by Addison Jane
I took a deep breath.
I didn’t expect to have her this close.
Across the hall, I could have handled.
In my space, though? Where I never let anyone go?
Fucking kill me now.
“I’m really sorry, Repo,” Meyah urged. “I didn’t mean any harm.”
“I know you didn’t,” I told her honestly.
“There’s something between the two of you, though,” she continued, refusing to let me just get a free pass on this one.
“Go to bed, princess.” I chuckled softly, reaching past her for the door handle and pushing the door open before she could say anything else. I closed the door behind me before looking up to find Kennedy sitting nervously at the end of the bed looking around the room, scrutinizing everything. This was obviously a situation where she wasn’t sure of what the hell she was doing here, and you know I kind of understood why.
“Did Meyah get you some clothes?” I asked as I removed my club cut and hung it on the back of the door.
Kennedy nodded but there was a heavy frown pulling her brows together. “Yeah, she did. She’s sweet, kind.”
The way she said the words instantly brought a smile to my lips. “Too sweet and too kind to be hanging around with a bunch of fucking bikers?”
She was going to deny that was what she was thinking, but I fucking knew. That was the problem with people who’d had their own experiences with an MC, or maybe even just one single biker. They’d been shit on, they’d been hurt, they’d seen too many news articles about what we do to our fucking women. Or in Kennedy’s case, she’d felt it firsthand.
That was the thing, though, we weren’t all the same.
“I never said that,” she denied, climbing up off the bed and getting to her feet, almost like she was preparing for a fight, like she didn’t want to be caught off-guard. I knew why, though, because she’d had it beaten into her that saying the wrong thing had consequences.
That alone made me fucking angry. It made me want to go back a couple hours and pull the fucking trigger while I held the gun to that asshole’s head. “You wanna know whether we beat her into being so placid, or how many years Shake has spent breaking her down?”
“Don’t put words in my mouth.”
“Then learn to ask when you have a question, instead of just letting it fucking brew inside your head. I’ll answer anything you want to know, and I won’t hold nothing against you,” I fired back, holding her fierce gaze. “Meyah and Shake have been a thing since he was a prospect and he joined the club her uncle was a part of up in Alabama. Long story short, she came down here in search of her dad… Huntsman, and Shake followed like a lost puppy.”
Kennedy’s mouth fell open. “Huntsman’s daughter?”
I huffed out a breath. “Yeah, and I can tell you now, Shake would be buried in a shallow grave if it weren’t for the fact that he treated that woman like a fucking princess.”
At my words, her body slumped, and she inhaled deeply. “That’s the connection.”
“Yeah, that’s why our club here and The Exiled Eight in Vegas have a tight relationship,” I snorted with a laugh. “We’re practically goddamn in-laws. Meyah’s best friend also happens to be her older brother’s old lady.”
She paused for a moment before a smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. “That’s kind of cute, I guess.”
I scoffed. “Yeah, it’s gonna be even cuter when we head up there in a couple weeks and Shake tells Huntsman he’s knocked up the man’s baby girl.”
The smile on Kennedy’s face grew wider, her eyes softening.
“I get it, you know,” I said finally, leaning back against the wall and tucking my hands in my front pockets. I dipped my head and looked at her from beneath my brow. She was still standing at the side of my bed, like at any moment she was going to make a run for the door. And I wouldn’t stop her if she did.
“Get what?” she whispered, her voice cracking.
“That you think your experience of MC life was so real to you, that imagining it any other way seems impossible.”
She shrugged nonchalantly before backing up and sitting down at the edge of the bed. “I’ve known one thing for over the past five years. I’m not trying to judge you, your club, your brothers, or their old ladies, I’m just telling you that it’s hard to believe anyone would want to do what you’ve done for me without me having to give you something in return.” Her eyes drifted to the bed, and her hands gripped the sheets beneath her. I knew what she was trying to say, and it made me fucking furious. She thought that this was what she was worth. That was the life of a whore—the one thing that you had to exchange was your body. It made her feel like she had nothing else of worth, like she couldn’t understand why I would want to save her if it weren’t for the fact that I knew she was good at fucking.
“Goddammit,” I cursed under my breath. I turned and grabbed my club cut off the back of the door and shrugged it back on over my shoulders. My entire body was shaking with anger.
“Where are you going?” she asked, jumping up and racing forward.
“I’m going to sleep elsewhere, you need to rest,” I drawled, turning away, but before I could, I caught her reaching out. I swung back around, catching her wrist before she could grab my arm. “Kennedy…” I warned.
“I won’t touch you. Can you just stay, please?”
Sleep in the same fucking bed but don’t touch her? Yeah. Easy. Fucking hell!
I should have walked out. Got the hell out of there. That would have been the smart thing to do. But as it turned out, I was not that fucking smart. Instead, I walked over to the bed and took one of the pillows, placing it down the center before looking over at the beautiful fucking blonde. “You stay on your side, I’ll stay on mine.”
She was silent for a long few seconds before she finally nodded. “Okay.”
“Okay,” I said back before turning away and working on the rest of my clothes.
I was going to hell.
All the way to fucking hell.
KENNEDY
Crow stood over the bed.
I couldn’t move, I couldn’t scream.
“You’re never going to escape, Kennedy,” he taunted, his crooked smile making my stomach churn. “Your mom didn’t want to live with you as a daughter, your dad took off and left you with his debt, your sister is living a normal life, and you’re trying to ruin it for her. I’m the only one who will ever put up with your shit, Kennedy. I’m the only one who’ll ever give a shit about you.”
I tried to squirm, I wanted to scream at him, tell him it wasn’t true, but maybe he was right. No one had ever stuck around, no one had ever put me first or protected me. I was constantly looking after the people in my life, until they were done needing me and left.
Maybe I wasn’t worth anything.
Maybe I would never be more than this.
I gasped, my entire chest heaving up off the bed.
I tugged the blankets around me and sat up, using the back of my hand to brush away the tears that had dampened my cheeks. “Fucking hell,” I cursed, breathing in a shaky breath.
The doorway to my left opened, and I jumped, pulling the blanket around my body a little tighter. Repo stepped out, a wave of steam following behind him.
He had on a pair of jeans that sat low on his hips, a pair of Calvins just peeking out the top.
At least these bikers had good fucking taste.
“How’d you sleep?” Repo asked, using the towel in his hand to scrub at his hair. All I could focus on was his body and the tattoos that decorated it. Repo was broad and sturdy but every inch of him was cut and defined. His abs, his pecs, the V-shape of his torso that tapered down into his slim waist.
Jesus Christ.
“Didn’t really.”
“Neither.”
“If you don’t like people touching you, how’d you get your tattoos?” I asked curiously as I examined the script writing which completely covered his left side. It was b
eautiful and artistic, but I couldn’t read what the words said.
He smirked and tossed his towel over the chair in the corner of the room. “They put me under.”
My eyes shot open wide. “You got put to sleep so you could get tattooed?”
His soft laughter was warm and comforting. It was one of those things that you craved to hear over and over again. Something you had no idea that you were missing in your life until suddenly it was part of it. “Yeah,” he nodded, looking down over his body and ink. “There are things in my life I want to remember, and that was the only way I was able to do it. I usually get a few done at once, although my back piece took a couple sessions ‘cause they didn’t want to keep me knocked out for too long.”
He turned around.
I gasped and quickly threw the blankets back before scampering off the bed and moving in closer.
His entire back was covered. Almost every inch. His club patches and emblem were the centerpiece, but there were so many different elements to it—scripture, real-life images, flags, cartoons. I could have stared at it for days and days and still kept finding something new. My eyes weren’t able to take it all in at once. “It’s stunning,” I whispered, chewing on my bottom lip. My hands wanted to reach out and trace the images and question him about every single one, but instead, I tucked my hands under my arms and pulled back.
Repo looked over his shoulder at me, his eyes softening when he saw the fight I was having with myself. I backed up a little giving him some space and sitting at the edge of the bed.
Repo grabbed a shirt from a pile on top of his dresser and quickly pulled it on over his head. “It’s hard for me, too,” he explained, reaching for his towel once again when his hair started to fall and drip in his face. “I don’t know why I am the way I am. All I can tell you is something happened to me when I was a kid, something that my brain chooses not to allow me to remember, but that my body has never forgotten. Which is why my skin crawls, and I get aggressive when someone touches me.”
I instantly felt a pinch in my heart. It sounded strange not to remember something so important. A blessing or a curse? Not having to relive the pain or trauma you’d felt in nightmares or flashbacks? Or being confused about why you are the way you are because you don’t know what it was that made you that way. I’m not sure which I’d prefer to be honest.
“Do you want to be touched?” I wondered, tilting my head just slightly as I watched him pick up a comb and drag it through the long wavy tuft of locks that ran down the center of his head while the sides were shaved short.
He stopped for a second but didn’t turn to look at me. “Sometimes.”
While I’d love to forget some of the things I’d been through, some of the things I’d been forced to do during my time with the club over the past few years, I kind of believe that those things made me the person I am. They made me stronger, they made me more compassionate.
Events that happen in our lives shape us, they alter our vision and our goals.
It was like touching something hot.
You touch it, it burns, you know not to do it again.
What if you didn’t know if you touched it. What if you’re not sure at all. But you just know that something burned you, so you decided to eliminate everything around you that could possibly do the same thing. It hurt me to think of the things he was missing out on.
My fingers twitched, and for a moment I considered just saying fuck it and throwing caution to the wind. But we were still feeling each other out, and even though I was drawn to his comfort and his warmth and the way he seemed determined to save me, we still didn’t know each other. And I didn’t know how far I could push before he broke, and I found myself on the streets.
“Huntsman called,” he said suddenly, placing down his comb and turning to face me. “Your sister’s safe, but there were some complications, so he wants to keep Brooklyn with them for a little bit.”
I climbed onto my knees, my stomach beginning to swirl. “Complications? What does that mean?”
Repo shrugged. “Anything from someone getting hurt, to them feeling like someone may have followed them. It could be a million different things, but all you need to know is that Huntsman ain’t gonna let anything happen to her. The Exiled Eight clubhouse is almost the fucking safest place on this planet.”
I allowed myself a moment to breathe. “Can I talk to her?”
“They only just got in about an hour ago,” he explained, folding his arms across his chest. “Let her sleep. I’ll call Huntsman this afternoon and see if you can speak with her.”
I nodded. “Yeah, okay.” I wanted to see her, to hear her voice, but right now, these guys were in charge, and even though I wasn’t exactly sure what the next step was, I trusted Repo at this stage to take the lead.
“I need to hear your story.”
His words surprised me and I frowned. “What do you mean?”
He leaned back against the wall. “You need to tell me what kind of shitstorm I’ve started so I can warn the club. I need to know your story, where you’re from, why the hell you think that you owe Crow five years of your life, so I can figure out whether he’s gonna back down like a good little bitch, or if he’s gonna try and come back for you.”
He’s gonna come back for me.
“I don’t know,” I murmured.
“Bull fucking shit,” Repo argued, his tone harsh. “Now is not the time to start lying to me or acting like you’re some dumb blonde who has no idea what’s going on. You need to be fucking honest the club and me, so we can help you.”
“The thing is, I didn’t ask for your help,” I threw back, suddenly feeling defensive. I climbed off the bed and put some space between us. When you’d spent so long being trapped, being manipulated, being hurt, it was strange to think that he wasn’t going to do the same thing. “I’d almost paid what I owed, my time was almost done, and now here I am back in debt again.”
“Debt?” Repo laughed driving my agitation higher. “I thought I made this clear last night. What do you not understand?”
“You bought me, so you tell me!”
“I didn’t fucking buy you, I took you, there’s a fucking difference,” he snapped back, slamming his palm against the top of his dresser. “That means I don’t fucking own you. You don’t belong to me. But because I decided I wasn’t about to leave you in the hands of that psycho, it means I may have started a whole new fucking problem for my club. So, I need to know just how important you were to him in case we need to start preparing for a war.”
I grabbed a hold of the bed sheet, twisting it in my hands.
God, he was right. Whether Repo’s intentions were selfish or selfless, he rescued me and may have now put his club at risk. He may not have given me a choice at the time, but if he had, would I have said no?
Repo’s brothers have been nothing but accommodating so far when they had every reason to throw me out on my ass for snooping around their club, looking for a reason to hurt them.
When I didn’t answer, Repo sighed and hung his head. “Look, eventually, I’ll take you to your sister in Vegas, and after that, if you still want to get the fuck away, I’ll pay for your plane ticket across the country, and I’ll even set you up somewhere near a club in case you need help.” My body warmed, relaxing softly. I believed him. I believed that his intentions were genuine.
Repo wasn’t trying to be some fucking angel, he wasn’t trying to pretend to be some superhero and get me to worship him. He was just being a fucking human being. He was being a fucking good person who saw someone else hurting, and decided that he had the power to step in and do something about it.
He wasn’t obligated.
He didn’t have to do shit.
Which made me wonder whether this pull I felt toward his energy was a two-way thing. Did he feel it as well?
Bang. Bang.
I jumped, looking toward the door, my heart racing.
“I’m making pancakes,” Meyah called with a chuckle
. “This is your only warning before the rest of the club devour them.”
I felt my tummy grumble, and Repo snorted out a laugh. “Come on,” he urged, nodding toward the door. “Food first, then chat. Maybe then you’ll be less snappy.”
I frowned. “Screw you.”
“Now there's that girl I thought I met last night.”
She was still there, she was just a little scared and trying to find her feet.
But he was making it easier.
KENNEDY
I felt like I’d eaten half my body weight in pancakes. My stomach was going to explode.
I groaned as I got to my feet making Repo and Myth, who had joined us for breakfast, both crack a smile. “Are you guys done?” I asked, reaching for Repo’s empty plate.
“Kennedy, sit down,” he scowled, narrowing his eyes. “You aren’t here to do fucking chores and shit. We have people for that.”
“Club girls?” I challenged.
He huffed out a heavy breath and looked over at Myth.
Myth raised his hands with a wide grin. “This is all you, dude.”
Repo swiped at his face with his hand. “Jesus fucking Christ,” he cursed as he looked over his shoulder, his eyes searching the rooms. “Guess now is as good of a time as any. Avery!”
A beautiful young girl with long, thick, brown hair looked up from her breakfast, her eyes searching the room until she found Repo waving her toward us.
“Can you come over here for a minute?” he asked, almost politely. Which was already more than what I would have been offered back home. The way they treated the old ladies in the club did seem extremely respectful. It was something I wasn’t accustom to, given that none of the boys back at Red Riot had old ladies. A couple of them had kids, but they weren’t allowed to have them around the clubhouse.
