by Franca Storm
“Nah, you were right on.”
“I’m sorry, Slade. You need me, I’ve got you, all right?”
“Yeah, I know, brother. Appreciate it.”
“I’ll let you get back to it. See you in a couple of weeks now?”
“Yeah.”
“All right.”
We hung up and I blew out a breath and slumped down on the steps at the front of the safehouse, pocketing my phone in my leather jacket. There was a chill in the air, but I was welcoming it, all the stress lately making me sweat and overheat way too often. I’d been coming out here a lot for the last few days that I’d been here. The place was soothing and quiet. The log cabin was surrounded by nature, a wall of thick foliage on all sides. There weren’t a road for miles, so there was no traffic noise pollution. There was a river nearby that I could hear babbling, a real peaceful sound that helped to relax me at least a bit.
If there was one thing I’d learned over the years, it was that when the world was raging all around you, you had to take comfort in the little things, in whatever you could. It was the only way to remain sane.
That was getting harder and harder to maintain all the while I was rooted to one place, trapped. I didn’t do trapped well. It’s possible I might’ve had a slight bit of claustrophobia. Slight. But more than that, I was a take-action kind of man all the way. I liked to come and go as I pleased. The whole MC lifestyle itself was all about that, all about that kind of freedom, living life on your own terms. It weren’t by chance that I’d found my way into that life and stayed there for decades.
It was a real kick in the junk that the role as Prez actually had me feeling the opposite way about it all nowadays. I knew my age was also a factor. Getting older had you seeing things differently. Things that used to be a challenge became a burden. Things that used to get the adrenaline pumping became tiring. The sexual thrill of having so much pussy thrown at you became old hat and boring as hell. You couldn’t take the bullshit as well as you used to, couldn’t let it just roll off your back. You wanted a simple existence. You craved peace.
At least, that was how it’d played out for me.
I’d been planning all of this for months. Getting out. Stepping down. Leaving the club.
I already had a whole retirement plan worked out. I knew where I was gonna go, what I was gonna be doing, the whole deal. These last few months, sometimes just the idea of it had been the one thing that’d kept me going.
It was my anchor. There was no stopping me from making it a reality.
Nobody was gonna stand in my way.
Not even those two shitheads, Nolan and Freeman.
But if it turned out to be true about them teaming up together, they’d become a much more dangerous force.
When I’d been gearing up to lead the boys in the takedown of the Strikers MC, I’d gotten word at the last moment that Freeman was staying put back at the clubhouse, as some kind of last-resort defense because Nik had been worried that I’d send a strike team to his clubhouse as well, as a two-pronged attack strategy. Part of me wished that I had. But Liam getting shot and Cole nearly getting killed had been enough to stomach, enough pain to inflict on my boys. Heading to the Strikers clubhouse, a compound that was extremely heavily-fortified, would’ve wreaked way more havoc and caused some major damage, probably even some fatalities. At the end of the day, the club came first. Lives mattered above all else.
Freeman had been quiet since the takedown. No moves by him in months. It was looking like that hadn’t been him laying low at all, just gearing up for war.
I pushed off the steps and started pacing, trying to calm the adrenaline coursing through my system at the thought of it. I was itching to get confirmation on it, so I could act. A week spent twiddling my thumbs was bad enough. Knowing what might be happening out there right now was skyrocketing all that intensity to an unmanageable level.
I was on board for doing it Willa’s way, as long as it didn’t involve sitting still any longer.
She was a real good asset to have. She didn’t take shit, she was ruthless, and she had the experience in all this down and dirty shit. That whole hell bitch thing she had going on was really gonna come in handy.
But to do any of that, we couldn’t be as we were.
We had to be in sync.
There had to be trust and respect.
Goddamn it.
I had to fucking well apologize.
10
~Willa~
MY BACK HIT THE WALL.
It was barely a jar, barely an impact.
What the hell?
I slammed my hands up and out, breaking Slade’s grip easily and shoving him back a couple of steps. Way too easily.
I rolled my eyes. Unbelievable. “You’re holding back.”
He wiped the sweat off his brow and leveled that smirk of his at me. “Am I?”
God, he was infuriating. Standing there in all his powerhouse glory. He was wearing sweatpants and a muscle tee, nothing special, or as enticing as the leather jacket and jeans get-up that I was known for enjoying on a man. But the way he wore it was a whole other level. Pants hanging low on his hips, giving a tease of those chiseled grooves forming a sexy ‘V’ and dipping below the waistband. Sweat was dripping off him, making that gray muscle tee stick to his skin, emphasizing those cut-from-marble abs of his. It also didn’t help that every time he threw a punch, his muscles bunched and rippled. Rippling biceps didn’t even cover it with him.
The other night when I’d walked in on him training all-out had been bad enough of a temptation, but up close now and training with him was steps beyond that.
What did help for me to keep it in check was that he was being a fucking dumbass right about now.
I moved away and walked to the bench, snatching up the towel I’d left there earlier beside his. Dabbing off my face, neck, and chest, I told him, unable to check my pissed tone, “You apologized for the bullshit you spouted about my sex life. I accepted said apology. Then we both agreed that we need to be on the same page and in sync, going into this mission, from this point out. Training together and learning to mesh our fighting styles, tactical responses, and all of that, was the first step toward achieving that.”
“Yeah, I know. I was right there with you.”
“Then what the hell is this bullshit? For the last forty-five minutes you’ve been fighting like a pussy.”
Instead of taking offense, like I thought he would, a burst of laughter erupted from him. “Pussy, huh? Ain’t that offensive to women, seen as real sexist? Just like saying somebody hits like a girl?”
“I’m trying to speak in a language you understand.”
The humor vanished then and he bit back, “You know damn well I ain’t some fucking dumbass caveman.”
I did know that, but I also knew that he needed a push here to bring it, so taking a dig that would spark a reaction was the route to go.
Shifting my weight and assuming a fighting stance, readying myself for him, I said, “Let’s do this then.”
He held up his hand. “Chill, woman. We’re just sparring. We ain’t here to kick each other’s asses. Can’t be risking serious injury right now with the mission we got going on.”
I narrowed my eyes.
More talking.
Misdirection.
Avoidance.
Didn’t he get by now that I could see right through his bullshit tactics?
After all, they weren’t far off from mine.
“Slade,” I hissed.
He blew out a breath. “Jesus.” He shifted into a fighting stance, then crooked his fingers at me in a ‘bring it’ motion. “Take your best shot.”
“And you’ll take yours? Give me your best?”
“Yeah.”
I ran at him and threw a right cross. He dodged it well.
But that was what I’d intended.
As he veered away, I faked him out and spun into a roundhouse kick that connected hard.
He stumbled and I too
k the opening it offered me and moved in closer, intending to deliver an uppercut to his jaw to destabilize him further. After that, an elbow to the back should have him on the ground.
But Slade was far from green when it came to a fight.
He saw it coming and as I swung, he turned into it, snagged my arm, then leveraged it to slam me to the ground.
I rolled as I hit it hard, something a lot of training had made instinctual.
When I came up in a crouch, he was already there. He swept my leg out from under me and I collapsed onto my back.
In the next second, he straddled me, pinning me beneath him, his legs holding mine down, his hands grasping my wrists.
I grinned up at him.
I saw the worry there in his eyes, clearly wondering why amusement was my reaction and not concern about my predicament, or acknowledgement of my defeat.
“Good. You’ve stopped holding back.”
“That ain’t why you’re grinning.”
I tapped out.
He moved back, sitting up, straddling me. “Thought you didn’t want no holding back?”
“I don’t. But in this case, my next move was either a brutal headbutt, or twisting my hips sharply to the side and crushing your balls with my fist.”
He chuckled. “I know.”
“You do?”
“I’ve seen you fight, know how you operate. This training is just because you don’t know how I do it. You ain’t never seen me in a fight before. I know firefights don’t count with you.”
“They don’t. Anybody can fire a gun. Pretty much. It’s what happens when you don’t have that to hide behind or depend on that counts.”
“You wanted to know if you could take me.”
I nodded. “If it came down to it.”
“The thing is, darlin’, we ain’t never gonna find out the answer to that question,” he said, pushing off me and getting to his feet. “It’s because the only way to know is to go all-out and deliver some serious hurt to each other.” He offered me a hand up. “No way I’m going there with you. I can’t hurt you, all right? Ever.”
He can’t hurt me?
I bristled at the unintended reminder of when he’d done just that. Although, only emotionally. But for someone as closed-off and stoic as me, that was a hell of a thing, and not something I was used to dealing with.
I batted his hand away roughly and he moved away.
With a growl, I reared back and somersaulted to my feet. In the next beat, I was striding up to him, getting in his space, and demanding, “If that’s true, why did you pull that asshole move and stand me up that night at my old penthouse?”
“To spare you.”
Our eyes locked.
Sincerity was coming off him in waves.
That was easy to do when he was suffering from so much fucking denial.
“I didn’t need a chivalrous act, or a hero. I needed a choice.”
“That ain’t what—”
I grasped his arm. “Admit it. It wasn’t just about that.”
“What the fuck else would it be about?”
“You were scared.” I tightened my grip on his arm in my urgency. “After way too long without, you finally felt something, and it scared you.”
He pulled away, shaking his head.
But I wasn’t done pursuing it. It was something I’d wanted answers to, something I’d needed resolved for a long time. Whenever I came up for air between missions, it always came back to that, to him. And it bothered the hell out of me, because I should be better than that. I shouldn’t care. He shouldn’t have been able to get under my skin.
But he had.
He was still there, beyond skin deep.
“We knew each other well enough by then. Hell, we’re the same. You knew it. I knew it. What was there to be afraid of?”
“It weren’t fear!” he snapped. “It was good fucking sense.”
“Bullshit.”
With a snarl, he got in my space, looming over me. He stepped even closer, so close that his body was pressed against mine. Dipping his head, he leaned down, and spoke in a low rumble at my ear, “If I’d come to you that night, I never would’ve been able to let go. Neither of us were ready for that. Didn’t mean to hurt you. It was the last thing I wanted. I didn’t mean to take a choice away from you neither; you know I respect the hell out of you. But it had to be done back then.”
His lips brushed lightly against my cheek, his hand sliding into my hair. He held tight for a good few seconds.
Then I heard him sigh with regret and pull back. “And we ain’t ready for it now neither, darlin’.”
It took me a moment to recover from the intensity.
But then I gave a nod. “No. No, we’re not.”
With two people like us, what were the chances of that ever changing?
11
~Slade~
“I’VE GOT SOMETHING.”
I stilled, a second away from taking the first mouthwatering bite of the triple meat sandwich I’d just finished up making, when Willa burst into the kitchen.
Her perky tits bounced in her strappy black tank with her rapid movements. My gaze went lower, to the ripped gray jeans she had on that were so damned tight they could’ve almost been painted on. She was sporting a pair of combat boots. In the fucking house. The woman couldn’t relax even a little, no matter what. High-strung didn’t even cover it.
“Got what?”
“Best if I show you.”
I gave a nod, then went to take the sandwich with me, but she shook her head.
Fuck. Fine.
She’d made it clear that there weren’t no food or drinks allowed in her office, around all that expensive and real-hard-to-obtain equipment packed in there. I might’ve had a rep as being an asshole in a lot of ways, but I wasn’t a complete dick through and through. Besides, I was a guest in her home and she was helping me out. The least I could do was respect her rules, no matter how anal I thought some of them were. It was for the good of our partnership.
I dropped the sandwich back down on the plate and muttered, “After you, darlin’.”
I followed her down the hall to the last room on the right. She rushed through the open door and I strode in after her, watching her hurriedly running around the main desk in there and hopping onto her chair, her attention riveted on her laptop.
She spared me a quick glance, before announcing, “You were right.”
“How’s that?” I asked, coming right up to her desk.
Damn, I still couldn’t believe this fucking room. She simply called it her office, but it was way more than just a room in the safehouse with a desk and a computer. There was a wall of monitors fixed to the desk, eight in total, and God knew how many computers with all the gear obscuring some areas. There were at least two laptops as well, multiple keyboards to go along with everything. She had multiple VPNs setup. There were command windows open all over the place. Some of the monitors depicted a bunch of camera angles and views on a single screen, from surveillance feeds she had running all over the place, keeping an eye on key players, former clients, enemies, and potential threats. It was an intelligence center, a tech nerd’s wet dream, for sure.
Willa sat back with a heavy sigh and I could see it in her then, not for the first time, how heavy she felt, that the burden she carried on her shoulders was getting to her. That night in the basement gym had been the first time she’d admitted it outright to me in such a blatant way. And I’d seen further proof during these weeks I’d been under the same roof as her, in such close quarters.
The cracks were there.
As much as I hated having a reaction to somebody else’s pain and suffering, because of the compromise it could mean to me and my need to stay stoic and levelheaded, it was there. It was because I knew. I knew how that felt. It clawed at you like a merciless beast that wouldn’t be satisfied until it had your guts, blood, and soul. It wouldn’t let go until hope and strength were just old, worthless memories. Until it decim
ated you.
“Well?” I pressed her.
“Like I said, you were right. And before I tell you the details of what I’ve unsurfaced, I want to know what you’re planning.”
“Planning?”
“I know you. I have a very good understanding of how your mind works. You have your own plan in your back pocket ready to pull out if you don’t agree with where I’m going to take this mission.”
Well, she wasn’t exactly wrong. But it didn’t have the intention she thought it did. It wasn’t to overrule her, or screw her over, or go behind her back, nothing like that.
“You know me as well as you claim, then you know I’m a real good tactician. I see shit others don’t, shit they can’t. It’s what’s kept me alive through all the crap that’s come at me trying to take me out.”
She stared at me.
Nah, it was more than even that.
Those deep-blue eyes of hers looked like they were literally trying to pierce right through my gaze. She was trying to see down deep, past all the blocks I had in place, that titanium-strength wall I kept up to everybody. It was the look I gave people to draw out what was inside, to get to the truth and the heart of things. The irony was so fucking bitter, I couldn’t stand it, and it had a rumbling chuckle bursting out of me.
“Seriously? There’s humor to be found here?” she groused.
“You know, darlin’, sometimes humor’s all we got left when shit hits the fan.”
She arched an eyebrow. “And sometimes people do whatever they can to avoid answering a question.”
“You’re crazy intense. Anybody ever tell you that?”
“Slade,” she groused.
I pushed out of the chair and walked up to her at the desk. “I’m serious. It ain’t good to be that way all the time.”
“Stop playing games and just answer the question.”
As I rounded the desk and stopped right in her space, I held up my hands in mock-surrender, “No games. Just calling it like it is. Giving you a piece of advice right from the mouth of somebody who’s spent way too much time being nothing but intense. It ain’t healthy and it ain’t sustainable. It wears you down. Big time.”
