His lips came crashing onto mine like the waves crashing onto the shore behind me, and I melted into his arms, his kiss warm and soft and full of such sweet passion that it almost broke my heart. I could feel him holding back, his desire to be gentle with me fighting with the growing desires of a man. His cock throbbed hard between us and I pressed my body into him, kissing him back fervently, wanting to somehow let him know how much I needed him, too.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Ryder
Rock music poured out of the windows of the clubhouse as we roared up. Dozens of my brothers, all wearing Gods of Chaos cuts, were streaming in and out of the door, while others were outside, bottles of beer and whiskey clutched in tattooed fists, standing in a circle and cheering on whatever was going on inside. I couldn’t see through the crowd, but I knew what was there. I groaned as I took off my helmet, shaking my head to warn Sam that it might not be so pleasant.
“What’s going on?”she asked.
“Riot. Slade. They’re fucking idiots,”I said.
“What are they doing?” The sound of a loud smack echoed through the trees, followed by a loud raucous cheer from the crowd.
“Bleeding, probably,”I replied, shaking my head. “You can see for yourself. Come on.” I grabbed her hand, pulling her through the crowd.
When we broke through, Riot was pinned to the ground and Slade was sitting on top of him. They were covered in dirt, their bare chests streaked with blood and mud. Huge smiles stretched across both of their faces, as they beamed at each other through blood-stained teeth.
“Looks like we got here just in time for the after-fight make out session,”I said, just as Slade jumped off Riot, grabbing Riot’s outstretched hand and hoisted him up to his feet. They hugged, patting each other on the back hard, and then threw their arms around each other and walked out of the circle. Another raucous round of cheering erupted from the crowd as they parted to let them pass through. Slade reached down and scooped up a helmet at his feet that was overflowing with crumpled cash. Victoriously, he held it up over his head as he passed by.
“Hey, Ryder,”Slade said, grinning.
“Hey, Slade. You win today?”
“Sure did, brother!”he replied.
“I let this mother fucker win!”Riot said, his cheek smeared with drying blood. “I can’t stand the sight of his little girl tears when he loses!”
“Yeah, yeah, you fucks are insane,”I said, turning to Sam. “You want another drink?”
“Sure, a beer sounds great,”she replied, as the crowd began thinning out, everyone spreading out around the various bikes parked in front of the house or going inside.
I glanced down at her, and felt my heart skip a beat. Those fucking eyes of hers were going to kill me if I didn’t get a fucking grip on myself.
I reached down, quickly brushing those full, perfect fucking lips with mine. She tasted like salt, and I felt my cock swell as I kissed her again.
If I hadn’t been so hyper-aware of everyone around us, I would have done a hell of a lot more than kiss her. But I didn’t. I stopped. Turned. Left her there.
Like an asshole.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Grace
I looked around as Ryder walked inside, feeling completely at a loss with what to do with myself.
I spotted Cherry and Tiff on the porch, leaning against the railing, and I walked over to them. Tiff smiled and Cherry squinted her eyes, her gaze traveling from my head to my toes.
“Well, well, well,”she slurred, her eyes bloodshot and watery,“if it isn’t Sleeping Beauty!”
“Sam,”I said. “You can call me Sam.”
“Sam? Did you remember who you are then?”Tiff asked, excitedly.
“Oh, no,”I said, looking away, wishing that I had.“Nothing’s come back. Ryder and I just decided I needed a name in the meantime.”
“Ryder and I?”Cherry snarled. Her lip curled and she looked at me with disgust.
“Um, well…”I wasn’t sure how to respond to her. She was obviously completely wasted.
“So, now you and Ryder are‘Ryder and I’?”she asked, making air quotation marks with her hands. She lost her balance as she let go of the post, and swayed against Tiff. Tiff barely caught her, saving her from crashing down the front steps.
“You know,”she said, leaning in to me, her breath stinking of cigarettes and whiskey.“Ryder doesn’t do that.”
“Doesn’t do what?”I asked.
“Relationships!”she spat out the word, and I moved away from her. “He’s not the“Ryder and I”kind of guy, sugar, if you know what I mean,”she continued.
“Cherry! Stop,”Tiff said, looking at me apologetically.
“It’s okay,”I said.
“It’s okay,”Cherry repeated, mockingly. Cherry had been so nice earlier this morning, hell, everyone had, and it took me completely off guard to see her being so nasty now.
“Are you okay, Cherry?”I asked.
“Fuck you!”she said.“You think you can waltz your pretty ass in here and just take over Ryder’s bed, like you’re the only piece of ass in his life! No, Ryder doesn’t do that, bitch! You think he wants more from you than that fresh little pussy between your legs?” She reached down, and to my utter amazement, cupped my pussy in her palm and squeezed. I jumped back as fast as I could.
“Cherry, I…”Why was she saying these things to me? Was she his fucking him? Of course she was. I was at a complete loss for words. And then she lunged at me again.
I didn’t even realize what was happening until I felt her hand tangled in my hair, trying to pull me to the ground. I yanked back with all my strength, and she fell down on the porch, a handful of my hair wrapped around her fingers, as I stared down at her with astonishment.
“Cherry, what the fuck!”Tiff yelled at her.“God, Sam, I’m so fucking sorry…”her voice trailed off as she leaned down to help Cherry to her feet.
I walked away, pushed through the crowd that was forming again, no doubt waiting for the next bout of entertainment. I wasn’t about to be it.
I ran down the steps and past the bikes, my footsteps quickening as I headed down the dirt road.
I needed to get away. I needed to be alone. I needed time to think.
What the fuck was Cherry talking about? Her words sank in as my feet carried me farther away from the clubhouse and I began to realize just how much of a fool I had been. Of course Ryder wasn’t that type. What was I thinking? Of course he would be involved with all those women there.
He had saved me. So what?
He had sat by my bedside for days, waiting for me to wake up. So what?
He had offered his home, his bed, his food, his time, even the comfort of his arms, for as long as I needed it. So what?
He had kissed me on the beach with such intense passion that it calmed every panicking voice inside my head. So what?
What did any of that mean?
It didn’t mean a fucking thing. Was I really that much of a fool? Had the amnesia made me forget the basic traits of men? Especially drop-dead gorgeous leather-wrapped men with the swagger and confidence of Ryder. He could have any woman he wanted. And I’m sure he did, and often, too.
I shook my head, trying to clear my thoughts. I had been overwhelmed with emotion earlier. I just had a moment of weakness.
What I needed to do was continue to stay focused and figure out who the hell I was. The last thing I needed to be doing was spending time making out on the fucking beach with such a dangerous distraction. Yes, what I needed was to focus and find some help. And lots of it.
I would just go to the cops on my own. What could that hurt? I wouldn’t mention Ryder or the club at all. Just see if they could run my fingerprints or something. Maybe dental records? There had to be some record of my existence somewhere.
I sure as hell wasn’t getting anywhere hidden away in the God of Chaos MC clubhouse, for fuck’s sake!
I had a momentary thought of going back for my things, but then
I realized I had absolutely nothing at all to go back for. The only thing I cared about back there was Ryder, and that was just an ill-fated disaster waiting to happen, as proven loudly by Cherry’s behavior.
I kept walking. My boots were heavy and loud, the dirt from the road covering them in dust. The pine trees swayed in the wind around me, and as I rounded the first curve, and the clubhouse disappeared from view, as well as the tiny light it provided, the forest seemed to grow taller and darker around me. It was eerily quiet.
“I’ll just hop in the first car that stops and ask for a ride to the nearest police station. Or, I’ll ask to use the phone, call for help,”I said out loud.
Fear gripped my heart as I heard a loud howl in the trees to my left. I picked up the pace of my steps, gathering all my inner strength as my blood pounded through my veins.
“Surely, someone is looking for me,”I said, my voice shaking with fear this time. “Hopefully, because they miss me and not because they want to finish killing me.”
My stomach churned, and my hands began shaking. Each step that carried me away from the clubhouse, from the only guaranteed safe place that I had, just increased the knot of dread that had settled deep inside me. That big, black box of fear threatened to overwhelm my entire soul and I walked even faster, trying desperately to stuff the fear back down before it could spill over completely.
Tears flowed down my cheeks. I jutted out my chin, pushing my chest out and putting one foot in front of the other, determined to continue pressing forward. I will be fine, I told myself over and over, as the sounds of the clubhouse faded away behind me.
You’re already survived so much. Everything will come back. You just need a little time.
If only I could stop crying, stop being such a fearful wimp, find some sense of courage to face whatever the real truth was, then maybe it will all come back, and I can go back to my normal life…whatever that was.
I remembered the short denim skirt and heels that Ryder had found me wearing. What was normal life? What kind of woman was I that I would dress like that? It seemed so foreign, so uncomfortable to me. It just didn’t fit.
But neither did the bruises on my face. Or, the fact that someone had tried to kill me - and on this very road somewhere, too.
My steps slowed as I remembered Ryder’s words earlier. He didn’t tell me exactly where, but it couldn’t have been too far from here.
I stopped walking, and looked around. There wasn’t much to see. Towering trees, a deep, dark, dense forest and a dirt road. Nothing more. What had happened to me? Why? The questions had been echoing in my head endlessly, and I still had no answers.
Maybe I was asking the wrong questions. Maybe I needed to know who it was that had tried to hurt me. Maybe I needed to know where that person was. Were they waiting for me? I had meant to ask Ryder a lot more questions, specifically about the man that he had found me with, and I couldn’t remember why I had stopped questioning him now.
Instead, we had ended up at the beach. Instead, we had ended up kissing.
Cherry’s words rang in my head, and once again, I wondered what the hell I was thinking. That was just it, I wasn’t. I was feeling. And I couldn’t afford to do that right now.
I started walking again, and saw something move high up in a tree to my left. I looked up and saw huge, blinking yellow eyes. An owl! My heart raced as I walked over to the tree, staring up at him as he stared right back at me. His head was turned down toward me, and he tilted his head to the right and then back to the left, as if he were sizing me up.
“Hi, there,”I said, quietly. I couldn’t believe he was just sitting there so calmly. “I’m Sam.”
“Wow, you’re beautiful,”I whispered. He blinked at me again, and then with a big, sweeping flap of his wings, he flew off the branch and landed in the dirt directly in front of my boots.
Although he startled me, I resisted jumping away, keeping my boots firmly planted on the road. I watched him, wondering what I should do. Would he let me touch him, I wondered? I took a few deep breaths, trying to soften my panicked energy, and then bent my knees, squatting in front of him.
He remained still, watching me silently, his huge blinking eyes the only thing moving on his body, outside of the small patch of white fur on his chest that pulsated with each beat of his heart. He was tiny, but majestic, and something about his complete stillness calmed me.
Slowly, I reached out my hand towards him, touching the side of his soft wing. I was amazed that even with my touch, he remained seated calmly in front of me. His eyes searched mine, and I smiled at him, as I petted him as gently as I possibly could. His feathers felt like velvet under my fingertips, and I smiled.
“Wow,”I whispered. “You’re absolutely amazing. Do you live around here? Are these your trees? If only you could talk…”
“If only he could,”Ryder said behind me, jolting me from the peaceful moment. I hadn’t heard him approach at all and I jumped up when I heard his voice. The owl flew away quickly, disappearing into the trees behind me as I faced Ryder.
“Hey,”he said casually. As if I weren’t running away from him, as if we weren’t standing on a dirt road in the middle of the night, as if his lover hadn’t just assaulted me on his porch, as if, once again, my entire life didn’t depend on this moment.
“Hey,”I replied, just as casually.
“So, where ya headed?”he asked. If I weren’t so upset, it would almost be funny.
“Oh, you know,”I replied, shrugging. “Just thought I’d hitch a ride into town or something.”
“Hitch, huh?” he asked, cocking an eyebrow. It was dark, with only the moonlight falling around us. I couldn’t see his face very well, but I had a sneaking suspicion he was trying not to laugh at me.
“Yeah, or you know…walk, whatever,”I said.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I shoved my hands in the pockets of my jeans, kicking at the dirt with my boot. His boot. Fuck. He was all I had. Why in the hell was I running away?
“I’m sorry about Cherry,”he said quietly. “I don’t even know what to say about her.”
“Oh, that’s fine. Nothing to say, I guess. She’s drunk, I think. And she didn’t say anything, really…”
“No? That’s not what I heard.”
“Oh. Well, um…look, Ryder, it doesn’t matter. I get it okay? I know I’m a burden.”The words began tumbling out of me before I could stop them, the panic and fear churning inside me again now that my new owl friend had abandoned me. “A big burden. And I appreciate you getting me away from the guy…whoever he was. But you’ve done enough. It’s time for me to go find some help, figure out who I am, and go back to my life. Whatever that is.”
“You aren’t a burden, Sam,”he said, the deepness of his voice thick with emotion.
“Oh, you’re kind, but really. I understand. I don’t want to get in the way of anything you have going on, you know…with Cherry, or whoever…and I don’t belong here. You’ve done too much. It’s time I get out of your hair.”
“Get out of my hair?”he asked. His face was still hidden in the shadows, but the sound of his voice cut right through me.
“Yeah, you know,”I replied. “And listen, I won’t tell anyone about you, okay? I’ll just say I woke up on the side of the road, and that I can’t remember anything. It’s the truth, pretty much, anyway, right? You don’t need to worry about the cops or anything.”
“I’m not worried about the cops, Sam, I’m worried about you.”
His words were like a knife to the heart. This man really was concerned about me. He had no reason to be, he owed me nothing, in fact, it was me that owed him everything. I owed him my life.
“Ryder, thank you for everything, really,”I said, taking a step back from him. “But you don’t have to worry about me anymore, seriously. I’ll be fine. I’ll catch a ride into town and I’ll be okay.”
I turned to walk away from him. I made it three steps before the heat of his fingers wrapped aroun
d my arm. I thought he was going to argue with me. Ask me to stay. Offer to give me a ride.
Instead, his lips possessed mine again, only this time, the sweetness from earlier was gone, the gentleness had turned to raw passion, and his lips moved against me urgently, hungrily, devouring me. I moaned against him, the sheer force of his kiss bringing all that emotion that I had worked so hard to stuff down right back to the surface of my heart.
He tore his lips away from me, and I stared up at him. The moonlight reflected in his eyes, giving me a chance to see what I couldn’t earlier. Desire and yearning flashed in them like a bright light, before he lowered his head once more, engulfing my mouth, his kiss even deeper this time, searchingly assaulting me with his tender passion until, once again, I melted into the comfort of his arms.
REMEMBER ME: GODS OF CHAOS MC Page 7
