I saw the hair first.
The crazy curls that looked like the water had spun them around and around until they were as tight as stormy ocean waves. The same curls that I’d once seen being yanked back as my ex-best friend had ploughed into her from behind.
Malia.
A grown-up fucking Malia.
That empty space where my compassionate heart had once lived clenched inside me.
Her beauty was still the same. This world would never dull that sparkle, but there was something in her eyes that I’d only ever seen once before and it was the same look she’d had when I’d left her bereft on her kitchen floor, the last time I’d seen her.
“How’d you know my brother again?” Horn threw back, folding his arms across his chest.
“Yeah, how does that pretty little thing know you?” Shadow whispered from behind me, reminding me that creepy motherfucker was still very much present.
“Fuck.” My one word wasn’t muttered or mumbled, and she heard it. Across the melee that was taking place around her—the drinking, the music, the game of pool and even another one of my brothers being one step away from fucking the girl who was giving him a very intense, just on the edge of clean, lap dance—Malia heard me.
Her face took in mine. I felt her eyes as they scanned me for any sign that she’d made a mistake. It briefly registered that I was shirtless and wearing a leather cut, before her hands nervously clasped the purse she held in her hands.
“Reef.” My name fell from her lips and it brought it all back.
“What do you want?”
“I… need…” Malia looked around her, no doubt remembering our last interaction and recognizing that we were surrounded by a bunch of biker brothers.
“Don’t give a fuck what you need. Turn your ass around and go back to wherever the fuck you came from.”
Her mouth parted slightly in shock before her resolve kicked in. “I deserved that,” she mumbled, and with a stiff nod, turned and headed for the door.
“I’ll just go and—” Horn stood and went to follow.
“Horn, you put one foot outside that door, I won’t be responsible for what happens next.”
He turned to look at me then held his hands up in surrender. “Got it. Off limits.”
When I was satisfied that he understood, I turned and came face to face with Shadow. I would never get used to that motherfucker’s ability to blend and reappear. “You sure that was a good idea?”
“Best fucking idea I’ve had all day.”
For the second time in as many minutes, my face was searched for emotion, truth and understanding. Being hyper sensitive to moods and surroundings, Shadow left whatever he was about to say next and stepped aside.
I stormed off back to my room at the compound, desperate to lock myself behind the door. I was worried that if I didn’t, I’d burn the place to the ground or make the mistake of going after her, and that couldn’t happen.
The past needed to stay in the past.
End of.
Malia
I kept my head down as I left what was definitely biker party central. I wasn’t sure what hurt my eyes more, the sight of people having fun laughing with a beer, or the girl in the corner who had embraced her sexuality to the point where she was ready for sex there and then. I could feel it. I felt it for him.
Reef.
The guy who’d been my best friend until I’d made the mistake of choosing our other best friend and he’d left us both, unable to forgive our betrayal.
He was so different but exactly the way I’d expected him to be. Reef had filled out his skin with more muscles than I’d seen on a guy since Dean had been kicked out of college. His hair was wavy and just past due a good cut. And he oozed something that made my nerves tingle.
Reef was a biker.
A biker called Wave.
It was the perfect name for him, and even with all that hatred that still burned deep inside him, I could still see sparks of the old Reef. The minute I heard his voice I felt unsettled. That was the only way to describe it and I recognized it from last time, from the last interaction we’d had.
I didn’t go to work that day. I took all those documents to a copy shop and made doubles of everything.
Then I panicked.
Where the hell could I go? I had nothing but a small slush fund I’d been hiding from Dean. He ploughed through our checking account religiously and at the end of the month there was nothing left. Around the middle of the previous year, I’d started to siphon money out and keep it hidden away. I only used it in extreme circumstances, usually for food, but now I’d taken it all. It was a couple of thousand dollars, and I needed it.
I packed a case, picked up the copies of the documents and paid cash for a rental car. I drove to a small motel and checked in, hoping that the answer to my problem would come to me.
It didn’t.
The only thing that pinged around inside my head was the life I’d given up, the life I’d settled for and what I could have had if I’d made better decisions. During an exhausting night of restless sleep, the answer, it seemed, had stared me in the face all along. That ‘better decision’ could be my only answer and if nothing else, it would be the last place on earth Dean would look for me.
Reef Bryant.
The following morning, I drove from the motel and waited outside his mom’s place of work. I knew she still worked there because I’d tried over the years to keep tabs on him through Dean’s parents. My guilt over what had happened was that bad. I figured if he was happy then the end would have justified the means. There was also the one time I’d tried to apologize to his mom; it didn’t go down well at all.
I didn’t ever remember anyone mentioning he’d become a biker, though.
To say his mom was less than impressed to find me loitering outside her office building was an understatement. In the end, the only thing she told me was the name of the autoshop where he worked. She’d then flown into a tirade about me being the hellcat who drove her son away.
No one paid me any mind as I retreated from the clubhouse.
By the time I was back outside the compound gate, I was breathing in and out like I was in labor and having contractions.
I knew I’d hurt him, but I’d never expected him to be that salty. Over the years I’d convinced myself that he’d have come to terms with everything and be over it, like I was forced to be.
“Shit.” I dropped the keys to my car on the tarmac and felt wet tears running down my face as I bent to retrieve them. As I reached out for them, a hand appeared and grabbed them. I breathed in relief and looked up expecting to see Reef but was met with the face of another biker in a jacket, with a shaved head and what could only be described as dead eyes.
“You okay?” his voice rumbled.
“Been better.” I stuck my hand out, palm open. “My keys?”
“How’d you know Wave?” he asked, not giving me my keys.
“We’re old friends.”
“Known him a lot of years and he’s never mentioned an old friend who looks like you.”
I wiped at my cheek and snatched for my keys.
“Not so fast.” He smirked, pulling them just from reach. “You got a name?”
“Do you?”
For the first time I saw a spark in his dead eyes, before his face was swallowed up in an all-encompassing grin. “I guess there’s a reason he didn’t mention you. Yeah, I get it.”
“Get what?”
“Shadow,” he replied on another grin.
“Shadow what?” I asked, feeling tired, emotionally drained and desperate to leave.
“Club name. Shadow.”
“Whatever.” This time, I reached for the keys again and he let me take them. “It’s time for me to become just that.”
“Shall I give him a message?”
I beeped the locks and strolled around him. “No.”
“Sure? Looks like you had something you wanted to say before.”
I
threw my purse at the passenger seat. “Yeah. Just tell him to go to hell.”
I did a crazy three point turn on the tarmac and screamed out of there, trying not to let panic overwhelm me.
The last door left open to me had just been unceremoniously slammed in my face and I only prayed that another night in the motel would deliver me with more answers.
Wave
“Yeah, just tell him to go to hell.”
Fucking bitch.
She’d already put me there once. Only back then, I was barely more than a spotty, horny college kid and didn’t know that all those feelings of not being enough, being a lesser man than my best friend had returned. That feeling of betrayal.
“Figured you’d follow,” Shadow muttered, as I stepped from the tree line and stood beside him. We both watched the dust being kicked up in the distance as her car made progress away from us.
“Thought I’d got the drop on you.”
“Behave,” he chuckled. “Next time, try less elephant and more ballet dancer.”
“I can’t believe she came here.”
“Who is she?”
“My past. Mom warned me she’d been asking about me back home.”
“Why’s she here?”
“Don’t know, don’t care.” I turned and walked back towards the clubhouse, and unlike my apparent elephant impression moments ago, Shadow was at my side like a nimble ballet dancer before I had chance to hear him. He matched me step for step, his hands in his pants pockets, waiting for me to break the silence. “Fuck.”
“Wanna know why she’s here?” he goaded.
“Not really, but—”
“But, it’s gonna eat at you until you do find out.”
He was right. “Too late now.”
Shadow snorted. “Leave it with me.”
Two hours later, I’d just climbed out of the shower in my room at the compound. “Fuck! Ever try knockin’?” Walking back into my bedroom, I found Shadow sitting on a chair in the corner of my room and as usual, the creepy fucker scared the shit out of me. “Well?”
“She’s at the Sunbay in town.”
“Thanks.” I turned, giving him my back and let the towel slide as I reached for my pants.
“Dude, don’t need to see your junk.”
“Then why are you still here?”
“She’s sleeping in her car, so I wouldn’t wait until the morning.”
I froze at his words. I’d known Malia was a fighter, but she was also good at hiding the pain in her life. The years she’d put up with her mother treating her like some bad roommate were proof of that.
Shadow stood up and headed for the door.
I wasn’t going to wait until the morning. The Sunbay motel was notorious for its nighttime activity and even though I hated Malia with a passion, I’d never forgive myself if she ended up part of some forced fuckfest with Hermanos and a crime statistic in our local news.
I grabbed my cut and van keys, and was less than surprised to find Shadow leaning against my truck waiting for me. “How did you know?” I asked.
“Know you’d go to her, or that you’d go immediately?”
“Both.”
“Because underneath all that bravado you’re a good guy, and more importantly, curious.”
I climbed into my van and felt my hackles rise when the passenger door opened and he climbed in. “You’re not fucking comin’.”
“I am. Besides, someone needs to keep look out. The Hermanos won’t be best pleased about you wandering into party central.”
I grumbled under my breath but didn’t argue. He was right. Shadow was always fucking right. I had no idea how someone who was a few years older than me had become so jaded, but every time I asked or pried, he shut me down.
The drive wasn’t that long and with each passing mile, I began to feel anxious and I figured that Shadow could tell when he asked, “What’d she do?”
“The usual.”
He grunted and seemed to accept my non-answer.
When we rolled into the parking lot, I saw what I expected—a few bikes and their Mexican owners having a little party that seemed to spill outside. There was booze, music and women, and not too far away, tucked in the furthest corner, under a street lamp was the rental I’d watched Malia drive away in.
I pulled the van to a stop a few spaces down, knowing if I didn’t Shadow was about to have front row seats to what would, in all likeliness, become an angry screaming match and that was just the venom I knew I was capable of throwing at her. “Wait here.”
“Sure.”
I shut the van door as quietly as possible, not wanting to attract too much attention. The Hermanos would definitely get involved if they caught sight of me. Malia was out of sight until I was right on top of her car. Under the yellowy glow of the lamp, I could see her huddled under a coat on the reclined driver’s seat, the odd curl poking up from where she was buried beneath it.
Was this how she slept? Snuggled up? Or was she normally wrapped around him, sharing body heat and more, like they had done a decade ago when they were hiding shit from me?
I wrapped my knuckles on the window loudly, causing her to squeal and jump.
Good.
She should be scared.
Her face was shocked when she realized it was me on the other side.
“Get out of the car, Malia,” I ordered.
She debated complying.
“Now,” I reaffirmed.
Pulling the coat around her body, she climbed out. “What do you want?”
“That’s my question,” I snapped back.
I saw the flash of Malia’s temper in her eyes. Growing up, there’d been a way of getting information out of her. It had taken me a while to figure it out, but basically, if she didn’t want you to know something, she wouldn’t tell you and the more you tried, the deeper in she dug.
And it still pissed me off, only now, ten years on, I had less patience for it.
“There a reason you’re sleepin’ rough?”
“I didn’t feel like venturing inside and asking for a room.” She shivered with her head inclined at the action close to the motel block. I didn’t know whether it was from the cold or the activities. If seeing that kind of sexual play going on shocked her, she’d be downright abhorred if she knew what I’d got up to over the last decade.
I’d had my fill and more of any girl I wanted, the dirtier the better. I didn’t just bend girls over a counter top and fuck them to an orgasm. I bent girls over and fucked them raw, again and again, until I was done. It didn’t matter how badly I treated them; they got off on it and always came back for more.
“Sensible move. There are other motels in other towns.”
She didn’t like that. As much as I hated being this close to her, I loved how it felt to irritate her.
“I didn’t feel like driving tonight. I’ll be gone by first light.”
She turned her collar up as the wind picked up her hair. I could see the light from the street lamp bleed through her curls. She had a beautiful head of hair, and it still smelled of fucking lemons. Without knowing it, she’d turned the tables around. I was irritated. I was reminded of the past and what she’d done to me.
I needed this to be done.
“Why did you come looking for me?” I watched as she pulled her lips between her teeth. “Finally realized you made the wrong choice?”
Her fire returned. “Fuck you, Reef,” she shouted, unable to choke back her argumentative nature.
“Hey! Keep it the fuck down. Those boys over there might be dressed similar to me, but trust me, they’d treat you a lot differently. Now, quietly. Tell me why you thought it’d be a good idea to show up.”
“I need help.”
“There must be plenty of people you can turn to besides me.”
She sheepishly shook her head and my patience wore thinner with every second I had to stand here and look at her.
“Talk,” I growled.
She jumped. “Look, just
forget it. This was a mistake.”
“Probably.”
I watched as her shutters slammed down.
This was getting me nowhere. I’d come here for answers and got none. I could see from the look in her eyes that she wasn’t going to tell me until she was ready. Stubborn Malia was ruling this conversation, and short of beating it out of her, there wasn’t much I could do.
“Have it your way. I ain’t draggin’ it out of you.” As I turned to walk away, the cruel bitter wind blew and the lemony scent that had haunted me for years assaulted me in an attempt to hold me hostage in this situation.
“What’re you doing?” Shadow asked, exasperation evident in his voice by the time I reached the van.
“She won’t talk. I haven’t got all night and she’ll be gone by the morning. Life will return to normal.”
“You’re just gonna leave her here with that crowd in grabbing distance?” He inclined his head back towards party central.
“Looks that way.”
I watched as he shook his head with incredulity. “At least make sure she’s locked in the fuckin’ car before you cower away.”
His words pissed me off. “Remind me why the fuck you’re here again.”
“Thought I’d be stopping you from making a mistake. Seems not.”
I spun on my heels. “Malia, get back in your motor, lock the fucking door and stay outta sight.”
“Dick.” He began to shake his head again before he stepped around me and headed in her direction. I climbed into the van and watched as he made sure she was going to be safe. His actions ramped up my irritation level, like the dial had gone full max. In the rearview mirror, I could see our club emblem on the back of his cut and her facial reactions. Whatever he was saying, she did her best to school those reactions until she gave him the barest smile. It was the smile I knew from teenage Malia, which crinkled the corners of her lips and caused her whole face to transform and blossom. It was the smile she used to give me when she’d caught me looking at her, or when I was trying to be cute and funny by taking the piss out of Dean. I rarely saw it and thought it was something just for me, but now I knew different. She just handed it out whenever she needed to get under the skin of a victim. It was part of her charm offensive. The real Malia knew how to reel men in, chew them up and spit them out.
Malia: A Black Sentinels MC Novel Page 11
