Her voice drops. “I don’t need a reminder. I loved him too.”
I chuckle as I move the clothes around. “Yea. You loved Derrick so much you couldn’t wait to ride my dick.” I look to the mirror and watch her reaction.
Her hand moves to her hip. “That’s not fair, Justin, and you know it.”
I shrug and dab some cologne on my neck having given up finding the shirt I was looking for. “Life’s not fair, Steph.”
“When are you going to man up and do what you should have done years ago? I’ve been patient and played your little game long enough. Derrick’s memory deserves better,” her nasally tone harps in my ear giving me a Goddamned headache.
I throw my hands up and the movement forces the towel around my waist to drop. “Fuck you. You don’t know shit. Things are different now. The guys in the club aren’t even the same bastards who rode with Derrick. I’m sick of you running your Goddamn cocksucker all the time. It never fucking ends with you.” I shake my cock at her. “Maybe if you’d suck my dick once in a while I’d be a little nicer.”
“Don’t talk to me like that!” Her hand flies toward my face landing with a brutal sting.
I rub my jaw and smack her back. “You want it rough, Stephanie. I’ll give you rough.” I grab hold of her as she rubs a palm to her cheek.
“God, I hate you,” she spits at me trying to break free.
“Not as much as I hate you.” I shove her down on the bed. My tattooed hand goes around her throat and I squeeze until she goes red in the face then I let go. Her nails bite into my arm leaving crescent shaped indentations. Our eyes lock and her chest heaves. “You’re nothing but a spiteful, manipulative bitch.” I’ve fucking had it with her. I thought maybe if we had a kid she would settle into the life I have built for us. Neither of us ever wanted this but this is where we are now. A baby would give her something to do.
“I’m sorry,” she breathes out her fake apology, rubbing her tender neck.
My lips screw into a half smile. “No, you aren’t.” I stroke a finger along her cheek and over her lips as they part. Her hand comes up to mine and she pushes my fingers in her mouth. Sucking each one leisurely she teases me.
“It’s so hot when you get all worked up like that, lover.” She smiles as I work my hand under her shirt to palm her breast.
“That so…,” I whisper, rubbing a thumb over her pebbled skin.
Pushing up to recline on her elbows her mouth meets mine. There is nothing but lust between us. No love but yet I can’t stay away. I keep coming back for more, taking whatever she will give me. It has always been the two of us. Me and Stephanie against the world. She knows all my dirty secrets and I know hers. Grabbing hold of her shorts she slept in last night I drag them down her hips and thighs, exposing her bare pussy. My fingers move through her slick heat. I knew she’d be wet and ready after out little exchange. Nothing like a little violence and foreplay to get the bitch hot and bothered. Any threat of my leaving her ass and she complies.
“Let’s make a baby,” I tell her as I kiss her stomach.
“We’ve talked about this. I think we need to see a specialist.”
“Give me a baby and I’ll put our plan in motion,” I lie just as I have been for years. The truth is, I stayed with the club because I wanted to bring them down. I wanted to make them pay for getting my brother killed but the longer I stayed in earning their trust the more I became like them. The more I reveled in the lifestyle. The brotherhood—now I have a good thing going and I find even though I still miss Derrick, Hades and the guys aren’t to blame. My brother made his choice when he earned his cut. He knew what he signed on for.
The price for Derrick’s death has been paid. I made a bargain with the Devil and paid my dues, but he wants more. Always taking. Always demanding. I block that shit out though, getting lost in the warm body the woman I married provides.
Chapter 5
—Stephanie
Justin pushes inside me, and I wrap my legs around him, crossing my ankles. I know the minute I give him a baby he will use it as another excuse not to do what he promised and end the Devils Rejects MC. He’ll say it’s too dangerous for the kid. I’m not stupid. I may be a lot of things but I’m not dumb. I know he likes the life. The club life. The Brotherhood and their loyalty.
He forgets that this wasn’t always about Derrick. It’s about my father too. I think he forgets I lost him too. He suffered a brain aneurysm the day after Derrick passed away. I know it was due to that fucker, Brute, but I made sure he got his. We both did. I pretended to seduce the bastard and lured him away during a party. Only when we got to the bedroom, Justin was waiting for him and as I was dry humping the man, my guy came out from his hiding space in the closet and choked him to death. I stared into his eyes as he gasped for a breath and I enjoyed whispering into his ear that it was for Derrick.
I got a taste for revenge and I liked it.
So did Justin.
Raking my nails down his back, I urge him, “Harder.” He moves to give me what I want, just how I like it. There was a time when I loved Justin and part of me still cares for him, but I don’t want this life, and I damn sure don’t want to bring a kid into the mix of our fucked-up relationship. It’s getting harder and harder to pretend. I’m the bitch wife who treats everyone like shit. I’m the bad guy so that no one suspects that my husband came to this club to see it in ruins. We thought it was over when Tiny Leone took out Marek, but he fucked us over and named Hades as the new Prez in a deal behind our backs with the Black Rebel Riders’ MC. These supposed brothers that Justin claims to care so much about wouldn’t hesitate to kills us both if they knew that he’s the one who leaked information to Tiny.
We traded one evil for another.
“Fuck if you don’t drive me crazy fucking mad but your pussy is damn good.” He groans as our bodies move together. My heart is beating like a hollow drum between us. He knows what I crave, and I know how to play him to get what I want except for a way out of this tangled web we’ve weaved.
“Do you love me?” I smirk.
“Yeah, baby, I fucking love you. Want nothing more than to give you a baby. A piece of my family living on. You know the family line dies with me and what it’d mean to me if you gave me a son.”
I close my eyes and swallow his lies, biting back my tears. A son would only serve as another man I love who would someday sign up to ride or die and death would be his only future. Despite what my husband thinks of me, I’m not as cold and unfeeling as he likes to make me out to be. I found out I was pregnant twelve years ago. I sat by myself in a clinic terrified out of my mind. My boyfriend and my father both had just died. Justin had just accepted his brother’s place in the club, taking his chance with fate. I made a decision. One I have carried with me all on my own. I was alone and didn’t leave my room for a month.
Justin was off becoming a man. He had no idea that I was pregnant or that I terminated my pregnancy. That I possibly took away the last piece of Derrick either of us would ever have. My Mom didn’t know how to help me. She had her own grief to deal with. I lashed out and I did things I wasn’t proud of. I was doing drugs and drinking to numb the pain. Then I went looking for trouble at Justin’s door. We thought we could save each other. We thought we could honor Derrick’s memory by bringing down those who had wronged him. We were just kids making grown up plans. Playing with fire and tempting fate. I’m tired of fucking burning in this purgatory of our own creation.
“We can’t keep doing this.” I push him off me suddenly feeling smothered.
“Well fuck you too.” He rolls to his back, cock still saluting me. “What’s wrong now?”
“Aren’t you tired of the fighting?”
“You know where the door is. I’m not stopping you. You’d be doing me a fucking favor.”
We both know his words are hollow. If I tried to leave right now he’d drag me back. I know too damn much.
I sigh and lean on my elbows.
Justin�
��s eyes meet mine. Green with tiny flecks of gold and brown. Sometimes his eyes appear green. Other days they are the gooey center of a brownie fresh out the oven. Today though they are a mossy green. I believe his eyes change colors depending on the man’s mood. Green is a good sign. It’s when they are dark like his heart that I worry.
Chapter 6
—Uno
“I need to get on the road.” I shove up off the bed and move to the closet for a pair of jeans. Steph moves to stand behind me. Her arms circle my waist and her deft fingers rub along my abs as she lays her cheek to the center of my back.
“I wish I could be the woman you want me to be. The strong girl who takes no shit and dishes it out, but I’m not. I’m drowning, Justin.” Her tears fall, trickling down my spine. I place a hand on hers not knowing what to do or say. She’s all I’ve ever known. I’ve never strayed. Never even looked at another woman, because I take my vows seriously. I made Stephanie promises that I never should have agreed to. We both have made our share of mistakes, but I’m torn. I don’t know how to be without her.
As much as I swear I want her gone she’s a part of me. “Hey now.” I turn around and kiss her forehead. “You’re plenty strong. You’re one of the baddest bitches I know.” I smirk at her and she shakes her head, pulling away. She’s spiraling. I know her. If I don’t pull her back from the ledge she’s going to do something stupid to get us both killed. “I’m selfish, Steph, I know I need to let you go, but I can’t.” I bring my mouth down on hers, kissing her slowly. Her tongue sweeps against mine and I know I’ve won this time.
“You better go. Tiny isn’t a patient man.” Her hands move around me and she grabs a pair of my jeans from the shelf. “Wear these.” I accept them and tug them up my legs.
“What are you getting into today?”
“Mom has an appointment today and I said I would take her.”
“I’ll call you when I get back.”
“Okay. Um, I’m not sure what time I’ll leave from Mom’s, it depends on how this new doctor is. You know how she gets.” That’s for damn sure. My mother-in-law is a hypochondriac. Every damn day she is calling Steph or me swearing she’s got cancer or having a heart attack. Bitch is crazy as hell. I don’t know how my wife deals with it all the time. I grab a plain black t-shirt out of the dresser and Stephanie slips her bathrobe on before handing me a pair of socks and fetching my boots.
I shrug my cut on and light up a cigarette. Waving her hands and wrinkling her nose in irritation she gripes, “You know I hate when you smoke in the house. Makes my clothes stink and my hair. Now I have to wash it again.”
I roll my eyes at her but stay quiet. I have bigger fish to fry like what the fuck I am going to do about Tiny. He’s pumping me for information. Bastard is never satisfied. I swear he gets off on making us dance like his little puppets. “I’m gone.” I pull her to me, tracing the curve of her breast with my thumb and she shivers. “I’ll call you later.”
“Okay.”
“About what you said earlier. I hear you. We just gotta find a compromise.”
“Don’t you want something more? Something better for yourself than this, Justin?”
I take a hard drag off my cigarette. The smoke blows in her face but she doesn’t flinch. “Since I was fifteen, a future with you was all I wanted. I didn’t care what it costs me, Steph. I hated how my brother treated you. Most days I hated him, but I also loved him because he gave me you. I paid the price for you and I’d pay it again. A million times over, I’d do it all again if it still left me standing here with you.”
Her gaze softens, and I move to snuff my cigarette out in the ashtray on the coffee table. “You never told me that before.”
I shrug. “I’m sure I have. You just never listened till now. You know what I want. All I’ve ever known is you. I’ve been patient too you know.” My hands go to her waist. “To see you with your belly growing…I want a baby with you.”
“I know. I’ll make an appointment. I promise.”
“Good. You do that.” I leave her to start her day. When I get on my bike I put in a call to Boogeyman. “Follow her today.”
“Will do,” he grunts, and I roar off on my bike to go meet Tiny.
——
Three hours later I pull into the back lot of pool hall North Carolina. We never meet at the same location. Though I have stopped here before. I don’t like seeing the dirty fucker if I can avoid it, but he insisted and when a man like Tiny Leone calls you don’t refuse. It’s afternoon and the music filters out the backdoor when someone tosses a bag of trash into the dumpster. I survey the lot, not seeing the black sedan that is usually present when we are meeting. That doesn’t mean he hasn’t arrived.
I go through the backdoor of the kitchen area and slip into the bathroom to take a leak. When I exit one of his goons is waiting for me. “Come with me,” he barks and leads me to a storage closet and I give him a cross look until he slides a panel of the wall that opens to a secret stairway that goes into the basement. Downstairs is far removed from the scene above. Leather couches, and scantily clad women dancing on a pole. Upstairs is filled with worn tables with watermarks on the tops and fat bastards who have nothing better to do all day than drink, belch, and fart. The carpeting is sticky, but down here the floors are hardwood and so clean you could eat off them.
Tiny is seated on a couch with a woman on either side of him rubbing on his chest and thighs. He holds a hand up and they scatter like roaches. “How’s my favorite outlaw,” he crows. I’d like to say I find him in poor health, but truth is the asshole is fit as an ox and in his prime. My life would be a hell of a lot simpler if I could just kill him for Reaper and get it over with, but like my wife, he simply knows too damn much. They both have me by the balls.
“You wanted to see me.”
“Always so eager to get straight to business, you road warriors. You hurt my feelings. Never taking a drink, declining my dinner invitations. I thought we were friends.” He pours himself a glass of seventy-year-old scotch. I keep my expression neutral and he laughs, clapping his hands together. “I made good on our deal, no? Marek is gone.”
“The deal was to dissolve the club,” I grit, my jaw ticking with annoyance.
“I’m a businessman before I am a friend. This is true. It was business. The Devils Rejects could provide me with something I wanted, and I took the opportunity. You didn’t complain. Is Hades doing as agreed?”
I nod. “We have a few girls lined up.”
“I heard there was trouble with ZoZo. Was a shame I liked him. You know he was one of mine. Sent to keep an eye on you. But I understand, he was out of line with MaryAnn. He had always coveted her when she was on Marek’s arm. I’m happy to hear she is recovering and that her baby thrives in her womb.”
“It’s handled.” I keep my response short. I know what he’s doing trying to get under my skin. Trying to get me to talk.
“Good. I don’t want further complications.”
“There won’t be.” I shift in my seat eager to get out of here. The fucker makes my skin crawl.
“Anything else I should be aware of, friend? How is the lovely, Stephanie?”
“We’re done here,” I tell him, getting up from my seat and he laughs.
“You change your mind, give me a call. I’ll take her off your hands. She is a very attractive woman and I did enjoy our time together the last time we were in each other’s company.” I ball my fists and grit my teeth. I remember all too well how much he enjoys seeing my wife. Tiny has a thing for blondes and has approached me several times to give him a night with my wife. Stephanie doesn’t know but I keep her protected from the sick fuck. I stay under his thumb because I have to but also because if I don’t he’ll out me, have my head, and take her to his bed. Something even I wouldn’t wish on her. No one would wish it. “I’ll be in touch soon, friend. Give your wife my love.”
I lift my chin and he laughs. His voice darkens, low and menacing. “I like you, Uno, but
never take my friendship for granted.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
I can hear his laughter echoing up the stairs behind me with each step I take. Tiny just threatened my wife and I have no idea what to do about it. If I go to Hades I risk everything.
My secrets.
My betrayal.
My Life.
Her life.
If I go to my Prez it will all end but I’m not ready to die.
Chapter 7
—Stephanie
I pull up to my Mom’s house, the one she moved into after my Dad passed away. She said she couldn’t be in that house, the one I grew up and him not come through the door at the end of the day. It’s been years and she never has moved on. Not one date. Nothing. Anytime I bring it up she says it is nonsense talk. In her eyes my father was her one great love, but I wish she’d find some happiness. If she did it would be a lot easier for me to disappear. In a lot of ways, she is the only thing keeping me with Uno. I’m afraid of him using her against me. I don’t think he’d want to do hurt her, but if he were desperate enough I know he would.
Everyone doesn’t know my husband on the intimate level that I do. I have seen him at his worst. I have witnessed what he is capable of—cold blooded murder. But I helped him. I was his accomplice so what does that make me?
Mom gets in the car interrupting my thoughts. “How are you feeling today?” I ask knowing she has probably developed thirty new symptoms while I was driving to pick her up. She’s been this way since my dad died. Always thinking something’s wrong with her. She is always on the verge of dying. Her funeral arrangements have been made for years. She has it all set. The music she wants played during the service. The speech I am supposed to give. The woman is a bit crazy, but I love her. She’s all I have.
It only takes us about fifteen minutes to get to the hospital, so she can see her new doctor. She goes through them easy enough. “Are you good to go in alone?” I question, as I pull up to drop her off at the entrance to the medical clinic.
Uno's Truth (Devils Rejects MC Book 5) Page 3
