“I didn’t bring you here to talk about that,” she whispered a second later, and I saw the haunted shadows in her eyes, saw them and wondered if she’d somehow seen her father kill her mother.
“No, you brought me here to tell me your father had the mayor in his pocket.”
“And that he’s trying to get the sheriff on his side.”
“Knew that already. It’s why the mayor brought in some new detectives from across the county line.” I smirked at her wide eyes. “This won’t be our first rodeo, darlin’. Ain’t the first time some rich fuck wants to pin something on us.”
She gulped. “Do you know who the Five Points are?”
I stilled at that, interested at long last. “Do you?” I countered.
“No. I just know they’re in Hell’s Kitchen.”
“Well, I can promise you that they’re not a takeout place.” I cracked my knuckles. “Why you bring them up anyway?”
“He’s going to target them to get to you too.”
She bit her lip then surged to her feet. When I realized she was going to just stalk off, I grabbed her hand and ordered, “Don’t lose my number.”
A scowl crossed her brow. “Why shouldn’t I? I went to great lengths to get this information to you and what? It bores you?”
The shit about the Five Points didn’t.
But she didn’t have to know that.
“Don’t be a stranger,” was all I said.
“Why?” Her eyes were cold, like gemstones.
“We’re friends, aren’t we? Mutual enemies stay in touch, don’t they?”
Her jaw clenched. “If you say so.”
When she wrenched her wrist from my grip, the difficult bastard in me wanted to keep a tighter hold on her. Sure, Tink was back at the compound, her ass stuffed full of a plug that I’d put in there, but Lily Lancaster? Well, she was far more interesting.
“How come you wanted to meet here?”
She frowned. “It’s my regular stomping ground and I told my father I’d be coming here in the hope of meeting the sheriff. I’m supposed to turn him to my father’s side.”
I whistled under my breath. “You fuck with the devil, baby doll, and don’t be surprised when he fucks with you.”
“He’s already fucked with me,” she said simply. “Many, many times, but enough is enough.”
“I’m sure it is,” I murmured softly, recognizing something in her words that made me want to kill that fucker of a father myself. “But softly catchee monkey.”
Her eyes widened. “What does that mean?”
“It means that if you want the money and the man and don’t want to go to jail, then you need to watch your step.” I stared her square in the eye. “Or make sure someone has your back.”
Her mouth gaped a little at that, and I didn’t blame her. I was going off script here. Hell, the script didn’t really exist, but I knew that any extensions of help had to be offered by Rex and Rex alone. Even Storm, our VP, couldn’t make offers like this. But I knew, just fucking knew, that this would help us.
Allied with the enemy?
United to take down someone who could champion their rapist scum and twist it around so that my brother’s woman was fearing jail?
Yeah, I’d deal with the devil too…but then, I was one of Satan’s Sinners. We were buds, and I came from a family of other fuckers who’d sold our souls a long while back.
“What are you saying?” she whispered.
“I’m saying that we need to talk on my stomping ground.”
She shook her head. “I can’t. My father watches my every move through my guards—they report to him at all times.”
“Suppose getting them blistered last night didn’t go down well.”
“Yeah, you’d be right on that score.” She tugged her bottom lip between her teeth, then murmured, “I’ll see what I can do.”
“Do that.”
I let her go then and watched her walk away, that fine ass of hers squirming against the tight fabric of her skirt. Tipping my head to the side, I let my gaze drop down to her long legs and feet that were shod in expensive heels. Everything about her screamed class, and everything about me screamed the opposite.
“Lady and the tramp,” I muttered under my breath, my lips curving into a wide grin, one that was loaded with anticipation.
There was only one issue with my plan.
I fucking hated spaghetti and meatballs.
Five
Keira
“Cyan, please, I need you to focus and stop fidgeting.”
My baby girl looked up at me, big green eyes that would melt the rest of the polar ice cap if given the chance. Most of the time, she melted me, and she definitely melted her damn father. And that was the trouble. She was a handful. Already higher than a lot of the percentiles in school, I knew, pretty soon, she’d be skipping grades.
Which was exactly what I didn’t need or want for her.
I’d skipped two grades, and I’d been miserable ever since. It had put me in a bad place, being with older kids when I was so young and had, undoubtedly, shoved me into a life path I’d never anticipated.
I’d thought I’d become a nurse.
Instead, I’d gotten pregnant at nineteen and had tied myself to a jackass. A jackass named Storm.
“Mommy, it’s okay. You don’t need to do this.”
My mouth tightened as I began re-pinning the dress I’d made for her a week ago for the school pageant and, because she was going through some kind of growth spurt, was about four inches too short now. Because I was used to that, I’d made a long enough hem, but it was still a pain in the ass.
“I do need to, Cyan. No way I’m having them looking down on you.” Of course, that was a pointless endeavor. They always would because she was a biker brat. Hell, back when I’d been her age, I’d looked down on the kids who attended Jackson High and were spawned by the Satan’s Sinners.
Maybe because I’d been one of those judgmental bitches, I was scared all the more for my baby girl. She handled it well, and I knew that was because she had more of her father in her than me. Well, except for the smarts.
Storm was many things, but smart wasn’t one of them.
The thought made me wince with guilt. Because, the shit, Storm, wasn’t stupid, not outside of our relationship at any rate.
As I began plucking at the hem again, trying to figure out where to let it down to, a soft starfish hand touched my shoulder. “Momma, it’s okay.”
It wasn’t.
It was the exact opposite.
I fucking hated people.
Hated. Them.
And kids?
I hated them even more.
She never complained, never said anything against anyone but damn, I knew what was what. Knew that on the days when she was quiet after school, it was when someone had insulted her.
Worse, her daddy.
Worse still, me.
I blew out a shaky breath as I looked up at her. She had the glossiest brown hair, and those eyes of hers made a mockery out of her name. All the books I’d read, and somehow, the knowledge had bypassed me that a baby’s eyes changed color a few weeks after birth.
Joke was on me, but still, Cyan suited her. It was beautiful, rich, and vibrant, just like her.
She had a pixie face, delicate features, and her bones were like a bird’s. That she hadn’t inherited from me, or Storm. I wasn’t sure why she was so skinny, didn’t know why she kept on spurting upward, just knew that when she was a teenager, she was going to give Storm and me nightmares with boys.
“It’s okay,” she repeated, her voice far too mature for her years.
I didn’t say anything. What could I say? Instead, I cupped my fingers around hers and murmured, “Love you, baby.”
“I love you, Momma. Thank you for this dress. I really do look like a princess.” Her grin told me how happy that made her. “I want a cut like Daddy’s, then I can look like a real biker princess just like he calls me.”
“I’ll talk to—” Before I could finish that sentence, a knock sounded on the door, then the lock jiggled.
The second that happened, I knew who was there and, warily, I got to my feet and headed out of the small kitchen toward the door.
The knock came louder this time, and I wasn’t surprised when Storm growled, “What the fuck, Keira? Let me in, dammit.”
I headed to the door and unlocked it, but left the latch firmly in place. The second I peered through the opening I’d made, I saw him scowling at me. I arched a brow. “That how you think you’re going to get in here?”
Keira O’Shea was many things, but a fool she wasn’t. Well, not anymore. I’d been an idiot back in the day, but now? Nope. I knew the score. Knew what he was like, knew what was happening and had been happening in the time since we’d parted.
It was how the MC worked, how things rolled, and it was what I loathed about being Storm’s Old Lady.
The reason we were here?
The sweetbutts.
The bastard had cheated on me one too many times, and because that was how shit worked in his world, he didn’t seem to realize I wasn’t cuffed to him. If I wanted out, if I wanted away from his cheating ass, I could go. So I had.
I wasn’t denying him access to his daughter. I wasn’t moving out of town. I’d just moved away from the house we’d shared, had very little to do with the Sinners’ MC unless it involved a few of the Old Ladies who helped me out by watching Keira when I needed to work, and that was it.
Of course he hated it.
Hated that I wasn’t under his thumb anymore, and the truth was, I wouldn’t have minded any of it, just the cheating was something I couldn’t stand. The shit he did for the MC, the laws he broke, the long runs he went on at the drop of a hat, the fact that he could be imprisoned and sent to jail for years…I could handle it. I could. But cheating?
Nope.
Big. Fat. Nope.
He was a handsome bastard, and that was how he’d wormed his way between my legs all those years before. Well, that and everything about him screamed bad boy, something that had tempted the good girl in me more than I could say. All that he was had been a temptation, and to this day, I still felt the fire I’d felt all those years ago. Nothing had doused it. Not even what he was.
But that didn’t mean I had to accept it.
I wasn’t a masochist, after all.
His hair had always been a mix of black and gray, even when he was younger. Back then, it had been more delineated. Almost like a streak of white lightning through the unrelieved black. It was why he’d gotten his name. Lightning, he’d jokingly told me all those years ago, wasn’t worthy of a road name.
His eyes, Cyan’s eyes, stared back at me from the top step of our front stoop, and they were glittering with fury. His stubborn jaw was set, and the nose that had been broken one too many times was flaring with his outrage.
“You changed the fucking locks?”
I shrugged. “Wasn’t about to have you coming in whenever you wanted.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“It means exactly what I said. You’re not my man anymore, Storm. You don’t have the right to just walk through the door—”
I’d expected a rebuttal loaded with anger at those words, but if anything, he blanched. “The fuck?” he whispered, interrupting me. “You changed the locks so I couldn’t get in?”
He looked like a kid whose puppy had just been kicked.
I firmed my lips, refusing to be affected by that. Refusing, point blank, to relent, I lifted my chin and said, “Yes.”
Simple.
Effective.
He swallowed, looking confused and bewildered, like we hadn’t argued for months about his behavior. Like this was all coming out of the goddamn blue. “Why?” he rasped.
“You know why.” I went to close the door so I could release the chain. His eyes flared in astonishment at the move, and I heard him growl under his breath.
Fuck, that sound got to me. He made a similar noise when he thrust inside me, his hardness plowing my softness, and God, it had been so long since that had happened. Since he’d been inside me.
I released the chain the second the door was closed and pulled it open, surprised to note he was halfway down the path to the curb where he’d parked his hog.
“Where are you going?” I queried, leaning against the jamb.
“You shut me out—”
“No. I was unfastening the chain.”
He twisted around, glowered at me.
“Cyan wants to ask you something.”
I looked over my shoulder and saw our kid watching us from her stool in the kitchen. I saw the hurt in her eyes, knew the physical distance that I’d put between father and daughter was a strain on her, but I wasn’t about to let my baby be raised in an environment where it was okay for a man to treat his partner like her father treated me.
No way, no how.
That was not a lesson I was okay with imparting.
My mom had been subservient to my dad. Always doing as she was told. Always behaving. Never acting out because, God forbid, the neighbors might see. He hadn’t hurt her, but he’d controlled her. All the time.
I genuinely believed that my experiences growing up had made me put up with Storm’s shit for as long as I had, and with that at the forefront of my mind, I knew I had to show Cyan another path.
Even if she hated me sometimes for leaving her daddy.
Storm’s jaw was like it’d been hewn from stone as he rushed back to the door. He didn’t shove past me, but he made sure that his arm brushed against my body, dragging nerve endings to life that would always surge into being for him.
And fuck if I didn’t resent the shit out of that.
I hated my body some days. Hated it with a passion because the way he made me feel obviously wasn’t reciprocated. If it was, then I’d be enough for him, and I never had been.
Ever.
Not from the start.
If I’d started to soften a little, just thinking about what Kendra had told me, sneering all the while as she ground me into the dirt with her hooker heel, strengthened my resolve.
She’d been sucking his cock while I was carrying Cyan.
He’d been fucking around since he’d claimed me.
The bastard.
Then, just as hate filled me, Cyan squealed as he stormed into the kitchen, hauled her into his arms, and swung her around in a circle that had her laughing as she huddled into him.
Storm was many things, but I couldn’t say he wasn’t a good dad. He was. Sometimes, he wasn’t as present as I’d like. And that had been before I’d moved out. It was partly to do with his responsibilities at the MC, but more so his choices that kept him at the clubhouse longer than I felt sure was required of him. Still, that didn’t take away from the fact that he loved his baby girl and she loved him.
I would never, ever get in the way of that.
No amount of bitterness would ever spill into their relationship because what they had was exactly what I wanted for the pair of them.
So, even though it hurt to watch them, I closed the door behind me and smiled as I leaned back and watched them together.
The hard biker.
The little girl in a fairy princess dress.
Incongruent and all the more beautiful for it.
“Now, what’s my baby want to ask me?”
Cyan plucked at his cut then she dipped her chin, twisting her head slightly to the side and, peering up at him from under her eyelashes, murmured, “Well…”
* * *
Lily
It was stupid.
Weird.
Wrong even, considering what was going on in my life, but when I pressed the bullet vibe to my clit and closed my eyes, the first thing I thought of was Link.
That mass of tousled waves on his head.
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The cheeky grin that could turn deadly.
Those eyes that could cut then, out of nowhere, could soften and make me realize he wasn’t as hard as he liked to make out.
That body, framed by a cut that declared to the world he was a rebel, exuding power, the pecs that were delineated through the wifebeater he wore, those biceps that were burnished with the sun and had glinting, golden hairs dotted here and there…
Fuck!
I pressed the vibe harder against my clit and rocked my hips up. Frustration worked through me, making me spread my legs under the covers and arch my hips up, frigging the air if I couldn’t frig anything else.
A breath escaped me, hiccupping out into the ether as I thought about him, thought about him between my legs, thought about his hands on my body…
“Oh God,” I muttered, slightly overwhelmed by the need flushing through me.
I wasn’t often aroused, and that was a nasty truth. Maybe in my situation, it made sense. I was living among sharks, sharks who bit. Often. I was usually stressed, tense, and unhappy. None of those things made a woman feel horny. But today? After having been in that biker’s presence?
God.
I shouldn’t like him.
Bikers were dirty, right? Gruff and rough, mean and…what?
My dad wasn’t a filthy bastard? Rough and mean and violent? The only difference was, my father had a shit ton of money in his wallet and that smoothed things over, kept the world from seeing exactly who he was and what he was capable of. Money was a front, and it shored up the façade that he was a good man.
He wasn’t.
And Link? He wasn’t good either. But he was delicious, all the same. And he cared. Fuck, he did. He’d been hurt, distressed about Luke’s prisoners, making me wonder exactly what my brother had done. I’d put nothing past him…and shit, there went my arousal.
Wincing, I forced myself to focus on Link. He’d been on my mind ever since we’d parted ways back at Crosskeys. I had, indeed, met with the local sheriff, and all the while I’d been thinking about the biker.
Link: SATAN’S SINNERS’ MC: TWO Page 9
