by Susan Stoker
They couldn’t look more different. No one ever guessed they were sisters. Where Angel was tall, slender, and light, Mickie was curvy and dark. She kept her black hair short and couldn’t care less about makeup, fashion, or pleasing those around her. She said what she wanted to say, and to hell with what others thought. On the other hand, Angel wore full makeup in the sixth grade and had dated more boys than Mickie could even remember.
Angel’s words had hurt, but Mickie was sadly used to them. She didn’t want to take notice, but she couldn’t help it. Anytime Angel didn’t want to hear what Mickie was telling her, she’d strike back at her sister’s looks or her disastrous marriage. There were days Mickie thought she looked good, but Angel’s words could still sometimes hit her where she was most vulnerable, and she’d fall back into believing she wasn’t as pretty as her sister.
Angel was also always telling her that she would never talk to her again, but Mickie knew the next time her sister needed something, she’d conveniently forget anything she’d said in the past and call her for help.
Ignoring the hurt in her belly, Mickie thought about this Ransom guy. He completely freaked her out. He was bad news, and she knew she’d never forgive herself if she didn’t try to warn Angel. Even if they didn’t get along, Mickie still loved her. She was her sister. Her younger sister. The girl who’d held her hand when she was small. Who Mickie had mostly raised. Mickie had known going into lunch that it was a long shot to try once more to talk Angel out of dating the president of the motorcycle club, but she’d had to try.
Mickie had to give Angel one thing, Ransom was a good-looking man. He was in his mid-forties and had dark brown hair. He had a beard, but it wasn’t one of those beards that were long and straggly looking. Ransom kept it neatly groomed. It hung about an inch below his chin and actually looked soft. He was a few inches taller than Angel, probably a bit over six feet. He wasn’t all muscle, he could probably stand to lose about fifteen pounds, but he wasn’t obese. The few times Mickie had seen him, he’d been wearing his leather vest with nothing underneath. He didn’t have a beer belly, but there was no six-pack present either.
All in all, he wasn’t a troll, but it was the look in his eyes that freaked Mickie out the most. They were cold. Cold, hard, and empty, as if he didn’t have any morals and didn’t give a crap if what he did hurt someone else. And that was the thing. Mickie didn’t want Angel to be the one he didn’t care about hurting.
Mickie had done a bit of research about Ransom and his motorcycle club. It was really a gang. They called themselves the Red Brothers, or Hermanos Rojos, and one story had claimed it was because of the amount of blood they’d spilt around the city.
If that wasn’t enough to scare the hell out of Mickie, she read that they’d been involved in drugs, owned a strip club that had been busted for prostitution more than once, and one member of the gang had been put in prison for murder the year before.
Every man in the gang had a tattoo that said “Loyalty to One,” whatever that meant. Mickie had seen a picture of the tattoo on a newspaper exposé of the club. The men in the gang apparently were “honored” with the ink once they were voted in as full members. It was huge, and spanned their entire backs, from shoulder to shoulder and down to just above their butts. It was a takeoff of lady justice, but instead of being a woman, it was a man sitting on a motorcycle. He was holding a pistol in one hand in place of a sword, and rather than the scales of justice, he was holding up the severed head of a man who had been blindfolded. The letters RB were on one side of the vest the man on the motorcycle was wearing, and on the other side was the letter R. Above the image were the words “Loyalty to One” in beautiful scrolled letters.
The entire tattoo was creepy as hell, and Mickie couldn’t believe that anyone would voluntarily get it put on their back permanently.
Even the women who hung around the men in the club were hard and scary looking. The same exposé about the gang included the tattoos the women got that read, “Property of…”, and listed the man they belonged to. The words were put on the backs of their necks, as well as on their lower stomachs. One woman who was interviewed had proudly claimed they were inked in both places so no matter how their man was “doing them,” they could see the brand on their skin.
Mickie shivered. She liked reading romance novels herself, and even liked the ones that portrayed submissive women to their dominant men, but she didn’t think these MC relationships were like that.
Angel was twenty-four years old; more than old enough to make her own decisions, but Mickie knew this wasn’t the right choice. But obviously trying to talk sense into her sister hadn’t done any good.
Mickie sighed and kept her eyes closed as she rested her head on her hands and tried to figure out what she was going to do next.
* * *
Cruz held his breath and tried to filter through what he’d just heard. He was sitting in the booth behind Angel and her sister. He’d arrived just after Angel, having followed her with the tracking device Ransom had planted in her purse.
Everything Mickie had tried to tell her sister had been dead-on correct. Ransom had been right in his assessment of Angel, she wasn’t very smart, but she was beautiful. Cruz felt bad for the sister. He hadn’t gotten a good look at her because he’d already been seated behind Angel when Mickie had come into the restaurant, and she’d come at the booth from the opposite direction of the one he was sitting in.
Angel hadn’t sugar-coated her words, and Cruz had flinched when she’d laid into Mickie about her looks. No woman liked hearing she wasn’t pretty.
While Cruz didn’t have any brothers or sisters, he did have good friends he considered his family. If they wanted to warn him about a girlfriend, he might not necessarily agree with them, but out of respect, and due to his history with his ex and, yes, love, he’d listen to what they had to say.
The fact that Angel wouldn’t even listen to Mickie was telling. She was used to getting her way and doing what she wanted. Spoiled was how Cruz would characterize her. Ransom wasn’t the smartest person Cruz had ever met, but he wasn’t stupid either. He couldn’t be and have clawed his way to being the president of the MC. He’d chosen well in Angel. She was pretty, stubborn, spoiled, and clueless. She’d most likely do exactly what Ransom wanted her to do, including trying to sell her friends drugs if it came down to it. Damn.
He didn’t like Ransom’s threat against Angel’s sister. It was obvious he had plans for Angel, and if her sister did somehow convince her that Ransom was bad news, the MC President wasn’t going to be happy. He didn’t even know the woman sitting in the booth behind him, but if her stubborn tone was anything to go by, she wasn’t going to let the matter of her sister dating Ransom drop. The president was right to be worried about her.
Ransom’s not-so-vague threat about hurting his pseudo-girlfriend’s sister echoed in his mind. If Ransom had no issues asking Cruz to hurt her, he wouldn’t have any problem ordering any of the other members of the club to do it as well. Cruz knew without a doubt that Ransom would do it too. He’d have her hurt to keep her away from Angel. And that was unacceptable. Cruz couldn’t exactly warn her off without blowing his cover, but he could try to stick close to make sure Ransom didn’t get near her. It wasn’t a perfect plan, but if she got hurt and he didn’t do anything to prevent it, he’d feel like shit. If push came to shove, he’d tell Ransom he was tailing the sister and keeping his eye on her. That should buy them both some time. If Ransom thought the sister was under control, maybe he wouldn’t sic anyone else on her.
He thought about what his next steps were. He was supposed to meet Angel in a couple of hours and bring her into the lion’s den, but he knew what he had to do before then. He’d ditched the idea of getting close to Angel because Ransom had been keeping her far away from the club up until now. He was gathering quite a bit of information without having to involve the woman, which was a relief.
Cruz got up and left the restaurant, going the long way aroun
He put his leather vest, which the members of the club called a cut, in the trunk of the small black piece-of-shit car the FBI had given him for the assignment. He’d wanted to have a Harley, but he’d been denied by the bean counters at the FBI. Damn the government and their budget cuts. They’d argued the expense was only worth it for long-term undercover assignments, not his short-term one. Cruz could’ve used his own bike, but didn’t want to risk it getting wrecked, confiscated, or stolen while on assignment.
So Cruz had sucked it up and taken the shit from the Red Brothers about his lack of a bike. It wasn’t normal for a prospect not to have a motorcycle, but somehow they’d bought it…with the groundwork story laid by the other agent in the southern club about how his previous bike had been stolen.
Cruz took out a pair of sneakers and exchanged his black boots with the zippers and rings on them for the more normal shoes. He also pulled a black T-shirt over his tank top, and even tucked it into his jeans to try to look more respectable. Cruz ran his hand briefly over his short crew cut. There was nothing he could do about the stubble on his face. It was too short to be called a beard, but too long to really be called a five o’clock shadow.
He took a deep breath and headed back into the restaurant toward the sister’s table. Here went nothing.
* * *
Mickie didn’t know how long she’d been sitting at the table with her forehead resting on her arms when she heard someone talking to her. She lifted her head and saw an absolutely beautiful man standing next to her table.
She looked around, thinking he must have the wrong table, but when she gazed back up at him, he was looking down at her and smiling.
“I’m sorry, did you ask me something?”
“Merely if you were all right. I saw your companion leave and you looked distraught, so I thought I’d check on you.”
Holy freaking hell. Mickie looked around again, trying to see if someone was playing a joke on her. When she didn’t see anyone, she looked back at the man standing next to her table.
He was tall. So tall Mickie had to tilt her head up to see him clearly. She’d always had a thing about tall men. There was nothing that made her feel safer than a man who towered over her. But then again, most men were taller than her five feet six inches.
He was wearing a tight, black T-shirt that didn’t hide his extremely muscular arms. Even his forearms were tight and bulging with muscles. Mickie could just see the tip of a tattoo peeking out from the left sleeve of his shirt. It was done in shades of black, with no other color. Even though she couldn’t make out what it was, she suddenly wished she could explore it in depth.
The man’s jeans were well worn and tight in all the right places. His crotch was at her eye level and Mickie blushed and quickly brought her eyes back up to his face, trying to ignore the bulge that more than filled out his pants. His hair was black, like hers, but cut military-precision short. He had facial hair that looked rough, and Mickie briefly wondered what it might feel like against her skin. Would it be prickly, or soft?
She shook her head. She had to get herself together. “I’m okay. Thanks for asking.”
“Are you sure? May I sit?”
The man gestured at the empty seat across from her. Mickie frowned. She wanted him to, she really did, but what was the point?
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why do you want to sit with me? You don’t know me. I don’t know you. You, looking like you do, can’t possibly be interested in me, so why would you waste your time?”
The man shifted, leaned one hip against the table, and crossed his arms over his chest. He didn’t look pissed at her words, but instead seemed amused. “I want to sit with you because I’ve been watching you since you walked in. I noticed you right off. You’ve got a cute little sway to your walk and I liked what I saw. You’re correct in that we don’t know each other, but I’m trying to remedy that. I don’t know why you think I can’t possibly be interested in you, but you’re wrong. I’m probably overstepping some social boundaries by telling you so, but there it is. So as I see it, I’m not wasting my time at all. In fact, I can’t think of anything I’d rather be doing right now than sitting here talking and getting to know you.”
Mickie could only gape at the man. What. The. Hell?
“My name is Cruz. I’m very glad to meet you.”
Mickie looked at the hand the man held out to her. She glanced at the other hand resting on the table, no rings. His fingernails were short and well groomed. Mickie mentally shrugged and reached out to him with her own hand.
“Michelle, but I go by Mickie.”
“It’s great to meet you, Mickie. So, may I sit?”
Mickie found herself nodding. Holy shit. This wasn’t like her, but there was no way she could turn this man down. If nothing else, she’d bring this memory back out later and bask in feeling good about herself for the first time in a long time. His attention soothed the hurt feelings from Angel’s words.
Cruz eased into the seat across from Mickie. He was surprised by how attractive he found her. After hearing Angel’s words, he’d assumed she’d look very different than she did. He was a bit ashamed of himself for thinking the worst. Mickie’s hair was cut short, but still managed to frame her face in a way that was very pretty. She had large brown eyes and her lips were plump, especially since she kept nervously chewing on them with her teeth. Cruz couldn’t see her body with the table in the way, but what he saw definitely wasn’t a turn off. Her breasts were on the full side, way more than the A cup his ex’s had been. And he had to be at least a foot taller than her.
She was the complete opposite of her sister…and his ex. Sophie had been slim, and even though Mickie was shorter than him, she was curvy. She probably thought she carried too much weight, but ever since discovering Sophie’s slight frame had been the result of years of drug abuse, Cruz much preferred a woman who looked healthy. And Mickie certainly fit that bill.
He continued scrutinizing her. He watched as Mickie brought a hand up and smoothed her short hair back behind one ear nervously. She was wearing a light purple shirt that dipped low in front, showing off a hint of cleavage. Her eyes would meet his, then skitter away nervously. Her modesty and nervousness was endearing…and suddenly the entire undercover mission took a weird turn for Cruz.
He’d only meant to get to know her a bit today so he could accidently run into her again later and talk to her, stick close to her to make sure Ransom didn’t get some bright idea to do something drastic to keep her away from Angel. But suddenly Cruz wished he really was sitting here with no agenda and with no other motive than to get to know the woman sitting in front of him. Somehow he knew he could really come to like her.
If he wasn’t undercover, and wasn’t trying to keep her safe from a psychotic motorcycle club president, he might have seriously considered dating her.
“So, Mickie, you never did tell me if you’re all right or not.”
“I’m okay. Just a sister thing.”
“Ah…”
“You have any brothers or sisters?”
Cruz decided right there to be as honest as he could with Mickie. If he was going to have to deceive her, he wanted to keep things as real as possible as long as he could. “No, I’m an only child. My parents wanted more, but it didn’t ever happen. I do have some friends I consider my siblings, but I know it’s not the same thing. You? Only one sister?”
“Yeah. She’s way younger than me. My parents thought they were done having kids, then she came along.”
“Wow, was that tough on you?”
“Yes and no. I was still young enough that I thought it was cool at first. She was my own living doll. Then my parents became less and less interested in raising another daughter, so the job mostly fell to me.”
Cruz reached across the table and put his hand on Mickie’s. “I’m sorry, that sounds tough.” He pulled his hand back and leaned forward on his elbows. He’d wanted to keep his hand on hers, but knew it would be weird since they didn’t really know each other. “I’m sure your sister appreciates everything you’ve done for her.”
She gave a quick, short chortle. “I’m not so sure about that, but thanks for being optimistic. So, you from around here?”
Cruz nodded, letting Mickie change the subject. “Yeah, you?”
“Yeah, me and Angel have lived here our entire lives. You like San Antonio?”
“I do. There’s culture, there’s art, it’s a city but if you drive twenty minutes in any direction, you’re out of the city and can see longhorns and ranches.”
Mickie laughed. “That’s about right.”
Cruz knew he was asking for trouble with his next question, but he couldn’t stop wanting to get to know the woman in front of him. “Since we’re learning about each other…what do you do?”
Mickie tilted her head and eyed Cruz critically. There was something about him that seemed…off, but she couldn’t really put her finger on it. She mentally shrugged and gave him a vague explanation. She wasn’t so stupid that she’d tell him everything about her. She didn’t know him, after all. “Nothing too exciting, I assure you. I work at a car dealership in the service department. It’s not very glamorous, but it pays the bills.”
Cruz looked at Mickie in approval. “Good girl.”
“What?”
“You didn’t tell me which car dealership. Smart.”
Mickie blushed. “I-I didn’t—”
“It’s fine. I was being honest. You shouldn’t go blurting that stuff out to any ol’ man who asks to sit with you and flirts shamelessly.”
“Is that what you’re doing?”
“If you have to ask, I’m obviously not doing it right. I guess I’m rusty.”
“I’m just…guys don’t usually flirt with me.” She blushed again. Jesus, this guy was going to think she was pathetic if she didn’t keep her mouth shut.
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