My gaze was on the long-haired, golden-eyed, very well built man who was eating up the doorway with his body. So I missed Thayer scooting forward, reaching across the table.
But I sure as hell felt it when his fingers swiped across my bare thigh, catching the amber liquid, making my eyes shoot over to him, watching as he raised one of said fingers to his mouth, swiping it across his lips, making the liquid glisten there a second before his tongue moved out to pull it in.
I'm not too proud to admit that the action - and the unyielding eye contact during it - didn't make my sex clench hard, just wondering what else he could do with that tongue, those lips.
Trying to convince my body that this was neither the time nor the place for it turned out to be harder than I expected.
"See, Cal?" he asked suddenly, eyes dancing for a second at me, knowing damn well the impact he had, before glancing over at his brother. "We're all old friends now. Cal was worried about kidnapping you."
"How absurd of him to be worried about ripping a woman off the street, throwing her in a car, and dragging her into a foreign building?" I asked, giving Cal a small smile.
"I know, right? Pussy," Thayer shot at him, something that didn't even faze his brother as he made his way to the fridge to get himself a beer, popping the cap, taking a long pull, then giving me a nod.
"Calloway," he offered by way of introductions.
"Sera," I shot back.
"Short for?"
"Seraphina," I supplied.
"You're shitting me," Thayer cut in, making me turn to find his brows raised.
"Nope. My mom was a little... unusual, I guess."
"What is Joey short for then?" Hatcher asked.
"Josephina," I told him. "We both hate our full names," I added a bit pointedly.
"Joey," Calloway said, rolling the name around. "The redhead?"
It was more of a very deep, natural auburn. But men weren't great at things like that. "Yeah. You've seen her?"
"Saw her a couple months back, but not since. She never smiles."
Ugh.
That was another kick to the gut.
My sister always smiled. She smiled to herself when she was cleaning, cooking, folding laundry, like she was always thinking of something good, sweet, uplifting. She was the one always telling me that I would feel better if I sought out reasons to smile every day. The idea that she never smiled anymore, no longer sought out her own reasons to do so, that hurt.
She was a shadow of the woman she had been.
And, what was worse, I wasn't sure there would be a way to get her back. Not exactly anyway. Like a vase broken and re-glued, it would resemble the original, but the cracks would be there, weaknesses that hadn't existed before.
Still, I would prefer a changed Joey to no Joey at all.
"She's with Doug," Hatcher explained. "Not so willingly anymore, it seems."
There was no mistaking the sympathy in Calloway's gaze, something deep, something bottomless that said he understood. It was maybe the first time since this whole thing started that I felt like someone did.
"I tried to get her out. I even went to the police when I realized she was going downhill."
"What'd they say?" Thayer asked in a voice that implied he didn't have much respect for them. But, then again, he was an outlaw biker ex-felon. It would be weird if he did have respect for men and women in blue.
"That she was an adult. That she had every right to be there. That there was nothing they could do except maybe do a wellness check. But they told me they wouldn't recommend that. Unofficially, of course. Because being the reason cops come into an outlaw biker compound might not work in my favor if I wanted to keep seeing my sister."
"So, in other words, they won't do dick unless she ends up hurt or dead. And even then, not likely."
"Exactly."
"What was your plan, then?" Hatcher asked. "Before we showed up and gallantly escorted you back here?" he added, smile warm.
"I didn't have a concrete one. I figured maybe one day I could sneak in when most of the guys aren't around or something. Drag her out. Hide her somewhere he couldn't find her."
"And you?" Thayer asked.
"What about me?"
"I'm sure you've figured out by now that you don't just take something from a crazy fuck like Doug. Not without him coming after you. So, you get your sister safe. In rehab or some shit. But what about you? You got a job, a life. He would come for it all."
"I'm a lot stronger than I look."
"Not stronger than a club of bikers with guns, babe," he said, shaking his head at me.
"Yeah, well, I didn't exactly have a lot of options."
"Well, you have us now," Thayer told me, casual, like he hadn't just thrown a lifesaver to a drowning woman, like he hadn't just set himself up to be a hero. Possibly the world's least likely hero. But, let's face it, I wouldn't be anyone's first - or fiftieth - choice for heroine either.
"So, you're in?" Hatcher asked while Calloway stood there in stony silence and Thayer, well, watched me with those unnerving eyes.
"I'm in," I agreed.
For better or worse.
FIVE
Sera
Maybe I was being crazy.
What else could explain agreeing to help one set of outlaw bikers by spying on another group of outlaw bikers to help the former take back their club from the latter? All the while knowing exactly how dangerous both groups were.
I mean the brothers had seemed nothing but friendly. You know... after kidnapping me. But two of them were sporting some nasty scars from gunshot wounds while acting like it was no big deal. And Thayer, the oldest, had just done a stint in prison. Which usually meant a certain level of hard. So one could guess that they could also not be underestimated.
That said, I had been known to do some crazy things in my life.
And I would do absolutely anything to get my sister out of that life before it was too late.
"What are you doing here?" I asked a week later, opening my door to Thayer standing there, on arm resting against the door jamb, something that made his white tee stretch a bit too appealingly across his chest.
"You always answer the door in your bra?" he asked, lips curving up as his eyes left my face, trailing down toward my chest, taking in the somewhat tame deep purple t-shirt bra. "Not that I'm complaining..." he added.
"They're just boobs. Nothing you haven't seen before. You ran a strip club."
"I've seen a lot. I haven't seen yours yet."
"Why are you here?" I asked, my voice coming out a little snappy. Though only I knew that it was because I was maybe fantasizing about him pushing the door fully open, grabbing me, slamming me against the wall, and ripping said bra off.
"Wanted to go over tonight," he said, pushing off the jamb, jerking his chin toward the room behind me, asking for admittance.
"That's why phones were invented."
"Come on. You've seen mine. Let me see yours."
He absolutely knew what he was saying, what I would infer from it, and exactly how much appeal he had.
Damn him.
Damn my dry spell that was leaving me more vulnerable to it.
Damn this whole freaking situation.
On a deep exhale, I moved out of the way, turning, walking back into my apartment, leaving him to follow. The door closed, yet he said nothing, making me turn back to find his head tilted, not even trying to hide the fact that he was watching me walk away.
"What?"
"Is that a The Baby tattoo from that Dinosaurs show on your shoulder?"
"It is," I affirmed with a nod, but didn't give him the explanation he was clearly after.
"Do all your tattoos have a personal story behind them?"
"Yep."
Most guys - or, at least, most guys I had known - didn't like dismissiveness, their egos needed the validation of female interest. Whatever Thayer was, though, was not most guys. Because those eyes of his just got warmer.
"You
always so talkative?"
"When someone interrupts the precious few minutes I have to myself a day, yes, I am always this talkative."
"What did you need privacy to do? Find a fun way to relieve your stress?" he asked, glancing around the room.
"If you're looking for my vibrator collection, it's in the second drawer of my nightstand."
"Collection, huh?" he asked, not the least bit intimidated by the possible competition. Maybe he knew I preferred actual touch to solo orgasms.
"Threatened?"
"Babe, please," he said, shaking his head.
"You know, a lot of guys think they're a hell of a lot better in bed than they actually are."
To that, he moved closer, close enough that I had no choice but to go back a step, making me press against the kitchen counter, the cold of it against my bare skin causing a shiver to course through my system. But he didn't stop there. His body only came to a full stop when his front was pressed against mine, when he was pinning me, when he forced me to turn my head up to meet his eyes.
"You want a demonstration?"
I did.
God, did I.
And, normally, I liked casual and confusing and messy.
But with Joey's life literally on the line here, I had to be serious, focused, and things needed to be as controlled as possible.
"Nah, I'm good," I told him, hearing the breathlessness in my own voice.
"Are you sure? You're wound tight. Must have been a while since you've had a good fucking."
"Says the man who just got out of prison."
"See, we both got the same issue," he said, leaning down a bit, making his mouth way, way too close to mine. I wasn't sure how I managed not to go up on my tiptoes and seal mine to his. "We could take care of it together."
"We already are," I told him, trying to remind my body that it could wait just a little longer.
"You know that's not what I meant."
"There are more important things than getting laid," I told him, proud of the certainty in my voice while my body internally rebelled, begged me to push closer, feel his chest press to my breasts, run my hands over the strong muscles of his back and shoulders.
"Dunno who you've been fucking, babe, but they have clearly been letting you down."
"Why are you here?" I demanded, pressing a hand into his hip, pushing him back a step, walking past him to where one of my tees was discarded on the back of a couch, slipping it on, deciding more barriers was definitely a good idea.
"I figure you aren't going to be able to get everything we want on one trip in there, so I thought it would be a good idea to decide on what we need you to notice tonight. Then next week will be something different. Until we get everything we need."
"Alright. That makes sense."
"I brought a sketch of how I left the inside of the compound. Where the furniture is, the doors that are always locked, etcetera. Let me know if all this is the same. And having a list of names you might have caught would be a good jump-off point for tonight."
With that, he spread out a paper over the counter, waiting for me to move in next to him. "Well, you definitely don't have any future in the arts," I told him, smiling at the sketch that could have been done by a ten-year-old. "So we better get you your club back, huh?"
"Calloway is better at drawing than I am, but his stubborn ass refused to quit his jobs."
"How dare he want to make sure he keeps a roof over his head, right?"
To that, he snorted. "He'll always have a roof over his head. The place we were at last night belongs to all three of us. Paid outright. And now that I'm back, he doesn't need to work. He's just being pissy."
He didn't have to work.
I couldn't fathom such a luxury.
I would likely have to work until the day of my funeral the way things were looking.
"Alright, this looks mostly the same," I agreed, reaching for one of my pencils that could always be found on every surface. "Except this card table is over here now," I showed him, putting an X there. "This door is always closed. And there is always one guy guarding it."
"This door?" he double-checked, brows drawing together. "The basement door?"
"Yeah. I figured there were guns or drugs down there that needed to be protected." But judging by the look on his face, I could tell something wasn't adding up.
"Any idea who the guys are that are guarding it?"
"I've seen two different guys there. I mean, there could have been others. I just wasn't paying that close of attention. I think I only noticed because one was hot and one was really old."
"Hot how?"
"Um, about your height. Your build. Beard. But black hair and ice blue eyes."
"Roux," Thayer supplied, the name snapping out, like maybe the betrayal by the man in question was worse than the others. "And I'm assuming the old guy is Abe."
"And we all know about Doug. It seems like Doug's second-in-command is a guy named Kyle. He's always up Doug's ass, always the one Doug calls when he wants something."
"He was always a yes-man. That doesn't surprise me."
"I've heard other names. Slick, Mo, Eddie, Six. I think that was what they called him."
"He has six toes."
"That's a, ah, lovely visual."
"It's not a little one either. The fuck has two big toes. Any other names?"
"Not that are coming to me. I will listen more tonight. Weren't these your men? You don't know their names?"
"I don't know if Doug has added any new guys."
"Will a headcount help?"
"Yeah."
"Women too?"
"Not necessarily. Unless you think they are members."
"I doubt that." To that, Thayer's brows rose, waiting for an explanation. "He likes women subservient and submissive and just... weak. He hates me because I have a mouth and snap back at him with it. I don't see him liking the idea of female bikers being on the same level with his other guys. I mean, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe he just likes my sister weak and passive."
"Can't imagine anyone related to you being weak or passive."
It was meant as a compliment, albeit a somewhat weak one.
"I protected her," I explained. "From all of the ugly in the world. I faced it up, so she didn't have to. It let her stay sweet and soft while it hardened me. But that was my job. I was the big sister."
"I like the spine, babe. It's not a bad thing to be strong. You gotta be able to protect your own. That's what people like us do. That's why we're doing this."
As much as I hated to admit it, over the months of watching my sister start to take a steep nosedive, I had been feeling this overwhelming surge of helplessness. I didn't even like thinking it, that I didn't know what to do, where to turn, how I could get her safe again. But there was no denying it was there, a nagging insecurity that I couldn't ignore in quiet moments.
Yet hearing the confident certainty in the voice of this man I had just met, I couldn't help but feel relief... and purpose. I wasn't so proud that I couldn't admit that it would have truly been nearly impossible to get my sister out - in her current state - alone. Yet having Thayer and his brothers beside me, yeah, it felt not only possible, but a sure outcome. Even if our motivations were different. Even if they didn't actually care all that much about Joey. Our paths ran alongside one another. They would help me because I was going to help them.
It wasn't in my nature to be trusting, especially of someone who wanted something from me. I almost certainly shouldn't have been so willing to trust a bunch of outlaw bikers who had blood and carnage and revenge on their minds.
But if you were going to align yourself with an ally, the kinds with guns and street smarts were surely better than the ones without.
At least if the enemy was a scum of the earth bastard like Doug anyway.
A bullet was exactly what he deserved.
"Anything else you want me to be on the lookout for tonight?"
"Anything you can casually catch. We definitely
don't want to have Doug getting suspicious about you. If he cuts you out, you don't get to keep an eye on your little sister, and it really decreases our chance of being able to get her out safely. So, you need to keep your cool while you're in there. Do your usual visiting with your sister. But if there are gaps in conversation, try to listen hard to what is going on outside of the room. I'm gonna take a wild stab in the dark and figure this is where he has her," he said, jabbing a finger at the door.
"Yeah. How did you know that?"
"Because that used to be my room," he told me, tone annoyed, but resigned. Like he figured Doug would have done everything he could to step into his shoes while he was gone. "I don't know if this would be of any use to you in any situation, but there is a door under the carpet in the closet. Opens to the basement. It's a drop. There's no ladder. But in an emergency situation, it's a way from the chaos."
That was good to know. I only wished I could relay that kind of information to my sister. But who knew what she would be willing to tell Doug if he was withholding her next fix from her. I was sure he questioned her about what we talked about. I couldn't, like Thayer said, risk my visits with her by revealing too much.
"There's no walkout from the basement though," I heard myself say aloud, having already wondered if there was some way I could sneak her out of there at some point.
"No, but there is a panic room down there. Seals from inside. No way for someone else to get in if the shit hits the fan. Food, water, the works. Doug likely doesn't even know it exists. Only my brothers and I do. It's behind the heating unit. It just looks like the wall ends, but there is just a big enough gap there to squeeze through, get to the door, and lock yourself inside."
"I'm not sure how that is useful to me," I mumbled, absentmindedly doodling with his sketch, turning it into more of a useful model instead of a couple of sharp lines that meant nearly nothing.
"Just saying. If you're in there, if shit goes down and you think someone is out for you, that's a place to go. You could even drag your sister there if you can."
"Yeah, but then what? We're just stuck there. Surrounded by bikers with guns."
Revenge - Reckless Renegades 1 Page 6
