Steel Cobras MC Complete Box Set: Books 1-6
Page 22
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Drake said. “You’re being quiet. Is this a Fury thing?”
I shook my head, checked my phone. It was after eleven, so a good chance that my guests would be asleep. After she got done reaming me out about the kid not having anything to eat, I showed her this app where she could order anything she wanted and have it delivered. She’d placed the first order to the tune of $300.
I had no fucking clue how something that small could be that expensive.
I pushed off the bar and clapped Drake on the back. “You know, I’m gonna go home.”
He gave me a bleary, heavy-lidded drunken gaze. Drake, our lightweight. “What? It’s too early dude. You need to stay.”
I shook my head, grabbed my helmet, and as I did, was cornered by a red-haired wet dream in a leather mini-skirt. “You’re not leaving, are you Cullen?” she asked in a sultry voice that tugged at my cock.
She knew me, but I had no fucking idea if I’d ever seen her before. “Not unless I get to leave with you.”
It didn’t take long before she was on the back of my bike, and we were speeding toward my house. It wasn’t my style to bring girls home from the bar; I usually went to their house. When they knew where I lived, they tended to show up at the wrong time.
But I didn’t care about that, now.
The house was dark when I got there. I pulled the motorcycle into the garage. The girl was all over me the second I stepped off the bike. The shots were starting to get to me. She wrapped her arms around me as I reached for the door to the house. “Hey, baby,” I said, trying to disarm the alarm. “Give me a second.”
I threw open the door to the house and she kissed me, wrapping her arms and legs around me. I walked her toward the living room, slowly unhooking her bra, until I remembered the furniture was all under tarps. Switching directions, I took her to the kitchen, where I sat her on top of the center island.
That’s when I heard something.
A baby cried, so loud it sounded like it was coming from the same room.
I stopped. Removed my face from the girl’s tits. Looked around.
“Don’t mind me!” a voice sing-songed, as I saw her tear by me, a strawberry-blonde streak, on the way to the staircase.
Fuck my life.
“Hey!” I shouted after her.
“Who was that?” the girl asked, her eyes searching in the dark. “Was that a kid?”
I shook my head. “No one,” I said, leaning in for a kiss. “Now where were we?”
She pulled away. “You’re living with a girl? And a baby? Janice said you lived alone up here.”
“Janice? Who the fuck is Janice? And that’s no one. She’s just staying for—”
Her squawk of a voice split my eardrums. “Oh, my God, Cullen. Is that your kid?”
She looked like she was going to laugh at me. I started to shake my head, as once again, my dick shriveled in my pants. Way to fucking ruin the mood.
I pushed away from her and vised my head in my hands. “Just get the fuck out?” I said, my voice just a breath.
Her eyes narrowed.
I reached for my phone. “I’ll get you an Uber.”
She reached for her purse. “No thanks, I’ll walk,” she said, a bitchy smirk on her face. “Can’t wait to tell everyone that Cullen is a daddy. You’ll make a great father, Cullen. Poor kid is gonna be so fucked up.”
She didn’t have to tell me that. I shrugged and plunged my hands into my jeans. “Just leave.”
She opened the door and ran outside, laughing. “You’re such a loser, Cullen.”
I went to the center island and splayed my hands on it, staring at nothing for a long while. Then I walked to the foyer and started to climb the stairs up to my bedroom.
When I reached the top of the stairs, I sensed her presence at the end of the hallway, in the darkness.
I turned and saw her standing there, in a nightshirt, legs bare, her hair mussed and on her shoulders.
There was only one reason I’d brought that woman home to my house tonight.
Because I couldn’t get Grace out of my head.
As long as she was here, I was too fucked up to do anything but think about her. Her pretty lips. Her perfect tits. The way she talked back to me with her smart mouth. The way she smelled. All of it, just down the fucking hall.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “Ella woke up and was thirsty so I’d just gone down to—”
“Stop,” I barked, reaching for the door handle. “I don’t fucking care. I think I’m done with bitches for the night.”
“I really am, Cullen,” she said, sounding sincere. “I’m trying to stay out of your way. I didn’t know that you’d be home this early.”
I scowled at her. “You didn’t know that I’d be home in my own house?”
“No. I thought you’d be out later, and Ella was—”
“Grace. I. Don’t. Care,” I bit out, pushing away from the door and stalking toward her. “You came back here because you needed money and a roof over your head. Don’t expect anything else, because it’s not happening.”
“Have I asked for anything else?” she said, crossing her arms over her middle. For the first time I realized she was wearing just a nothing piece of t-shirt, all ripped and destroyed. Might’ve been one of mine. Her nipples were poking through the fabric. Hard.
Something in me must’ve snapped. I kept a close watch on my emotions, but only one woman could send them on a rollercoaster. And here she was.
I balled my fists and came up real close to her. “Not with your mouth,” I said, dragging my eyes from hers, down to her hard nipples. I cupped one of her tits roughly through her shirt, to her surprise, but she didn’t flinch away. I flicked the pad of my thumb over the nipple, making it harder yet. “With these.”
She looked up at me, her breathing a deep rasp. “It’d be so easy for you, you know,” she murmured.
I drank in those liquid crystal eyes, framed in thick, feathery lashes. “What?”
“To be the man your father never was.”
I caged her between my forearms and said, “Not tonight. Don’t fucking tell me what to do in my own goddamn house.”
Then I bowed my head down and captured her mouth with mine. I kissed her savagely, brutally, angrily. Teeth and tongue. Biting and growling. I ground her against the wall as I clenched her tit in my hand. She let out a moan as I remembered just how good we were together. Just how fucking responsive she was. Our bodies fell in complete sync like cogs in a well-oiled machine.
The memory was my undoing, along with her, wrapping her hands around my neck, letting out a desperate sigh. She kissed deeper. Harder. All in.
When I pulled back, meeting her gaze, I realized she was shivering. “When was the last time you came?”
She gave me a stunned look, as if I was speaking another language. “I don’t…”
“Wrong. It’s now.”
I flattened my body against hers, pinning her to the wall, feeling the soft curves of her. I ran my mouth relentlessly to her cheek, to her ear, down to her neck, and to her neckline. I groaned as I tasted her. I’d never tasted anything as good.
Breathless, she arched against me, clawing at my back. She let out a wanton little whimper, asking me to stop and begging me to keep going in the same breath as I reached under her t-shirt, wrenched a knee between her legs and spread her thighs.
She gasped as my fingers forced their way between her legs.
“That’s it,” I whispered on a hiss, rocking steadily against her. Watching her face because I wanted to see her come undone. I deserved that little bit of satisfaction, after what she’d done to me. I wanted to rip her apart the way she’d devoured me.
Her hands twisted in my hair, she breathed out little words, half formed. Pleading for more. My fingers climbed higher and higher.
My thumb eased against her panties. I rubbed the pad of my thumb back and forth over the silken fabric as I cupped her chin in the palm of my han
d, hardly able to believe she was here, in front of me, after all this time. Grace. Fucking Grace.
I didn’t want to fucking think. I just wanted to feel her under my hands, my mouth again.
I buried my face in her cleavage, rubbing my stubble against petal-soft skin as I worked the shirt up and kissed her perfect tits. I edged my finger under her panties and rubbed her clit. Then, no holds barred, I drove my fingers inside her. Pumping her hard, in and out, back and forth.
Her head dropped to my shoulder. Her mouth opened. Her breath came faster, in gasps.
She cried out as our shadows rocked back and forth on the wall, and her pussy clenched around my hand. Easy. She was so fucking easy to please. I stayed with her, milking her orgasm as she panted against me. It brought me right back to my sister’s shit basement, where we’d fuck all night long, insatiably, bringing each other to orgasm after orgasm like animals in heat.
When I removed my hand and she straightened, she looked up at me, a stunned expression on her face, as I licked my fingers clean, tasting her. She was as good as I remembered, making me remember just what it was like to be an addict.
I’d inherited my addictive personality from my dad. He was addicted to it all: drugs, sex, alcohol, gambling. I’d flirted with all of those things, but then I’d stumbled upon the one habit that was more impossible to break than all of them combined.
This woman.
Grace.
And now, just like an addict, I was right back in the throes.
“Fuck,” I muttered. I pushed off the wall, feeling that surge of adrenaline that comes before losing all control.
She blinked and said my name, hesitantly, as I lowered her shirt into place.
I turned and stormed into my bedroom, slamming the door behind me.
And for the second night in a row, I jacked off in the shower, thinking of her, and only her, as I came against the tile wall.
Chapter Six
Grace
The following morning I woke, picked up Ella, and held her to my chest, shivering as I thought about Cullen.
I knew this would happen. I knew if I went to his house, I’d fall under his spell again. He was just too damn irresistible. Once he put his hands on me, I was powerless to stop myself from submitting to him.
Which was the reason why I put off contacting him until things became really dire and he ended up as my last resort. Really, if there’d been any other option, I would’ve taken it, if only to preserve my sanity.
Being in the same house with him, my sexy, infuriatingly hot ex with the hard body and penetrating eyes was a total recipe for disaster.
I couldn’t sleep that night, after he’d put his hands on me and made me come, as easily as I breathed. He always had that magic touch where I was concerned—all he had to do was call my name and I was his puppy; touch me and my body whirred to life.
As I cuddled Ella in bed, staring up at the ceiling, it was like I could almost feel those spider webs being wound around my body, pulling me to him. I’d escaped before, barely. I didn’t know if I was strong enough to detach myself a second time.
I also felt something else, with even greater urgency: Incredibly horny.
Truth was, I’d had a few flings after Cullen, but they were nothing to write home about. Being pregnant wasn’t the greatest way to find new guys, believe it or not. And having Ella, breastfeeding, and having my big fat post-baby body, had pretty much gobbled up all of my sex drive. So, when he’d asked me that question? About the last time I’d come?
It had been with him. Two years ago.
And last night? He’d awakened something inside me. Something feral, desperate.
Something that made me really afraid for myself, living in a house, alone, with him. I knew it was only a matter of time before I surrendered entirely.
I had to . . . I didn’t know. Clear my head? Invest what little money I had in a vibrator? Anything to keep Cullen out of my head, and my pants.
It was early in the morning, so I felt safe going downstairs. I gave Ella some Cheerios and a banana from the huge delivery of food I’d ordered, and we sat down together in his cinema room to watch Dora the Explorer on the giant screen. For a minute, as Dora and Boots tromped all over God’s creation, I thought, maybe this could work. This house is huge. I’ll just plan my days to make sure I’m never around when he is.
And then I realized, as I deposited Ella the Explorer back in her seat for the hundredth time, that with a curious toddler in the house, staying confined to one area wasn’t exactly easy.
Not to mention that part of me, a big part of me, really wanted Ella to know her father.
But not if he was going to be a dickwad, bringing women home and treating them like garbage. My dad had walked out on me when I was twelve. Been there, done that. Wouldn’t want to subject my daughter to that kind of torture for anything in the world. It’d be better not to know her father than to feel that rejection.
After breakfast, I went over to the next-door neighbors and knocked on the door. Barry answered.
“Good morning!” I said when she answered with a bright smile. “I was wondering if you had a stroller I might borrow for a jaunt around the neighborhood?”
“Of course, of course!” she said, opening the door wide in a big welcome for Ella and me. “Wait here.” She came back with a top-of-the-line jogger.
“Oh, thank you,” I said, settling Ella inside. “I’ll bring it right back.”
She shook her head. “Keep it. Mariel bought it for me at a garage sale, to use with her daughter, but I never jog. We prefer the other stroller.”
“Really? Amazing!” I reached over and gave her a hug. “You have no idea what this means to me. If there’s anything I can do.”
“Well,” she said, walking us to the front of the house. “It’s probably presumptuous for me to say, but . . . does your boyfriend have to ramp up his motorcycle late at night?”
“Oh.” I knew this was coming. “He’s not my boyfriend. But I could ask him to keep it down if he’s coming in late.”
“I’m sure it must’ve woken your baby, didn’t it?”
Come to think of it, that made sense. Ella usually slept through the night, but something must’ve woken her. I’d been so deeply asleep I hadn’t heard it, but that had to have been the reason she was up, and the reason we’d been downstairs when he’d stumbled in, drunk, with that woman. “I’ll talk to him about it,” I said.
And that’ll go over like a lead balloon.
Ella waved at Barry. “Buh bye,” she said sweetly, and Barry waved back. “Have fun, you two.”
We went for a long walk, all up and down the hills of the development. I walked down to the edge of the development and found a Circle K not very far away. I also found a little park overlooking the ocean with a bench, and we sat there, just taking in the sun and sea air. It felt good, to be in a real, stable situation, for the first time ever.
Even though I knew the stability was short-lived, it still felt nice.
Then I went back to the house. I parked the stroller on the deck and went inside. King Cullen was up by then. I heard him in the cinema room, watching another R-rated epic.
I did my best to avoid him, but Ella was babbling, and he must have heard it. “Hey,” he barked out as soon as I closed the door. “You disable the security system and leave here without locking the door again and I’ll lock your ass out.”
My jaw dropped. He did not just say that.
“Up, Mommy. Up!” Ella lifted her arms. I lifted her up with a huff and stormed into the room, just as an actor onscreen unleashed a barrage of curses.
I covered Ella’s ears. “What did you just say to me?” I demanded.
Chewing on a toothpick, he didn’t look up at me. “You heard me.”
He was wearing just jeans again, his body draped out over the seat, his chest muscles and six-pack rippling in a way that was impossible to ignore. He wore a bandana wrapped around his head, which happened to be my favor
ite Cullen look. I willed my heart to be strong.
“No, I don’t think I did,” I snapped, putting my hand on my hip. “Because if you think you’re going to lock me and Ella out of the house, you’re mistaken.”
He pressed his head against the backrest of the seat and looked up at the ceiling. “I think I’ll do as I damn well please, baby, since this is my fucking house.” He growled the last part, and I felt Ella tense in my arms.
“You’re an asshole,” I hissed at him.
For the first time, he looked at Ella. He feigned shock. “Mommy’s got a potty mouth. She’s got to be more careful around you, precious.”
Ella looked at him, lovestruck, and squealed in glee. Did she know her daddy? I hated how she was already wrapped around his finger, with just one sentence. He’d done the same damn thing to me. My fists clenched.
He flipped off the television, crossed his thick arms, and looked at me. “Sweetheart? Let’s play a little guessing game. You know why the carpet in the living room is all ripped up? You know why there’s fresh drywall on the walls? You know why I spent forty-thousand dollars on new windows?”
I stared at him. “What do you mean?”
He slid out of his seat and came up close to me, touching my cheek so that I flinched. “I’ll let you come up with the answer. I promise you, it ain’t gonna be one you like.”
He moved past me, and I whirled to him. “Wait. Tell me.”
He turned, leaned an elbow on the door jamb, near his ear, and shook his head in an infuriatingly slow way. “You probably ain’t gonna want to take walks in this neighborhood anymore either, as long as you’re living in this house. I don’t got a lot of friends.”
My blood went cold.
I thought back to some of the things he’d said to me about the Cobras. He wasn’t able to talk much about the club, but once, a couple dudes had been shot, and he’d come home covered in his brothers’ blood. Once, he’d nearly been arrested. And that was only in the few months we were dating. I told him if he was ever hoping to have a legit future with me, he’d need to get out.