‘As long as you don’t talk in your sleep.’ She pulled herself away from the bike, walking over to Jesse and tugging gently on the collar of his overall, biting down on her lip as she spoke. ‘I’d hate to see what your old lady would do if she knew you were thinking about me and you, up against the wall, right here…’
‘Jesus Christ, Mia…’ Jesse groaned, dropping the cloth on the floor as she ran her hand quickly over his unexpected hard-on.
She smiled, backing away from him, returning his wink, and Kip felt his heart break all over again, because he couldn’t even join in with the flirting – the games that were played around here, even they were off-limits. He was family. And he wished with all of his heart that he wasn’t.
‘Sorry, Kip. You asked if I was busy…?’
She seemed happier than he’d seen her in a while, it was hard to miss. She had a glow about her, an aura, almost, surrounding her. And he had no idea why, considering all the shit that was going on, but looking at her like this; she was so beautiful, when she was happy. And he was about to turn that happiness on its head. He was about to cause her pain; he was going to hurt her. But only because he loved her. And it had to be done. Before Ben got the chance to hurt her more.
‘I think he’s after some brother/sister bonding time,’ Jesse said, turning his attention back to the bike he was working on.
Mia gave Kip a questioning look. ‘You want us to spend some time together, huh?’
He felt his stomach nosedive. Yeah. He wanted to spend some time together. He wanted to spend all the time in the fucking world with her. He just wished the circumstances were different. ‘Nothing else happening right now.’ Kip shrugged, trying to keep it all casual.
‘OK.’ Her tone was bright, cheerful. Trusting. ‘Come on, then. What you got planned?’
Breaking her heart, that’s what. Breaking her beautiful heart.
***
‘You can’t tell them he’s here.’ Sol stretched his long legs out in front of him, taking a swig from a bottle of beer.
‘They’re already suspicious,’ Ben said, leaning forward, clasping his hands between his knees.
‘That’s the reason they sent you here, I know,’ Sol sighed, throwing his head back and staring up at the sky. ‘They want to know where Shane is. They want to know if we’re the ones hiding him.’ He fixed his brother with a dark look. ‘Well, we are.’ He shrugged. ‘But if they already know that…’
‘I said they suspect. They sent me here to find out for sure.’ It was pointless, in Ben’s eyes, to pretend there was any other reason why he’d come back to the Dark Angels. Sol knew why, his father knew why; the latter just hadn’t said as much. And Ben knew Coby wasn’t stupid enough to think anyone would believe he’d come back here purely because he wanted to prove his loyalty to his father. That was the last thing Ben had any intention of doing. He had no loyalty towards his father. None at all, not even a glimmer. But Sol – he was another matter. Sol was a man Ben had always looked up to, despite their differences growing up, because there’d been many. They’d fought, disagreed, threatened one another with random acts of violence that had never amounted to anything other than harsh words and a few thrown punches, but underneath it all, Ben had always loved Sol. He’d always sought the approval of his older brother, which was why the thought of Sol blaming him for Marianna’s death had hurt so much. The thought of never being able to see his brother again, the thought of Sol hating him, it had torn Ben apart, for all those years. And now – now he had a chance to really bond with his brother, because only now did Ben realize just how much he’d missed him. But then there was Mia. The Lone Riders. Could he really go against a club that had given him a new life? The club that had given him the woman he was crazy about?
‘You listening to me, Ben?’
Ben looked up, quickly shaking himself back to the here and now. ‘Yeah. Yeah, sorry…’
‘Something on your mind, bro?’
‘’No. Everything’s fine.’
‘I meant it, y’know.’ Sol took another swig of beer. ‘You can’t go back there.’
‘But isn’t that gonna make them even more suspicious that something’s going on?’
‘Hey, brother, it’s no secret we’re after whipping their asses. They know that’s gonna happen. They just don’t know when we’re gonna strike.’
‘And me quite obviously turning traitor is gonna help things, is it? Isn’t that only gonna accelerate the whole fucking situation?’
Sol grinned, draining the last of his beer and handing the empty bottle to a passing blonde in skin-tight jeans and T-shirt, whacking her ass as she left, an action she didn’t seem to mind in the slightest. ‘Getting them all worked up is exactly what we want. Let them start to feel paranoid, it’ll only weaken their ranks.’
Ben sighed, bowing his head. He needed to see Mia so bad, and he would. Soon. He’d see her, and nobody would know because when he’d vowed to not let her go, he’d meant it. Somehow, when all this was over, he was going to be with her. But right now, he had no idea how that was going to happen. He just needed to see her, to fuck away all the shit that was happening.
‘You’re distracted, Ben.’
He looked up, meeting his brother’s eyes. ‘This is a fucking mess, Sol. I’m just trying to get my head around it all, OK?’
‘You’re not thinking about showing them any kind of loyalty now, are you?’ Sol’s tone carried more than a hint of warning. ‘You’ve been patched into their club for all of five minutes. You were born a Dark Angel, brother. Don’t you ever forget that.’
Ben said nothing, bowing his head again.
‘Oh, I get it. This is all to do with the girl, huh?’
Ben’s head shot up. ‘Don’t bring Mia into this.’
Sol leaned forward. ‘But she’s the reason you got yourself patched-in.’ It wasn’t a question. ‘You gonna tell me I’m wrong?’
‘I fell in love. And you more than anyone must know how it feels to have that person you care about more than anything ripped away from you.’
‘Marianna was a cheating, lying bitch, Ben. In the end I wasn’t even sorry she’d gone. I cared more about the betrayal of our father than I did about losing her.’
Ben just stared at his brother, suddenly remembering how cold he could really be, when pushed.
‘How long you been fucking her?’
‘Jesus, Sol…’
‘How long, Ben?’
‘A few weeks.’
Sol’s laugh was loud, verging on maniacal. ‘A few weeks? Jesus, brother, grow some balls and walk the fuck away. It’s not like you’re married to her.’
Ben felt a rage start to rise inside him, memories of how the brother he undeniably loved could also piss him off big style.
‘You in love, huh?’ Sol mocked, lighting up a cigarette.
‘Shut the fuck up, Sol.’
‘Hey, come on, bro, I’m just messing with you. But, come on! A few weeks… Just forget her. I mean, look around you. You could have any fucking woman you want, any one of them. You click your fingers, they’ll come running. Forget the beautiful Mia Rose. She’s a link to the Lone Riders, and you can’t have her no more, you hear me? She’s history. And in a few short days, that’s exactly what the Lone Riders are gonna be, too.’
***
Mia looked at the woman sitting at the table, nervously playing with the coffee shop’s laminated menu.
‘What’s happening here, Kip?’
‘There’s someone I think you should speak to.’
‘Why?’
Kip stopped and turned around, gently taking Mia’s hand in his. ‘Her name’s Carrie. She used to be engaged, to Ben, back in the days when he was a Dark Angel.’
Mia frowned, confusion washing over her in waves. What the hell was going on? ‘I don’t understand. Why… why do you want me to talk to Ben’s ex-fiancé?’
‘Did you even know he’d been engaged?’ Kip asked, determined this was going to go the way he
needed it to go.
Mia shook her head.
‘He didn’t tell you, huh?’
‘No,’ she whispered, looking back over at the woman, who was still fiddling with the corner of the menu, an almost vacant expression on her pretty face. ‘But, to be fair, Kip, I didn’t ask.’
‘There are a lot of things Ben didn’t tell you, Mia. About his past.’
She looked up into his eyes. ‘I know all about what happened with his father.’
‘Did you know he used to beat his fiancée?’
Mia felt her heart almost shudder to a stop. ‘No.’ She shook her head, so vigorously it sent her hair flying. ‘You’re lying, Kip. You’re fucking lying. You can’t have me, but you don’t want anyone else to have me either, so you’re lying…’
‘Listen, Mia… Listen to me!’ He gripped her hand tighter, determined she wasn’t going to walk away from this. ‘I’m not lying, I promise you. But you need to listen to her, OK? Please. You really need to listen to her.’
The only thing Mia was aware of was the sound of blood pumping through her veins, pounding away inside her head like a doom-laden drumbeat.
‘What you went through with Lennie, you can’t go there again, Mia. You don’t deserve that.’
‘Ben’s different.’ She could feel herself almost drifting away from this situation. Maybe becoming detached was the only way to deal with it. ‘He’s different, Kip. Ben loves me.’
‘Lennie loved you, remember? And look what he was capable of.’
She looked over Kip’s shoulder, at the woman still sitting at the table. She was now looking back at Mia, her eyes wide, a nervous expression clouding her features. But there was something about her that was almost drawing Mia to her. Would listening to what she had to say hurt? Maybe not. But whether she believed her, she had yet to see.
‘OK,’ Mia whispered, wrenching her hand free of Kip’s grasp. ‘OK. I’ll listen to her.’ She walked over to the table, her eyes fixed firmly on the woman sitting there.
‘Are you… are you Mia?’ Carrie asked, watching as Mia sat down opposite her. Kip pulled out the chair to her right, placing himself between the two women.
Mia nodded, clasping her hands together in front of her.
‘I’m Carrie. I used to be engaged to Ben.’
Mia said nothing to that, just kept her eyes fixed on Carrie. She seemed an odd choice for Ben – biker Ben, that is. An odd choice for him to have gone for back in his Dark Angel days. But it was only when Mia noticed the tattoos poking out from the cuffs of her shirt that she realized this woman may have undergone some kind of change over the years. It was possible she’d left one life behind and found a completely new one. Was Ben the reason for that?
‘Look, your brother he… he asked me to come talk to you. Said you needed to hear what I had to say.’
‘My brother needs to keep his nose out of my business.’ Mia’s tone was cold, which was slightly unfair on Carrie. It wasn’t her fault she was here. She’d obviously been coerced into it by Kip. ‘I’m sorry,’ Mia sighed, realizing Carrie wasn’t to blame for this. ‘I know you’re only here to try and help me, but… Ben isn’t like that.’
‘Jesus, Mia.’ Kip threw back his head, his tone exasperated. ‘Are you really so fucking naïve? After everything you’ve been through?’
She shot him a look which told him in no uncertain terms to back off. But he was having one of it.
‘You’re blinded by love, for Christ’s sake,’ he went on, his eyes blazing as they stared right at her. ‘Or by something you think is love…’
‘Don’t fucking patronize me, Kip, because I really don’t need that.’
‘Look, if this is a bad time…’ Carrie said, pushing her chair back.
‘No. It’s not a bad time,’ Kip said, desperate to save this situation before it got completely out of hand.
‘That’s not your fucking decision to make,’ Mia hissed, glaring at Kip.
‘Grow the fuck up, Mia, and stop acting like some lovesick teenager who won’t have a wrong word said about the prick she’s seeing because she thinks she fucking loves him…’
‘This is what he did to me.’
Both Mia and Kip turned to look at the photo Carrie had slid across the table. Kip picked it up first, staring at it for a few seconds before handing it to Mia.
‘You need to look at this.’
She took it from him, staring down at the image in her hands, and within seconds she felt the nausea start to rise. ‘Ben did this?’ Mia couldn’t tear her eyes away from the photograph of Carrie’s neck, the bruises and red marks that decorated her skin all-too familiar.
‘He didn’t always go for such obvious places,’ Carrie said, her voice low but steady. ‘Usually he kept it to my upper arms, y’know, ‘cause they could be hidden. Never went for the face, not in the beginning, anyway. And he didn’t always use physical violence. Sometimes his words hurt far more than any twist of the wrist or punch to the stomach.’
‘I can’t do this…’ Mia whispered, throwing the photograph down on the table and pushing her chair back. ‘I’m… I just…’ She looked at Kip, not knowing what she was feeling now. Anger, pain, fear… she didn’t know. She just knew she’d heard enough.
‘Mia, please,’ Kip pleaded, standing up and reaching out for her, but she backed away, shaking her head.
‘You’ve made your point.’ She looked back at Carrie. ‘I’m sorry, for what happened to you. I really am sorry, because no one – no one – deserves that.’
‘Men like Ben, I’m not sure they can change.’ Carrie’s voice was quiet, but there was a hardened tone there that Mia couldn’t miss. ‘I mean, he’s gone back, hasn’t he? Back to the life.’
‘He just… he…’ Mia didn’t know what to say. The words wouldn’t come out. It was almost like her brain was shutting down, yet, at the same time, refusing to let her ignore this.
‘He did that to me,’ Carrie continued, holding the photograph out again before sliding it back into her pocket. ‘And that was only the start. Ben Salter will never really exist, Mia. Because Benjamin Almeda will never really disappear.’
Mia looked up at Kip, still not knowing what to say. She just felt numb. Like the shutters had come down and everything had gone dark.
‘He may not have done anything yet, Mia,’ Kip began. ‘But you’ve only been together a few weeks. Right now, that man is still a stranger, you have to remember that.’
‘It took months before he started displaying any aggressive behaviour towards me, Mia.’
Once again she looked over at Carrie, a woman who’d been through everything she’d suffered at the hands of Lennie, and she’d got out. And hadn’t she – Mia – got out, too? Shot the man who’d put her through so much shit, and walked away from that crap? It just tore her apart to think that the man she’d thought could protect her from men like Lennie; he was one of those men himself. Could he really have changed? Was it worth the risk to find out?
‘And now he’s back in the Dark Angels…’ Kip continued, until Carrie cut him off.
‘He’s back in the Dark Angels?’ It was the first time she’d let her voice falter so badly.
Kip looked at her. ‘For a reason, Carrie. We needed him to…’
She shook her head, grabbing her jacket from the back of the chair, fixing Mia with a look that turned her blood to ice. ‘Walk away, Mia. Please. Don’t give him a chance, don’t believe he can change because if he’s… Just walk away.’
Mia watched as Carrie almost ran from the café, her head spinning with it all. This was unreal. This wasn’t happening.
‘I need to see him…’
‘No, Mia. You can’t…’ Kip gently grabbed her arm, stopping her from doing something rash, something stupid. ‘You can’t. Let him go. Please. Just let him go.’
Was it that easy? Closing her eyes for a second she remembered the last time she’d seen him; how happy he’d made her feel. And then she remembered Lennie, and how it had bee
n with him in the beginning, how happy he’d once made her feel, too. Until he’d changed, just like that. Once she’d become his, everything had changed.
‘Mia?’
Kip’s eyes were almost pleading with her as she stared up into them. And a part of her wished beyond anything that they weren’t related, that he wasn’t her brother, because Kip Hart – he was the kind of man she should be with. He was a kind man, tough when he needed to be, but never one to disrespect any of the women who hung out at the club. No one had a bad word to say about Kip. But she couldn’t have him.
‘Come on,’ Mia said, taking his hand as a wave of calm resignation washed over her. ‘I need a drink.’
Seventeen
‘This is making me nervous.’ Coby paced the floor of the chapel, stopping only to look out of the window now and again. ‘It’s like the calm before the fucking storm.’ He turned to face Kip, who was perched on the edge of the meeting table, a cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth. ‘And where the hell is Ben? He been in touch with you? ‘Cause he sure as hell hasn’t contacted me. I tell you, Kip, I’ve got a bad feeling about this.’
‘I told you this whole fucked-up scenario had the ability to go belly up. He’s turned against us, gone back to the Dark Angels, for real. That’s his heritage, Coby.’ Kip stood up, turning around to stub out his cigarette. ‘Sending him back there, it was always gonna be risky. Maybe that’s why he was so reluctant.’ He fixed Coby with an “I-told-you-so” look. ‘Because he knew, deep down inside, that if he was to get too close, he wouldn’t be able to walk away.’
Coby’s stare narrowed. ‘I don’t appreciate being told I was wrong, Kip. I was desperate, OK? And Ben, he was our only hope…’
‘No, Coby, he wasn’t. We couldn’t trust him, not really. I mean, all that time he was our lawyer, how do we know he hasn’t been passing on information…’
Coby slammed his fist down hard on the table, his eyes blazing. ‘Enough! This is bullshit, Kip. It’s getting us fucking nowhere.’
Kip remained calm. Getting Coby rattled was never a good idea, so maybe he had to take the reins here. Calm the situation. ‘Look, why don’t I ask around, see what I can find out?
Resurrection (The Lone Riders MC Series Book 3) Page 12
