by Leah Ashton
Beth reached up to grab at his shoulders, as much to steady her suddenly weak knees as to touch him. She was desperate to touch him. Everywhere. Now.
She kissed him back with equal determination, welcoming the touch of his tongue and loving how he deepened their kiss. She also kissed him with impatience, pushing herself closer as her fingers slid into his hair, then gasping into his mouth when he gripped her hips and pulled her roughly against him, so she could feel him hard against her belly.
Such clear evidence of his arousal – of how much he wanted her, Bethwyn Banfield – seemed to do something to her, and she rapidly moved right past being simply impatient to demanding.
She was doing this, this raw, amazing thing that was this kiss, beneath a street light, on a public street, in the middle of the night, and she didn’t care. In fact, she was revelling in it. It felt so good to have his huge hands cup her hips, it felt so good to have his lips against hers, his tongue inside her mouth.
She was liquid everywhere – every muscle in her body, inside her belly, and between her legs.
His mouth moved from hers to kiss and nip against her jaw, then beneath her ear and then her neck. Everywhere he touched, she shivered and then as his hands moved from her hips to grab her backside, to shove her against him, to rub her body against the front of his jeans, he bit her.
No – not a bite. Not really. But the sting of his teeth, and then suction – a love bite. He’d branded her.
And she didn’t care. It felt right – almost primal. It fitted. This whole night, this connection between them, it wasn’t based on logic or the meeting of minds. It was based on chemistry. Pheromones. It was sex stripped down to its most simple. He was a man, she was a woman, and nothing, nothing else mattered.
Now she was impatient again, impatient for his mouth on hers, but he’d stepped away, wrapping her hand in his as he tugged her towards his front door. She had to force herself not to touch him as he opened the door, only so he could complete the task, as she was beyond caring how obvious it was how badly she wanted this. Needed this.
She stood there as her heart beat almost out of her chest, her whole body humming with anticipation.
Then they were inside. He didn’t bother turning on a light, and Beth’s bag thudded randomly to the tiled floor.
He pressed her up against a wall, and kissed her again, but this time his hands were beneath her skirt as he gripped her bottom, the satiny fabric bunching up around her waist as he slid his fingers beneath the lace that edged her knickers.
His body was huge and hard against her, and she loved how overwhelmed she felt by his size and how small and delicate she felt in contrast. Not that he treated her delicately, and she liked that too. She hadn’t known until right this moment that she wanted to be treated like this, to be held so firmly and for the man she was with to be so certain about what he was doing - or for that to give her confidence too.
Her fingers slid under his T-shirt, pushing it upwards as much as she could, her hands greedily exploring every solid line and dip of his body, and always pulling him closer, wanting him closer, needing him closer.
Now his hand slid to the front of her knickers, finding her clit immediately and rubbing it hard through the satin fabric. She gasped, groaned, sighed – everything all at once. “More,” she whispered. And then his hand was inside her underwear, touching and circling right where she needed him to, and she closed her eyes as he began to trail kisses down her neck and then lower, making his way to her breasts.
“I always knew you’d be this hot,” he murmured against her skin. “So, so fucking hot.”
Beth’s brain wasn’t capable of understanding much of anything, and the chance to question what he meant was lost entirely to her when his mouth reached the swell of her breasts and then his spare hand reached for the buttons of her blouse. He cupped her exposed breast in its white lace, rubbing his thumb across her nipple just as the clever fingers of his other hand took her right to the very, very edge.
“That’s it,” he said, his mouth coming back to her neck, to the sensitive place just below her ear. “Come for me, Miss Banfield.”
“How do you know my—” she began, but the question ended on a gasp. And honestly, in that second she didn’t care, couldn’t care, because she was doing just as he’d told her. She was coming, coming absolutely apart beneath his fingers, in quakes and shivers and sparks that rolled in waves through her body and down to the tips of her toes and fingers.
Finally, eventually, she came up for air, and she met the man’s gaze in the moonlight.
He was doing it again – looking at her with such intensity. But then, he smiled. A self-satisfied smile that he thoroughly deserved – and Beth smiled right back.
“More,” she whispered again, her hands falling to the front of his jeans.
But then, suddenly, the lights came on.
And someone – someone else – started a slow, steady round of applause.
Damon Nyhuis jerked his hand out of Miss Banfield’s underwear, shoved her skirt down and for one, way too brief moment, met her gaze.
She glared at him in frozen, wide-eyed shock and betrayal – as if he had anything to do with the clusterfuck they were both now in. Or were probably in.
Because he couldn’t think of one good reason why someone would be in his house. But he could think of a lot – a lot – of bad reasons. Of very, very bad reasons.
He turned around, doing his best to keep Miss Banfield shielded behind him.
In front of him, standing not even five metres away in front of his narrow staircase, were four men he knew. Only one he knew by name. Garth Gaff, the Notechi outlaw motorcycle club’s sergeant-at-arms. The other three were totally interchangeable Notechi thug prospects, all desperate to prove their loyalty to the Notechi so they could get ‘patched’ and have the supposed honour of wearing the club colours.
“What do you need, Garth?” Damon said meeting Gaff’s gaze, hard and steady. He was going to play the role he’d been so successfully playing these past two years: A loyal Notechi patch member who’d proven his allegiance time and time again – with his fists, his willingness to take risks for the club, and with the intel he’d provided to the top of the Notechi hierarchy. The fact the intel he’d provided had been strategically and exclusively provided by Elite SWAT – who Damon really worked for as part of an undercover operation – had never been suspected.
In fact, not once in the past two years had Damon felt anyone thought he was anything but the role he’d become so good at playing.
Probably because he’d had quite a lot of experience being a shithead before he’d joined the police, so he knew how criminals behaved. He hadn’t had to do a lot of acting, he’d just had to pretend he was seventeen years old again and spending his weekends stealing cars.
But clearly – he’d been lax. He’d fucked up.
Because no way was Gaff here with his thugs for a chat. Or to ask him to sort something out for him. Or to fix something.
They were here to hurt him.
Probably to kill him.
And so, he needed to get his Year 12 calculus teacher out of here. Now.
Gaff crossed his arms, his steroid-enhanced biceps bulging in a cartoonish way. “I need you to stop lying to me, Crawls,” he said. “Pretty simple, really.”
Gaff said his fake name easily, without hesitation.
That was something. They didn’t know exactly who he was.
But they suspected something, clearly. The small foyer of his townhouse was thick with tension and anticipation. The thugs were itching to please Gaff, and were simply waiting for permission to come at him.
“I’ve never lied to you,” Damon lied. “But we can talk about whatever bullshit you think you know. Just let me get this slut out of here.”
He felt Miss Banfield flinch behind him, but he couldn’t do a thing to reassure her he didn’t mean it – because how to explain? He had to speak the shithead language. He had to do everyt
hing he could to make Gaff believe he remained loyal to the Notechi.
“No,” Gaff said. “She stays.”
“Why?”
Behind him, he could hear Miss Banfield taking what he guessed were supposed to be calming breaths. But he could feel her entire body thrum with fear.
He was such a fucking idiot. He’d been so caught up in his teenage fantasy come true he’d done the unforgivable for someone working in deep cover. He’d dropped his guard. Completely.
He’d walked straight into an ambush, and dragged an innocent woman with him.
“I know that type,” Gaff said. “Goody two-shoes. Fuck knows why she’s with you. She’ll call the cops.”
“I won’t,” a soft yet strong voice said behind Damon.
He closed his eyes briefly. Fuck. She needed to be invisible. Totally invisible to these pieces of scum.
“Really?” Gaff said, his interest clearly piqued. He took a couple of steps towards Damon. “Why should I believe that?”
Damon reached behind him, but he was too slow and Miss Banfield slipped past his arm to stand by his side. What was she doing?
“Because I don’t lie,” she said. She stood there, with her shirt still untucked, but her chin high. Her dark brown hair cascaded down the shoulders she held straight, and she was steady on her shiny black stiletto heels.
Gaff barked out a laugh. Predictably, the thugs joined in. “Really, sugar? You expect me to take you on your word?”
“I don’t lie,” she repeated. Firmly.
Gaff shook his head. “What’s your name?”
She paused, as if working out if she should tell the truth. “Beth,” she said, eventually.
She’d been honest, Damon realised, her first name familiar even though he’d long forgotten it.
“So, Beth,” Gaff said. “You’d just leave and not worry about lover boy here?”
She shrugged. “I met him less than an hour ago.”
“Harsh,” Gaff said, looking at Damon now. “Especially since she seemed to really like you a couple of minutes ago.”
“She doesn’t know me,” Damon said, ignoring Gaff’s leer. “I’m nothing to her. She just wants to get out of here. Let her go.”
Gaff didn’t laugh this time, but he did smile. A sickly-sweet facsimile of a smile. “Oh, I get it,” he said. “You like her.” Abruptly he turned back to the thugs. “She comes with us,” he ordered. “Leverage.”
Damon glanced at Miss Banfield – at Beth. She’d barely moved, and her posture remained perfect. Her cheeks, however, had gone pale.
Comes with us?
“What the fuck’s going on?” Damon demanded, playing the role of the offended. “Tell me what shit you’ve been told. Because none of it’s true. You’re my brother, man,” he said. “I swear.”
But Gaff didn’t give a shit what he was saying.
The four men advanced on him and the woman beside him.
Two he could’ve taken. Three, at a stretch. These guys were all brawn, no brains. No training, no skills. He was the tallest, strongest, most skilled fighter in the room.
But four of them …
It didn’t matter. He had to try – there was no other choice.
His hands formed into fists, and he was seconds from going for the knife he kept concealed in his left boot.
But then Gaff reached for the small of his back, and the next moment the Notechi sergeant-at-arms was pointing a Glock at Beth’s forehead.
For the second time tonight, Beth went weak at the knees.
But this time it was for a bad reason. A very, very bad reason.
She stumbled in her uncomfortable heels but righted herself, her gaze never shifting from the barrel of the gun pointed at her.
There is a gun pointed at me.
This was impossible. Surreal. Terrifying.
How is this happening?
She was being held hostage by a bunch of bikies. She thought. Not that she knew a lot about bikies, but she couldn’t imagine neck tattoos were so popular in other circles.
And the man beside her – Todd – was one of them.
Apparently.
You’re my brother, man – he’d said.
But just like his name, Beth didn’t believe him. He was dressed like the other four, although his neck was tatt-free. But he didn’t fit. He wasn’t like the other four men, who terrified her. Especially the one holding the gun. At her.
Or did she just not want to believe she was dumb enough to go home with a bikie?
Possibly.
“We’re going for a drive,” the gunman said looking her straight in the eye. “So, Crawls, you’re going to do exactly what you’re told or this little piece is collateral damage. Got it?”
The gunman didn’t wait for a response. Instead, he nodded at one of the goons who advanced on the man beside her and patted him down. Wallet and phone were pocketed, as was her own phone and purse after another goon snatched up her forgotten bag from the floor.
Todd stood still and silent, his gaze straight ahead – not that she looked at him directly. She literally couldn’t drag her eyes from the gun still held on her. Beyond the black metal of the gun, the boss goon sneered at her, quite obviously enjoying her fear.
She hated revealing her terror, but it was impossible to do anything else. Her knees may have regained their ability to hold her upright, but her heart still pounded against her chest, and her skin was damp with nervous perspiration. Her hands, which she held still against her thighs, were shaking, no matter how firmly she pressed her palms against the satin of her skirt.
Then, the gun was lowered. The gunman stepped closer, grabbed her arm with thick, sweaty fingers, and yanked her close to his body. Beth gasped when he then shoved the gun against her belly.
She struggled – it was pure instinct – and the man responded by tightening his fingers painfully on her arm.
“This gun isn’t for show, sugar,” he whispered in her ear with hot, rancid breath. “Wanna guess how many times it’s fixed a problem like you for me? Huh?”
Beth squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t need to know the number, because she was certain it was more than zero. This man was capable of killing her.
Her eyes popped open at the sound of movement beside her. As she watched, one of the goons cable tied Todd’s wrists together behind his back and then shoved him between the shoulder blades in the direction of a narrow hallway.
It was dark. No lights were on in the house except the foyer, and when they eventually spilled out into a rear laneway, there were no street lights. The moon provided just enough of a glow to see the hulking shape of a black SUV.
“You scream, you die,” the gunman whispered again in her ear.
It hadn’t even occurred to Beth that she should try. That she could try. She was too shocked to think logically, to work out any sort of plan.
But the ringleader had just given her one. There hadn’t been a silencer on his gun – she knew that at least from TV. Surely, he wouldn’t kill her in the middle of East Perth? Thousands of people slept in apartments around them. And besides, he’d called her leverage. She wasn’t leverage if she was dead.
She screamed.
But fear had turned her mouth completely dry, and her attempt was little more than a croak before disgusting fingers covered her mouth. Something hard smacked against the side of her head, and the night went completely black.
Beth lay curled in the back of the SUV, her back pressed against Damon’s front.
She was unconscious, sticky blood drying in her long, dark, hair.
Not too much blood, thank Christ. She was breathing regularly and had stirred a little when they’d tossed her not too gently into the SUV. He thought she’d just wake up with a headache, without any permanent damage.
Please just wake up with a headache.
He gritted his teeth. If he wasn’t careful, the guilt he felt for putting Beth in this situation would overwhelm him. And he needed to stay sharp. He needed to work
out a way to get her out of this – and himself out of this – safely.
And ideally without losing his cover, although that seemed increasingly unlikely.
Damon didn’t know for sure where they were going, but he could guess. The Notechi president owned a huge swathe of pastoral land in the goldfields of Western Australia. The station ran some cattle, but much of the land was uninhabitable, and it had become a second clubhouse of sorts. Fraser Smythe – known as Knife – was a country boy long before he’d become the president of an outlaw motorcycle gang, and as he said, he liked being close to his roots.
It had been more than two years since Damon had infiltrated the Notechi, and several months before that of research. The Notechi weren’t even official when Damon had become a club prospect. It had been an entirely different OMCG he’d been assigned, in fact. But Knife had grown tired of being president in waiting of his previous club – and he had ambition far above and beyond the club he’d left. So, Elite SWAT had decided Damon would follow – at Damon’s recommendation of course – because the Notechi were a bigger, badder, and more sophisticated operation.
So far, Elite SWAT – through Damon’s intel – had made several arrests after tracking drugs from the Notechi to dealers. The Notechi involved in the transaction had remained untouched – deliberately – because E-SWAT wasn’t after the small fry, and nabbing the dealers still got the drugs off the streets. But they couldn’t risk anyone suspecting someone inside the Notechi was tipping off the police, and until tonight, Damon had felt confident that no one suspected a thing. Loyalty was everything to the Notechi, and to all appearances, Damon had been nothing but loyal.
If all went to plan, he only had another few months left on this job. Everything he’d done was leading up to a billion-dollar shipment of meth that Damon knew was hitting WA shores soon. But frustratingly, he didn’t know how soon, because Knife had revealed little to anyone outside his very inner sanctum. But Damon had been working on that, and he’d believed he was so close to being considered for a promotion within the club.
But clearly, he’d been wrong.
Damon tested his wrists, and his now cable-tied ankles – knowing they would be immoveable but kind of needing the punishing sting of the narrow plastic bands digging into his skin. His mouth was taped, but not very well. It had only properly adhered to the skin above his top lip, so he could talk if he wanted to – not that he could in the silent SUV, or had anyone to talk to given Beth’s current situation.
