by Addison Jane
I was defenseless against his presence which seemed stupid given that whenever we saw each other, we barely managed to have a conversation.
There was still something, though.
It swirled around us like a hurricane—beautiful, but with the ability to tear us to fucking shreds.
He took a step inside and softly closed the door behind him, his eyes never leaving me, his head dipped low. “Hey,” he said as if that was all that was needed.
I frowned, trying my best to keep my voice steady and my emotions in check. “What are you doing here?”
Ham had never come to my house before. I’d spotted him the odd time or two sitting outside the school as I was getting on the bus. It was those times I knew there was something not so great going on with the club. Our paths often crossed when I was at the club, but since I walked in on him with a couple of the club girls in his lap, things had been more than tense between us.
I got it, he was older, he was a part of the club, and I was just a teenage girl with a crush. I knew that’s what he thought of me even though there were times when I caught a flash of something else, something deeper, but only when he thought I wasn’t looking.
The boys at the club drank, they had sex, they did stuff that I was pretty sure wasn’t legal. A lot of them were growing up having families and kids, so things were tame when they were around. But they were also bringing in new members, young prospects who took the opportunity whenever possible to let loose. They saw me as Leo’s niece, barely worth a passing glance, especially if you didn’t want a fist in your face.
I wasn’t a little girl anymore, though, not like I was when Ham and I first met. A year can do a lot to change someone, and I’d had time to grow up—not just mentally, but physically, too.
“I heard about what happened at school,” he replied as if it was obvious as to why he’d suddenly felt the need to show up at my house unannounced when he would usually do his best to avoid acknowledging my presence. I continued to stare at him confused and unsure of the strange tension settling around us. “I’m done with him thinking he can treat you, and other kids at school, like his fucking slaves. I should have done this shit a long time ago.”
I shook my head, the fact he wanted to protect me sent a cascade of warmth through my chest, but it was quickly cooled off by an unexpected icy blast. “What did you do?” My bubble of self confidence was popped, and I was suddenly very aware of the smear of blood across the back of Ham’s hand.
He saw where my eyes were leading and quickly squeezed his hand into a fist rolling it around and examining it carefully. He was angry. I’d seen him this way before, the way his muscles all tensed up and his fist closed like he was looking to hit something. It was strange how I should be backing away from him wondering whether he was going to throw a punch or lose his shit, but instead, I stepped closer.
He wouldn’t hurt me.
I couldn’t explain how I knew that, but my gut told me it was true.
He blew out a long, deep breath rolling his shoulders and standing a little taller, a little prouder. His eyes? Those had softened, though. They didn’t match his strong posture, and neither did his voice when he finally spoke, “I wasn’t gonna let him get away with that bullshit, Meyah.”
I had to keep my head from floating off into the clouds when I heard him say my name with such intensity.
“And he didn’t get away with it! I made sure of that,” I argued loudly holding up my hand which the doctor had strapped with a simple bandage, and thankfully, was a lot less swollen than it was just a couple of hours ago. For once, I’d stood up and shown everyone I could look after myself, and that I wasn’t going to hide anymore. I wasn’t going to let him take that away from me by doing his macho man, ‘I’ll destroy him in your honor,’ act.
A few months ago, I would have been that damsel in distress and Ham offering his protection would have made me fall further and further in love with him.
Not anymore.
Spending time with Hadley and Skylar and the other women at the club made me realize it was the strong women who attracted the strong men. These guys wanted a woman who could stand her ground, who could be their partner in crime and hold their own.
That’s how I wanted Ham to see me.
“I made sure that he knew,” I protested, not surprised when he didn’t bother to argue, his eyes burning a hole through me. I patted my chest refusing to let his brooding nature make me pull back. “I did it. Me. I didn’t need someone to do it for me because if Nick comes at me again, I’ll kick him in the balls, or drench him in water, and watch him melt like the Wicked Witch of the West. Whatever the hell I have to do, to show him that I’m done putting up with his bullshit.”
He was fighting the smile that was tugging at the corner of his lips. I was struggling really hard myself to keep a straight face, but I wanted to make a point, and I needed him to hear it.
“I can fight my own battles. I’m not that little girl on the side of the road you had to rescue,” my voice softened, but it was still strong and persistent. I knew Ham still saw me as that girl—the one he came to the rescue of when she couldn’t rescue herself. “That day… I needed you. But today, I didn’t need a knight in shining armor, Ham. You’re not my protector or my hero. I did that all by myself, so let me have my damn moment.”
Ham took a step forward, and in response, I took one back. I wasn’t sure what to expect. This was the most we’d ever talked before, and it was almost a little surreal. Was he really here, standing in the foyer of my house, telling me he’d beaten the shit out of my ex-boyfriend because he’d grabbed my ass?
How strong are these painkillers?
“You certainly fucking did it all by yourself, and I’m really fucking proud of you.” He chuckled softly, running his fingers through the long part of his hair. Ham had his hair short on the sides, but the top was long, and it curved over like a wave. Some days it was messy and unruly, but others I could tell he’d made some sort of effort to form it the way he wanted it. He brushed it back away from his eyes, the impressed smirk on his face made me feel like there was a rope around my waist and someone was pulling it, tightening it on my stomach, making it hard to breathe. I wanted to reach up and touch it myself. I wanted to see if it felt like silk in my fingers like how I’d imagined it would.
“You are?” I asked, standing a little taller, the corner of my mouth pulling up. I huffed out a laugh. “You have no idea how good it felt.”
“He’s been trying to screw with you for far too long. I should’ve done something about it a long time ago. Someone should have done something,” he corrected at the end.
I looked down at my hand. His eyes followed the movement and narrowed on the beige colored strapping. “I should have done something a long time ago,” I told him, a simper on my face as he turned my hand over and raised it closer to his face. “Me. I should have. Not anyone else.”
I could feel the moment that things changed. It was an important moment, one that was about to force us onto a different path, one we hadn’t experienced before, and one I wasn’t sure either of us would come out of without a few bruises and a handful of scars.
He reached forward, his hand cupping the side of my face, his fingers delving into the hair at the nape of my neck. It wasn’t like I’d never been kissed before. I also wasn’t a virgin. That was something I, unfortunately, gave to Nick thinking that I’d found my happily ever after, my high school sweetheart, just like Uncle Leo had with Aunt Kim.
I was naive. I was stupid. And now that I’d seen Uncle Leo and Hadley together, I was just so wrong. Yes, he and Aunt Kim were in love, they were meant to be, but so were he and Hadley. She was right when she told me that sometimes it’s worth the wait to find the person who was meant for you, and at some point, I’d be happy that I didn’t settle for dickwad, Nick.
Right now, it was that time.
Ham moved forward forcing me to move with him until my back hit my mom’s small entry table. T
he only reason it was there was for the bowl on top—not just any bowl, but one my little brother made her in preschool which she unhealthily adores—to put her keys in since she kept losing them. The bowl wobbled behind me, the table knocking against the wall. I reached out and grabbed his club cut in my hands when I thought I might fall, but his arm came around my waist steadying my body.
He was so close now, his breath fanned my bare shoulder where my spaghetti strap dress strained to hold up my less than average sized breasts, given that I wasn’t wearing a bra.
Ham dipped his head leaning forward and forcing the edge of the table even further into my lower back. It was uncomfortable, but it soon became a distant memory once the feeling of Ham’s lips brushing across my shoulder had me gasping in delight. I arched my neck, my eyes fluttering closed as electric currents shot every which way through my body, zipping and zapping, causing my heart to stutter.
“He never fucking deserved you,” he murmured in my ear. “Knowing he touched you makes me fucking pissed.” He moved to my ass, gripping it in both hands, lifting me up off the floor. I moved like a flash in fright hooking my arms around his neck and pressing my body tightly against his. He guided my legs around his hips, and I hooked my ankles at the small of his back as he set me on the edge of the small table.
Blinking, my eyes slowly opened, and I found myself eye to eye with the boy—no not boy, definitely man—that I’d been obsessed with for almost a year now. I’d imagined this in my head more times than I could count wondering whether he’d be soft and attentive, or if he would be demanding and controlling when he finally touched me.
His fingers laced through my hair tugging it back while his other hand now snaked up my arm. He reached my neck, his rough fingers tracing gentle patterns across the soft and sensitive skin just under my ear.
Just when I thought maybe he was going for the soft and attentive approach, his entire hand captured my throat, and he ducked his head swallowing my surprised gasp and pressing his lips to mine in a flurry of passion and excitement. I knew then that I was going to get the demanding and controlling Hamlet, and I was perfectly fine with that because it was that Hamlet I’d always dreamed of.
I didn’t want soft and gentle, not right now. I wanted the real him and every little bit of crazy and brooding he had swirling around inside.
Kissing Ham had my head spinning. I wanted to feel every little movement, every touch or brush of his body against mine, but my head suddenly felt like it was in a cloud, lost in the moment. His hand was tight against my throat but not enough to cut off my air, just enough to hold me in exactly the position he wanted me in.
My hips moved of their own accord grinding forward. Delight lit up my stomach when I connected with the front of his jeans and was well aware of the fact that he was just as turned on, if not more, than I was. His cock was hard and pressing tightly against his zipper.
Our lips battled against each other, neither of us able to breathe, but also not willing to break this contact it seemed like we’d both been aching for a long time now.
I slipped one arm from around his neck and drew it down over his chest. The feeling of his club patches underneath my fingers only reinforcing the fact that I was falling in love with a man that my mother may never approve of. Even despite her having been more accepting of my uncle and his brothers recently, I was falling for a man who had possibly done things that my brain just couldn’t fathom, but I knew wouldn’t matter to me anyway.
Just as my hand reached the waistband of his jeans, Ham suddenly pulled back, the both of us gasping for air.
My gut sunk.
Maybe he’d come to his senses.
What the hell would I do if he turned and walked away right now?
He withdrew his hand from my throat lifting it and brushing his knuckles across my burning cheek. “Doubt your mom would be pleased with me tarnishing her little girl in her foyer.” He smirked.
My brows pulled together. I was confused about what the hell he was talking about until I heard a car door shut in the garage just to the other side of the kitchen. “Oh shit,” I cursed, shuffling off the small side table which I was surprised had held my weight and hadn’t broken. Then just as I landed on my feet, the bowl on the top of the table slipped from where it had apparently been balancing half against the table and half against my back. A loud smash against the wooden floor had me squeezing my eyes shut tight like a vice. “Please tell me that didn’t just happen,” I pleaded, but the sound of his stifled laughter told me otherwise. Slowly opening my eyes, I took a deep breath refusing to look at the mess I knew was behind me.
“Meyah?” Mom called, causing my heart to skip. I turned, my mind trying somehow to figure out how to sneak Ham out without my mom flipping her fucking lid at me, but he’d already opened the door and was out on the porch.
Ham shook his head, a smug smirk on his face that I didn’t have the time to pull to pieces at that moment. “Have a good night,” he said simply before jogging down to his bike which I now realized was parked right at the curb. Something my mother wouldn’t have missed as she pulled in.
Fucking awesome.
For the second day in a row, I pulled up outside Meyah’s house and turned off my engine, hooking my helmet onto the handlebars before I climbed off and onto the curb.
I’d thought about her a lot last night.
Things had changed.
I wasn’t sure when or even how things had suddenly become so different, but it was like there was a shift in the universe. Meyah made a choice, a strong and important one. It was the point she chose to have a voice and to speak it out loud. Every one of us faces that breaking point in life where we have to stop and say enough is enough. It’s a defining moment in our lives where we can choose to keep living the way we are or fight back—fight for something better, something we deserve, something that up until now we have let win.
And now she had, I wanted to encourage it. I didn’t want her to pull back into herself because the fire I saw in her eyes yesterday made me want to throw myself into the flames. It was spectacular and beautiful. She was proud and unashamed, and all I wanted to do was fuel that inside her.
For so long I’d fought the growing magnetism between us. Even trying to mute it with other girls, trying to tell myself that I had too many problems, that I’d only drag her down at the point of her life where she should be flying.
But honestly, I was fucking exhausted.
The more I thought about this fight I’d been through to find Romeo and Phee, I was becoming aware that I was wasting fucking time. I imagined how different things could have been if that drunk driver had just gone through that intersection three or four seconds later and hadn’t plowed through my mom and dad. But that’s not what happened, and in reality, it could happen to almost anyone at any time.
It’s something out of our control.
What I can control, though, is how I spend the time I have. For all I know, it could be minutes, hours, a few days, a couple of years. Who knew? I didn’t want to waste time anymore. I wanted to live every damn day, and I wanted to live it with the people who meant the most to me.
Just touching her yesterday had set me off like a fucking firecracker. The feel of her body, the noises she made, a simple brush of my skin against hers was enough to tell me I hadn’t imagined the chemistry that electrified the air between us, pulling us closer when she was nearby. I didn’t want to go the rest of my life without ever feeling that again.
So here I was, walking toward her front porch keeping a straight face when the front door slowly breezed open, and Meyah stood there with a devious smile and her eyebrow raised. “You leave something here?”
I scoffed. “Yeah, but she better go and put some jeans on if she intends on coming with me.”
She stood a little taller gasping far too dramatically and pointing to herself. “Moi?” The playfulness was both sexy and cute, but I didn’t have time, I just wanted to ride, and I wanted to ride with her. I t
hink we could both do with the fresh air and open road.
“Do you wanna go for a ride?” I asked, rolling my eyes when she still didn’t move.
I could tell she was surprised, her eyes growing wide as she looked out past where I was standing at the bottom of the porch to where my bike sat glistening in the afternoon sun. She chewed her lip nervously before a smirk danced across her lips. “A ride, huh?”
I folded my arms across my chest shaking my head in amusement. “You know what I fucking mean, smart ass.”
She chewed her lip. “My mom would murder the both of us. I already had to listen to twenty minutes of ‘reasons I, in no way, shape, or form, would be dating a biker. Ever,’ last night after you left.”
“Come on,” I insisted, acting like I hadn’t even heard her, taking a few steps backward, indicating I might leave without her.
I could see her thinking it over, her eyes looking upward moving from one side to the other as she debated with herself. Her nose crinkled for a moment making her look like a little rabbit before giving way to an impish smile. “Well, I’ve punched a kid in the face and broken my mother’s most prized possession, so why not add biker bitch to the list of juvenile delinquency.”
I smirked. “That’s what I was hoping you’d say.”
Having her arms wrapped around me, and the roar of my Harley beneath us as we were flying down the open road, was like some crazy ass fucking dream I felt like I’d had a million times. Even with her face hidden and pressed against my back, I could still feel how broad her smile was, and the excited way she clutched to me tighter when I twisted the throttle and opened my baby up just a little more.
This was probably a horrible idea. I most likely should have never gone around to her house this afternoon. I should have just left it the hell alone and bugged Leo with fifty questions about how she was. But I didn’t do either. It was like fighting against a fucking magnet. I couldn’t resist the pull. I needed to see her more than my lungs required their next breath of air.
