“Looks like around fifty to eighty and about a week Chandra. Body won’t be released until the final autopsy is done. Dragon’s gone down there but from what the po-po was telling us last night, best we just do a closed casket.” His words dropped like a stone into the well of silence the kitchen had become. None of us wanted to think too hard about the implications behind his words. The whole thing really was bad enough.
Zander found me a short time later and we took a time out to hold each other before the flurry of activity set in. Before long, Everett and I had to head in to work and Chandra commandeered Shelly and Ashton into giving the clubhouse a good going over.
Dray drove me and Evy in to work in my car, his Trans-Am not exactly built for the snow. He stayed with us until Reaver could come in and then left. I let him take my car, with the promise that he or Zander would be back to take us to the club later. Reaver played on his phone in my kitchen and from the odd smile or chuckle I gathered that he was texting back and forth with his wife, Hayden.
I snuck him an odd sample or two of chocolate when he grew too solemn. It was hard to see Reaver, who was always laughing or smiling or telling a joke, look so terribly unhappy. The light in his eyes decidedly dimmer than usual.
The rest of the week went much the same. I spent my days keeping the shop stocked with confections and made enough to set aside for Grinder’s wake too. My evenings were spent with Ashton in the club’s kitchen making enough food to feed an army. The first night was spent preparing lasagna dinners in the foil throw-away pans. We made so many, and then froze them so all we had to do was pull them from the freezer and reheat them.
We spent the remainder of the week doing similar things. The night we did the cinnamon rolls to have for breakfast we could barely keep the men out of the kitchen and ended up having to make quite a bit more than we initially anticipated because of it, but it brought with it a margin of levity to the club as men and women from other clubs began to trickle in.
The evening before the wake itself, Zander slipped into the kitchen and held out my property of vest out to me with a sad little smile. I slipped into the proffered bit of clothing and retied my apron over it to protect it with a quizzical look.
“Bunch more brothers just showed up,” he explained quietly, “The three brothers that came up with Grinder are out there. They might come back and talk to you and Irish. He did spend a bunch of time in your shop.” I nodded and pursed my lips and Zander sighed.
“Not how I pictured you wearin’ my rag for the first time, Sugar.” His voice was tinged with such a deep regret my heart gave a fractured ache for him. I nodded and he left the kitchen. Ashton turned from the sink full of dishes and Trigger brought her the vest he’d given her a short time later, giving her a lingering kiss after she’d donned it.
The women of the club were kept feverishly busy all the way up through the wake and I have to honestly say, I have never seen anything like it! The drinking and partying and carousing was just phenomenal and I was almost grateful when Zander pulled me into his arms and walked us to his club room, even with as drunk as he’d gotten.
Still, something was different about him tonight than ever before and Disney’s words of advice tumbled through my mind, just don’t get scared if he gets rough with you in the bedroom… I didn’t fully understand the implications of what Disney had said until the door swung shut behind us and Zander fell on me.
He shoved me back, hard, against the closed door, his thigh riding up between mine, pinning me, my sex pressed to the top of his leg as his mouth crashed up into mine and his hands delved beneath my black sweater to find skin. The veracity of his kiss stole my breath and my heart very nearly stopped in my chest, doing a flip and plummeting into the pit of my stomach. Fear fizzed through my veins like sour champagne and I dragged a deep breath through my nose and fought my urge to squirm, to try and get away. Instead I cupped his face with my hands and kissed him back and kept reminding myself over and over this is Zander, this is Zander; this is Zander.
He broke the kiss and ripped my sweater over my head. I yelped as one of my earrings caught and pulled painfully before slipping free of my earlobe. It stung for a moment but it seemed there was no real harm done, but it was as if Zander hadn’t even noticed. He pulled me tight and tighter against his body until I cried out into his mouth which just seemed to excite him further. He broke the kiss and pulled me away from the door, turning me and giving me a shove onto the bed.
“Zander, you’re scaring me!” I cried under my breath.
“Sorry, Sugar,” he said with a crooked grin but he honestly didn’t look or sound sorry at all, which only served to scare me more. I’d never seen him so drunk before either and so I kept telling myself that he would be sorry when he sobered up. Still, this wasn’t exactly a good feeling.
“Ohhh hey, don’t look like that Red,” he said, voice deep and unsteady. He came to me where I sat on the edge of the bed and cupped my face in his hands, pressing his forehead to mine. His eyes were closed and he seemed to be sobering a bit.
He asked me, “Remember the locker room?” I covered his hands with mine, firmly as his thumbs stroked back and forth over my cheeks.
“How could I forget?” and I tried a tremulous smile.
“Can I have that Red? Do you trust me enough to give me that?” he asked and he shook lightly with his restraint. I closed my eyes, not entirely sure what it was I was getting myself into but the short answer? Yes. Yes I trusted him, yes I loved him and so I would see. I would see if I could take what he needed to give.
Heart in my throat I let the answer he was looking for fall from my lips, “Yes.”
He hauled my lips up to his and feeling a bit more left of center, a bit more like I was in control, him having asked, me having given him permission, I let him kiss me and returned his kiss with an equally savage intensity. We clawed at each other’s clothes, and Zander ripped his shirt completely in two to be rid of it. I pulled myself further back onto the bed and with a snarl he came after me. He got between my thighs and shoved his way inside, brutally fast, brutally hard, wringing a cry from my lips that was half fear, half desire. It felt good, surprisingly so, with just that little bit of added edge of pain from my not being quite ready, not being quite worked up enough to take him.
It was okay though, my body would catch up soon enough and it wasn’t like Zander was going to give me any quarter. He slammed his body against mine and set a punishing cadence of hard fast thrusts, the report of our bodies coming together filling the room with rhythmic pounding to equal the pulse of blood through my veins.
There was nothing kind, nothing gentle or loving about this, but it felt so good. So freeing and intense and so, just, unlike anything I had ever experienced before, just ever. I was vaguely aware of my nails biting into the flesh of his back, of scoring down his skin in such a way it left him arching into me harder, his thrusting stilling.
“Oh, awe fuck, Baby! Yes!” he cried above me and adjusted his angle, he grabbed me behind the knees and folded them up to my chest, his hands pressing the backs of my thighs as he drove into me harder. I bit back a scream at the intensity of it and tried to relax but it was almost too intense, too extreme. I cried out a feral sound and squirmed and he eased up just enough to make things comfortable again.
“Shit, sorry,” he gasped and the love in his voice turned me on that much more.
“It’s okay, don’t stop!” I cried, breathy, and he smiled and brought the intensity back up to a slow rolling boil between us, his hand straying from the back of my leg, his thumb finding and sweetly torturing the top of my sex until my womb grew heavy, weighted with the promise of orgasm.
“Yeah, Sugar, come on for me Baby, come for me Sweetheart,” he urged, and when I did it eclipsed my whole world, though instead of being cast in the dark it did just the opposite, lighting me up from the inside out until every nerve, every filament and every fiber of my being glowed with purest shining bright pleasure at the hands
of the man who rode my body, plunging deeply and drinking sweetly of the pool that was my being until he met his own end. Zander came, crying out above me, thrusting deeply and unevenly a few more times, touching off aftershocks in me nearly as intense as the original cataclysm.
We came back to ourselves slowly, breaths sawing in and out of our lungs in a ragged race to supply oxygen to our overworked bodies, lightly slicked with a dew of sweat and further down below, heavier wetter things denoting our very good time. Zander unset his teeth from my shoulder and truthfully I hadn’t even realized he’d bitten me, the impressions left behind from his teeth, a stinging arch in my skin that would surely bruise.
“Ow,” I uttered softly and he pressed the pad of his thumb into the marks and massaged at them which I couldn’t tell if it made it better or worse but to have him touch me so tenderly, I wasn’t about to complain.
“You okay Sugar?” he asked between breaths.
“Yeah, I think so.”
Zander pushed himself off of the top of me and stared down into my eyes.
“You’re fucking incredible, you know that?” he asked me softly, caressing my bottom lip with his thumb. He covered my mouth with his in a slow sultry kiss and I felt a surge of pride in myself for having not been afraid, and truthfully I was so glad I had kept it at bay. I was pretty sure I was going to learn to enjoy rough sex with my man if it was like that all of the time.
“Mm,” Zander pulled back at the sound, “I liked that,” I told him and he smiled ruefully.
“It’s not going to be a problem then?” he asked.
“Mm-mm.” I shook my head no.
“Good, because I was going easy on yah.” He winked and I scoffed a laugh. He gave me a cheeky, if satisfied grin and slipped from me and cursed.
“Fuck, hope you’re keeping up with the pill, Baby.”
I looked down between us, we’d forgotten a condom again. I sighed nodding. I’d had my period a couple of weeks ago but still, we needed to stop tempting fate. He kissed me and grabbed his robe.
“Don’t go anywhere,” he murmured and slipped out of the room. I laughed to myself, I didn’t think I could get up and walk if I tried! My legs felt like they weren’t up to the job of standing.
Zander returned and cleaned me up before pulling me into the curve of his arms, we talked softly about what the next day was going to hold before falling into a fitful sleep. One that was all too short.
Chapter 23
Revelator…
The ride was colder than shit to the cemetery. I had on two pair of long johns under my long denim shorts and it still wasn’t really enough. I had on gloves, a hooded sweatshirt, and a tee with actual sleeves hugging the shit out of my biceps on under my leather jacket and cut and I was still freezing my balls off. Wraparound sunglasses kept the wind out of my eyes, and a bandana wrapped around my face tried to keep out the cold. It only worked marginally well. Still, the ride was a slow one and it felt like forever before we were standing beside a gaping pit in the ground. A mound of astro-turf covered earth at the yawning darkness’ side.
My girl’s father, and I do use that term loosely, presided at the top of the grave and said some nice shit about Grinder, a man he didn’t even know and my fury towards him loosened its choke hold some. My Red looked somber and washed out by all the black she was wearing and I longed to see her back in her colors that complimented her so well. I hated this. Hated standing beside this open grave, hated committing my brother to the cold hard earth when it could have been prevented.
A bunch of us guys felt guilty as hell. Grinder’d been striking out with a bunch of the girls around here. They just weren’t his speed and we’d all been giving him some hell about it. He was trying hard to get out of the life of gun and drug running over the border from where he’d come from, and was looking for a new start with the mother chapter out here. None of us bargained that he had a temper or that we’d been fucking with him on the wrong topic.
He’d told us all to fuck right off and had gone off on his own. None of us had really thought anything of it. We’d figured he’d gone down to The Spot, found himself a willing pussy and had gone balls deep in it back at the apartment he had gotten himself into; he was one of the ones that didn’t live at the club, surprisingly few guys did anymore.
That had been a Friday night. We really hadn’t thought much of it, Grinder was a big dude and from what we could tell, a smart dude. We’d fucking let him slip through the god damned cracks and didn’t even really notice ‘til Tuesday morning that he was still MIA and that, well that made us all a bunch of fucking douche bags. We’d failed our brother and you could tell by the stony expressions of the brothers from the mother chapter that it wasn’t a mistake we would ever make again. The Suicide Kings had gotten lucky catching Grinder out alone, but it wasn’t ever going to happen that way again.
There would be no solo riding until every last one of those motherfuckers were taking a dirt nap in an unmarked grave in Cicada woods. We filed back to the club the way we’d left. In a proud procession heads held high, but that didn’t stop The Suicide Kings from parking along the funeral route, smiles of glee pasted to their faces tryin’ to look all badass. It took everything we had to keep Grinder’s three brothers on their fucking bikes and away from scrapping with those dimwitted fucks.
The police escort was even pissed off. One, because they couldn’t prove shit. There was no probable cause to go after anybody without a motive and we couldn’t exactly supply the cops with one without incriminating ourselves. Two, The Suicide Kings weren’t exactly doing anything illegal. They were just legally parked along a section of the road we happened to be driving by giving us the one fingered salute as we rode by. It was bullshit, but it was also bullshit we couldn’t do a God Damned thing about… yet.
Back at the club Mandy had the coffee and hot chocolate flowing and was doing her level best to warm everyone’s soul as much as their bodies with murmured words of comfort. I’d been fucking afraid she wouldn’t be okay with the rough stuff we’d done the night before come the cold light of morning, but she’d kissed me silently until I’d quit asking and had slipped off to a hot shower looking as thoughtful as I’d ever seen her.
She slipped up to me and pressed a steaming ceramic mug into my hands. The warmth unbelievably welcome to my frozen ass fingers, even with the gloves on.
“I was cold just watching you,” she murmured with a slight smile.
“Yeah, brutal out there but as far as riding in frozen conditions go, couldn’t ask for a better day for it,” and it was true. The sky was blue, the sun shone brightly and even though it was still predominantly a winter wonderland out there, the streets had been dry as a bone and the icy patches, if any, had been stark and apparent. It’d been easy riding despite the frozen conditions.
“Women,” Dragon’s voice interrupted the low murmurs, and everyone turned to the original P. of The Sacred Hearts.
“Appreciate all you done for us these last few days but if you could kindly give your men the floor it’d be much appreciated.” His voice held all the respect we felt for the girls and everything they’d done in getting this together. The women of The Sacred Hearts, both from here at home and abroad beamed with pride under the praise and graciously melted into the back, towards the media room.
Dragon cleared his throat, “I wanna thank all you brothers for coming out during such a difficult time. Grinder was still relatively new to us but overall was a likeable guy. For being here such a short time, we’re sure gonna miss him.” Dragon raised his glass and we all did the same and put down some of whatever we were drinking.
“So the mother chapter and Grinder’s home chapter out in Phoenix have some business. Namely, Archer, Nox and Rush from the Phoenix chapter would like to patch over into the home chapter. So I would like to put it to a quick vote, since we’re all here.” Dragon’s gaze captured the gaze of the Phoenix president, a guy called Dom. All though if it was short for Dominic or calling him out
on his personality was anyone’s guess.
“Dom, is having these three guys up and leave your chapter going to cause you some undue hardship?” Dragon asked him. Dom, a tall motherfucker with long brown hair graying at the temples, braided tight to his skull had tan leathery skin. He eyed Dragon speculatively.
“I appreciate that you’d ask,” he grated, his voice deep and gravelly. “Losing all three would put me one man short of the bare minimum of keeping my chapter above board on a headcount, but, I got four prospects and two of them are on the verge of patching in next month, the other two not too far behind. If the other chapters can give me a couple of months grace on being a man down, I could make it work. I ain’t going to stand in the way of these boys and their revenge, but neither am I gonna let my chapter fold from it.”
“Fair enough. We got reps from at least every chapter out there Nationwide. Those of you who are here can act as proxy for your people. You wouldn’t be here otherwise. So first up, a vote on grace for a period of three months for the Phoenix chapter being one man down. All in favor of granting that grace?” every hand in the room shot up. Dragon raised an eyebrow, his expression clearly communicating that he wasn’t surprised.
“So ordered. You reach out to other chapters, see if someone is willing to prop you up, see if a nomad is willing to stick around and help you out in the meantime, but you got your grace period.” Dom nodded.
“As fer us, all in favor – “ he didn’t get to even finish before every hand in the home chapter shot up. We’d heard Archer talk about growing up in foster care with Grinder, Rush and Nox. Heard their stories about coming up in the same house, the four of them. Rush and Nox were twins even though they didn’t look a thing alike and Archer and Grinder being older, had pretty much lain their asses on the line to keep the younger boys safe from a fucked up set of foster parents more interested in the state money than actually looking after their charges.
Archer seemed a little hot headed, but it wasn’t anything that these guys hadn’t already dealt with when it came to me… all though in all fairness, that had mostly been Unkind’s doing. Trig had carried my original mentor’s torch just fine though and I was pretty confident that the three new guys would fall in to our line of thinking after the dust had settled and the Suicide Kings were just that, dust.
Fractured & Formidable: The Sacred Hearts MC Book V Page 21
