling her.
When I finally stop, I run my fingers through her hair, caress her back. "Feel better?"
She nods, her words muffled as her lips move against my cut. "Thank you."
"You know," I say, reaching for the mortarboard on the nightstand. I place it on top of her head. "It's not a proper graduation until you move your tassel to the other side."
She sits up, adjusting the cap. "It doesn't really matter," she says, but the corners of her mouth curl up anyway.
I take the tassel, stroking the silky fibers for a moment. Then I move it from the right to the left.
"Congratulations, Olivia," I whisper.
"Now it's off to the real world," she says with a sigh, hopping up from me. "Do you really think you can convince the club to take on Esther's parents?"
I grab cigarettes from the nightstand, light one for each of us, and pass her one. "We're a team," I tell her. "You and I can do anything, together."
"We'll see," she says, turning from me. She pads into the bathroom and closes the door. A moment later, I hear the shower start.
She's given me the slip again.
12
Olivia
There are times I feel like someone is pulling the strings, just trying to push me to my breaking point. Today is one of those days.
This morning feels like it was ages and ages ago, yet it's not even midnight. It's like someone is just dragging it out, building up the tension until I can't take it anymore.
I sit on Cliff's bed at the club house, alone, my wet hair dripping down my back. I thought about just going home, but it'd look really weird if I ditched my own party. Besides, the guys put a lot of work into the whole thing. It's not their fault that my opportunist ex dragged himself back into the state, or that, even dead, Bastard is still pulling the strings behind the scenes.
I don't even blame Ravage, not really.
Cliff is right—I think Ravage really did mean well when he told me I have to pick up Mercy. It's not even his fault that I didn't know where my father's been all this time. All I had to do was ask, but I never did, not in the weeks since Ravage told me who he was. I never even asked my parents or any of the social workers about him.
Maybe I didn't want to know.
Sighing, I glance at the closed door. I have no idea when Cliff will be back, so I've got to make this quick.
Opening the browser on my phone, I type in Greg's full name, then add "Naugatuck, CT" to make sure I've got the right Greg Byrne. My guess is that he's living in his mom's old house. Before he went into the Navy, he stayed with his dad in an apartment part of the time, and the other half at his mom's. It's a shot in the dark—he could be anywhere, really. He might not even be staying in town.
But if he's really back, I need to know where he is.
Especially if he's going to be playing at my club.
The search engine results load, starting with a Facebook listing of all Greg Byrnes. He might not even have a Facebook, but he does have an ego. I can't imagine him forgoing everything that comes with social media: DMs with tit pics, adoring fans fawning all over his latest selfies, hundreds of likes and comments. All that shit.
Hands shaking, I click on the link.
The page loads agonizingly slowly. I never have good service up in the club house. Downstairs, at the bar, I have full bars. It's one of those Naugatuck oddities.
I stand and pad toward the only window in the room. I pop open the screen and hold my phone out in the humid air, hoping I don't drop the damn thing.
The listings appear on my screen all in one shot.
Pulling my hand back inside, I go back to the bed. Even though Cliff isn't here, it makes me feel safe to sit on his rumpled sheets next to a discarded tee, his scent the only thing I can smell.
I take a deep breath and light a cigarette.
The first result is a direct hit. The profile pic thumbnail is teeny, but I'd recognize that red hair and those dead gray eyes anywhere. It's the s
ame man who was on stage downstairs just a couple hours ago. He's gained a little weight and a goatee since I last saw him, but it's him. He's still chiseled from head to toe with the body of a Navy SEAL god. Once upon a time, I adored those abs. Now I want to kick them in, break some ribs.
I've never hated anyone so much.
I click on his profile, but other than his profile pic and basic information, I can't see shit. Stupid Facebook makes you log in to see any of the good stuff. Snarling, I punch in my email address and password.
I get the spinning wheel up top in the teeny status bar.
The River Reapers need to get themselves some goddamn Wi-Fi.
I stalk back to the window, cigarette clamped between my teeth. Greg's profile loads, every detail mine to peruse. I'm going to have to block him eventually so that he doesn't find me, but for tonight, it's all at my disposal.
You don't need to be a private investigator or cop to find someone. You just need to know what you're doing.
I start to scroll through his posts when something in the information sidebar catches my eye, stopping me cold.
He's married.
He has a wife.
Nausea cramps my stomach, and I drop the cigarette into the ashtray. Running for the bathroom, I barely make it to the toilet before every drink I had earlier comes hurtling up my throat, burning even worse the second time around. I vomit until I'm empty, until my voice is hoarse and tears stream down my cheeks.
He's married.
When I let him get away, I didn't just save my own ass. I gave him the opportunity to do what he did to me . . . to someone else.
Bile crawls up my throat, and I bend over the toilet again.
13
Cliff
I find Ravage sitting at a table downstairs, his wife Shannon in his lap. Shit. I'd hoped to catch him before the party really got going. I don't even see Donny, so he and Esther must be upstairs.
A Risky Prospect (River Reapers Motorcycle Club Book 2) Page 5
