Ginger's Two Goals [The Ghost Riders 3] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting)
Page 6
“Try months, smart-ass. Either move it, or I’m going without you.” She managed all of two steps before Dom had her in a bear hug.
“Come on. We better get inside while we can still find a table.” Jessie glared at her men before stomping ahead.
“Don’t even think about it, baby girl.” Ajax latched on to her wrist with one big hand.
Narrowing her eyes, Ginger looked up at the man with his close cropped hair and serious expression. When he didn’t let go of her, she sighed and pulled against him.
“Then come on, Ajax. I want to have fun.”
“Oh, we’re going to have fun, babe, but it’s going to be later,” Murdock drawled with a sexy smile.
Ginger couldn’t stop the shiver that danced down her spine. That was a promise of something sinful if she’d ever heard one. Why wasn’t she arguing with him? She should be telling him in no uncertain terms that whatever his plans were they didn’t include her. Instead, she lowered her eyes and walked between the two men as the group finally headed for the door of the bar.
When they stepped inside, she was surprised that it was relatively clean as well as well-lit in places. For a Thursday night, the place was already growing crowded. The men herded them around the dance floor then claimed a couple of tables and gathered chairs so that everyone had a place to sit.
“What does everyone want?” Rhodes asked. “I’ll grab a waitress and place our order.”
“Let’s make it easy. Everyone okay with Dos Equis?” Reece asked.
Everyone agreed. Ginger usually stuck with Corona but wasn’t above conforming to keep things simple. Dos Equis tended to be a little stronger tasting than she liked. She’d just drink it slow.
Fifteen minutes later, the waitress deposited their drinks and everyone settled down to listen to the band as it warmed up. By the time they started their first set, the bar was well on the way to being packed. She was thankful that smoking wasn’t permitted with so many people. As it was, the room was heating up fast.
“Oh, God! ‘Save A Horse!’ We’ve got to dance.” Jessie jumped up, gesturing to Ginger and Raven.
Raven grinned and quickly joined her. When Ginger pushed back her chair and stood up, Murdock actually shook his head at her. She gave him a sweet smile then slipped past him as she followed the other two women out on the floor. When she looked back it was to find Ajax and Murdock talking with the other men. No doubt they were expressing their displeasure about the situation. She caught Jessie staring at her with a knowing grin. Instead of feeling the need to defend her singleness, Ginger laughed and added a little sway to her hips as they bounced and stomped their feet to the music.
They remained on the dance floor through the next song as well. When the third song started, Ginger was surprised to find herself sandwiched between Ajax and Murdock as the music got wilder. They kept her between them as she danced, their cocks pressing against her body with every undulation the music inspired. When the song finished, she was hot and horny, but she had no intentions of letting them know about the horny part. Instead she collapsed in her seat and drank her beer.
Jessie and Raven seemed tireless when it came to dancing and had her up again before she’d really regained her breath. Ajax growled when she let the other women pull her out of her seat.
“Stop shaking your ass so much.”
The other men chuckled, but Murdock looked just as serious as Ajax. Ginger figured short of wearing a sack cloth that covered her from head to toe and sitting in their laps, nothing would satisfy them. She intended to have fun.
Two dances later, Jessie called for a bathroom run and the three of them pushed their way through the crowd to where the bathrooms were located in the back of the building. Thankfully, it held three semi-clean stalls and they only had to wait in line for about two minutes.
As they washed their hands and checked their hair and makeup, Raven kept the conversation going with comments about some of the people who’d been dancing around them.
“I swear, only you could come up with stuff like that,” Jessie said.
“It comes from being a writer. My imagination is scary sometimes.” Raven leaned back against one of the sinks. “What’s going on with Ajax and Murdock, Ginger? They’re hovering around you like freaking stalkers.”
Ginger sighed. Glancing over at Jessie, she frowned at her. “They say they’ve claimed me, but I’m not buying it. I don’t want to be claimed by anyone.”
“They’re good-looking guys. I don’t know anything about them, though. You’re smart to be careful, but I’m sure Reece and Dom wouldn’t have let them move here if they didn’t trust them.” Raven looked thoughtful.
“Well Rhodes said they did some checking on them when they informed us they were claiming her. Nothing showed up that bothered him or Vernon,” Jessie said.
“Just because they appear to be good guys, and they probably are, doesn’t automatically mean I’m going to be their plaything. I have other plans that don’t include them.” Ginger couldn’t figure out why everyone seemed to think she would be okay with a couple of bikers as her boyfriends.
Just because they were in relationships with bikers didn’t mean she wanted to be. There was nothing wrong with it, but it wasn’t what she wanted. Maybe she had made the wrong decision to come back to Reo. Just because she didn’t have a lot of friends where she’d been living didn’t mean she’d had to move. Sure Jessie had been her best friend all those years ago, but now she was getting married to two men. Who said she would have time for Ginger now?
“…this is going to be fun to watch,” Raven was saying.
“What’s going to be fun to watch?” she asked, having missed the first part of the sentence.
Raven and Jessie looked at each other and burst out laughing. That didn’t bode well for her.
“Watching you evade capture, girlfriend. Those two bikers have their eye on you and I can’t imagine anything or anyone getting in their way,” Jessie said with a smirk.
“Well, they haven’t met stubborn yet.” She huffed out a disgusted breath and pushed through the bathroom door.
The other women followed her as they negotiated the sea of bodies to return to their table. No doubt the men would be worried by now.
So used to getting grabbed and felt up in places like this, Ginger didn’t pay any attention when someone jerked at her arm. She just jerked back, only the hand didn’t let go. She turned to tell them to fuck off and stopped dead still with Raven and Jessie running into her from behind.
The man who had her arm stood a good six feet three inches with long blond hair that needed a good brushing. His blue eyes pinned her with a serious stare she wanted no part of. Nothing good lived behind those eyes. But his eyes and the sickening leer didn’t bother her nearly as much as the fact that he was wearing Skulls leathers. And so were the three guys around him.
Chapter Seven
“Um, excuse me. I’m just on my way back from the bathroom.” She tried again to pull out of his grip.
“Don’t run away, little girl. Let’s get to know each other a little better.”
“Let go of her. She’s property of The Ghost Riders.” Raven stepped up, wrapping her arm around Ginger’s waist.
Neither Raven nor Jessie was wearing their jackets since it was so hot in the bar. They didn’t have to know that she didn’t have one of her own. It didn’t seem to matter to them anyway. They didn’t seem to be impressed that they might be messing with another gang’s property.
“Don’t see anything that says that.” He looked over at the other two women. “In fact, I don’t see that any of you are marked as far as I can tell.”
The other three men started moving in on them. Ginger panicked. Pushing back at the blond stranger, she yelled for the other two to go.
“Get help!”
Raven grabbed Jessie, and together they pushed into the crowd, disappearing before her eyes. Now she was well and truly caught. The biker had his arms around her now.
“Name’s Riot. What do they call you?” he asked as he ran a hand down her back to grip one ass cheek.
“Look. You really don’t want to cause a scene, do you? When the guys get here they’re going to be pissed.” She strained against him but soon realized he was too strong for her to budge.
He laughed. “You’re right.”
He turned to the others and nodded toward the door, dragging her with him. That wasn’t exactly what she’d hoped for. Ginger weighed her options, not that she had many. She could scream and fight, causing a scene, and hope someone would help her. Which, she admitted, would probably only succeed in getting herself and someone else hurt in the process. Still, allowing them to get her outside didn’t seem like a good idea either.
Her instinct for survival kicked in, and she started struggling as they neared the front entrance. With Riot’s buddies surrounding them, no one seemed to notice her fighting to get free of the bastard. Yelling didn’t seem to attract much attention either. It did get her arm twisted hard enough she cried out.
“Scream all you want, sweet thing. I like it,” he yelled in her ear.
They emerged from the building into the night. When the door closed behind them, it dulled the noise inside. The other guys spread out some, giving her more room to fight. All she managed to do was earn herself more bruises while Riot laughed at her efforts.
“I knew you’d be fun just by looking at you.” He pulled her over to the side of the building and pinned her to the cinderblock wall, still warm from the afternoon sun.
“Let me go, Riot.” Ginger knew it was useless to beg, much less ask.
“Don’t think so. I like you, sweet thing. You and I are going to have a real good time.” He leaned in and licked across her lips.
Ginger fought the urge to gag, pressing her lips together as hard as possible. What had she done to attract the asshole’s attention? Where were Ajax and the others? Why hadn’t they come to get her yet? She was beginning to worry now.
“Nothing about you makes me think good time, asshole. Let me the fuck go!” She tried to pull away from him to no avail.
The biker frowned and jerked her away from the wall with one hand around her neck before slamming her back against it hard enough to knock the wind out of her. Her head snapped back and connected hard with the cinderblocks. Immediately her hands wrapped around his wrists trying to pull him away from her neck. He was squeezing just enough to make breathing difficult but not enough to completely cut off her air supply.
“Dog! Go find us a truck and load our bikes up. Terry, you and V can ride ahead of us.” Riot didn’t sound as if he was happy anymore.
“I don’t think you’re going anywhere with our woman.”
Ginger looked over Riot’s shoulder to see Ajax, Murdock, and the others forming a semicircle around them. None of them looked the least bit angry or worried. They could have been chatting with friends from their bored expressions. She wanted to scream at them to get the bastard’s hands off of her, but she still hadn’t managed to catch her breath yet.
Riot kept one hand around her neck, holding her in place, but looked over his shoulder at the men behind him. She noticed he slipped his other hand toward his waistband. She wanted to warn the guys, but couldn’t make her voice work. Scenarios where Riot and his friends pulled out guns, killing her friends, had her struggling against the man’s hold despite the pressure he kept on her neck.
“See, I didn’t see anything on her to say that she belonged to anyone. No ring, no collar—no college letterman’s sweater. That tells me she’s fair game.” Riot didn’t seem any more worried than The Ghost Riders did.
“No reason to get bloody over a piece of tail, guys. Let her go,” Dominic and Reece took a step closer to where Ajax and Murdock stood.
“Then why bother with her if she’s just an easy lay? Since when do you care about leather groupies?”
Ginger didn’t like the direction the conversation was going. She wasn’t a leather groupie or an easy lay. Anger pushed aside good sense, and she kicked out with one leg, using his hand around her neck as an anchor. Her knee connected with something that obviously didn’t feel good to him, but he didn’t let go of her neck. It did give her guys an opening to attack.
Riot let go of her to lunge at Ajax as Murdock caught her before she could hit the ground. She found herself thrown over the man’s shoulder as the sounds of grunts and flesh hitting flesh slowly faded. He set her back on her feet next to their bikes.
“Hey. Are you okay? Can you hang on to ride?” he asked.
She nodded, rubbing her throat. She didn’t trust that she could speak yet. Her throat hurt like a bitch. He climbed on the bike and waited as she did the same. They had just gotten settled when the others ran up and jumped on their bikes as well. Ginger realized that Jessie and Raven had been waiting by the bikes during the fight.
“Let’s ride, guys. They aren’t going to be happy when they find their tires slashed,” Rhodes pointed out.
“Hold on back there, babe.” Murdock pulled out with the others close behind.
“Are you okay, baby girl?” Ajax’s voice startled her.
She’d forgotten about the mics in the helmets. She cleared her throat, wincing when she did.
“I’m fine.”
“Sound like shit. Do you need to go to the hospital?” Murdock asked.
“No. Just take me back to Reo.”
“Fucking Skull bastard. What in the hell where they doing hanging around there in the first place?” Ajax asked.
“There were only four of them, too. Makes me wonder if they were just stragglers that hadn’t left yet, or a cell left to spy,” Murdock said.
“Either way, I smell trouble brewing. I don’t think we’ve heard the last from them.”
Ginger agreed with Ajax on that thought. Riot didn’t seem like the type to take a beating and write it off as a lesson learned. She was sure he would want revenge and retaliate somehow. How had she managed to get herself mixed up in that crap?
Running around with bikers is just asking for trouble. I should know better.
She snorted. Evidently not.
* * * *
When the pulled up outside the club house in Reo, several of the gang were waiting on them. Evidently Reece or Dom had gotten word to them to expect trouble, Murdock thought. He killed the engine on the bike and pulled off his helmet. When Ginger started to swing off the bike, he stopped her.
“Wait for Ajax to help you.”
To his surprise, she waited without a fight. Either she was hurt worse than he’d thought or she was still freaking out from her near kidnapping—or both. Ajax walked over and helped their woman off the bike then immediately swung her up in his arms and stomped toward the building. Murdock wasn’t surprised. His friend had almost lost it when the women had run up yelling that The Skulls had Ginger. Then when they hadn’t found them inside, he’d almost killed some people getting to the door.
“Think you need to calm him down?” Reece asked him, staring after Ajax.
“He’ll be fine with her. What do we need to do?” he asked instead.
“I’ve got the main entry points guarded for the night. I don’t really think they’ll show up tonight anyway.” Dom ran his hand over his head. “Let’s get a good night’s sleep and meet at 0900 to plan.”
Murdock watched as he and Reece pulled Raven between them and headed for the door. Rhodes and Vernon nodded and pulled Jessie along as they followed. He looked around the area, unable to really see anything in the pitch black that filled in past the security lights. He opened his saddlebag and pulled out the extra SIG SAUER P226 he carried. He wasn’t taking any chances. He was sure Ajax already had his with him. He rarely went anywhere without his weapons.
When he walked inside, silence greeted him. It looked like most everyone had already settled down for the night. Well, what was left of it, anyway. When he reached the door to the room he and Ajax were sharing, he paused and settled himself. He had
no idea what he’d walk in on when he opened the door. Ginger wasn’t going to be happy about sharing a room with them, but there was no way in hell he would let her stay anywhere else now.
He turned the doorknob and walked inside. Ajax stood with his arms crossed by the bathroom door. They shared a bathroom with the room next door. Butch had that room, so he doubted Ginger would slip out using the other door.
Lifting an eyebrow he nodded at the closed bathroom door. Ajax just shook his head. His buddy didn’t know what sort of mood she was in yet either.
“We’re meeting in the morning at nine to plan. Dom has guards posted tonight.”
“Good.” He stared at the weapon in Murdock’s waistband. “I see you decided to bring it inside after all.”
“Not taking any chances. I’m sure you already had yours handy,” he said with a smile.
Ajax just snorted. The sound of the bathroom door opening grabbed both of their attention. Ginger emerged wearing an overly large T-shirt carrying her dirty clothes. The bruises at her throat were a stark contrast to her pale skin. Anger boiled to the surface once again. The bastard deserved a hell of a lot more than he’d gotten.
“Don’t think I haven’t noticed that all of my things are in your room. I’m too tired to deal with it tonight, but you can bet we’re discussing it tomorrow.” She shuffled over to the king-size bed and climbed in.
He and Ajax exchanged looks. They weren’t going to push it tonight. They’d take the temporary reprieve and run with it. She was exhausted and hurting, and they all needed to get some rest. There was no telling what the next day would bring.
While Ajax commandeered the bathroom next, Murdock eased a hip on the edge of the bed and gently brushed the hair from Ginger’s face.
“Do you need anything, babe?”
“I don’t suppose anyone has any Tylenol or aspirin I could have. My head is pounding.”
He winced at the rough sound of her voice. He was sure her throat hurt as well.