Vipers Run

by Stephanie Tyler

  Cage watched me silently, waiting for me to spill everything. God, I didn’t want to. “Is this about the guy I’m going to find?”

  My throat tightened. “No. Bernie was looking for my brother. He—Ned—stole money from me.”

  “And your dad was helping?”

  “Yes. He’s not Ned’s father so . . .” I shrugged, hoping that would end it. “I’m sorry—if I’d thought for a moment . . .”

  “That you’d have a rabid MC on your ass, you would’ve behaved differently? I’m thinking not,” he said. “But from now on, you need to.”

  “The way you talk about your club . . . do you like it there?”

  “Most of the time, yes.” He paused. “I’m not sure how any woman survives it, though.”

  His honesty floored me. “But some do, right?”

  “Yeah, some do, Calla.”

  I swallowed. “If you want to be with someone enough, you’ll deal with almost anything. As long as you’re doing it together, right?”

  When I was younger, I looked for a love that would tear me up and have its way with me. I wanted to feel battered. Satiated. Terrified. The ups and downs of my mother’s love life made me think that was the only way it should be. It wasn’t until I got a little older—and wiser—that I realized that all I really wanted was a love that would set me free from all the pain of my past.

  I knew it was out there, if for nothing else, because of all the time musicians and authors spend on the subject. It’s the Holy Grail and compromise is out of the question. Still, I figured that, after what happened with Harris, I’d never really be able to trust any guy again. That didn’t mean I didn’t try. I pretended I didn’t care. And while I never had another situation like that one, it didn’t mean I was happy. I’d had some good sex—I’d needed to in order to make up for the worst first time ever—but the attraction postsex was never there.

  Not like this. “I’m going with you by choice, Cage. Not because I don’t have one.”

  “Good.”

  “Whatever happens . . . I don’t have any expectations. I don’t even want any. It’s all too complicated anyway. Sex is simple.”

  He raised his brows. “You might be the first woman in history to say that. Even if I know you don’t mean it.”

  I didn’t bother arguing.

  * * *

  I woke to the sound of bodies thumping against the wall, hard. I heard grunts and cursing and tried to make myself invisible against the back of the couch while I watched the shadows, really hoping that one of them was Cage.

  “Son of a—”

  Yes, Cage. I sagged in relief, especially when another man’s voice said, “She would’ve been proud to be called ‘bitch.’”

  “Asshole.”

  I blinked and watched the men stand, saw Cage shove the other man away hard. When the man I didn’t know turned to me, I immediately saw the resemblance to Tenn.

  “You shouldn’t have done this shit alone, Cage.”

  “Heard it from your brother. Don’t need to hear the same shit from you.”

  “You’re going to hear it, and a lot more where that came from.”

  “Calla, this is Talon,” Cage said, and Tenn’s brother smiled and corrected, “Friends calls me Tals.”

  “She’s not your friend,” Cage replied.

  Tals shrugged, unconcerned. “Now I can see why you didn’t want any of us near her.”

  Cage groaned. “Ah Jesus, Tals. Shut it!”

  Tals’s laugh was deep and booming. “You’ve got it bad.”

  I, for one, was glad to hear it, but I wasn’t happy about the world intruding. Cage had warned it would happen, sooner than I’d want it to.

  Cage ran a hand through his hair and sighed. “Why are you here, Tals? Coincidence?”

  “You’re the one who always says there’s no such thing. No, sir, I’m your escort back to Skulls in the morning.”

  Cage tensed immediately—and I wasn’t the only one who noticed it. Tals clapped a hand on his shoulder and said, “Preach is not happy.”

  “How much does Preach know?”

  “He knows everything,” Talon said simply. “Calla, honey, we’re just gonna step outside for a few minutes.”

  “Knock yourself out,” I told him, then wrapped the sheet around my body and headed to the shower. I could’ve sworn they both whistled at me.

  And I liked it.

  * * *

  Cage watched Calla’s retreating back until she shut the bathroom door behind her. Tals had whistled with him, but then his friend had turned away and was already on the front porch when Cage joined him.

  “Tenn wouldn’t let me come get her.”

  “He’s the smart one in your family,” Cage told him, and sidestepped a swipe at the back of his head.

  “I wouldn’t have let anything happen to her. Christ, hers was the only name you kept saying, over and over and—”

  Cage held up a hand. “I’ve heard it before.”

  “You’re keeping her with you, then?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why?”

  “Lot of reasons. But I pulled her into this, and I’m the only one who can get her out.”

  “Keep telling yourself that,” Tals muttered.

  His friend was more pissed than Tenn after being shut out. Even though he’d known that Cage wasn’t dead pretty much the whole time. But before that, Cage had dropped out of sight for months, and he’d refused to return any calls. “I’m sorry, Tals.”

  “Yeah, that you got caught.”

  “Gonna make a great father with lines like that.”

  Tals pointed at him, fear of the devil in his eyes. “Don’t you dare fucking curse me like that.”

  Cage snorted. “Did Tenn get anything out of the Heathens?”

  “They weren’t in a chatty mood and Tenn doesn’t have the patience for that shit.” Tals crossed his arms and stared at him. “Going to finally tell me what the hell really happened? Because I don’t believe the Heathens just happened to sneak up on you.”

  “Got some intel.”

  “Gonna share?”

  “Tapes. Wiretaps.”

  “Enough for a RICO case against them?” Tals asked.

  Cage nodded. “It’s locked up tight, though. I won’t risk giving it to the feds until I know who I’m giving it to.”

  “Your dad know you have it?” Tals asked, then paled. “Shit. That’s why?”

  Cage kept his mouth shut. He wasn’t sure he could get the words out.

  Tals whistled softly. “I knew it was Heathens, Cage . . . but . . . your dad?”

  “He sent Troy.” And Cage didn’t know if that made it better or worse. “A lot of this is about me, Tals. But some of it’s about her.”

  “We’ve had to tread lightly where Bernie’s concerned.”

  Cage agreed. It was the only thing that kept him from breaking into the police database to see what they knew. The only thing that stopped him from calling Bernie’s sister. He thought about the burial, how he and Tenn and Tals had to avoid it . . .

  “He always knew what he was in for with us,” Tals told him. “He went into things with both eyes open.”

  “Calla didn’t.” Tals looked like he wanted to say something, but he didn’t, and so Cage continued. “Need a favor.”

  “You’re serious? Beyond this saving-your-ass thing?”

  “Where were you when I was trying to lose a Heathen tail tonight?”

  Tals snorted. “Go for it. Just remember, you’re really racking them up.”

  “Bernie was trying to help Calla.”

  “And while you avoided all of us, you were figuring out a way to help her too.”

  He nodded. “Her father’s Jameson Bradley.”

  Tals whistled and shook his head.
“And you got his baby girl in trouble.”

  “I don’t think they’re exactly close. But she’s got a brother. Need to find him.”

  “Take it we’re not paying a Welcome Wagon call.”

  “As far from it as we can get,” he agreed. And there was also another guy out there who hurt her. Cage had that tucked into the back of his mind. Because as much pain as he’d been in that first night they’d talked, the pain in her voice when she’d admitted that a guy had hurt her in her past was unmistakable.

  Every time he thought about it, his fists clenched, the way they were now.

  Tals noticed, of course. “I’ll help.”

  “Thanks.”

  “S’what we do.” Tals touched the scarred side of his face, shook his head. “Helps that you were always an ugly motherfucker.”

  “Better than you on your best day.”

  Tals hooted, and for a second Cage was back in better days. Then again, the woman inside the cabin might just be the start of more.

  Tals told him, “I’ll be back tonight to escort you back to Skulls. Preacher’s orders, so don’t try to say no.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Figured I’d visit Havoc and give you two some privacy.”

  Cage shook his head. “You getting involved in shit I should know about?”

  “You’re one to talk. Don’t worry about me, brother. I’m just fine. See you in the morning.” Tals jumped off the porch, got on his bike and gunned it up the road.

  For a long moment, Cage stood in the mountain air, letting what Tals said settle in.

  Preacher swore the hills of South Carolina were the perfect place to soothe—and save—men’s souls. And that might be true of North Carolina too, because Havoc thrived there, while boasting the rep of being both calm and deadly. What that MC did was far enough removed from civilians and the law to give them some kind of mythological, legendary status.

  Cage knew some of them, had visited their compound. Their rep was well fucking deserved. They had no desire to play nice with anyone. They just stayed to themselves and out of most wars, unless an MC fucked with them. And then their army came down from the hills and let their fury loose.

  Whatever Tals was doing up there, Cage hoped it was for pleasure and not business.

  Cage had been putting bikes together for as long as he could hold a wrench. The irony of being born in the back of a van—and being named after the incident—was something of an inside joke among the Heathens, because “cage” was a derogatory name for a car, which civilians drove, as opposed to the freedom of the bike.

  For Cage, it referred to his Heathen lineage and his royalty, so to speak, because his cage was a beat-up Ford Bronco in which his mom had been in active labor, and it had a line of hogs leading it to the hospital. He’d been too damned impatient to wait, a trait that followed him his entire life. He was the firstborn, the golden child, and at that time his mom had been a hot-as-hell old lady his dad had been lucky enough to bag. She’d run away from a very wealthy family to be with his father and, by extension, the MC, and Cage knew she’d regretted it. Not at first, but for sure it was a part of the reason she’d turned to drugs.

  She’d been trapped. She’d seen no escape and, in reality, there was none. So whether or not she’d planned to kill herself, she’d already been doing it slowly, years before her actual death.

  Which was why everything about Calla concerned him. More often than not, the old ladies of the clubs had grown up around the MC, and if they didn’t, they were well enough versed in the ways of club life. The real version, not the romanticized one.

  And then there were the MC groupies. The mamas. Similar to the women who looked for soldiers to marry. They knew what soldiers were capable of, and they knew that the job involved more than wearing a uniform.

  Calla knew more than most civilians, unfortunately because of what he’d put her through already. But once that situation was over . . . no matter how hard it was for him, he was going to have to give her the choice to walk or push her out the door.

  He knew he was trouble, more than any one woman should have to deal with. He also had an expiration date—if his family had anything to say about it. By running off on his own to get Calla, he knew he might be cutting himself off from the only family who’d ever given a shit about him.

  But for now it seemed they were standing by him. He’d go back to Skulls and take whatever he had coming to him.

  Chapter 12

  It was almost time to head to the Vipers MC, and I felt like mourning that. At the cabin, for a little while, at least, we were just Calla and Cage, no pasts, only present. Even though we were both wanted, we were also hidden from the world. We had each other all to ourselves.

  Until Tals showed up to rip the curtain away and drag us back to reality.

  “Did you ever just want to escape everything? Escape who you are, who you’re supposed to be? Run from the expectations until you know what you expect from yourself?” I asked Cage now.

  He gave a small smile, almost rueful. “I know a little something about all that.”

  As foolish as it may sound, this cabin was our literal escape. Maybe a little too literal for my tastes, but now that the imminent threat of danger had passed, it was just us. And I didn’t want to argue or worry anymore.

  I just wanted. “So we’re going to Skulls Creek.”

  “I don’t know if I’m welcome there anymore. But for you, I’m willing to try.”

  “Suppose they don’t welcome you?” I didn’t know much about MCs, but what little I did convinced me that the Vipers wouldn’t just wave and let Cage walk off into the night.

  “We’ll be okay, Calla. They’re good people.”

  I ran my hands over the tattoo on his biceps, the viper curled around the knife, the grim reaper skull with the not so grim smile, like he held the secrets of the world. I sighed. “I don’t want to leave this place.”

  “No one does.”

  “Then maybe the MC should move here.”

  “Wouldn’t be special anymore. Besides, who’s got that many secrets?”

  “You’d be surprised,” I murmured, and he smiled a little.

  “You’re going to let me in on all of them, you know. You’ve already started. No going back now, no matter how hard you try.”

  And did I really want to go back? My future was scary as anything, but that future promised me a life.

  “So what does the MC do for you?”

  “We watch out for each other. Help through hard times. Keep the town safe. Drink, fight, tattoo, screw. And ride.” He smiled at “ride.”

  “You’re dangerous.”

  “If you’re the wrong person, yes.” He shrugged. “No different than any family.”

  “Any gang or mafia family.”

  “We’re a club, Calla,” he said seriously, before pulling me closer. I escaped his grasp, though, and sank to my knees in front of him.

  He ran a hand through my hair as I knelt between his legs. I’d never wanted to do that for anyone else in my twenty-three years.

  Ran a hand along his thigh, his muscles tensing under my palms.

  I wanted to make him lose it. Completely, one hundred percent lose it. He’d nearly done so at Tenn’s, but now that we were alone, would he let the facade drop more? Or was this him?

  No, it couldn’t be. I had walls high enough for armed guards, so I could recognize similar boundaries.

  I unzipped his jeans and tugged them down. He shifted to help me, and ran my finger over the head of his cock, avoiding the piercing for the moment.

  “Yeah.” He smiled as I looked up at him. I tongued the piercing and he hissed with pleasure, and then I took him into my mouth.

  His entire body tensed and he groaned my name as he bucked his hips up into me. I took him in again and again, sucking hard
er as he got more frantic. Until finally he tugged at me, saying, “Fuck, Calla . . . need to be inside of you when I come.”

  Reluctantly, I rose and stripped as he watched. And then he picked me up and flipped me to the couch bed and covered me.

  I was simply greedy for him—there was no other way to put it. I needed him to be mine, all mine—and the feeling seemed to be mutual, judging by the way he held me down and nipped along my tender flesh. Marking me.

  “Harder,” I told him. “I want to see marks there.”

  He stared down at me, his eyes blazing with lust. “You’re trying to kill me, Calla.”

  “Why would I do that? You couldn’t fuck me then.”

  He groaned and slid halfway down my body. He licked my cleft as I watched, unable to do more than grasp the sheets and pant. Between my legs was a pulse of pleasure. And then he licked his way back up my body, driving into me, hard and fast, like he couldn’t wait any longer. I knew I couldn’t.

  I buried my nose in his hair, the crook of his neck, and hung on while he took me. He was so completely, intensely male, and right at this moment he was one hundred percent mine.

  How he could so quickly demolish all the heavy walls I’d built around me—around my heart—I didn’t know. The tears that ran down my face did nothing to diminish the ferocity of my orgasm. And even as my core convulsed, I wanted more.

  It was a beautiful, brutal race to orgasm for both of us. My climax was a quivering, heated roll of delight as it uncoiled, rushing through me.

  * * *

  Affection was the most painful thing of all—the most dangerous too—because it dug into Cage’s heart and lied to him, told him everything would be all right.

  She was afraid of it too, maybe as much as she was of him. She didn’t trust it, or him, or her feelings.

  But goddamn, they made each other feel. He was all revved up and so was she. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes shone, and even with the death-defying race, this experience had proven something. They were both alive.

  Did anything else really matter now?

  Chapter 13