Ride or Die 2

by Claire C. Riley

  “Harlow, order up for table five!” Bobby called from the bar.

  I had been busting ass for the past couple of hours, but finally we were almost ready to close. Just this one last table to go and I could clock out—which was both a blessing and a curse because A, I needed the money and didn’t want to have to think about my life dramas right then, but B, I hadn’t eaten before I got there and now my stomach was growling loudly.

  I grabbed the order off the bar, loading the pitchers of beer onto my tray, and then headed over to table five—a bunch of businessmen looking to rough it in the big bad biker bar, by the looks of their suits.

  “All right, boys, here you go.” I placed the pitchers and glasses on the table, making sure to smile at them all even though I was really fighting back a yawn.

  “Excuse me, darlin’, I asked for a double shot of Jack, too,” one of the men said as I turned to walk away from the table.

  I turned back to him and offered him my best smile, because I’d been serving this table all night and didn’t want to lose the tip I was hoping they’d leave me. “I’m sorry about that. I’ll be right back with it.”

  “That’s no problem.” He smiled back and I blushed and headed back to the bar.

  He was handsome in a non-classical way—nothing like Casa with his flirty smile and eyes that pulled me in. No, this man was a little older than Casa, with a strong jaw, cropped hair, and a dark look in his eye.

  “I need a double Jack too, please, Bobby,” I said apologetically. I swung my gaze back to Mr. Jack Daniels, flushing when I noticed that he was still staring at me.

  “You got it, H,” Bobby said.

  My gaze shot back to him. “What did you just call me?” I frowned at my boss.

  Bobby frowned back harder. “I don’t fucking know. I’m not keeping a tab on what I call you.”

  I narrowed my gaze but let it go. This job had already seemed too good to be true when Charlie had told me about it, but then I’d seen the sign outside and recognized Casa’s work right off the bat. How could I forget it? Whether he was painting pictures of me on walls or painting signs for bars, his talent was easily spotted. It was obvious why I’d gotten the job, but right then all I cared about was that I had a job. And thanks to Rose I had a roof over my head—at least for the time being.

  Bobby was older than Casa, with sun-kissed skin and long hair that he wore tied back from his face. He was rough around the edges, that was for sure, but he wasn’t a biker so technically working there was still keeping with my “stay away from bikers” clause.

  Bobby slammed the double Jack down and I took it with a quick “thanks” before hustling back over to table four.

  “Here you go, sir. Sorry about that, it’s my first night.” A little sob story never hurt anyone, I decided.

  “It’s Leo, and thanks,” he replied.

  “No problem, Leo.” I smiled and went to turn away, but Leo’s hand moved to my arm to stop me.

  “What’s your name?” he asked as I turned back around to face him, shrugging from under his grip.

  “Harlow,” I replied, wondering why I was such a slut and had offered it up so easily.

  “What time do you finish up here, Harlow?” Leo asked.

  My gaze slid to his friends at the table, but they were all in conversation and paying us no mind so I guessed this wasn’t him being a jackass and trying to show off to his friends. Regardless, though, I needed to nip this thing in the bud and let him know I was off the market for the foreseeable future, because after everything that had happened with Casa, the last thing I wanted was a man in my life. Right then I needed to focus on me and getting myself straight. All men had ever done was fuck everything up for me.

  Leo reached out and placed his hand on the back of my leg, sliding it up toward the hem of my skirt in a move that made my skin crawl. Okay, so maybe he wasn’t a nice guy after all. I opened my mouth to tell him to get his hands off me when I was abruptly barged out of the way. I slammed into the table next to me, almost knocking over one of the other waitresses, Katie.

  “I’m so sorry,” I mumbled out, righting myself and turning to see what had just happened. But behind me all I could see were bodies scrambling over one another as the table where Leo and his friends had just been sitting toppled over.

  “What the fuck?” I squawked loudly, looking over to the bar to see Bobby watching what was happening but not moving to intervene or help.

  “Shit, Harlow, you never said you were dating a Highwayman!” Katie laughed from next to me.

  “I’m not!” I protested, but the evidence was hard to ignore because in the mass of limbs I saw the flash of a Highwaymen patch.

  I backed up to where Bobby was leaning over the bar, resting on his elbows and shaking his head. He glared at me as I got closer.

  “Told him this wasn’t a good idea,” Bobby sighed. “A bar ain’t any place for an old lady to be working.”

  “What are you talking about?” I looked back to the fight, spotting Casa lifting a chair and slamming it down over Leo’s head. There was another Highwayman I didn’t recognize holding Leo in place for Casa. “Holy shit! He’s going to kill him—do something!”

  “He won’t kill him, though he did promise me the honors of chopping off the fingers of anyone who touched you, so your new boyfriend may be going home a little maimed,” Bobby laughed.

  “A little maimed? Are you all fucking insane?” I screeched.

  Katie and the other waitress, Beth, were standing next to me. Katie took off her apron and declared she was going for a smoke break before she cleared up, because clearly she’d been doing this for some time and a little bar fight was not going to ruffle her feathers. Beth was staring transfixed as the men fought one another.

  “You have got to hook me up with one of them. I don’t care which one, I’m not fussy—just ask my ex-boyfriend—but you can’t keep them all.” She grinned at me.

  I looked into the mass of limbs, my eyes wide, watching as Casa got Leo in a headlock and slammed his fist into his face repeatedly until blood exploded from his nose. The other Highwayman was slamming some guy’s head against the table…and then I noticed Dom. He was fighting off two of Leo’s friends, though he looked completely unfazed by the hits he was taking. He picked up one of the pitchers of beer and swung it at one of their faces. The pitcher was too heavy to break but it definitely knocked a couple of the other man’s teeth out, and he grabbed his face and ran toward the exit. The other men Leo had been with quickly followed until it was just Leo and Casa—though Leo was barely conscious by this point.

  Casa dragged a bloody Leo toward the bar, shoving him headfirst into the wood. “What table was he at?” he asked Bobby, completely ignoring me and my horrified expression.

  “Four,” Bobby replied.

  “Take four then.”

  Bobby headed around the bar. “Works for me.” He picked a barely conscious Leo up off the ground and started dragging him out back.

  “Wait!” I screamed. “Four what?”

  “Fingers,” Casa replied, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Four fingers is what Bobby is gonna take from this piece of shit for touching my woman.”

  I wasn’t sure which statement to react to first, but fortunately Leo chose that moment to try and fight back, so I sided with him since it was his fingers that were about to be cut off

  “Don’t, Casa! Please! He didn’t know, it wasn’t his fault.”

  Casa tilted his head to one side questioningly, a spark in his eye. “Didn’t know what, H?”

  I squeezed my eyes closed, willing myself to be strong and stand up to him. When I opened them again, all I saw was his stupid cocky smile that made all the wrong parts of me tingle. Casa stepped toward me, his hand reaching for me until it was wrapped in my hair and he was pulling me closer, and my body reacted whether I wanted it to or not.

  “What didn’t he know, H?” he said, his breath against my face, our mouths millimeters apart. I
practically whimpered.

  I swallowed. “He didn’t know that you were—”

  Casa tutted and shook his head. “Wrong answer, girl.”

  My heart sped up, my body trembling for more of his touch even as I fought it. He’d hurt me, more than once, yet I couldn’t deny the attraction I had for him. Yes, I wanted his touch again, but this was more than that. His name was already tattooed on my heart.

  I knew what he wanted me to say, and I knew what my body wanted me to do. But what about me and my needs? My head and my heart—as usual—were fighting for control, and I wanted to give in. Just let go and see where the cards fell. But look where that had gotten me in the past! Dom had broken my heart and now Casa had, too.

  I had never meant to fall in love with either man, but love is a duplicitous bitch and she’d found her way into my heart regardless of what I had wanted.

  But look, she smirked, look who is here…

  I looked between Dom and Casa, though Casa pulled my face back to his when I looked at Dom.

  “What didn’t he know, Harlow?” Casa asked me again.

  “He didn’t know that I was…” I hesitated and Casa placed a soft kiss on my lips.

  “Say it.”

  I wanted to believe with all my heart that Casa wanted me as much as I wanted hm. I wanted a life, I wanted love, I wanted it all. The whole package. It was what I had been searching for my whole life. For someone to love and accept me for who I was without question. But I realized in that moment that it didn’t matter what I wanted anymore; it was what I needed that was important. And what I needed more than anything else was Casa.

  “That I was yours,” I whispered, hoping he wasn’t about to laugh in my face and throw me away, again.

  I wouldn’t have been able to handle it if he did. Not again. There were only so many times you could survive a broken heart. It would be the end for Harlow Bernadette McQueen, for sure.

  Casa leaned his forehead on mine. “That’s right, H. You’re mine.” He pressed another kiss on my lips. “And I’m yours.”

  “You hurt me,” I said, my words sounding strangled.

  “I know. I was a fucking idiot.”

  “How can I trust you not to do that to me again?” I pleaded.

  “Because I ain’t ever been afraid of anything in my whole life—not dying, not living, not losing people. Shit happens and life moves on, but, babe, right now, I’m afraid of losing you for good.” Casa pulled away so I could look into his face, and I saw his sincerity and his vulnerability. “Want you to be my old lady, H. I ain’t never felt nothing like this before. But I’m done running from you and whatever this is, because no matter how hard I run, you’re in here—” He tapped his head. “—and in here—” He took one of my hands and placed it over his heart. “—and I can’t run from that because it’s part of me. You’re a part of me. I don’t want anyone else anymore. I just want you, and me, for good now, okay?”

  I stared into Casa’s eyes, my heart bleeding for him and my body aching for him. He looked so certain and so determined, and I decided I had to take that chance, a leap of faith, and trust that he would protect my heart this time—believe that maybe Casa could be my happily ever after, after all.

  “Okay,” I replied with a small smile.

  His smile grew wider and wider and he turned to look at Dom. “She said ‘okay!’” He turned back to me and pressed a hard kiss on my lips, his tongue pushing into my mouth and stroking against mine. My knees went weak and he held me tight, pulling my body flush with his. I was breathless when he pulled out of the kiss.

  “Looks like you’re one lucky bastard today, Leo. Because my girl said no to the whole finger execution, so it looks like you got a Get Out of Jail Free card just this once,” Casa said, never taking his eyes from me—not even when Bobby grumbled his annoyance.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  Casa grinned at me. “Anything for you, H.”

  “Can’t I just take one?” Bobby asked, his voice a whine. “Just the pinkie?”

  Leo started twisting in Bobby’s grip again.

  “Stay still or I’ll take your fucking feet!”

  Casa and the other biker I didn’t recognize barked out a laugh. “Bobby, you’re one sick motherfucker!” Casa looked back to me and I quickly shook my head no. He glanced back at Bobby. “But H says no, so no, not this time, brother.”

  Bobby shoved poor Leo toward the exit. “Get the fuck out of here. You got a free pitcher of beer next time you come in, but remember, no touching the waitresses, ya hear me?”

  He turned back to us as Leo stumbled away from the bar and I shook my head in disbelief at the whole thing. Bobby walked toward the back exit, dusting his hands off like he’d been cleaning. “All right, I’m going to go bang Katie. Blood always makes me horny.”

  My mouth gaped open.

  “Harlow,” Bobby continued, ignoring the snickering coming from Casa, “you’re back in tomorrow night at eight. Don’t be fucking late, I hate tardiness. Casa, Dom, Crank, get the fuck out of here and stop wrecking my fucking bar! Beth? You wanna join me and Katie?” He smiled like he’d just offered her a cup of coffee and not a threesome.

  I choked on a nervous laugh and looked toward Beth, who was eyeing up Crank like a shark. “You’re disgusting, Bobby,” she replied.

  “What’s your fucking point? You coming or what?”

  Beth flipped her hair, her gaze still on Crank. “I think I’m good here.”

  Crank smirked.

  “Your loss,” Bobby called as he walked out back. “Get out of my bar, assholes.”

  I gave another nervous laugh and looked at Casa. He leaned forward and pressed his forehead against mine. From the corner of my eye I saw Dom watching us, and I pulled away from Casa, my gaze shifting between the two men.

  “So, what now?” I asked them both, uncertain of how things would play out with Dom.

  “Now we fucking live, H,” Casa replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

  “What about you?” I asked Dom.

  Dom stepped toward me, his expression darker than I had ever seen it, yet there was something else there too—something that hadn’t been there previously, something that made me think that maybe things were going to be okay after all.

  “Now I fucking live too, Red,” he said, his words a growl. He held out a hand to me and I took it, allowing him to pull me into his embrace. His arms wrapped around me and he held onto me fiercely. “I fucking love you, Harlow. Always have and always will. But you belong with Casa, even if I think you’re too fucking good for him.” He laughed.

  “Motherfucker!” Casa bit out.

  “Only yours,” Dom replied.

  “Yeah? Well she’s six feet under so you’d be fucking a corpse, brother.”

  “Pussy is—” Dom stopped himself and grinned. “Yeah, you’re right, maybe I’ll fuck your dad instead.”

  I choked on a laugh and Dom pulled me into a hug tighter than the first one. I felt Casa step up behind me and wrap his arms around both of us.

  “Ah, we’re like one big happy motherfucking family, ain’t we?” he mocked.

  But he was right. We were like a family. A happy, really fucked up family.

  Chapter thirty-one:

  Harlow

  Casa held my hand as he guided me into the clubhouse. He was still grinning from ear to ear, holding my hand tightly and pulling me along. It had been a long day and I was tired, yet my body was tingling all over with anticipation at what would come next.

  We would have already been back at Casa’s house if he hadn’t have been called to Church, but it only made the anticipation even better. I looked around us, embarrassed at what people would think when they saw me. Would they believe that I was just another whore he’d picked up from some bar, or would they know I was more to him than that? I wasn’t sure what to expect. I’d been a part of club life for as long as I could remember, and yet I’d never been this big a part of it.

&
nbsp; Casa pulled me to the bar, where a couple of the girls were serving drinks.

  “Your best motherfucking Champagne, please!” he said loudly, making my cheeks grow hotter.

  “Are you high?” a dark-haired biker asked him. “You look fucking high.” His gaze slid to me, appraising me head to toe. “Who’s the girl?”

  Casa pulled me into his side. “This, you lecherous motherfucker, is my girl.” Casa turned to me and planted a kiss on my cheek like we were five years old, and I snorted on a laugh. “You laughing at me, girl?” he mocked.

  “No.” I laughed again, a smile splitting my face.

  He turned to me. “Yeah, you fucking were. You were laughing at my romantic gesture like I’m some punk who doesn’t know how to woo a woman. Well let me tell you, I can woo a woman like no other man. So let me woo the fuck out of you, go to Church, do what needs to be done, then come back out and bury my face and my dick in your pussy.” He stopped talking and waited for me to speak, but I was incapable of speaking after the speech he had just given in front of everyone. “Course,” he continued, “can’t be doing the whole tongue and dick thing at the same time. Gonna have to take turns at that. And there’s this ass play thing Rider was telling me about that I wanna try.”

  “Church!” a fierce-looking man called from the doorway of a small room.

  Casa looked over to him and then back to me. “Gotta go see the prez—I’ll be back. Go talk to the other women and make friends.” And with that he slapped my ass and walked away.

  The dark-haired biker stared after him, and then with a shake of his head he followed, muttering under his breath something about every brother turning into a pussy.

  I stood in the middle of the room, feeling awkward and out of place and wondering whether I should just make my way back to Rose’s and wait for Casa there, but another woman came over to me.

  “I’m new here too,” she said, one hand tucking her hair behind her ear and the other resting on the small bump of her belly. “I’m Nancy, I’m Sketch’s old lady.”

  “Hi, I’m Harlow. I guess I’m Casa’s old lady.” I blushed, finding the words strange in my mouth.