Savannah’s voice breaks me from my daze. The chick in front of me actually sticks out her tongue like ‘I fuckin told you so,’ before turning her back on me, “Darn right it’s me,” she says, and I know that this cute as fuck bitch is gonna feel so good, once her lips are wrapped around my cock.
I laugh as I remember our first meeting. Since Savannah and Jenni showed up, shit has really changed, and the birth of Sienna Grace, Sin and Savannah’s daughter, is the least of the changes. We all knew what was coming when Sin risked the club when he brought Savannah here. She’d been beaten and then got knocked-up by some hoity-toity oil heir.
Sin tried to make the excuse that he was doing the ‘right thing’ by keeping her safe and out of danger, but we all saw through his load of shit. We knew there was something there. Something that he didn’t want to acknowledge. And once he found out about the baby, it only fueled his need to care for Savannah and to keep them both protected. His blood may not flow through Grace’s little body, but she’s his just the same.
The death of that piece of shit Prez of the Diablos, Louie Sr., has allowed the dark cloud that’s hung over this MC to dissipate. Cut, our current Prez, and his wife, Lily, are able to actually act like a married couple. They live in the same house, interact with each other in the open and not just behind closed doors. He no longer lives in fear that his wife’s fate will end up like his sister’s. It’s sick as shit to see how much they love each other, but I’m happy for our Prez.
There had always been bad blood between Devil’s Fury and The Diablos. Turf wars were normal when territories run parallel to their rivals, but this shit went deeper. Louie Sr. and our original Prez, Devin, had more issues than who was walking on who’s territory. They had both fallen in love with the same woman. Too bad for Louie, because Bianca only had eyes for Devin which resulted in a marriage and three children. Cut, Sin, and their sister Sienna.
Louie Sr. continued to be obsessed with Bianca, so Devin made it his mission to keep his wife safe by building up not only the MC but several houses along the land of the compound. He wanted to make sure that his family always had the MC around to watch over the ones he held most dear. With years passing, his watchful eyes never faulted, but Devin never thought Louie would aim his sick obsession towards his daughter. Devin was killed trying to bring Sienna home.
We lost so much that day: our Prez, our family, and the feeling that we were invincible. We were a shell of what the MC once was.
Until now.
Years later, the death of Louie Sr. means freedom. It means justice, and it lifts the weight we all had carried on our shoulders as members of the Devil’s Fury MC. The houses that were once abandoned have been reopened, and most of them occupied. Sin and Savannah have settled into their home, waiting patiently to be a family with their daughter, and Cut and Lily have taken up residence in another one of the houses. We’ve even got guys from Canada trying to make a home and a name for themselves here in New Mexico.
These past few years have been rough on the club. Our numbers dwindled when Cut chose to move the club into a different direction. The years of running guns and slinging drugs were over. Turf wars weren’t something that Cut saw when he looked at the future of the club. He wanted stability, a legal way for the club to earn its money, and he found it in the way of bounty hunting. In the short five years that Devil’s Fury has been in the business, we’ve made a name for ourselves.
Once word got out that things were changing in Las Cruses, some of the old members came back, and some of the sister charters transferred over, including a few nomads. Everyone is excited about what Cut and Devil’s Fury stand for. They like the fact that we do things by the book and don’t look for illegal activities to make the money we need to survive.
This is a new time for Devil’s Fury.
Pushing through the screen door of the kitchen I’m hit with the aroma of sautéed onions and garlic. Both Lily and Bianca are moving around the kitchen preparing the food for the cookout we’re holding. “How’s everything coming along?” I ask Bianca and Lily as I enter the kitchen.
“We’ve got it under control, mija,” Bianca says, giving me a wink. “You think this is the first gathering this club has seen? It may have been years in the making, but believe me. I know how to cook the food.”
“No doubt, Bianca,” I tell her pulling out the ingredients I need to make my famous salsa from the refrigerator.
“What are you doing?” Lily asks, stirring the fresh pinto beans.
I’ve come to adore Lily, and admire her strength and courage. She isn’t intimated by the life her husband lives. Love is love, and sometimes it doesn’t matter what you have in mind because in the end your heart always wins.
“I’m making salsa.” They both stop and stare at me. “What?” I continue to pull out what I need. “Do you think a white girl can’t make salsa? It’s not rocket science.”
“You said the white girl comment, not us,” Lily teases.
“It’s not that, mija. You simply can’t cook. You burned soup last week.” Bianca gives me a wink.
Okay, so I forgot to add the water. It was a simple mistake, but it wasn’t my fault that Lick came over and distracted me. “It’s not cooking, which I can do by the way. I’m freaking southern. I can fry and cook anything, but it’s chopping. I can do that. Believe me. It’s good. I promise.”
“I brought my salsa. Don’t worry Bianca. We’ve got it covered,” Lily says as she continues to stir.
“We love you, but someone who burns soup, yeah, I’m not sure I’d trust you to boil water, let alone know what to do with the chilies.” She laughs. “Just leave it, mija. I’ll chop everything up when I finish this last batch of rice. You go and make sure the boys are doing everything outside. Tell Cut to get the grill fired up.”
I’m not going to win the argument, so I decide to bow out gracefully. “On it.”
I leave the ladies to the cooking and head out back.
I know I’ve only been here for more than a few months, but these people have become my family. They have shown me that it’s not about the blood bond that makes you family, it’s about the loyalty and love. You’re family because you want to be.
When I told my father and mother that I was leaving to help Savannah, they said that I was ungrateful, uncaring, and selfish. That I wasn’t living up to who I was supposed to be—the daughter of a Southern Baptist Pastor and, because of that, I was a disappointment as both a daughter and a woman. But I knew a long time ago that I would never live up to their expectations…
“I will not allow this,” my father bellows.
“You don’t understand. I just need to make sure she’s all right.”
“She’ll never be all right. That girl has made her bed, and it’s up to her to lie in it. No daughter of mine will rut with pigs.”
“Daniel,” my mother starts. “She needs to do this.”
I’m shocked that my mother is standing up for me, and against my father, no less. If it’s one thing you know in our house, it’s that the wife never goes against her husband.
“There are many things she needs to do, but this, Rebecca, is not one of them.”
“How can you think you have the right to continue to choose my life decisions for me? I’m no longer a child, and I haven’t been one in some time. You have no place to say what I can and cannot do. I’ve only told you out of courtesy. I’m going, Father,” I confirm. “I’m not asking permission.”
“Maybe if she took her brother with her,” my mother adds, trying to smooth the situation.
“Take me where?” My brother enters the kitchen from the back porch, with his Bible in hand.
“I’m not taking Jacob. I don’t need a babysitter.”
“Why do you need a babysitter, sister? What has Satan waved in front of you now?”
Sometimes he’s like a mini version of my father. Oh, how I wish he would think for himself. Do for himself. Figure himself out before it’s too late and his life i
s set in a way that he’s not happy with. But maybe I’m being closed minded. Maybe this life is exactly what he wants.
“No matter the hours I have prayed for the opposite, your sister has always been weak to temptation, son. She is a prime example as to how strong the evil of the world is.”
I shake my head. “That’s not true, Father. If it were, then I would have been tempted to leave this house long before today. If I were tempted by the devil, then you would have lost me to the world the day I became an adult.”
“You forget the mischief you get into when you’re with that girl. How she allows so much evil to brush your soul just by her friendship.” He shakes his head. “I don’t understand how such fine people could raise such a hellion.”
Savannah’s parents were loving and grateful and didn’t have crazy expectations of their daughter. They simply wanted her to be happy. Not like my parents who thought I should conform to their ways. I tried, but I couldn’t continue trying to live a life that didn’t make me happy.
Savannah, knowing that she was adopted, always wanted to make her parents proud. She was a great student and a loving daughter. She never wanted to be a disappointment to them; that was one concern she always confided in me. That’s why she’d kept quiet about the abuse she endured from Tyson.
Life here is so much different from anything I’ve ever known. I can’t imagine growing up in the MC. I’m still trying to wrap my head around me being here as a guest. Still living with Bianca, still trying to finish school (something I should have been done with) and getting my own life on track. I was supposed to come for a visit, just to check in on a friend who at one point lost her way, but things changed. I started to change, and I realized that there was more to life than what I knew. I wanted things, and staying at home wasn’t going to allow me to achieve my goals. It’s hard to obtain a college education when you have parents who believe a woman’s place is in the home, serving her husband and raising a family. There are only a few things that I know when it comes to my own life. One, that I want to teach, and two, that I don’t want to do it in my hometown. I don’t plan on ever going back there. My parents can continue to dote on my younger brother since he’s never been the disappointment that I’ve been.
As I look out onto the backyard, I try to think of how different our parents would react to seeing a yard full of leather wearing, tattooed, scruffy guys. Mine would drop to their knees while praying to God that there was a chance for these men and their souls. But Savannah’s parents would love each and every one of them with open arms.
“Cut,” I call out, making him turn and face me. His gaze is fierce as it lands on me. His shoulder length hair falls in waves along his face. The product he uses to keep it away from his face makes it shine in the sunlight. The T-shirt that adorns his muscled flesh is stretched tight around his chest, sleeves taut around his biceps. There was a time when this guy scared me to my core. His presence alone is intimidating, and when he’s in protection mode, it’s even worse.
“Lily said to start the grill.”
“It’s already started,” he calls back.
I look over to the older guys of the MC sitting under the shade of the mulberry tree, sipping on their beers laughing about something. Those guys have been around way before the time when Cut was put in charge. Many of them had known their president when he walked around in diapers as a baby, and yet now they look to him for leadership. That’s total respect if I’ve ever seen it.
Cut stands at the grill with Hawk, Tiny, and a newer guy named Cruise, but Lick is sitting by himself watching his brothers. He scans the area, eyes constantly moving. I wonder why he does that. Why, even in his brother’s backyard, does he feel the need to be on high alert. I gaze as he brings a beer bottle to his lips, his forearms flex with the movement. So much power under all that leather and cotton. So much strength. He’s gorgeous really. Tragically flawed in so many ways, but gorgeous all the same.
It’s sad to see someone so lost when they’re always around people. Hawk seems to be a similar way, but he fronts it differently. He’s always laughing and joking about what life has thrown at him. He tends to look on the brighter side of things while Lick is quick to anger, quick to act and quick to spew some ungodly things from that mouth of his. He has a silver tongue, and man can he wield it when he’s angry, but I know that its part of his armor. It’s his shield. I knew it the first moment I met him. That man has so many layers to him, but I have a feeling that no matter how much time I spend with him, he will never allow me to see who he really is.
“Why did you come to my rescue?” I ask, safe in his arms.
“Don’t think of it as rescuing.”
I know his answer is bull crap. I know that he did that because I was in trouble and deep down, he was worried. “Well, he had his hands on me, and you pulled him off then clocked him, so I call that a rescue.”
“Don’t read too much into that shit, baby. Maybe I just don’t want other men touching, what I want to touch myself.” Unwrapping his arms from around my body, he places his hands on my waist, pushing me away. His woodsy, engine oil and all man smell that I was just engulfed in, dissipates with his distance.
“But the fucker was right. You keep dressing like a slut, then you’re gonna be treated like a slut. You might wanna keep that in mind when you work in a fucking motorcycle shop. This ain’t no fucking lady’s boutique.”
He turns around, leaving me alone.
These men, honestly. They’re like walking sex pots. Every single one of them. I’m not naive when it comes to men and how they see me. From the time I hit puberty, my body has been changing and I know guys are physical creatures. I know that how I dress might invite advances that I may not want. But I can’t live my life in a burlap sack just to make sure men don’t put their hands on me.
“Hey, Jugs.”
I roll my eyes at hearing this latest name from Lick. Never once has he called me by my actual name. That’s one of the reasons why I refuse to call him by his road name. I don’t have much ammo against him. I can’t even start to compete against that mouth of his, so I do what little I can to get under his skin.
“What, Tylan?” I ask as I make my way over.
“How many more of these damn things do I have to blow up? I’m getting light headed over here.”
“It’s gonna take a lot more than blowing up a few balloons to deplete all that hot air you’ve got stored up in those lungs of yours, hotshot.”
“From where I’m standing, I’d say that by the look of your lungs you have way more than enough hot air to spare.” I playfully smack his shoulder, but as soon as I place my hand on his skin, his arm darts out and wraps around me, pulling me to his body. “When are ya gonna let me look at those lungs of yours, huh?” He leans down and places a light kiss on my neck.
My nipples harden, and without warning a soft moan escapes my lips, rewarding me with another kiss upon my skin. There’s always a little humor behind the words that he speaks to me. That’s us: always goofing around, always joking, and never serious. How I’d love for him to be serious when it came to us, but I know I can’t push. I’d rather keep him in my life, just like this than risk losing him forever.
“What’d I say earlier? Get a room already!” I hear Hawk yell from the other side of the yard.
Lick releases me, taking a step back and turning away. Over the past few months, this is what I’ve lived with. The secret intimate embraces, soft touches, chaste kisses when no one’s looking, but never anything more.
The hairs on the back of my neck stand on end, and the air around me buzzes with electricity. I can feel him even though he hasn’t said a word. I continue painting the nursery room walls. Bringing my brush up and then back down, up then back down. Leaning over at the waist, I paint towards the bottom of the wall. I know I’m teasing. I know that I’m provoking a beast that has yet to be tamed, but I can’t help myself.
I can hear him step into the carpeted room. My body comes alive wi
th anticipation, my need to get my fix. I’ve turned in to an addict, totally hooked on all things Lick. The quick kisses, silent touches. The moments that are only ours. Those are the things that I now crave.
“What are you doing, Sugar Tits?” Lick grabs my hips from behind. The heat of his breath against my neck gives me shivers.
“What do you think I’m doing?”
“You really want me to answer that?” He runs his nose down the column of my neck. When I feel his hand twist my curls around his fist, my breath catches. “Do you like to have your hair pulled when you’re being taken from behind?” My stomach tightens at his words.
“What’s wrong, baby? Cat got your tongue?”
Turning around, the wet paint brush hits the white of his T-shirt, tagging him with pink paint and barely missing the black leather of his cut.
“You’re playing with fire, Mr. McCoy.”
I meet his playful gaze as he steps closer, his chest hitting mine and trapping the wet paint brush between us. He leans down, and when I think his lips are going to find mine, he changes course, aiming for my ear. I feel his teeth nip at my skin.
“That’s one fire I wouldn’t mind being burned by,” he whispers.
“Jenni?” Savannah yells from the other room, making Lick step back and breaking our moment.
Another one that’s only ours.
Since I arrived at the club, I’ve been at war with myself. Lick does something to me that no man has before. I want to be close to him. I’ve heard the hush-hush rumors that float around the clubhouse. The tales of a tragic childhood with his mother being the reason for all that tragedy. He’s never confirmed anything, though. He never wants to talk about his past.
I often wonder if there’s more truth than not to the things I’ve heard. I want to show him that his awful upbringing shouldn’t cloud his mind when it comes to his happiness, or a possible connection with someone else. His heart has been shadowed by a woman who didn’t deserve his love, and because of that he’s now broken. Closed off from women. I want to break through his armor and let him see that he can count on me.
Lick: Devil's Fury Book 2 Page 2
