by K. D Clark
“What if someone comes in?” she asked, looking at the door.
He smirked. “Then I guess they’ll get a show.”
“Kit--”
Her words were cut off as he rubbed her clit.
“Fuck.” He couldn’t drag this out any longer he needed her now. It had been two, long weeks without her. He lifted her up and slid her down onto his shaft. Her body vibrated as he entered her. He was instantly surrounded by her warmth.
“Fuck, I can’t...”
Her legs shook as her pussy clamped around him. He waited until she came down from her orgasm before he started to fuck her hard. Her slickness poured down his dick to his balls. It wasn’t long before his spine started to tingle, and he emptied himself inside her.
Chapter Twenty
Cam
Cam placed the last bottle of liquor in the cardboard box and taped it up. Hugo, Kit, and Zeke would be here tomorrow to pick up all the boxes.
The sun was starting to set, and a stream of light from the window highlighted the dust particles in the air. The real estate agent would be putting the ‘for sale’ sign on the front window tomorrow. She could have waited until the day the bar sold to shut everything down, but there was no reason to stay open. As Kit said, this bar had taken everything from her and gave nothing back in return.
She ran a hand over the bar top, feeling the smooth wood under her palm. This had been her life for the last few years. The place where she built a relationship with her father. The place where she cried and screamed and met her best friend.
Amire wasn’t surprised that she was closing down. He found another job at Helen’s the same day. She’d been scared to tell Jen because Jen had been pushing so hard for her to sell the bar anyways. Cam thought she might pull an ‘I told you so,’ but Jen was happy for her. A tear slid down Cam’s cheek as she walked towards the big, old wooden door that she had walked through nearly every day for years.
There was so much waiting for her on the other side of this door. She could finish her degree and finally have the time to think about what she wanted to do with it. She could focus on her relationship with Kit and Jen and her new family. At least, that’s what Kit told her.
He said she was now a part of the Savage Spades. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that, but it was comforting to know she had so many people cheering her on. Taking a deep breath, she pushed on the door to walk outside. It didn’t budge. That’s weird. She tried again this time harder. Nothing.
“What the--”
That’s when she smelled it. The overwhelming scene of burning wood. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
She rammed her shoulder into the door over and over again. This couldn’t be happening. It’s over. She turned around to see smoke coming from the kitchen. This was a setup. Venom. She screamed at the top of her lungs, hoping that someone could hear her. But her screams turned into coughs as the smoke got stronger.
If the liquor caught fire, she would be done in minutes. Her body weakened, but she used the last of her strength to walk over to the window and hit it as hard as she could. Her arms felt like jelly as she slammed her fist against the glass. And then everything went black.
Chapter Twenty -One
Kit
The smell of smoke filled the cab, and his heart hammered in his chest. Something was wrong. He came to the bar to help Cam finish up any last-minute packing, but his stomach twisted into knots as he turned the corner and saw the smoke coming from the bar. Shit!.
He threw the truck in park and sprinted toward the building. The black and gray smoke billowed out of the roof. Sirens sounded in the distance like alarm bells. He didn’t give himself time to think as he slammed his body against the wooden door. It didn’t move an inch. He looked down to see a metal chain wrapped around the door handle and secured to a hook placed in the concrete. There’s no way she could have gotten out.
“Watch out, the firemen are coming,” someone yelled to him, but he didn’t care to see who it was. Cam was in there, and he wasn’t going to wait around.
He looked through the window. It was so dark he could barely see anything. A loose brick lay on the sidewalk, and he picked it up before slamming it against the glass. The window shattered, falling into pieces all around him.
A cloud of smoke hit him in the face. The smoke was getting worse in the small amount of time since he’d gotten there. Once the flames hit the alcohol, it would be a done deal. He pulled his shirt over his nose and mouth, getting ready to step through the window when a thought occurred to him: What if Cam wasn’t in there? What if Venom already took her…or worse?
He couldn’t think like that. He took a deep breath of clean air before stepping through the window. His eyes burned from the smoke, but he forced himself to keep them open. She was on the ground, not far from the window. Her hair spread out over the wooden floor that looked more like char than wood at this point. Her face held a softness to it, as if she was just taking a quick nap. Fuck. She was limp and hot against his skin as he picked her up. Damn, he should have taken the chain off the door first so he could go that way. The only option now was the window.
“Hold on, baby,” he told her. He stepped one leg through the window. The shards of glass rubbed against his jeans.
“Hold on; hold on,” a voice said.
Kit looked up to see two firefighters rushing towards him. “Take her,” he said, turning his body so they could grab Cam out his arms. He watched one of them run with Cam in his arms back to the waiting ambulance.
“Is there anyone else inside?” the other firefighter asked Kit as he helped him out of the window.
Kit shook his head. “I don’t think so.” He stumbled on his feet, but the firefighter grabbed his arm to keep him steady.
Everything that came next was a blur. Kit rode to the hospital with Cam in the back of the ambulance. The EMTs assured him that she would be fine, but she was still unconscious when they got to the hospital. It wasn’t until she was in a room, hooked up to oxygen, and a bunch of other machines, did her eyes finally crack open. He let out a breath he’d been holding ever since he smelled the smoke. Thank god she was okay. If he hadn't gotten there in time…
She opened her mouth to talk, but her face twisted in pain. The doctor said her throat would hurt for a while.
“Shh, don’t say anything. Do you want water?” he asked her.
She nodded, and he grabbed the water off the bedside table. She removed her oxygen mask and took a sip from the straw. She scrunched her nose as the cold water must have hit her raw throat. The door opened, and Jen barged into the room, Hugo not far behind her. Jen’s eyes were wide and panicked. He had texted Zeke in the ambulance, so he must have told everyone.
“Oh my god, you’re okay,” she said to Cam, coming to her bedside. Cam nodded, and Jen looked over at him. “What happened? Why can’t she talk?”
“The bar was set on fire,” Kit said through clenched teeth, allowing himself to finally feel the anger that had been buried underneath his concern for Cam. This was no accident. Venom wanted to kill his girl. “She was unconscious when I got there. She inhaled a lot of smoke, so her throat is pretty raw.”
A tear slid down Cam’s cheek as she listened to him talk. He used his thumb to wipe it away. She opened her mouth to say something but then stopped, as if remembering she can’t talk. Jen noticed and searched the bedside table until she found a notebook and pen. She handed it to Cam.
She wrote: The front door was locked.
“Someone wrapped a metal chain around it,” he told Jen.
“Oh my god, who…” Jen trailed off as she realized who would do something like this.
The same person they should have killed when Venom pretty much injected his sister with heroin.
“Kit…” Hugo warned, getting a look at the rage on his face.
“I gotta go,” he said, and started to walk away, but Cam wrapped her fingers around his arm. He can’t stay here and do nothing, so he prayed she wasn’t going to ask h
im too. Venom needed to pay for everything he’d done. He tried to ruin his life twice now. Cam used her other hand to write on the notepad:
You better come back home.
He leaned down and kissed her on the forehead. “I promise.”
*****
The entire club was in the waiting room. They took up almost all the chairs.
“Is she okay?” Lily asked.
He nodded. “She’s fine. She can’t talk right now, but she’s awake, and the doctor said she’d be fine."
“Thank god.”
He looked over at Gunner. His face was unreadable.
“I’m going,” Kit told him. He wasn’t letting Venom get away with this, not after today. Damn the consequences. For all they knew, everything Venom told them about the sex trafficking ring was a lie.
“We need--”
“I’m not voting. I’m going with or without the club. So, if you’re with me, I’m leaving now.”
“Hold on, let’s be smart about this,” Gunned reasoned.
Kit shook his head. “No, he has to die.”
Gunner looked around at the rest of the club. Zeke nodded his head in support, Otis nodded next, then Ace. All the way down the line, each person nodded.
“Alright, let’s go.”
*****
It wasn’t hard to find Venom. All they had to do was drive into the city and talk to the people on the corner. For a drug lord, he wasn’t very good at keeping his location secret. They pulled up to the building where Venom’s penthouse was located. Kit was in his truck and everyone else on bikes.
There was no way they were getting inside there. They stuck out like a sore thumb. The couple of people who walked past their line of motorcycles stared at the bikes like they’ve never seen one before. It was dark outside now, so the foot traffic had slowed down a lot.
“What’s the plan?” Gunner asked. He’d pulled his bike up next to Kit’s window so they could talk.
“We’re going to have to wait until he comes out.” The bottom floor was all windows. Kit could see straight through to a lobby area and a receptionist’s desk.
“That could be a while.”
Kit shrugged. “You don’t have to stay. I’ll wait.”
Gunner shook his head. “What are you going to do once we have him?”
“Kill him.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Why wouldn’t I be? Cam could be dead right now because that son of a bitch couldn’t wait until she sold the bar to get the money that she didn’t even owe to him.” He gritted his teeth as he thought about Cam lying in the hospital bed right now. He should be next to her, but he wasn’t going to be able to relax until Venom was out of their lives permanently. He needed to be killed for what he did to Megan too. Everyone in town had suffered one way or another from the drugs that Venom and his men sold.
“That’s a lot to have on your conscious,” Gunner warned.
“There he is!” Hugo yelled.
Kit jumped out of the truck, almost hitting Gunner with the door. Hugo got to Venom first. Venom was no match for Hugo’s size. He tried to fight, but Hugo easily wrestled him to the ground and put his hands behind his back, as if arresting him.
“Get the fuck off me! You stupid motherfuckers are going to regret this!” Venom threatened.
“Where do you want him?” Hugo asked Kit.
He looked up and down the street to make sure there weren’t any witnesses. “In my truck.”
Hugo forced Venom to a standing position and started walking him to the truck. Kit put a hand out to stop him.
“So what, you’re going to kill me? I already told you what would happen once I’m gone. You must be a stupid--”
Kit landed a punch to his gut knocking the wind out of him. “Killing you immediately would be too kind. We have a long ride ahead of us.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Cam
“I’m going to be in this big house all by myself?” Jen asked as Cam stacked one cardboard box on top of another.
“This place is not that big,” Cam said, doing a sweep of the entire place with her eyes.
Jen crossed her arms. “It still sucks.”
“I’ll have more time now, so I can always come over and hang out.”
“Yeah, but it’s not the same. I’m going to miss having my best friend down the hall.”
Jen opened her arms, and Cam stepped in for a hug. She opened her mouth to say she’d see her at the bar, but she realized that wasn’t a possibility anymore. It was a strange feeling to think a job she’d been working for so long was gone. A weight had been lifted from her shoulders, but she also felt a sort of emptiness. What would she do with her time? She already decided she’d start taking class full-time next semester, but until then, she had to learn to enjoy her time. She had to re-learn how to enjoy life when it wasn’t filled with work and stress.
“I’m so happy for you,” Jen said into her shoulder.
They pulled back, and Jen had a smile on her face. The front door swung open; Kit and Hugo walked back inside from the truck.
“How many more we got?” Kit asked. He was dressed for the move today in a muscle shirt and old jeans.
When he’d gotten back to the hospital the night the bar had burned down, he said that Venom was taken care of. She never asked for details because she knew in her heart Kit only did what he felt like he needed to do. He was protecting her and Megan from a monster.
“Just these two,” she said, waving her hand at the stacked cardboard boxes. As he bent down to grab him, she couldn’t help noticing the way his muscles bunched up. Every time she looked at him, she was reminded of why this was the right decision. She couldn’t white-knuckle her way through life. She had to enjoy her life now with this gorgeous man. She said her last goodbye to Jen.
Once Kit strapped down all the boxes in the back of the truck, he joined her in the cab.
“So this is it,” she said, looking out the windshield at the house she’d called home. She’d moved to Goldbeach to find her family: her dad. She would have never guessed her family would be a bunch of leather-cut wearing men called Savage Spades. She smiled at the irony.
Kit stretched over the console to kiss her lips. Her heartbeat quickened as his lips moved against hers. She breathed in his familiar, woodsy scent, allowing it to calm her. All the anxiety she felt during the process of talking to insurance agents and packing all her stuff to move seemed to wash away. This moment was all that mattered. She was ready to move forward. He pulled back and looked back and forward, as if searching her eyes for something.
“Are you having second thoughts?” he asked. His chest stopped moving, as if he was holding his breath as he waited for his response. She put both hands on the side of his face and leaned in for another kiss.
“Never.”
Epilogue
Kit
“Are you almost done with the Toyota?” Cam called to Kit through the open door that led from the waiting area to the garage.
He grabbed a towel to wipe his greasy hands on before walking into the waiting room. “Almost,” he told her.
She furrowed her eyebrows together for a moment as she looked down at the phone. She picked it up and pressed it to her ear.
“It will be ready to pick up in an hour Ms. Jenkins. Okay, we’ll see you then.”
She hung up the phone and wrote something down in a notebook.
“I don’t know how I feel about you making my schedule,” he said as he leaned against the counter. He peered over to look down her shirt. She was wearing a low cut top that gave him the perfect view of her tits. Autumn had turned into winter, and even though they were inside, the shop was freezing. She wore a heavy jacket that covered her arms but kept it unzipped.
“Well, I like to actually have customers,” she said, finally looking up at him. Her green eyes widened as he caught her staring down her shirt.
“Kit!” she snapped, zipping up her jacket.
He
looked behind her at the empty lobby.
“What?”
“You’re like a horny teenager.”
He rounded the desk and grabbed her hand to stand with him. Then he wrapped his dirty hands around her waist and pulled her close. Her body felt warm flushed against his body. Warm would have been the last word he used to describe Cam only a few months ago, but now she was his safe spot. The place where he could tell all his problems.
She was still going to school full-time. The insurance money from the bar covered the rest of her tuition. She still had a year until she graduated. Megan was able to get an apartment of her own. So he and Cam had been able to move out of the clubhouse. He didn’t mind staying there, but after a few weeks, he’d noticed Cam’s annoyance with the club sluts. He thought he would miss staying at the clubhouse, but he was enjoying giving himself some distance.
Cam made the apartment a home. It was filled with decoration and candles. There was no better feeling than getting off work and coming home to her sitting on the couch in one of his t-shirts with a textbook open on the coffee table.
When he hired her to work at the front desk at the shop, he didn’t think it would have such a significant impact. Due to the better customer service, he had more people from town bringing in their cars. Which meant Kit couldn’t work whenever he wanted to. Cam made sure that the shop had precise working hours. “I want you home at night,” she’d told him, and on the day she posted the hours on the window.
