“Ryder,” she breathed. She tried to tug her hand free, but he held it fast. His eyes were dark and soulful, so different from the first time she’d seen them, when they’d been hollow and empty. Was it really just a week ago? How could so much have changed in that small window of time?
“Laura.” Her name sounded so different on his lips, different than the way anyone else spoke it. “I have to talk to you.”
“I- I can’t,” she whispered. “Not here. Not- not anywhere. I thought you understood…”
“The thing with me,” Ryder admitted, that wry shadow of a smile she’d seen before, playing over his lips, “is that I have a thick skull and a hard fucking head.”
“I…” God. What she really wanted to tell him was that she’d done nothing but think of him. That every hour, waking or sleeping, was consumed by him. She thought of his hands on her body and she burned for him, for his touch. There was nothing, nothing else. No one else. He’d changed her. Given her back a part of her that she thought Nico had banished forever. He tortured her, even when he wasn’t near.
“I’ve thought about you,” Ryder confessed, echoing her thoughts. “You and nothing else. Please. I need to talk to you. It’s not what you think. It’s- you’ll want to hear what I have to say.”
“I-” Laura hedged. She was still safe in the shelter. No one had seen her and Ryder, or Nico would already have rained down his wrath. She was safe within the shelter’s walls. Her shoulders slumped and she admitted defeat far too easily. Of course she wanted to talk to Ryder. She wanted to hear his deep, velvet voice. She wanted his touch. She craved him. Any and all of him.
As a little girl, her mother had once said that when you meet the right person, you just know. She thought that she’d given up on her girlish fantasies a long time ago, or rather, blow after blow, they’d been beaten out of her, intimidated out of her, by Nico. She was wrong.
“I- I don’t know if I can. I shouldn’t. I- I don’t know what I’d do if Nico found out and this place- Jim- it’s not right.”
Because Ryder’s touch made her heat beat furiously and her pulse spike wildly. Because when he’d touched her that first time, when their eyes met before that- in that very second, she knew she was his. It wasn’t childish and immature or fanciful desperation. It gave her back her strength, her heart, her soul, everything good she thought she’d lost and never dared hope to find again.
His voice was deep and sure and was a balm to her frayed nerves. “It is right. We both know it. It doesn’t need to make sense. Little in my life ever has. What if I have to tell you isn’t about us. Not directly, at any rate. It’s about you. You will want to hear it.”
She knew she shouldn’t but Laura let herself get lost in Ryder’s eyes. In the warmth of his touch. In everything he was and the unexpected hope he held out to her, so close, just within her reach. “Alright,” she breathed. “But- but nothing more than that. I have to go soon.”
“It’s early yet. You usually leave around nine. It’s only eight.”
“We finished clean up early,” she whispered, startled that he kept tabs on her. Of course he did. He probably watched her every move without her knowing. Nico did the same thing, but with him, it was suffocating and painful. Thinking of Ryder doing it… she felt- safe. Warm. Protected.
“Good. Then we have time. My room is just at the back. You’ll come?” Desire glistened in his eyes and her body responded instantly. Not that she needed a reason. She’d walked around in a state of awareness since that night in the alley a week ago.
“I- I guess so. But please. Don’t make this any harder than it already is.”
Ryder pulled her close, just a breath away from his chest. He dropped his hand and whispered next to her ear, voice thick and dark and erotic. “Don’t touch you, you mean.”
“Y-yes.”
He nodded. “Fine. I won’t. Not unless you ask me to.”
“I won’t ask you to.”
“I know.” His words meant the exact opposite, but he walked a respectful distance away.
She remained rooted to the floor, her feet like lead. He’d promised… she didn’t want him to promise, but he’d given her his word. She had no reason to trust him. He himself had basically told her that she shouldn’t, but he was there, already in her heart, and she couldn’t force herself to deny him.
“This is more dangerous than you realize,” she whispered as she trailed Ryder down the hall. He stopped at the second door on the left and pushed it open, revealing a tiny room with a twin sized bed. It was the only thing in the room. A duffel sat neatly on the floor beside the bed. The walls were white and the partition wall that separated his from the other rooms looked slightly different as it was erected later, when the old school was turned into the shelter.
“I know how dangerous it is,” Ryder argued softly. He shut the door behind them.
Laura whirled. That door closing, trapping them inside that tiny space, made her throat close up. For all the wrong reasons and fear certainly wasn’t one of them. She shivered, but steeled herself. She had to hear Ryder out and that was it. It was far too dangerous to do anything else and it wasn’t just her life that she was risking.
Ryder held out his hand, palm up. “I’m not going to do anything but talk. I promised.” He skirted past her, though there was barely room, and sat down on the edge of the bed. He didn’t ask her to sit and she thought it was safer to stand, so she did. She slowly folded her arms across her chest.
“What could you possibly have to tell me that doesn’t concern us in some way?”
That shadowy smile was back, or maybe she just imagined it. “I guess it does, in some way, when you put it like that.”
“Just tell me then. We both know that I don’t have much time.”
“That’s the thing. I took this past week to do some research into your background. I wanted to know who you were so afraid of. Why the entire city appears to walk in fear of your brother’s shadow.”
“Then you know.”
“Yes. It’s pretty obvious. Your brother is a sick fuck and a bully. The kind of man that’s better off on the other side of living. I would be doing the world a service to put him down.”
“No!” Laura rushed over. She threw herself down on the bed and gripped Ryder’s hands, all without thinking. “You can’t do that. Promise me you won’t do anything like that. It’s suicide.” He laughed, a low chuckle, and she bristled. “I don’t see what’s funny about that.”
“It’s not funny at all,” Ryder admitted, his eyes alive and dancing with mirth. He was so, so different from that first night she’d seen him. But then… so was she. “I just like that you used the word suicide and not murder. It tells me where your loyalties lie.”
Laura shook her head. She stared at Ryder sadly. “Of course my loyalty doesn’t lie with him. He’s my brother, but what you said about him is true. He gets off on hurting people. The only things that have ever mattered to him are power and money. My dad- he didn’t want to leave Nico in charge when he died, but he didn’t have a choice. He- Nico was his son. His oldest son. He didn’t realize what he truly was until it was too late.”
“That’s usually how it goes.”
“Nico- he- he does whatever he has to do to stay at the top. Whatever. He’s had men tortured and killed without batting an eye. No, that’s not true. I think he enjoys that too. He- he- I- I’ve done what I can to protect my younger brother. Nico already views him as a threat even though Drake is twenty-one and actually doesn’t want any part of the business. Nico is forcing him to study law. He’s at least allowed out of the house, but Nico watches him at all times. He thinks Drake is lying to him about not wanting to steal the empire that he’s built. He thinks that because he’d betray and murder his brother, that Drake would too. He’s different though. We- we aren’t like Nico. Even as a kid, he was bad. A bully. I- I caught him torturing this cat once. He….” Laura trailed off, shuddering. Ryder never broke eye contact. He never reached for h
er, though she could tell that he probably wanted to. “He hurts me,” she admitted, her voice reedy and thin. “Whenever I do something that displeases him, or sometimes just because he can. He never lets me leave the house. The shelter is pretty much my only escape. He wants me to know that he owns me. I am just a pawn to him. Something that he’ll try to- to use when the time is right.”
“Use?”
“To further his position. I’ve known for a long time that I’m going to be married off to some thug or mobster or whatever. For money. Or political gain or some power maneuver.”
Ryder’s hand twitched where it was settled on his dark jean clad thigh, but again, he kept it where it was. She longed to reach out as badly as he obviously did, but she couldn’t. If she touched him again, it would be the end of her.
“If Nico knows what we did… he can never find out.”
“So you gave me your virginity because you wanted to thwart him? To prove a point? Or did you think it would change his mind? That he couldn’t sell you to the highest bidder if you were ruined?” The question was asked, devoid of anger or feeling, but Laura wasn’t fooled.
“No.” She blinked hard, willing Ryder to hear the truth in her words. “Of course not. I would never do anything like that. It was true what I said. I gave it to you because… because it was mine to give, my choice, my body, my will. I- I wanted you to have it. To have me. It had to be you. It was always meant to be you.”
Ryder was silent for so long, Laura almost thought he was angry with her, but then he shook his head and sighed. His eyes tracked to her face, but he had some version of a mask in place and she couldn’t read them anymore. She marveled at the ease at which he put up walls. “You could leave. Just disappear. I could help you.”
“No. I can’t. Not without Drake and we both couldn’t go together. Nico would hunt us down. He’d find us and make us pay. Probably torture and kill us both. We might be his brother and sister, but that means nothing to him. I’m only useful as a pawn and he’d rather Drake was dead as is.”
“What if Drake got out?”
“It wouldn’t do any good. Nico wants him dead, not out there, an unseen threat.”
“Tell me truly, what would Nico do if he found out you weren’t a virgin any longer?”
Laura winced. Icy tendrils of fear snaked up her spine. “Honestly, I don’t know. My best guess is that he’d punish me. Severely. He’d give me time to heal before he found a buyer. He’d tell them that I was pure and make me lie. Say I did horseback riding or some contact sport as a kid and that’s why I don’t have a- well- a hymen or whatever.”
Ryder stared at her and she stared back. She lost the battle first. She let out a tiny cry and leaned in closer. His hand shot out and he caught her on a caress, his hand rough and calloused, but deliciously warm against her cheek.
“You’re strong, Laura. So much stronger than you know. The fact that you’ve survived this long tells me that.”
“I’m not. When he- when Nico- when he hit me, I cry. I’m afraid. I- I lay awake for nights after it, afraid he’ll come back and do it again.”
“Being afraid doesn’t mean that you’ve lost your strength. It doesn’t mean that he’s broken you. You proved to me, and to yourself, a week ago, that it isn’t the case. Your heart. Your soul. It’s there. Ready and waiting inside of you. Ready for you to take a stand. You have no idea what my life has been, but I’ll tell you, it isn’t pretty and it hasn’t been easy. I felt like a thing, like this soulless creature that slithered through life. It didn’t matter to me if I lived or died, and that made me extremely dangerous. Then I met you and- and I realized that I do have a shred of something left inside. You gave that to me. You.”
Laura leaned in closer, so that their bodies were a fraction away from touching. Ryder’s hand terrified her, but he was right, it gave her strength the same way he said she gave him his soul back. She wanted to believe him. Believe that the moment they were wrapped up in could last.
“I have a way out for you.” Ryder’s words rocked her to her core.
“How?” she gasped.
Ryder’s eyes burned straight through her, raw, hungry, darker and more wicked than she’d ever seen them. “Nico’s made himself a few enemies. Your brother will pay with his life and you will be free.”
Chapter 11
RYDER
Laura’s eyes widened and she stared at him in disbelief. “No… no- that won’t work. You can’t- I made you promise that you wouldn’t go near Nico.”
“That’s the thing.” Ryder caressed her cheek gently, his soft touch at odds with his rough dark words. “It doesn’t have to be me. I’ll be honest with you, Laura. I’ve done things in the past- I’ve- I’ve killed men before. Done my time. I’d let myself become a thing and I can tell you, I was pretty seldom used for good purposes.”
“Did you- did you like it? Hurting people? Doing bad things? Ki- killing?”
Ryder wanted to lie to her. For the first time in his life, he was ashamed of who he was. What he was. What he’d become. “Sometimes,” he admitted. “I just said I wouldn’t lie to you, so I won’t. Sometimes I did. I- I killed someone who hurt people I loved. Who broke up our family and- and did terrible things to us. I made him pay and I was happy to do it. He would have killed us in the end, if I hadn’t got to him first. The others- they were just jobs. Just part of being in the club.”
“A club? Like- the bad kind of club?”
“The worst. There aren’t a lot of options out there for a guy fresh out of juvie. I was twelve when I committed murder for the first time, so there was no way I could be tried as an adult, but that kind of shit follows a person around. I don’t have an education past sixth grade. I could have spent time studying, getting my GED, and figuring out how to atone for my sins, but that’s not me. I was made the way I am. I wasn’t born into it, but I became it. For so long, all I was good for was getting other people what they wanted. My size, my street smarts- they were worth more than any high school diploma or a fucking college degree.”
“I- why are you telling me this?” Laura should have pulled away, but just like that night in the alley, she pressed into him instead.
“Because I need you to know who I am. I’m not saying that if I get you out that you have to be with me. I want you to be free, Laura. You deserve to be free and beautiful, not caged. You should never belong to another person.”
“I’m- I can bare it. I could if I had to. There isn’t a way to get to Nico without people getting hurt or killed and I can’t live with that. I’ve been raised for this lifestyle. Raised in it. There are precious few people who make it through. It’s probably only a matter of time before Nico makes too many enemies. People don’t get old in this business.”
“It won’t come soon enough. You’ll be married off to someone else, to some fucking thug or old man who ruins you.” He dropped his hand finally and took both of hers in his. He squeezed harshly, too hard, but he couldn’t stop himself. She didn’t flinch or pull away. “I have a plan. You never let me finish. I know people, a club here who hate your brother. One of many, but these guys are the ones you don’t want to piss off.”
“The Servants.”
“Yes.” He wasn’t entirely surprised that Laura knew. She was right. She’d been immersed in the underground, less savory lifestyle, since her birth. She’d been born into a life of crime. She might look sweet and innocent, she might still be innocent, but she was also wise to the hard facts of life. “They have their own reasons for wanting to be rid of your brother. I have a friend who isn’t a patched in club member yet, but he’s on that path. He’s willing to do me a solid. He’s going to find out if I can give them enough to deliver Nico to them, if they’ll go to war. They want the Cannelli territory. There’s little doubt about that. They do have a truce, but they’re just biding their time, waiting to make their move.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Because the club I was part of… the Prez was a bastard
. He was greedy to a fault. Nothing was ever enough for him. The Servants Prez, he’s ten times worse. If I can deliver up your brother, a time, a place where just for a second, his guards fuck up because they have a new master, a higher payroll, he’s as good as dead and the Servants will make their move.”
“They’ll come for me and Drake then.”
“No. That will be part of the deal. They can’t touch you or your brother. I’ll get you out. While they take down Nico, I’ll come for you. The Servants will take out the guards at the house. All of Nico’s men, whoever chooses to stay loyal and can’t be bought- they’ll all be taken out. The men who switch loyalties will probably be allowed to leave unharmed. Though I can’t guarantee it.”
Sadness filled Laura’s eyes. “They’re men. Some of them have families. Not all. Most of them do bad things just because Nico tells them to. They kill for him. Torture for him. Some of them like it. For the most part, Nico only employs the same kind of man that he is.”
“Get me the names of the ones you want spared and they will be warned or drugged or- or something. I’ll see that they aren’t harmed.”
“Really? You’d- you’d do that? Why? Why try so hard to get me out? I haven’t done anything for you- I can’t- I have nothing to offer-”
“You have everything to offer.” Ryder raised one of Laura’s hands and dusted a kiss over the back of her knuckles. She trembled under his touch. “I know what I said. I’m breaking my word and it’s the only thing I have left that means anything.”
“No.” Laura tilted her head. Her eyes tracked to his. “You said you’d only touch me if I asked.”
“But you didn’t.”
“I did. I just didn’t use any words.”
The air shimmered between them, glistening, charged. It was impossible to breathe. Ryder almost thought that the alley was a one-off, something that wasn’t going to repeat itself again because it couldn’t. That it was a fluke or some mystery. He’d never felt that way before about another person. He’d never felt anything at all, not like what he felt with Laura.
Lonely Rider - The Box Set: A Motorcycle Club Romance - The Complete Series Page 70
