by Violet Blaze
“Maybe they just forgot to pay us a visit?” Glacier asks, smiling wide, his teeth too white and his enthusiasm too real. This is what he lives for, the chase.
“Maybe they're all too familiar with the sort of welcome you like to give,” Smoky says, running his fingers through his red hair as he looks around, his face holding that same tired melancholy that's reflected in my own. Glacier, he lives for drama and bullshit and pain. Me and Smoky, we prefer a smooth ride, a cold beer and a beautiful woman. Why any asshole would get off on this shit is beyond me.
“Wipe that fucking smile off your face, boy,” Dober says, appearing in the archway to the kitchen, his dark glare narrowed in and focused on Glacier's face. “Our brother is dead and his wife's just cost us two more people. You think that's funny? You have a hell of a lot to learn.”
Glacier's smile fades and he tucks his fingers into his front pockets. Landon was his friend, too, our friend. The three of us went to high school together, so why the fuck did things end up like this?
“I'm going to cut Clayton Moore's balls off and mail them to his mum.” I toss my cig to the carpet and let it smoke the fibers.
“Maybe you should go home and get some rest first?” Dober says, the voice of reason as always. “We know what you want, and we'll get the job done, okay, boss? Take a breather and regroup on this one.” His subtle way of telling me to get the fuck out of here and go home before I do something I'll regret, like ride down to Ukiah and burn down the Mile Wide clubhouse.
Or go back to Lyric's house to hash all of this rubbish between us the fuck out.
I make myself take a deep breath, eyes scanning over my boys before I turn and leave Landon's house for the last time.
Didn't sleep a fucking wink last night. Not one wink. Instead, I went to the clubhouse and paced a rut into the floor while I waited for someone to call me with a bit of good news. Must've been a sore sight the way the girls avoided my ass and the boys stayed quiet at the bar.
This is the last thing I needed to hear.
“He's dead,” I repeat, tapping my fingers against the table in the chapel while I wait for Smoky to explain. His red hair is a mess, and there are dark shadows under his eyes, but also just a hint of relief. He knows how to get the job done, but he's not a monster. The fact that somebody else took Brent out for us must've come as a nice surprise.
“Suicide apparent,” he drawls without an ounce of belief in him. “Somebody probably shot him and stuck the gun in his hand. It's a botch job, but I guess nobody will ever know unless the FBI sends their own people out here. The Trinidad Police Department is a joke.”
I nod, my mind running over all the possibilities. If Mile Wide got rid of Brent, then I can only hope that Rebecca really did get the fuck out of here. If not … shit. I can't think about that right now. One step at a time.
“Why would they take out their very own FBI man? Can't reflect well on the club.”
“Who the hell knows? At this point, I'm just glad he's gone.” Smoky sighs and rubs his hand over his face. “Mile Wide's just cleaned up all our loose ends for us. At this point, we've done all we can do. I have a couple boys out canvassing Rebecca's neighborhood, but they've got squat so far.”
I lean back in my chair and weave my fingers together behind my head, trying to keep my eyes from straying back to my laptop. I emailed Lyric the papers she wanted this morning, and now I've got a meeting with the mayor on my schedule for next week. Guess the club's gettin' a key to the city for our outstanding rescue of his asshole son. Lucky us. Business should boom after this.
“I want Glacier looking into that bullshit with our weapons shipment from Seventy-Seven Brothers. After all this crap with Mile Wide, it'd be bloody fucking ridiculous not to assume they were behind that, too.”
“Got it,” Smoky says, turning to leave and then pausing. “There something else eating you beyond the obvious?” I give him a look that says I'm not buying what he's selling.
“Are you trying to have a heart to heart with me, you blithering twat. Get the fuck out of here.”
Smoky smiles, but it doesn't quite reach his eyes, turning on his heel and letting the heavy wood doors swing shut behind him. The hush of the chapel falls over me, a soothing balm that smells like tobacco and leather, the history of the club seeping into my lungs with every breath.
Lyric.
Her name starts small in my mind and grows big until she's all I can think about again. The thoughts come and go, letting themselves be pushed from my brain for brief moments in time, making room for more pressing matters. But then they come raging back with a vengeance. If I'm this bad after a day, what the hell am I going to be like next week?
But then I think about the fact that she was pulling one over on me, playing politics behind the scenes at the same time she was on her knees sucking my cock. How can I forgive that? How can I even consider starting some sort of relationship with a girl who was lying to my face from moment one?
I sigh, running my tongue across my lower lip, my body reacting to thoughts of Lyric like she's right here with me. I can still taste her, that wicked wild sweetness that turns my cock into a shaft of diamond. So fucking hard. I groan and grab my crotch, pleasure flooding my blood in an instant. I'm about to split my pants and rub one out to her when the doors to the chapel open and Smoky comes back in, hands tucked in his pockets, a wry expression on his face.
“The hell do you want, you bloody ginger bastard?” I stand up and shut the top on my computer. Smoky shakes his head at the tight bulge in my jeans and gestures over his shoulder with his thumb.
“Your girlfriend from the mayor's office is here.” I feel myself go still, muscles tight and pulse pounding. Lyric is here. “She says she doesn't give a flying fuck if you're busy because she desperately needs to thank you for what you did for her brother last night. I assume she means the daring rescue our boys performed?”
I realize I'm holding my breath and force myself to turn away, putting my hands on my hips and exhaling. I don't care what Smoky thinks of me. I just need a goddamn minute to get myself together.
Lyric is here. And I want to see her. I want to see her so fucking bad that it's making me crazy. If I had my way, I'd walk out there, grab her around the wrist and drag her to one of the dorm rooms for the rest of the day. I wouldn't let her leave until she'd come a dozen times, clawed up my back, and begged me for more.
But I'm not just Royal McBride. I'm the president of the Alpha Wolves Motorcycle Club, and I can't have a deputy mayor as my old lady. Beyond that, I can't have someone around me that I can't trust, who's not a part of my world, who doesn't even understand the implications of their own betrayal.
Fuck no.
This is a dangerous place for someone like Lyric Rentz.
“Tell her to go home,” I say. “Don't take no for an answer. If she protests, tell her you found me in one of the dorm rooms with my bare arse hanging out and a pretty girl moaning underneath me.”
I don't bother to look back at Smoky, but I can practically feel him raising his brows at me.
“And send somebody with her, someone who knows how to keep their goddamned distance and stay out of sight. I don't want any of this Mile Wide crap blowing the wrong way.”
“Whatever you say, pres,” he mumbles, leaving me alone in the chapel with nothing but the empty pit in my stomach for company.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Lyric
Royal's lying to me. I know it. I can feel it.
“Fucking dick,” I snap, slamming the door to his truck, hating myself for driving it over to the Alpha Wolves Compound in the first place. Sully's in the hospital. The messages waiting for me on my phone were not pretty. As soon as I got it charged, I ended up with an earful from my mom, a tearful plea from my sister, and a … well, my dad was actually pretty happy to see me deliver on that agreement between the Wolves and the city. In part, I think that's also because he believes that Royal's club members saved my brother from certain death
.
Call me crazy, but I have a feeling that that's not the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Royal either beat up Sully himself or had one of his guys do it. I know that as surely as I know that the man isn't engaged in some dirty exchange of fluids with one of his … his girls. After what happened between us last night, there's no way.
Royal might be a slut and a biker and an asshole, but he felt something for me last night, the same way I felt something for him.
Although I'm still really freaked out about Sully. He was coherent when I dropped by the hospital, but his eyes were swollen shut and his hands wouldn't stop trembling. When he mentioned the Wolves, his voice jumped in pitch and his words got all warbled. Nobody else can see it, but then they don't know the whole story.
What did you do, Sully? I wonder at the same moment my brain chimes in and says at least he isn't dead. I shiver, creeped out but somehow certain that Royal just gave me a really big favor. Huge. Was what happened to Sully on the menu for me? Was something worse in store for him?
If you know something you have to tell me now. If you don't, then I can't help you.
I unlock my front door and let myself in, feeling silly in my corset and garter belt. I layered as much sexy as I could beneath my leather riding clothes and then drove out there like an idiot. At first, I told myself I was going just so I could get the truth out of Royal about Sully, but then … I guess I imagined that I'd leave his truck there, that he'd drive me home on his bike, that we'd …
I take a deep breath as I close the door behind me and run my fingers through my hair. Last night, Royal was claiming me. I felt it. And well, I think I was laying my own claim on him, too. I let him inside of me without a condom and I haven't taken birth control anything in forever. Like I said, random sex isn't really part of my everyday. I plan sex, map it out, prepare for it.
And now what?
First thing's first. I dig around in yesterday's grocery bags until I find the morning-after pills I bought, taking one with a glass of water and praying that its eighty-nine perfect effectiveness at preventing pregnancy will apply to me. I really can't be in the other eleven percent category—especially since I'm really not looking forward to having an STI conversation with a physician, Royal, or anyone else.
I sit down hard on the edge of my couch.
This isn't like me at all. I'm going crazy here. I do everything by the book. I wouldn't even give my last boyfriend a blow job until we both got tested.
I'm coming unhinged—and it's all because of Royal McBride.
My stomach twists into a knot as I glance at my cell, hoping that at some point today, he'll call me back. I can understand why he doesn't want to see me, but what the hell happened last night? I thought we were done and then he came back to me. I even came out of my bedroom to find that he'd locked my front door for me.
Royal and me, we get along so well, have so much chemistry. If he wasn't an MC president, I'd say we were a match made in heaven. Right now though, this sure feels like hell.
I lean into the cushions, my phone tucked tight in my hand. I still have Royal's keys and his truck, so the asshole can't avoid me forever. If I have to, I'll drive over to his house myself, and we can talk. We might not work as a couple, but I can't pretend I'm not feeling anything at all. If he hadn't come back here last night, I would've been able to force myself up and into a gray skirt suit, headed to the office and buried myself in work.
Now?
Now I'm dressed in leather from head to toe with a purple corset hiding underneath, my hair hanging in loose waves around my shoulders. I'm still Lyric, but I'm different. It's subtle, but I can feel it, like a tiny spiderweb crack spreading across my psyche.
You can't just do that to someone and then walk away.
I stand up, snatching Royal's keys off the counter and heading for the door. I've made up my mind. If he won't see me, then I'll just wait him out. He broke into my house—twice—so I don't see any problem with breaking into his.
One way or another, this all going to end tonight.
I'll make sure of it.
Fortunately for me, I have a good memory when it comes to directions. If I've been somewhere once, I can get there again as long as I have a familiar starting point. I don't know what Royal's address is, but I'm confident I can figure it out.
I take a deep breath and sweep my hair over my shoulder, grabbing the iPod I found in the center console earlier. It's already plugged in and loaded up with several playlists. I pick the happiest, most upbeat one I can find and start down the road, trailing the coast and enjoying the golden glint of the California sun on the surface of the waves.
The song “Underdog” by the band You Me At Six plays loudly over the speakers as I weave my way north, flickers of memory from my first motorcycle ride bright and vibrant against the forefront of my mind. Despite what I told him, I really did love it. It might sound cheesy, but I felt like I was flying, like I was weightless. Like I was free.
I suck in a deep breath and try not to think too hard about that. I am free already, right? Right?
My eyes stray to the speedometer, to the careful positioning of the needle two miles below the speed limit. That's me, Lyric Lenore Rentz, always safe and slow and steady. There's nothing wrong with that, not really, but … I push the gas down a little harder, enjoying the easy acceleration of Royal's truck.
When I roll the window down and smell the salt of the sea, I can almost forget that I'm nervous about going to an outlaw MC president's house and letting myself in without his permission. At least his dogs like me, right?
I stay on the same road for a couple of miles and then realize that the houses are starting to look less familiar, taking a sharp right at the next corner and circling back around until I recognize a cute little seaside cottage that we passed yesterday. It's only once I get on that road that I realize somebody's following me.
Or at least I think he is.
“What the hell?” A quick glance in the rearview mirror shows me a guy on a bike that I don't recognize, weaving through the narrow side streets with me as I try to puzzle my way out to Royal's house. If I wasn't taking such an erratic route, I wouldn't think anything of it. But I don't know where I'm going and the sharp, sudden turns and circles I'm taking aren't anything that somebody might be copying by accident.
I should've brought my Glock.
That thought scares the shit out of me, enough that I decide that maybe this isn't a good idea. I don't think that Royal would send someone after me, but then why the hell am I being followed?
I take a deep breath to slow down my racing pulse and start back in the direction of my house, my fingers inching into the cup holder and grabbing my phone. Even though I shouldn't, I take a moment to glance down at the screen and find Royal's number.
The call rings straight through to voice mail.
Damn it. Okay, so to the police station then? My house is about six blocks from the Trinidad Police Department, so I keep going, heading back the way I came. When I look in the rearview, my friend's still there, but he's pulled back a little, like he's worried I might've seen him.
There are a million reasons this guy could be trailing me, but most of them aren't any good. God, what have I gotten myself into? The fingers of my left hand tighten around the wheel as I scroll through my phone, trying to find the number for the police department. I have it programmed in there somewhere, but I can't remember if it's under Trinidad police or just police. Ugh. I know I'm probably overreacting, but I can't shake the feeling that something isn't right.
When I glance up in the mirror again, I see that there are two new motorcycles coming up quick behind the first. That can't be good.
I force my eyes back to the road. It's a narrow stretch right here and the drop off down to the beach is quite literally feet away from me. A small swerve and I could drive right into the guardrail … or worse. There are parts here that have no guardrail or still have the old wooden fence that was put in w
hen the city was first founded. Getting it fixed is one of my dad's grand projects, but something that's still in the works.
I find the police department's number at the same moment that a phone call from Royal comes in.
Thank God.
I hit the answer button and suck in a deep breath.
“Please tell me these three guys are yours?” I ask and hate the silence that follows that question. “Royal?”
“Three guys?” he asks me, his voice tight. “The hell are you talking about, Pint-Size?”
“There are three guys on motorcycles following me, Royal. Unless there's another outlaw motorcycle club in town that I don't know about, they must be yours, right?” I glance up in the rearview again and … see that there are two bikes missing. I can see them in the background, one of them on its side, its rider lying in the middle of the road. “Oh my God.”
I recognize the wolf's head on the back of that guy's jacket, an image that definitely isn't reflected on the other guy's back as he hops off his bike and circles the man's still form.
I flick my eyes back to the road.
“Where are you, babe?” Royal asks, his voice verging on the edge of wild panic. “I'm coming to you.”
“I'm driving,” I say as I come up on a big turn, sand dunes on my left, the ocean still gleaming from down below on my right. “Two of the guys are gone. I think one of them crashed. I'm heading towards the police station unless you have something you want to tell me?”
“Stay on the phone with me,” he says and then there's some yelling in the background as he barks orders at somebody. A few seconds later, I can hear the deep growl of a motorcycle engine. “Don't bloody fucking hang up on me, do you understand? Where are you?”
“I'm about two miles north of my place, on Scenic Drive.”
I come around the corner, faster than I should, panic fueling my speed this time.
And there's a big, black truck parked dead center in the middle of the road.
