by Evelyn Glass
Dirk shrugged. “I guess,” he said again, carefully.
“To be honest,” she said, “I thought you were going to jerk me around for a little while longer.”
Dirk grinned. “So did I,” he admitted. “But I got tired of the game.”
Camilla’s face fell. “Oh.” She had no idea what was up with her. She should be happy that she had finally gotten him to give in. She should be ecstatic that she was finally allowed freedom of movement. Then why was she disappointed that it was over? Why was she already missing his hot body over hers?
“I’m not talking about the sex,” Dirk said, as if reading her mind. “That part I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of.” His smirk got wider.
Camilla tried to ignore the huge wave of relief that washed over her then. “So,” she began carefully, “you’re saying that I can walk around the house and I still get to have sex with you?” She had not meant to make it sound like such a prize, but she just couldn’t help it; the man was a sex god.
Dirk laughed. “Yes,” he said. “If you’d like,” he added again, for good measure.
Camilla couldn’t help but smirk back. “I think I’d like that very much.” She paused, frowning. “All parts of the house?” she asked, wanting to make sure that she really could walk around as she pleased.
“Yes,” Dirk confirmed. “All parts of the house. Of course, you can’t go outside.”
“Of course,” Camilla said grimly. She sighed. “I guess I’ll take what I can get.”
Dirk grimaced. “I’m sorry,” he said.
Camilla looked up, shocked. He sounded sincere. “For what?”
“All of it,” he said. “This whole situation. I know it can’t be easy for you. But we really don’t have any other choice.”
“Yeah, you do,” Camilla said grimly. “You could let me go.”
It was Dirk’s turn to sigh now. “You know we can’t do that. Do you want to get yourself killed?”
Camilla stared at him, unafraid to meet his gaze straight on. “Sometimes I really think you and you precious president are only using that as an excuse to keep me here.”
Dirk blinked, taken aback. To his credit, he had the good grace not to say anything.
“Anyway,” Camilla said after a few moments of silence, “thanks for finally granting me the freedom to stretch my legs.”
Dirk winced visibly, which surprised her. Was she really getting to him?
They finished their meal in silence, each of them lost in their own thoughts. Afterwards, Camilla selected a book from the library in the living room and retreated back to her room. She meant to explore the house that night, when Dirk was sleeping and she wouldn’t feel observed at all times. It unnerved her, the way he constantly seemed to keep an eye on her. The situation was becoming unbearable, to the point that Camilla almost wished the Tar Mongols would hit fast and hard, so that the Minutemen could put Ruiz and his gang back in their place and everything could finally be over. She couldn’t wait to be on a flight to New York—if the Minutemen ever put her on one. Even though she was getting to know Dirk, she really couldn’t bring herself to trust him just yet.
She settled on the bed and opened a fancy edition of Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues under the Sea. She wished that was where she could be, too. She wished she could be leagues away from California and the Mojave Desert. She wished she could be leagues away from the Minutemen and the Tar Mongols and their absurd, violent politics. But try as she might—and she really did try—Camilla couldn’t bring herself to wish that she could be away from Dirk Coleman.
***
The rest of Dirk’s house was just as eclectic as the part Camilla already knew. There was a studio with more books and papers and a desk, which was kept surprisingly orderly. There was a recreational room with a pool table and a jukebox and a collection of discs and vinyl that would be the envy of any radio station.
There was Dirk’s room, and Camilla imagined she would be allowed to enter it now that she had been granted wider access. However, she let it be for the time being; tonight wasn’t about sex. Tonight was about exploring. More important, it was about finding a way out. It was becoming more and more obvious that, if she ever wanted to be back in New York, she would have to find a way there on her own.
The front door was not an option, and neither was the back door in the kitchen. Sure, she could sneak outside, but then what? Running on foot through the desert seemed like an almost surer way of getting herself killed than being delivered to the Tar Mongols. She shuddered at the latter possibility. She had never met Herman Ruiz, and she was fairly certain she didn’t want to meet him. Ever.
She quickly decided that, if she were ever to get out of there, she would need transportation. The garage. The thought entered her mind suddenly, and she reprimanded herself for not having thought of it sooner. The garage was connected to the house through a door that emerged onto a flight of stairs, which, in turn, led to the hall. She could sneak down there and steal either Dirk’s beloved Harley-Davidson or his car. Camilla wished she could steal both, so that he would have no means to go after her, but she knew she would have to choose.
In the silence of the house at night, she sneaked over to the door in the hall. She wasn’t surprised to find it locked. She tried every key that hung on the wall by the front door, but none of them seemed to fit inside the lock. Cursing softly, Camilla went outside through the back door in the kitchen. Dirk didn’t bother locking that one, probably because he, too, knew that escaping on foot in the desert wasn’t something Camilla was stupid enough to do.
Camilla shivered in the night air of the Mojave Desert. She used to think that the desert was beautiful, but the recent events and her current predicament had led her to loathe the damn thing. She walked over to the garage door, and once again, she tried every key. And once again, none of them worked.
Camilla stared at the white, pristine garage door, taunting her with its impregnability. To her dismay, she quickly realized she had no way to get in. An image flashed through her mind then. Dirk’s powerful chest, heaving as he rode her. And dangling from his neck, a chain with two military plates and one key. She had no doubt that was the key to her freedom.
Disheartened, Camilla sat on the kitchen’s doorstep and looked up at the night sky. Thousands of stars blinked down at her, but for the very first time in her life, that majestic sight didn’t soothe her. She felt as though even the stars were mocking her with their twinkling.
Camilla took her head in her hands and sighed heavily. The need to escape was getting stronger by the minute, and now that she had some sort of a plan, it had become an all-consuming urge that made her skin crawl.
“Chilly night,” Dirk’s voice said from behind her.
Camilla jumped. She turned around and watched as he came to join her on the doorstep. Despite herself, she shifted to the side so that he could have enough room.
He, too, looked up at the sky, and unlike her, he seemed comforted by it.
“So,” he said, “plotting your escape?”
Camilla did her best to school her expression into one of stone that wouldn’t betray her emotions or the way her heart was hammering within her ribcage. “I’m not that stupid,” she said. “Where would I go on foot? Best case scenario, I’d end up as a coyote’s dinner.”
Dirk smiled. His eyes, however, were hard, and Camilla had the sinking feeling that he knew what thoughts had been going through her head. “That is indeed the best case scenario,” he said.
Camilla shivered, and it wasn’t the good kind of shiver that he usually elicited from her. She realized then that the familiarity that had been blossoming between them was not only (mostly) fake; it was also dangerous. Camilla had become too comfortable in Dirk’s presence, so much so that she had forgotten about just how dangerous he really was.
“Don’t play games with me, Camilla,” he said, as if reading her mind.
Camilla swallowed hard, and she didn’t care if he caught the gesture. “I
’m not playing games,” she said, and she was proud of the way her voice didn’t waver.
Dirk studied her for a few endless moments, and then he nodded. “Good.” He patted her knee and stood up. “Come back inside now. It’s cold out here.”
Camilla obeyed, because what else could she do? They went their separate ways, to their separate bedrooms, and Camilla burrowed under the covers. She thought of Kurt, back in New York. Was he looking for her? He probably was—he had to be. How was it possible that he had not found her yet? He had some of the best connections in the world of reporters. Were the Minutemen really that good at wiping their tracks?
Camilla exhaled sharply. They probably were. The Minutemen was no ordinary biker gang. The members were all veterans, military men who knew their way around. If anyone could baffle Kurt Davis, it was Stephan Walker and his MC. She shivered. A chill had settled into her bones, and she had the feeling it had little to do with the cold night air of the Mojave Desert.
Chapter 18
A couple of days later, Dirk woke up to an insistent sound hovering just at the edge of his consciousness. It took him a minute to realize that the ringing wasn’t just in his head but actually came from outside. He sat bolt upright, dislodging Camilla who had been asleep on his chest. They had taken to sleeping together after their hot encounters, and it was a habit that neither of them was willing to stop and really analyze.
“You should get dressed,” he told her as he jumped out of bed and did just that. “It’s probably one of the boys out there, and it’s not a good idea for them to figure out what we’re doing here.”
Camilla stared at him, bleary-eyed. Once his words finally registered, the expression on her face let him know that she thought that what they did in Dirk’s house was no one else’s business, but to her credit, she had the good sense not to say anything.
Dirk was already halfway through the door before she had even found her panties. “Camilla, seriously,” he said urgently, “hurry up.”
She glared at him, and he felt the familiar shiver that the fire in her green eyes always caused to run down his spine.
“I’m doing the best I can!” she snapped.
The doorbell rang again. Dirk cursed.
“I’m going downstairs,” he said. “When you join us, make sure they can’t tell you’re coming from my bedroom.”
She stared at him like he was crazy, but once again she didn’t argue, something for which he was incredibly grateful.
He hurried downstairs. His hand firmly clutched his gun, just in case. He didn't expect the Tar Mongols to have found out where he lived, but he still came prepared; it was a habit that had saved his life many times in the past. He peered at the screen in the hall that showed him the view from the security cameras scattered around the perimeter of the house. What he saw had his stomach in knots in one split second.
Stephan Walker was standing at his front door, peering impatiently up in the eye of the camera. Dirk swallowed. For Stephan to abandon the headquarters in the middle of a Tar Mongols crisis could only mean that trouble had hit the MC.
Dirk shoved the gun into the waistband of his jeans and took a deep breath. He reached the front door in a few long strides and threw it open.
Stephan’s hazel eyes glared daggers at him, and Dirk froze. He had only found himself on the receiving end of one of Stephan’s looks a handful of times, but it hit him every time; it was like being impaled by a hundred very sharp swords.
“You took your sweet time,” Stephan all but growled.
Dirk did his best not to flinch. Stephan Walker was a dangerous man on the best of days; on his bad days, he was downright lethal.
“I was—”
“Spare me,” Stephan cut him off sharply. “I can only imagine.”
Dirk swallowed and, to his horror, felt his cheeks heat up.
“Oh, relax,” Stephan snapped. “I couldn’t care less what you do in your own bed. Now are you going to let me in or what?”
Dirk jumped, realizing they were still in the doorway. He hurried aside and let Stephan walk past him. Dirk shot a quick look around outside to make sure that no one was spying on them, and then he closed the front door and bolted it. Stephan was making a beeline to the kitchen, and Dirk hurried after him.
“I need the blackest coffee you’ve got,” he announced as he took a seat at the kitchen island.
Dirk eyed him carefully. There were dark circles under Stephan’s eyes, and a quiet fire burning in the hazel irises. This could not be good.
“Why are you here?” Dirk asked as nonchalantly as he could, as he busied himself with preparing the requested coffee.
“We’ve got a problem,” Stephan said.
There was a dark tone in his voice that made Dirk turn around halfway through pouring the water in the pot.
Stephan waved a hand at him in dismissal. “Just make the coffee, Dirk. We’ll talk after.”
Dirk nodded wordlessly. It was too obvious that Stephan needed a moment to collect himself, which was terrifying enough. Stephan Walker was the most collected man Dirk had ever met; if he needed a moment, whatever had gone down must be worse than bad.
Dirk moved in silence through the kitchen, and he only spoke when he finally set two steaming mugs on the island’s counter and he took a seat across from his president. He spoke then, because Stephan had taken off his jacket and there were fresh bandages peering out from underneath the open V-neck of his white, cotton T-shirt.
“What happened to you?” Dirk asked, his eyes narrowing.
Stephan took a long sip of dark coffee before replying. “The Tar Mongols are what happened to me.”
Dirk frowned. “What?”
“They attacked the headquarters.”
Dirk felt his blood run cold with dismay and hot with rage at the same time. “When was this?”
“Two days ago.”
“Two d—? Why wasn’t I informed?”
“You would’ve come,” Stephan said simply. “I need you here. With her.”
Dirk stared at the man in disbelief. “You’d rather have me here babysitting than out there on the field with you guys?”
Stephan huffed impatiently. “I need you to keep an eye on her. You’re the only man I trust with the job. Everyone else is too sensitive to women’s curves.”
Dirk arched an eyebrow. “Uh…I’m sleeping with her, in case you forgot.”
“Exactly. So you’ve ruled out the temptation. I trust you to do your job even while you’re screwing her. I can’t say the same about anyone else in our midst. God bless them and their ever-present horniness.”
Dirk scowled. He couldn’t say that he agreed with what Stephan was asking of him, but—at the very least—he had to admit that the man had a point—as always. It infuriated him sometimes, the way Stephan was always right about pretty much everything.
“So this is the second attack those bastards unleash on us in the span of one week,” Dirk reflected darkly, remembering how five days ago he had taken Camilla from the MC’s headquarters in the middle of the night and brought her to his house in the desert. That attack had been stopped before Ruiz’s thugs could get to the headquarters. This time, it seemed, the MC had not been so fortunate.
“Yeah,” Stephan echoed, just as grimly. “Those fuckers are really getting cocky.”
“Was anyone else hurt?” Dirk asked.
“A few flesh wounds, nothing serious.”
Dirk nodded. “What about your wound?” he asked, knowing how Stephan tended to downplay his own injuries. “Are you all right?”
Stephan shrugged instinctively, and he winced when he did so. “I’m fine,” he said with a grunt. He looked up and met Dirk’s gaze. “They want her, Dirk,” he said quietly. “They want her bad enough that they’re risking storming into our home base.”
Dirk grimaced. Shit. That was definitely not good news. “What do you want to do?”
Stephan ran a hand nervously through his blond hair. “I don’t want to give he
r to them,” he admitted. “But we might not have a choice. It’s getting bad, Dirk.”
Dirk frowned. Something in Stephan’s voice made him pause. “How bad?” he asked. “What is it that you’re not telling me?”
Stephan sighed. He picked up his mug and took another long sip, and his hand trembled. Dirk’s stomach spasmed with renewed tension.
“Alex.”
Stephan said just that. “Alex.” One word. One name. And Dirk knew that Alex Hurley was dead.
Dirk clenched his fist so tight that his knuckles turned white. “You just told me no one else got hurt—”
“Not in the attack to our headquarters, no,” Stephan said.
