The Other Half of Me: (Dragon Skulls MC)

by Rose Briner

“Get lost,” I grunt at her as I remove her filthy hands from my cut. Seriously some of these women just make me want to gag. I think we need to start screening the women who come here.

  She wisely shuts her mouth when she sees the look on my face and saunters away, no doubt in search of another member who wants to play with her. I’ve never really been into the club whores, the only one I ever played with was Daisy. Speaking of which she’s visibly missing tonight.

  “Figs,” I say, turning my attention back to the old timer. “Figs,” I growl again when he doesn’t respond.

  “What?” he groans as he pushes Candy further down his length. I look up at the ceiling and pray for strength to finish this conversation.

  “What the fuck did you give Nat?” I ask in annoyance.

  “Strong sedative, makes her very complacent and agreeable, doesn’t it?” he chuckles like he’s telling me some funny joke that I don’t comprehend.

  “You’re lucky your high motherfucker, or I’d take you outside and wipe the floor with you. I don’t want her complacent; I liked her just the way she was,” I growl as I push away from him and walk out the door without looking back. I hear Fig calling my name, but I don’t dare turn around. I’d kill the motherfucker. I start to lose my footing as I step outside and the cold air hits my face.

  My head fills with images of Bear, my mother, and another dead body, Viper. I hold the wall as images of my hands covered in blood assaults me. I can hear myself screaming as I stare down at my bloody hands.

  My butt hitting the dirt outside the clubhouse makes me realize I’m screaming as I stare down at my clean hands.

  I sit there for a while, turning my hands over and over, searching for traces of the blood.

  This isn’t a good sign. I haven’t seen those images in a long time. I force the images from my mind as I stand and remember I need to get Natalie some new painkillers.

  “Fuck!” I shout as I kick my bike. What if that sedative is why she let me fuck her and now that it's worn off, she doesn’t want to be in my bed anymore? I don’t like the feeling that rushes through me at the thought of her not wanting to be with me anymore. My chest suddenly tightens at the thought. I struggle to focus on her as the darkness calls out to me again.

  It’s always there, just offshore, begging me to let it in, always searching for a weak point to gain entry. So far, I’ve managed to keep it there. I need it to stay there. Thinking of Natalie, focusing all my energy on her seems to be helping, so I use that for now. Hopefully, that will always be enough to keep it at bay.

  I quickly mount my bike and rev the engine as I take off full speed towards the gate. Tim is used to my aggression so he quickly opens the gate so I can exit. I almost don’t clear the gate this time, but don’t care to look back and see if I ran him over on my way out.

  I drive around for more than an hour before I pull into the twenty-four-hour pharmacy we have here in town. I grunt as I push the door open and search around for the aisle I want.

  “Hey Thunder, haven’t seen you in a while,” calls Mike from behind the counter. Mike has been the owner of this pharmacy since it opened back in the eighties, we’re part of the reason he’s open year-round. We’ve come in here more than one time in the middle of the night looking for supplies.

  “Hey, Mike, how’s is going?” I ask as I approach the counter and shake his hand.

  “Not bad, a little slow tonight,” I look out at the street and let out a laugh. The road is empty of cars. “What can I do for you? Tim came and picked up the club’s supplies last week, do you need more?”

  “No,” I say turning my attention back to him. “I need something for pain, but I don’t want the medication to be too strong. Someone thought it would be funny to give a friend of mine something that made her a zombie,” I smile even though I’m low on humor tonight and it isn’t funny. I just don’t want to scare Mike. Images of Fig laughing crosses my mind, so I shake my head to clear the image.

  “Let me see what I have back here,” Mike says as he moves around back and disappears.

  “Friend?” calls a voice from behind me. I squeeze my eyes shut and pinch the bridge of my nose, hoping I’m hearing things right now. “Since when do you have friends that are girls?”

  Her sickly-sweet perfume hits me even before I turn to face her. I plaster a fake some on my face before I turn to face her.

  “Daisy, what are you doing here?” I ask as I look her over. Surprisingly she’s wearing jeans and a long sweater tonight. She hasn’t been by the club this evening; that’s not her usual get-up.

  “Just came to pick up some supplies, my mother isn’t feeling well,” she says as she approaches and wraps an arm around my waist.

  Out of habit, I pull her closer to me as she wraps her arms around me. Like I hand her an invitation or something.

  “I can come by later and see you if you’d like,” she says as she reaches her hands up and runs her hands up underneath my shirt. I close my eyes and allow her to touch me. “You look like you need some comfort tonight,” she says as she leans into me and hugs me close to her.

  “This should work for your friend,” Mike says as he comes out, not bothering to look up as he reads the bottle in his hand.

  I feel like someone just dumped a bucket of cold water over my head. I quickly push Daisy away from me as I pull out my wallet and pull some bills out of my pocket and hand them over to Mike, not even caring how much I give him.

  “How often should these be taken?” I ask as I look the bottle over.

  “That’s strictly a pain reliever, like the other over the counter drugs, this one is just a little stronger. She can take it every four hours as needed,” he offers me a small smile, but his smile fades when he looks over at Daisy. He’s not a big fan of Daisy either, most people around here aren’t.

  “Thanks,” I lift the bottle in thanks and walk out the front door.

  I look back inside as Daisy quickly pays for her items and rushes outside to catch me before I take off. I’m fixing the strap on my helmet when she reaches me.

  “So, should I come by later?” she asks hopefully as she touches my leg and runs her hand up my thigh. I don’t like the way my dick twitches in my pants when I feel her hand on my leg.

  “I’m seeing someone,” I grunt at her as I push up my kickstand and take off into the distance, leaving her standing in a cloud of smoke.

  I probably just opened an entire can of worms I didn’t want to. Now she knows there’s someone else and it won’t be long before she comes to find out who.

  I should feel guilty for telling her the way I did, but I don’t. I don’t owe her a damned thing.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Natalie

  My head is pounding by the time I wake up the next morning to find the sun shining brightly outside and right on my face as I sit up and try to reorient myself. Parker is nowhere to be found in the room, and the other side of the bed looks like he didn’t sleep here at all last night.

  Confusion fills me as I look around me, there’s a bottle of pills next to me and a note that says take me as needed. That’s it, no signature, no note saying I’ll be back later, absolutely nothing.

  I reluctantly take two, hoping that I might feel better after taking it. I think about going back to sleep after I take them, but force myself to get up and get dressed. I think about attempting to shower, but I’ll probably slip and fall in the shower. Besides, I’m curious to find out what happened to Parker. I search everywhere in the house looking for any sign of him but come up empty handed. I do hear a noise outside the door, so I quickly go back to the room and pull on my skeleton converse and my club jacket before heading outside.

  I hope to find Parker sitting on the swing chair outside, but my heart falls when I see Tim sitting there instead.

  “Good morning, Natalie,” greets Tim as he stands and offers me a small smile.

  “Where is he?” I ask not even bothering with formalities.

  His smile falters mom
entarily before he pastes it back onto his face. “Thunder went to work,” he states as he looks off into the distance and in the direction of the gate now opening. I watch as a cleaning van pulls up to the gate and exits once it opens.

  Figures they would hire a cleaning service to clean this place up. I bet its real dirty in the clubhouse with only men hanging out in this place.

  It just now occurred to me that he never told me where he works.

  “He work around here?” I ask hopefully as I look around.

  “Nope,” says Tim. “He owns Dragon Skull Tattoos on the other side of town,” he replies as he looks around like he’s looking for someone or something.

  “Is Drag here?” I ask hopefully as I eye the bikes lined up outside the clubhouse. No point in asking Tim questions about it or for him to take me there, he doesn’t seem to want to have this discussion with me.

  “He is, why don’t you go ahead and head on over and I’ll be there in a few? I need to make sure the house is secured before I go that way,” he looks seriously at the house before he looks back at me. I bet Parker told him he’d cut off one of his balls if he didn’t secure the house.

  I nod once as I step off the porch and start to walk.

  I’m almost to the doors when a noise coming from a garage to my right has me stopping and moving off in that direction. Inside, I see another biker working on a Harley that’s propped up on a stand. It isn’t Parker, but I should try to introduce myself to some of the members if I plan to stick around here.

  The man, who has his dark brown hair in a braid turns his head towards the bike, and I see the longest beard I have ever seen. That thing must go all the way down to the top of his chest. He’s a little shorter than Parker and little older, but he’s twice his size in bulk. This man looks like a beast.

  I start to take a few steps back, but the crunch of some branches behind me has him turning to face me as he sets down the wrench in his hand down on top of the bike.

  He gives me a sinister smile when he’s done looking me over. “You new here?” he asks as he takes a few steps in my direction. I don’t like the way he’s looking at me like I’m meat at a buffet.

  “H-hi, I’m Natalie,” I stutter as I hold a hand out in front of me.

  “You must be new around here,” he says as his smile turns into a satisfied grin and he reveals his perfect white teeth for me. “I’m Dean, don’t be shy, come over here and say hi,” he says as he reaches for my hand and pulls me up flush against him and traps me between his bike and himself.

  Shit, what am I supposed to do now?

  I take a deep gulp as he runs one of his large hands down the side of my face, “I think I’m going to like you, a little too much clothes, but I can fix that problem real quick. I’m almost done here why don’t you meet me-”

  I squeeze my eyes shut as that same hands start to make its way down to the hem of my shirt.

  He’s suddenly gone from in front of me, and a massive crash has me opening one eye to look at what happened to Dean.

  He’s lying in the corner now, currently scowling at Tim who is towering over him.

  “You want to die, prospect?” Dean challenges as he rights himself and pulls a gun out from his waistband.

  “I don’t, but if you don’t want to die, you won’t ever touch that girl again,” he states, unfazed by the gun being pointed at his face. He instead points in my direction and signals for me to walk further away. That gun is being pointed dangerously close to me since Tim is standing between the two of us in case Dean tries to come back for me again.

  “What the fuck are you talking about, prospect? All pussy around here is free game if it’s not wearing a patch and you know it, besides that pussy over there looks like it needs to be tapped. You want to play don’t you darling?” Dean asks, turning his gaze to me as I move slowly off into the distance. Thankfully he doesn’t turn the gun on me as he continues to point his weapon at Tim.

  “That one doesn’t have a patch yet, but that’s Thunder’s girl, and if you don’t want to be missing a dick by the end of tonight, you’ll step off the girl,” Tim orders him as he looks over at me and then back over at Dean.

  “That true, girl?” he asks me pointedly. When I don’t answer, he cocks his gun and focuses his aim right at Tim’s chest. “Answer me,” he orders as he slowly gets to his feet and towers fully over Tim.

  “I’m Thunder’s girl,” I answer slowly.

  “What the fuck is going on in here?” a voice booms behind us. Drag sounds extremely upset right now. “Dean put that fucking gun away, now,” he orders in a subtle but threatening voice.

  Dean quickly complies, clicking the safety back into place before placing the gun back in the band of his jeans.

  “Someone going to answer me around here?” I turn to find that he’s not looking at me. I quickly move behind him for protection as Dean looks in my direction before looking over at Tim.

  He hugs me close to him when he feels my hands on the back of his cut.

  “This one here claims that whore there belongs to Thunder,” he laughs like he’s telling some funny joke.

  “He’s not kidding,” Drag deadpans as he scowls at Dean.

  “Did he hurt you?” he asks me as he pulls my chin up towards him. I shake my head, no, so he turns his attention back to Dean, “you ever touch her again, and I will personally cut your dick off,” he states as he turns away from them. “Forget about Thunder doing it; I’ll do it.”

  He turns at the last second and motions for Tim to follow us. I look back one final time and look at Dean and don’t like the look on his face as he stares back at me. “Good work Tim, don’t leave her alone again.” He’s quiet when he says it, but I can sense the underlying threat in his voice.

  “Yes Pres,” he replies quietly as he moves back in the direction of the front gate.

  “What were you doing out here alone?” Drag asks me as he pulls me inside the clubhouse and into one of the back rooms. He shuts the door behind us, not giving me a chance to look around as he motions for me to take a seat in the chair in front of us.

  “No one told me not to come out here. Tim said you were here and to go ahead and go,” I tell him as I take a seat in the chair and watch as he rounds the desk and sits in the chair on the other side and props his boots up on the corner of his desk.

  “No one here knows you, Nat, you need to be more careful. We have a lot of women who hang out around here; they are in all sense of the term, club whores. Basically, they are open pussy for the guys, and any man can have them with no questions asked if they aren’t wearing a property patch. You don’t have one which is why Dean went after you. If Tim hadn’t come along and I hadn’t heard the commotion, he would’ve raped you, and I would have a dead prospect on my hands, and then I would have to kill my Sergeant.”

  “Sergeant?” I question as I tilt my head to the side. I was unaware we were on a military base.

  “Of course, you would focus on only that detail, wouldn’t you? Don’t worry about that; that’s club bullshit and not your concern. Where’s Parker?” he asks as he puts his feet back down on the floor.

  “I don’t know,” I mumble as I look down at my hands.

  “What was that?” he asks loudly. He's obviously irritated today.

  “I don’t know where he is, we had an argument last night about the paternity of Brandon, and he flipped out on me, and I haven’t seen him since,” I tell him shamefully. “I didn’t mean to upset him, I don’t even know what happened, we were perfectly fine and then suddenly it was like a switch turned off, and his face changed,” I tell him sadly.

  “Come here,” he commands softly, motioning for me to come around the desk. I quickly comply, coming to stand before him with my hands clasped together in front of me. I yelp when he pulls me down onto his lap and sits me sideways like Santa does when children sit on his lap.

  “You are like a daughter to me, you know that right?” he asks me softly as he hugs me against him. �
�Parker has a lot of things he doesn’t like to talk about, I’ll speak to him about it, I can’t tell you these things, they need to come from him, but until he does, just be there for him. He cares a lot about you, but this is all new to him, he’s not used to feeling the way he does right now, and he’s going to need time to cope with that.”

  I look up at him in confusion, “He’s not used to having women in his bed?”

  He chuckles softly, “What I mean is that he’s not used to caring about the women who share a bed with him. I can’t speak for him, but I know he’d protect you with his life.”

  I sit there for a while and let this information process. I’m just going to have to take this one day at a time and hope that he decides to share himself with me. If he doesn’t, I may not be able to survive his moods. One day gone and I already feel like someone punched a hole in my chest where my heart used to be.

  “Okay, Roman thanks,” I tell him quietly. I know I can only call him that in private, he’s told me this before. I couldn’t figure out at the time why he was telling me this, but now that I am here, I can quickly put two and two together.

  I stand and prepare to walk out when he stops me.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” he asks from behind me. I turn to face him and find him standing there with his arms crossed over his chest. “What did I tell you? The guys here don’t know you, and you aren’t wearing a patch,” he opens the drawer in his desk and pulls out a smaller cut that says Property of Drag on the back. “This belonged to Dorothy, but I want you to wear this when you are walking around here,” he tells me as he walks around the desk and helps me put it on. “She doesn’t need it anymore. The guys know if they touch her, she’ll cut off their balls.” Somehow that isn’t hard for me to believe.

  “Thank you for taking such good care of me, Roman,” I smile up at him as tears fill my eyes. “You remind me of how a dad would take care of his daughter,” I tell him as I reach my arms up to hug him.

  His laugh rumbles through his chest and vibrates my body as he wraps his arms around me and fills me with warmth, “Don’t call me Roman anymore,” he suddenly declares, confusing me even more. He’s the one who told me to call him that. “Pop suits me better, don’t you think?”