Bedlam: Hell's Heathens MC (Book Two) (MC Romance)

by Raven Dark

  The satisfaction I feel right now is beyond anything I can put into words. He hasn’t just satisfied my body, he’s given me something so much more. I feel connected to him, tied together with him in a way that goes beyond the physical. He’s reached down inside me and satisfied a deeper need.

  We lie for a few minutes in warm, companionable silence before one question that nags at the back of my mind presses too hard to be ignored.

  “Gar?” I whisper.

  “Yes?”

  “What would have happened if I hadn’t taken off that shirt earlier? What would you have done?”

  “I would have spanked your ass, Sandra.” His eyes are entirely serious.

  I jerk back a little. “Spanked me? You mean like, over your knee?”

  “Mm.”

  I want to be indignant, but somehow, his words just feel right. It’s absurd, but they do.

  I sigh and put my head on his chest. “Shit.” I chuckle a little begrudgingly. “This is my life, isn’t it? I’m stuck with your arrogant, bossy ass.”

  “Yep.” He smiles against my ear.

  “So this is real, then? We’re really doing this?” The idea makes my heart feel huge.

  “Absolutely.” He rubs my ass cheeks, pressing me to him. “You’re stuck with me now, sweetness. No going back.”

  “I really am yours, aren’t I?”

  “Yeah.”

  I rest my head on his chest and hold him tight, grinning from ear to ear. He strokes my hair.

  “Mine,” he whispers into my ear. “All mine.”

  I sigh contentedly. As I drop off to sleep with him in bed a long time later, I realize the biggest thing that’s happened to me in these last two crazy days.

  For the first time in a long while, I believe in forever.

  6

  A Ghost of the Past

  Gar’s brother arrives home in the afternoon the next day.

  We’re in the middle of lunch, looking into anything we can on Sinclair, or rather Gar is, while I make lemonade. Annoyingly, he won’t let me see whatever he’s found on Sinclair, but it has him worried. Gar is staring at his laptop on the coffee table with his dark brows scrunched. Apparently, he’s been looking into Sinclair on and off since we got here.

  “You still aren’t going to tell me how you know him, are you?” I say, setting down the lemonade jug and glasses on the table.

  “Nope.”

  I drop my arms. “Didn’t you say yesterday, if we’re gonna do this, we have to communicate?”

  I hate like hell that I sound like a prying girlfriend, but if the man is putting me in danger, it feels like something I should know.

  “Not about this.” He picks up the lemonade and takes a sip. “Thanks.”

  I make a frustrated sound, feeling all the old fear and mistrust spiking up. “So communicating is only important when you want me to open up.”

  “Sandra—”

  That’s when I hear the front door open. Boots scuff in the hall. “Little brother? You here?”

  Gar rolls his eyes, probably at the name. It makes me laugh, and he glares at me. “In here,” he growls.

  The front door shuts. Footsteps fill the hall before a huge bear of a man strides into the room and drops a duffle bag on the floor.

  I have to crane my neck all way back to keep my eyes on his face. Gar is big, but Cal is a half a head taller, and every bit as broad and muscled. He wears dark faded jeans and a dark tee under his cut. He has salt and pepper hair like his brother, but it’s more salt than pepper. I’d put him at Vicious’ age, late thirties.

  “Ohhh. A girl!” He grins broadly as if he’s never seen one before. “There’s a girl here, with my brother, and she isn’t trying to throw her shoes at him.”

  “You’re home early, Cal,” Gar grumbles. “Sandra, Calamity. Calamity, Sandra.” He gestures between us and goes back to typing on his laptop.

  “Hi,” I say, a little less enthused than I would have been a few minutes ago. “You want a lemonade? Gar seems to think it’s my place to serve him, so…”

  “Wow.” Cal smiles at his brother. “What did you do to piss her off, Gar?”

  “Sandra, sit down. None of your business, Cal.”

  Cal sits on the arm of the couch and wrinkles his nose, his voice lowered in a stage whisper. “What did he do?”

  Instantly, I can’t help liking Cal. “It’s not a big deal. Seriously, you want a drink?”

  He nods and I pour him one, handing it to him.

  Gar finishes whatever he’s doing, and the sigh he lets out as he sits back on the couch tells me he didn’t find what he was looking for. “Come here, you,” he tells me, patting his knee.

  As much as he looks more open now and his tone is gentle, he can’t shut me out like that and then expect me to be all smiles.

  I sigh. “I think I’ll go get another sandwich.”

  Gar’s lips pull into an irritated look, but he shrugs.

  I get myself a sandwich from the kitchen and then take my time going over to sit with Gar. I don’t sit on his lap like he wants, but beside him on the couch. He puts his arm around me and I find myself leaning against his shoulder in spite of myself.

  Cal takes a seat in the chair across from him. “I see my house is still standing, brother.”

  “Fuck you.” Gar laughs, looking more relaxed.

  “So this is the beauty that has my little brother’s heart.” Cal takes the other half of my sandwich, ignoring my raised brow. It’s a salami on rye and he nods his approval after a bite.

  “I do?” I smile at Gar, wondering what he told him. He feels strongly enough about me to confide in Cal about it?

  “Damn right.” Gar tips my chin up and kisses me hard on the mouth.

  I kiss him back halfheartedly.

  If I was nervous of meeting Cal before, I’m not now. We sit and talk for a while, Gar with his arm around me the whole time.

  Cal watches us, looking pleased.

  “So, where the hell is the Prez?” Gar asks, massaging my hip. “I’ve been trying to reach him for two days.”

  “Oh, he’s off brooding again. This job took a lot out of him. If you try him now, he’ll probably answer.”

  I’m starting to get sleepy with Gar’s warmth seeping into me.

  Gar tries his president again. He leaves the room when apparently this time, the man answers. I hear him say the word “Prez,” as he leaves.

  Cal pours himself the last of the lemonade and lounges back in his chair. “So, where did you meet Gar?”

  “At Anne’s wedding. I almost hit him with my car.”

  Cal snickers. “Which, as I can see, immediately told him you were the one.”

  “He seems to think so.”

  “And you don’t.”

  I bite my lip. “I’m not sure.”

  He nods and leans forward. “Okay, look, let me tell you something about Gar. I don’t know what he did to piss you off earlier, but he’s a good guy.”

  “How much did he pay you to say that?” I half tease.

  He draws back with an impressed chuckle. “Ha. Nice one. I like you.” Then he becomes serious. “Hey, I’ll be the first one to tell you, my brother is a bonehead sometimes. But I will also tell you, he’s different with you. Real.”

  “Real, as opposed to what?”

  “Real, as opposed to the superficial shit he usually ends up in. This is no flavor of the month thing. This one is going to last.”

  I stare. “How can you know that?”

  “I can see it. He’s never been as open or as close to a woman as he is with you.”

  “He isn’t all that open.” I look at the table. “Or he wasn’t just before you came in.”

  “How so?”

  “ He… We have a mutual enemy,” I say carefully, not wanting to tell him too much about my ties to Sinclair. “The club has a connection with him, but he won’t tell me what it is.”

  “Oh, is this about Max?”

  My stomach tight
ens. “How… Did Gar…?”

  He shakes his head. “Gar didn’t tell me shit. Some of the guys were jawing about Sinclair causing shit with Vicious. They mentioned him harassing a girl whom Gar left with.”

  Relief floods me and I feel a stab of shame for worrying that Gar told tales. “Oh. Yeah, it’s about him.”

  He nods and leans forward a little more. “Well, like I said, sometimes my brother gets his head up his ass when it comes to telling a woman shit. But if he won’t talk about Max, it’s not because he’s being a jerk. It’s because he can’t. It’s club business.”

  I let this thought sink in. Anne’s used that phrase before, and it usually means the topic is something that’s off limits for females according to club law. How I find this easy to accept, I don’t know. Maybe it’s because I know it means his evasiveness is not his choice, but that it’s about something bigger than him and me. Only in this case, I can hear something else in the way Cal said the words. Something more dangerous.

  “You mean it’s illegal.”

  “Didn’t say that.” But his eyes tell me I’m right. “Let’s just say, when it comes to characters like Max, the less you know, the better.”

  I blow out a breath. “I see.”

  This revelation should scare me, and it does. But some part of me knows that being with Gar means accepting the parts of his life that I might not like. Or maybe I find myself wanting to accept it because I know that dealing with Max Sinclair is going to take the involvement of men who do things beyond the letter of the law. Bad, scary men who aren’t afraid to do what it takes to get things done.

  Before I can figure out how to reply to this new information, Gar comes back in, slipping his phone into his pocket. “It’s done, sweetheart,” he says, sitting next to me.

  “What’s done?”

  “The Prez knows everything. You’re staying with us until this shit is over. He’s got the guys looking into Sinclair and how to deal with him. We’ll meet him at the clubhouse tomorrow.”

  I shake my head. The last thing I want to do is come across as a pain in the ass to Gar’s superior. “Gar, I appreciate this. I do. But I don’t want to cause trouble. I’m sure he has bigger problems to handle than—”

  “Hey.” He takes my hands and kisses my knuckles. “Stop that. Helping you is not “causing trouble.” You belong to me, and that means what happens to you happens to me. We take care of our own.”

  I smile shyly. “Thank you.” Never have I felt the sense of safety and belonging I feel now. That his club sees me as someone worth protecting means more than he can know.

  We “shoot the shit” as Cal calls it, for a while until Cal suggests we go out to dinner. I enjoy the ride on Gar’s bike, wrapping myself around him while Cal rides at his side.

  Leaving the house initially made me nervous when I thought about Sinclair still out there, but we don’t see anyone on the road, and soon I begin to relax. Besides, after the warning Gar gave him at the wedding, I doubt he would try anything when I’m out with two huge bikers who look like they could flip a Mack Truck.

  The guys take me to a nice restaurant a few miles from the lake house. There’s a few motorbikes outside, and another car or two, none of which look like the wealthy, flashy kind of car Sinclair would drive.

  We sit in the booth and order drinks while we wait for the food to come, plates of steak and stuffed mushroom caps.

  “So, Gar tells me you’re in college,” Cal says as he takes a drink of his beer.

  Shutting down a twinge of nervousness, I nod. Questions about college always make me nervous, considering how I got the money to pay for it.

  Gar must pick up on my anxiety, because he squeezes my hand under the table while his fingers toy with his whiskey glass.

  “What are you studying?” Cal asks.

  “Business administration. I have two years left. Gar never said…what do you do?”

  Cal clears his throat. He glances from Gar to me. Apparently, considering how much to tell me. “I’m a Cleaner, Sandra.”

  “A what?” Something tells me he doesn’t clean toilets for a living.

  “Cal cleans up the club’s messes,” Gar says gently.

  I narrow my eyes at both of them. “Why do I have a feeling I don’t want to know what kind of messes?”

  “You don’t,” Gar says.

  “Let’s put it this way.” Cal leans forward with his arms on the table. “If you see me on a scene, you were never there.”

  A mix of intrigue and trepidation pricks me. I open my mouth to press for more, but the food comes and I close it. The waiter sets the food down with a wary look at us that’s common in Whiskey, even though we’re a few hours outside of the town.

  “Can we help you?” Gar growls when the waiter stands there, frozen as if he’s been petrified.

  The poor boy beats a hasty retreat and both men chuckle. I giggle into my hand.

  I’m not sure what it says about me that it thrills me to be with a man who others are afraid of.

  “Aw, fuck.” Cal puts down his fork after cutting into his steak. Blood seeps out of it onto the plate.

  “Eww,” I say.

  “I like my steak rare, but this isn’t even cooked,” Cal says. “Hey!” he shouts at our waiter.

  Across the room, the waiter’s face pales as he looks at us.

  “Come here, kid,” Gar says. “I doubt if this thing has even seen a grill.”

  “One of the owners is here. Let me get him for you.” Without coming near our table, the waiter turns and disappears into the back kitchen. When he comes back, out of my peripheral vision I see that he has a man in a suit with him.

  “I guess our waiter is too scared to deal with you guys,” I whisper to the men with a grin.

  “Is there a problem here, gentlemen?”

  The owner’s voice rings in my ears. My stomach falls to my feet. I whip my head up. The sight of his face causes all of the blood to drain out of mine.

  “Sandra. Well, wonders never cease,” the owner says.

  I swallow hard. “Skeeter.”

  7

  Bad Man

  I’m going to puke.

  No, I’m not being hyperbolic; at the sight of my ex-boyfriend, I feel like my stomach’s literally going to empty itself.

  As Skeet is only a year older than me, I assume he shares ownership of this place with his father. It would be my luck that I’d end up at the one restaurant within miles in any direction and Skeet owns it.

  Old memories flood in, making my whole body feel as if I’ve been doused in ice. Gar’s hand is on my shoulder, and that’s the only thing that’s keeping me from bolting from the table.

  “Sandra?” His concerned voice sounds like it’s coming from down a long tunnel. Distantly I hear Cal ask what’s going on, but don’t got the brain power to answer.

  That’s right, I’ve never told Gar anything about Skeet, much less his name. He has no idea why I probably look like death warmed over.

  “Still in the same line of work, Sandra?” Skeet asks good-naturedly. “Or did you get sick of humiliating yourself in public?”

  Shame rolls through me and suddenly I’ve forgotten how to breathe.

  “What the fuck?” Gar snaps.

  I make myself look at Skeet. His mouth spreads into a huge grin that I can’t believe I once thought was good-looking.

  “Wow, kid.” Cal says. “Are you brain-dead? Do you know who we are?”

  “Do you know who I am?” Skeet counters. His response says it all. With his family’s money and power, he’s like his dad; he thinks he’s too untouchable to be scared of the Hell’s Heathens.

  “Sandra,” Gar growls in a deadly voice I’ve never heard him use before. It’s a frightening sound. “Get up.”

  Shaking, but not because of Gar, I slip out of the bench. I realize what I’ve done only when Gar slides out after me, his huge fists balled up.

  “Come here and say that, you little piss-ant fuck,” Gar says when Skeet
steps back.

  There’s a flicker of real fear in Skeet’s eyes, but it’s not enough to shut him up. Everyone in the restaurant is watching.

  “So now you’re taking orders from degenerates too, Sandra?” Skeet cocks his head at me.

  Oh, God. Every muscle in Gar tightens until his cut bulges. I don’t know a ton about motorcycle clubs, but even I know Skeet just committed a huge mistake.

  “Skeet, for God’s sake shut—” I start.

  “Cal, take Sandra outside. Now.” Gar’s voice is death.

  ”You got it.” Cal gets up with a look that says they’ve done this a hundred times before. He grabs my arm, pulling me around the two of them. In less than six strides, he’s at the doors to the restaurant. We aren’t entirely out the door before there’s a horrible smash and I hear Skeet yell in pain.

  “Oh, shit. Cal, what is he doing?”

  He pulls me across the lot to their bikes. “He’s doing what he’s supposed to. Taking care of business. Here.” He hands me a helmet. “Put this on. Hurry.”

  I’m shaking now, with as much fear for Gar as for the situation. He doesn’t know Skeet, or what he’s gotten himself into by hurting him. I throw the helmet on just as Gar storms out of the restaurant. His face is a mask of fury, and there’s blood on his knuckles.

  He pulls me onto his bike.

  “Gar, what did you do?” For some reason, I’m crying.

  “We’ll talk about it later.” He starts the bike and when I try to ask again, he revs it, drowning me out.

  My thoughts are a dark tangle, and by the time we get back to the lake house, I’m shaking again. Gar says nothing until we’re inside. Then he yanks me close. “Come here.” He breathes me in.

  Cal locks the door. “I gotta go make a few phone calls. I’ll be upstairs.” Cal takes out his phone and disappears. I have the feeling he’s making himself scarce, giving us time to talk alone.

  I pull back from Gar. “What did you do?” I whisper shakily.

  “I gave the little shit what he deserves. No one talks about you that way, and no one disrespects the club.”