by Zoey Parker
I pulled out my vintage Harley Davidson cruiser and fired up the engine. It was loud enough to disturb my neighbors, who weren’t even anywhere near me. But it sure as hell let them know who lived next door.
I rode down the drive and through the gate, gunning the engine once I hit the road.
The Immortal Devils clubhouse was in a small garage on the edge of town. We kept it up, but we didn’t do anything fancy with it. It was really just a place for us to get together, have a few drinks, shoot some pool, and maybe coordinate our actions against rival organizations. We didn’t deal with street gangs anymore like smaller MCs did. We did have a few of those under our influence, so we weren’t completely innocent when things went sour for some of the guys pushing hard drugs or weapons on our streets, but nothing could really be traced back to us.
No, our interest was in handling real business. We worked with bankers, CEOs, and corrupt politicians. We made sure that money got where it needed to go to preserve the order of things. We occasionally found ourselves involved in major crimes that got swept under the rug or settled out of court for a fraction of what we made off the jobs.
Then, the Sun Stone appeared, and we knew we had found something that could potentially change our lives and the future of the MC.
I pulled up to the garage, and the guys already had the bay doors open. We all parked inside, and I brought the door down behind me to go into the back office to meet with the other four.
“Alright, Gunner made it!” Duncan cheered as I walked into the room.
Luther handed me a cold bottle of beer, and I took my seat at the head of the table.
“You know, when we sell this diamond,” I told the guys, “I’m going to buy us a new headquarters. We need something nicer than this dump.”
“Yeah, I guess it’s time,” Bryce said, looking around with a nostalgic look in his eyes.
“Guys, we haven’t been this small in years, so there’s really no point to keep this place, you know?” I said, taking a swig of my beer. It was nice to pretend we were still the same old hell raisers from time to time, but that was getting harder and harder to do.
“So, I heard your new old lady was keeping you late at the house,” Venom joked.
“She’s hardly that, but I can’t keep my hands off her long enough to do anything. Did you see her at Eden?” I laughed.
“Yeah, we saw her,” Duncan said. “She’s dangerous, man. Watch out.”
“She’s up to something is what he means to say,” Venom snapped. “Watch your ass, Gunner. I mean, she just has that look. She’s a professional of some kind. Either a call girl trying to work your ass over or a thief who’s going to take you for every penny your worth, probably while you’re here tonight.”
“Guys, I appreciate your concern, and I know she’s probably up to something, but she’s not going to find anything. Not unless I practically hand it all over to her. Anyway, she’s at the house under lock and key and under the watchful eyes and guns of my security team, so I’m not worried. You shouldn’t be either.” I took another drink from my bottle.
“Alright, if you think you’re safe, boss,” Bryce said.
“Just don’t get mad when the shit hits the fan,” added Venom.
“So, I called this meeting to see what we have on our radar as far as buyers for the diamond. Anything?” I asked.
“We’ve got a guy who wants to buy, but we’re still trying to negotiate a price,” Duncan said.
“I will take no less than a billion for it,” I told him. “It’s listed as priceless, so we can name pretty much any amount we want. I’m not going less than a billion, though, because that puts it at just under twice the value of the next most valuable golden diamond. I want to hurry and get rid of it before it becomes a curse, but I don’t want to have a damn fire sale on it.”
“Got it. I told him five billion,” Duncan said.
“Great, that gives us some room,” I agreed. “Anything else?”
“That’s really it,” Bryce said. “Duncan is talking to the potential buyer, and the rest of us are just waiting to see what happens.”
“Everyone else is being quiet,” Venom added.
“Now that we have it, no one wants to buy it.” Luther laughed. His laugh was like thunder. We sometimes called him The Boulder because his last name was Stone, and his fists were massive. He was a big guy. He was our muscle, no doubt.
“Tell us more about your girl,” Duncan joked.
“You saw her, right?” I started. “I mean, do I need to say more? She’s fine as hell.”
“How is she in bed?” Of course Venom wanted to go straight for the gold with the question that was on everyone’s mind.
“Man, she is electric. Her body is tight and toned, and she’ll take anything you give her,” I said, thinking about that sweet little body lying naked in front of me. I took another drink from my bottle. It was going to be a long night with the guys. I still couldn’t get her off my mind.
Chapter Eleven
Sierra
After I heard Gunner’s motorcycle pull off, my first order of business was to disobey him. I went straight to his office despite that he had told me to stay out. I wasn’t looking for information on where I could find the Sun Stone, though. I was looking for information on Gunner Kaye. I wanted to know more about the man I was staying with. Unless I found something heinous, I was going to agree to stay as long as he would keep me. Or as long as it took to find the Sun Stone and swipe it before disappearing.
Unfortunately, I knew that Sierra Farrow was going to have to disappear for good after this job. I was going to have to adopt a permanent alias since I was stupid enough to give him my real name. It wasn’t like I hadn’t already been a hundred different people at different times in my life. I was just going to have to add one more to the list. No big deal.
I walked the bookshelves in his office, looking at the pictures he had framed on his walls. There were all sorts of pictures of him with different people. There were a lot of pictures of him with different politicians, creating an indisputable record of their dealings, probably both for showing off and just in case someone wanted to throw him under the bus after a deal gone bad. It was a brilliant CYA tool, and it seemed so innocent to the casual eye.
I wasn’t interested so much in his business dealings. I wanted something personal. I wanted to understand his inner workings. I found a picture of him when he was younger with four other guys.
“This is more like it, Gunner. You’ll have to tell me who these guys are one day,” I said to his young face as I picked the frame up from its spot on the shelf.
He was so much younger then! He had been thinner, too. It was obviously before he had started working out. I recognized the guys standing around him, too. They had all been at the Eden when I walked in, but I hadn’t noticed that they were actually with him. They had all sort of stayed apart. They had been doing their own thing, I supposed.
But there they were, five young men standing behind their motorcycles with their MC vests on. They were in front of an old run-down garage. That must have been where their clubhouse was.
“There’s no way it’s still, is it, Gunner?” I asked the younger Gunner in the picture, but he wasn’t saying anything. I realized that I held in my hand a piece of his history and a clue as to the whereabouts of the diamond. There was no way he was hiding the diamond in that dump, though, I told myself.
I put the picture back and continued to look around the room. I didn’t find any truly personal photos. The photos of the guys in the MC were about as personal as it got, and there were only a couple of those that didn’t feature everyone in formal tuxes or suits handling MC business.
“You’ve got to have a personal life, Gunner,” I said to the empty room, but then I caught myself.
I sat down in his chair with another picture of the five MC members in my hands. It was a more recent picture but they still all had the same looks on their faces. Their smiles were genuine. It wasn’
t a photo-op. It was five brothers hanging out and having a good time together, no matter where they were or what kind of business they were up to.
“You should probably take your own advice,” I told myself, realizing that I had more in common with Gunner than I had originally realized.
If I’d had any pictures to go through, he would have found the same thing that I was finding in his office. I didn’t have a life outside of work, and my line of work even prevented me from having pictures of it. The only pictures that existed of my job were pictures of empty jewelry boxes and the upset faces of their owners that appeared in news articles.
I certainly didn’t have any pictures of Coyote! The last thing I wanted was something identifying my boss if I ever got caught. No, that would never do.
“Miss Sierra,” a member of his house staff said cautiously as he opened the door.
“Yeah?” I looked up from the picture. This time I wasn’t guilty of snooping, not really, so I didn’t feel the need to hide what I was doing.
“Mr. Gunner said you weren’t supposed to be in here.” The young man entered the room and spoke politely, but I got the point.
“Sorry, I know. I was just looking at some of his pictures. He doesn’t have to know, right?” I said as I put the picture in my hand on his desk, leaving a little sign that I had been in here.
“I guess not. Your clothes are upstairs if you would like to change,” he told me.
“Thank you, but I think I’ll be calling it a night,” I told him as I walked past.
“Excellent. He said feel free to use his bed,” the staffer told me.
“Thanks,” I told him as I walked away. I would have used his bed anyway.
I went upstairs and pulled his shirt off. I took my clothes, still on the hangers from the store, and put them in Gunner’s closet. I pushed his t-shirts aside to make a temporary space for my new clothes. I knew he would probably freak when he saw them, but that was part of the point.
I went to the bathroom. It was time to get ready for bed, instead of just jumping in bed like I had the night before, and I also wanted to be fresh in case Gunner wanted some action when he returned.
After all, that was why he was keeping me around, regardless of what he wanted to say.
###
Gunner
After hanging out with guys, I sort of wanted Sierra to be gone when I made it home. I knew that if I found her there, it would only serve to complicate my life. I had been all work for so long, I didn’t know how to handle someone trying to move into my life the way she was. Besides, I knew the only reason she was really there probably had something to do with the diamond. It would have been best for both of us if she was gone.
Unfortunately, I had no way of knowing until I was in the house and back upstairs.
I came home and parked my old bike in the garage. I trudged upstairs and walked to my room. I opened the door to find the shape of her body under my sheets.
Despite how much I had been hoping she would have left while I was at the meeting, I was relieved to find that she was still there.
I walked into the room quietly and went straight to my closet to get out of my biker clothes. I opened the door and turned on the light, careful not to hold the door too wide. I didn’t want the light to wake her.
I tried not to laugh when I saw the clothes Dario had purchased for her hanging in front of my t-shirts in the closet. That was too funny.
“You are moving in, aren’t you?” I asked her clothes in a low voice.
I shrugged off my vest and hung it up. I pulled off my boots and put them back in place on the floor, and I threw my sweaty shirt and jeans in the dirty clothes hamper. I stood naked in front of my mirror and considered whether or not to put on any clothes. I was pretty sure she was sleeping naked under the sheets, so I didn’t bother putting anything on, just in case she decided she wanted some action when I slid under the covers with her.
When I walked out of the closet and cut off the light, another light caught my attention, flashing on the nightstand. Her phone sat there next to her purse, and it was plugged into the wall. Apparently, she had found her charger.
I knew I had told her to ask Dario to get her one if she still needed it, and I wasn’t sure how I knew it, but I just knew that was her own charger, despite what she had told me in the office when I caught her snooping.
“What did you find while I was gone?” I asked her while I stood over her sleeping body. I was glad she wasn’t awake to tell me.
I slid carefully into the bed. The game wasn’t over yet between us. From what I could tell, we were tied, but the rules were already starting to change, and things were getting more complicated just because she had stayed the night. I knew she was going to agree to stay longer, and I knew that as much as the sex did it for her, that wasn’t going to be the only reason she was staying.
For some stupid ass reason, I didn’t care.
I put an arm around her thin waist and pulled her to me. She moaned in her sleep and pressed her naked body against mine. I knew that in the morning we would resume our game, but for now, she was just Sierra, the beautiful redhead who challenged me physically and intellectually, who turned me on with no limits, and who didn’t seem to have any problems allowing herself to be vulnerable in my presence.
I held her close. I accepted her vulnerability, regardless of where things would go from there. I got the feeling that no matter who had sent her, part of her needed me.
And I figured I could at least admit to myself that part of me needed her. I closed my eyes slowly, making sure she was still asleep before I let myself drift off.
Chapter Twelve
Sierra
“I guess you know by now I’m planning on taking you up on your offer to stay here with you,” I told Gunner in bed on the morning after our second night together. We lay in bed with our naked bodies pressed against each other. His arm was around my waist and I had my fingers intertwined with his on my stomach. His arms and hands were so large compared to mine. I really liked the way it felt to have my hand on top of his.
“Good,” he said smoothly in my ear. “For how long?”
“As long as you’ll have me,” I told him.
“That could be for a while,” he teased. “Are you sure you’re ready for that?”
“You’ll run me off eventually,” I answered him, and I knew he would. Once I completed my job, I would find a way to either run off before he noticed or get him to run me off before he could realize it had been me.
He sighed. “We’ll see.”
I knew he didn’t believe me. He didn’t have any reason to. He didn’t know who I really was, and so far things had been pretty good between us, so there was no reason to pretend we could see the future. Besides, it was one of those silly things people always said at the beginning of every relationship. It was the same argument every time. Except I wasn’t saying it out of low self-esteem or because I was trying to get more attention from him. I was saying it because I knew it to be true. This thing we were doing had an expiration date on it.
“Well, if you’re going to stay, we’re going to need to set up some rules,” he said, and he slid his hand down between my legs, stopping as his fingers slid down over my slit.
“What kind of rules?” I asked.
“Sexual rules. You’re going to need to know how to behave if you’re going to stay with me,” he said with his lips just over my neck. He kissed me as his fingers slid along my lips.
“Is that so?” I asked. I grabbed his hand and pulled it back up to my stomach. I was going to need to know more about these rules before I let anything go on this morning.
“Well, first, if you’re going to stay, you have to agree that your body belongs to me,” he said. Then he kissed my bare shoulder.
“What does that mean?” I asked playfully.
“It means that you agree I can have you any time I want you, and any way I want you,” he explained.
“What if I don’t wan
t it the way you do?” I figured that was the logical question that needed to be asked next.
“Well, that’s the second rule. If you don’t want to consent to behavior, or if you’re unsure, we have safe words,” he answered in a patient tone.
“Safe words,” I repeated. My blood turned to ice. He was serious.
“Yep, and I believe in keeping them simple. So, if everything’s good, it’s green. I don’t expect to actually use that one, but I might ask you if everything is green or whatever to make sure we’re good. If we need to slow down, or if you’re unsure, use yellow. It’s not a definite no, but it means we’re being careful. And if it’s a no, that’s red. You tell me red, we stop what we’re doing,” he explained to me.
