Man of the House: A Dark Bad Boy Romance

by B. B. Hamel

  But I let him take my hips and guide me down the ladder. He kissed my head. “Stay. I got it.”

  I gave him the bulb with a smile and watched him climb up. It was annoying that the fixtures were so high up in our room, but I couldn’t complain. Living in the Barone compound had its perks.

  Such as the handsome man who took care of me, Vincent Mori. I never expected he’d turn out to be so caring, but there he was, changing a bulb for me.

  “Done,” he said, climbing back down.

  “Bravo.”

  In the other room, Alexei began to cry.

  “I got it,” he said, quickly walking off.

  I laughed, following him. “You don’t have to do everything, you know.”

  “I do when you’re like this,” he said.

  “I’m pregnant; I’m not dead.”

  He shrugged, holding Alexei. My little boy had grown up so much over the past five months that it was absolutely amazing.

  “I hope you’re having a girl,” Vince said.

  “Why?”

  “Because this guy is going to be a hard one. I can already tell.”

  I laughed. “What makes you think that?”

  “Look,” he said, pointing. Alexei was crying because he had smashed one of his toys to pieces.

  I laughed, shaking my head. “And you think a sister will help?”

  “Girl might soften him a bit.”

  “Yeah, maybe,” I said, shaking my head.

  It had been months since Vincent had rescued me from my family and brought me back to the compound. We’d moved in together on that day and begun our life together.

  And it was incredible. Every day with Vince was better than the next. The war raged on, but it wasn’t about me anymore; I knew that. It was about the complicated politics of Chicago’s gangs, and one girl and her baby couldn’t really do much about that.

  So I trusted Vince, and I loved him.

  And my life was one wild ride after the next. We took care of Alexei, and when Alexei went to sleep, Vince made my body feel things I thought I’d forgotten. Fortunately Alexei was turning out to be a heavy sleeper, because I couldn’t exactly stay quiet.

  And Vince was turning out to be an amazing father. He’d had a lot to learn at first, but he wanted to figure it out and wanted to be there. The biggest part of being a father was just showing up, and Vince did that.

  Sure, he still went out with his crew. He still did dangerous things, but I asked him not to tell me the details anymore. I didn’t want to know which of my family members he had killed recently or how close he had come to getting another bullet in him.

  I just wanted to be with him. And one day, when he’d stopped using condoms and I’d realized that I didn’t mind, I knew we’d be together forever. Maybe we weren’t married yet, but we were an unconventional couple.

  And besides, he kept telling me that a ring was coming. He felt bad that he hadn’t made an honest woman out of me yet.

  I didn’t mind. I was just happy I had another of his babies coming. That was better than a wedding or a marriage. It was more real, more binding.

  He’d always be mine, and I’d always be his.

  Slowly, Alexei stopped crying.

  “Now, you be good,” Vince said, putting him back down to play.

  He came over to me and wrapped an arm around my waist as we looked down at Alexei.

  “Our kid,” he said.

  “I know,” I answered softly. “We’ll have more soon.”

  “Hey,” he said, and I looked at him.

  He held up a little black box.

  “Vince,” I said.

  “Listen to me,” he said. “I want to make this real. Be my wife.”

  “Okay,” I said, laughing. “Okay.”

  He opened the box, and the ring was incredible. I slipped it onto my finger and felt something deep inside me.

  It was contentment. I was happy, safe, and content.

  “I love you,” I said.

  “I love you too.” He kissed me hard.

  I was going to marry the bastard who’d gotten me pregnant. I never thought I’d end up with him, but I couldn’t imagine it any other way.

  Because Vince was perfect. Dirty, smart, sexy, exciting, and a great father. We had a comfortable life in the compound, and hopefully one day we’d get a house of our own.

  But for now, I was happy. I couldn’t ask for more. I had friends in Nat and Louisa, and I had my family.

  After everything, I had finally come home.

  In Vince’s arms, with Alexei playing nearby and another baby growing inside me, I was home.

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  Keep reading for the full text of Smash!

  Biker’s Claim: A Bad Boy MC Romance

  Prologue: Janine

  War was tearing the whole city apart.

  That was my life back then.

  I wasn’t owned, not exactly. But I owed the man who took me in as a kid and raised me as his own everything. I couldn’t betray him, even when every fiber in my body wanted to.

  My father wanted me to stay far, far away from him.

  He said Clutch wasn’t the type of man for me.

  I completely disagreed.

  And in the night when I could hear Clutch’s bike tearing up the sky, roaring down the road toward me, I knew exactly what I wanted.

  He was tall, ripped, and dangerous. The tattoos that snaked up his body only hinted at the strength inside him.

  An enforcer, a man with a dark past. He wasn’t right for me, but he made everything feel so good.

  My father was right, at least partially. Clutch was cocky, an asshole, and loved to tease me. His skin brushed up against my neck as he whispered in my ear.

  Ditch the fucking panties, girl, he whispered. I want to feel your soaking skin begging for more.

  Anybody could have seen us, and my father was not the type of man to be crossed, not at all.

  But Clutch wasn’t the type to walk away from what he wanted.

  Torn apart, ripped to shreds. Stuck between the club I owed my life to and the man I wanted to give my body to.

  I could see Clutch’s delicious grin in the dark.

  What are you waiting for? Spread those legs. Give me what I want.

  Chills ran down my spine, and that was exactly what I did.

  1

  Janine

  I owed my life to Larkin Yates.

  Not in one of those metaphorical ways, either. Some people said they owed their life to someone when that person just did something nice for them.

  No, not in this case. Larkin Yates saved my life in a very real way. Without him, I’d be dead, sure as anything in this world.

  I was just a little girl when I first met him. Larkin was one of my daddy’s friends, one of the tough men who smiled tender at me while they rode their loud bikes around the city. Larkin and my daddy, they went way back. They knew each other as kids and were as close as could be.

  Which was why it took Larkin so long to put a bullet in Daddy’s head.

  I still remembered that night and always would. I was ten years old. Ever since I could remember, Daddy was a violent man, a drinker. He had a temper and was famous for it. Daddy got in fights all over town, but nobody thought twice about that. If you were a biker, you
were practically expected to drink too much and to get in a fight or two.

  But Daddy took it all too far; he always did. He started hitting my mom when I was around six or seven. I could still vaguely remember the sounds they’d make, the yelling and the screaming, and eventually the crying as Daddy went too far and beat mom down to a pulp.

  It went on like that for a few years, getting worse and worse. At the height of it all, before Larkin saved me, I’d wake up wondering how long I had before Daddy got drunk enough to smack me around.

  Usually, that was before noon.

  I’d never forget the night Larkin came and changed everything. Daddy was getting drunk as usual, but he had some work to do in the backyard, something to do with the shed. I couldn’t remember exactly what, but it kept him busy. Kept his hands off Mom and me.

  But it also pissed him off. He was working himself into a rage back there, unable to fix whatever needed patching, drinking more and more whisky, getting louder, harder, scarier.

  Until around four in the afternoon, when he came inside. Mom said one thing, probably asked if he was hungry or something like that, and he started beating on her.

  He didn’t stop beating on her. She screamed and tried to get away, but Daddy wouldn’t stop. I’d seen him mad, seen him hit and smack, but never like this.

  Daddy was out of his mind.

  I hid in my bedroom, and eventually Mom stopped making noise.

  That was when he came for me with this look in his eyes and blood on his hands. He slipped the belt from his jeans and just looked at me, blood dropping onto the carpet. I couldn’t breathe.

  I had no clue when Larkin decided to come over. But Larkin, he must have heard me screaming as Daddy beat me with his belt over and over, leaving deep welts along my back, bloody scars I carried to this day.

  I didn’t know what he thought when he found Mom’s body beaten to death in the kitchen. I didn’t know how fast he got upstairs.

  But I remembered the door getting kicked open.

  “Frank,” Larkin said, “what did you do?”

  Larkin held a gun leveled at Daddy’s head. I could barely understand what was happening.

  “Mind yourself, Larkin,” he snapped.

  “Drop the belt, Frank. Come with me.”

  “Fuck you.” He hit me again.

  “Don’t hit the girl again,” Larkin said, cold as he could be.

  Daddy just laughed and laughed. “Stop me.” He hit me again and again.

  And Larkin put a bullet into his skull.

  One second Daddy was hitting me, and the next there was a loud roar in the room and Daddy collapsed onto the floor, red spilling from his face.

  Larkin swooped me up in his arms.

  “It’s okay,” he said. “It’s okay, Janine. I got you.”

  He carried me outside, put me on the back of his bike, and took me far away.

  I never went home after that. There was talk of finding me a foster home, but Larkin decided to raise me himself. I never understood why a single man running one of the most violent motorcycle gangs in the country wanted a little daughter for his own, but Larkin took me in and kept me safe.

  He gave me a life, gave me a home. In return, I gave him and the Demons Motorcycle Club my full and unwavering loyalty.

  I grew up in the club. I was Larkin’s little girl, though most guys knew the real story. As far as they were concerned though, I was off-limits. I wasn’t just another club whore, although sometimes I tried to pretend like I was.

  Because maybe it was safer that way, if I was just another normal girl.

  Living with the Demons MC taught me one important lesson, though: Nothing was safe, not ever, and you better learn to take care of yourself.

  2

  Clutch

  You didn’t become a top enforcer for the biggest motorcycle club in the whole Austin, Texas area without cracking a few fucking skulls.

  To put it fucking mildly.

  I came from nothing. My momma named me Jonathan but I earned the name Clutch. Even as a little boy, I loved all things with a motor, especially bikes. I got my nickname when some asshole neighbor kid said that I worked on motorcycles so much I was becoming a clutch.

  I kicked that kid’s ass and then I took the name as my own.

  My dad ran off when I was a baby, leaving me and my momma alone to survive. She had her own problems, mostly booze and pills, but she tried. She worked two jobs and whored on the side to earn her drug money. She kept the whoring a secret for a while, but as I got older, I figured things out.

  I was left to figure things out for myself. I got a part-time job when I could and got real good at stealing from the rich kids at school. I saved up everything I had and bought parts at the local junkyard to work on my bikes.

  When I found the Demons, it was like coming home.

  I was eighteen. I just left home, rode my bike out to Austin with nothing but a duffle bag full of clothes and some money in my pocket. I found them on that first day and never left again.

  It wasn’t easy joining the Demons. I had to hang around the bar they used as their clubhouse for over a year before someone invited me to pledge. The man who sponsored me, his name was Leopold. Big guy, old-timer, member of the council. He took me under his wing, taught me everything he knew. I pledged and eventually was the only pledge of the guys I started out with to make it into the Demons.

  Leopold lived long enough to see me wear the Demon patch. He died a few days later of a heart attack.

  Like I said, Leopold was a big man.

  From there, I worked my way into the club, did what I could to earn their respect. I moved up through the ranks because I wasn’t afraid of violence. I did what the club needed done, cracked skulls and killed other violent men. The club was my life and my family. The club was everything to me.

  Later on, I found out that my momma died, killed by one of her sex clients. The guy stabbed her to death because he couldn’t afford to pay her after he used her up.

  That was five years ago, five years after I joined the club. Now, ten years since I was a little eighteen-year-old kid, I knew more than I could ever have guessed, done some things I never imagined I’d do.

  I had no dad, no mom. My only family was the club, and that was all I needed.

  I still remembered the first time I saw her.

  I was a pledge back then, brand new to the place. I was sitting at the bar getting drunk with Leopold and two other guys I couldn’t remember anymore when she walked in that door.

  Long legs, long blond hair. Beautiful, absolutely fucking beautiful, and every guy in the place turned and looked.

  “Ah,” Leopold said. “There she is, the little biker princess.”

  I looked at him. “Who is she?”

  Leopold grinned. “You don’t know?”

  “Tell me, Leo.”

  “That’s Janine. She’s Larkin’s adopted daughter.”

  “Shit,” I said, looking at her again. “She’s gorgeous.”

  Leopold laughed. “Look away, kid. She’s out of your league. That girl is royalty. Ain’t no pledge in the world ever going to touch her body.”

  “She’s free to do what she wants, right?”

  Leopold just laughed and shook his head. “You don’t know how the club works yet, do you, kid?”

  I didn’t, not at that point, but over the years I’d figure it out. And although I never forgot that first time I saw Janine, I also never forgot what Leopold said about her.

  She was the biker princess. She was fucking royalty.

  We knew each other. Janine knew everyone in the club. She was three years younger than me, which meant we had more in common than some. We were friendly, as friendly as you could be with her at least. Larkin had the habit of beating the fuck out of any member that pushed the line with Janine.

  I respected Larkin too much to make a pass. And truth be told, for those ten years we were orbiting around each other, I was too busy finding my own damn place in the c
lub to really see her too clearly.

  It wasn’t until I was twenty-eight and she was twenty-five that she came back into focus.

  She came back to me, sharp and alive. I had forgotten what it was like to really want someone until that night. But of course, that night wasn’t the beginning, though it did begin a lot of things for us.

  No, it really started a week before that. One week before my whole fucking life got a hell of a lot more complicated.

  “Clutch.”

  I looked up and grunted. Janine grinned at me across the table, cocking her head to one side. She had this way of saying my name, like she was being sarcastic or some shit.

  “What do you want?” I asked her.

  She laughed. “You in a bad mood tonight?”

  “Just don’t have time to mess around,” I said, knocking back my whisky.

  Truth was, I had all the time in the world, but I’d learned a long time ago not to mess with Janine, even if she did want to flirt with you. Larkin had given me many of his famous bone-chilling looks, even if it was Janine’s own damn fault that she ended up in my lap.

  I never asked for that shit, and I sure as hell didn’t understand the girl.

  “Just wanted to say hi, is all,” she said. “Haven’t seen you around much.”

  “War got us all busy,” I said.

  “Yeah. War does that.” She tossed her blond hair, smiling at me. Of everyone in the club, I’d say that she liked me the best. Maybe I just thought that because she flirted with me the most, and because I was willing to walk the line between harmless and getting my ass beat.

  Never wanted to cross that line, though. Never wanted to betray Larkin’s trust like that.

  Even if Janine was one of the sexiest fucking women I’d ever laid my eyes on. Full lips like you wouldn’t believe, long, thick blond hair, and a body that made grown men cry. I’d be a liar if I said I never imagined what it would be like to sink my thick cock between her legs, fuck her like I was sure she loved getting fucked.