Текст книги "Burning Ember"
Автор книги: Darby Briar
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Текущая страница: 4 (всего у книги 33 страниц)
There is beauty in a broken heart, and undeniable allure to a damaged soul. And in an instant, our ideals of perfection are both shredded and rebuilt.
I wipe my sweaty palms feverishly on my shorts then tuck a loose strand of hair behind my ear.
Breathe, Em, breathe. It’s going to be fine.
Dozer raps three times on the door.
A whiskey rough voice with a bit of an accent snarls, “I swear to God, if you fuckers don’t leave me alone so I can get some work done today, I’m gonna ram someone’s head through the goddamn wall.”
Dozer’s arm tightens around me. “It’s okay, babe, he’s always like that. Got a perpetual stick up his ass. He’s gonna freak the fuck out. That’s inevitable, but I’ll talk him down, yeah?”
I nod and tell myself that no matter what, I will not open my mouth. I won’t let this guy get to me. I need to be prepared. He’s going to be a dick . . . that’s a given. Biting the inside of my cheek, I inwardly scold . . . don’t let your temper get the best of you. Or you can kiss your freedom goodbye.
Dozer removes his arm from around me, opens the door, and sticks his head in. “Mav, I need a word.”
A moment later, the same gruff voice answers, “Come in.”
Dozer pushes the door open further, and we walk into the small office.
A cloud of smoke swirls around the room. It sets off alarm bells in my head. I grew up in a home that always had mysterious clouds of smoke, and knowing I can’t afford to be anything but clear headed today, I don’t dare inhale. Not until I notice the smoke is coming from a cigarette resting in the overflowing ashtray on the desk.
A man with dark hair is leaning over the desk, sketching something on a large white sheet of paper.
His eyes don’t swing up to us, not right away. But his shoulders tense, and the pencil in his hand stops. After a second, he slowly sits back in his chair, sets down his pencil, and reaches forward for the cigarette. Pinching it, he brings it to his lips. His scruff-covered cheeks hollow out as he sucks in a drag. When he finally turns to face us, his gaze passes over Dozer as if he wasn’t even standing there and lands on me.
The oxygen sheltered in my lungs whooshes out. And for endless moments, I’m breathless. Frozen.
Captivated by the dark and arresting biker before me.
My mind goes on a vacation as I take in his amber eyes. The same color as the Pacific Coast sand. The sand I lazed in for days as a teenager and built sand castles in as a little girl.
He’s dark though and reminds me more of a hot summer’s night than a hot summer’s day. With his inky, closely cropped hair, thick lashes, and black stubble on the lower half of his face, so black it’s almost blue. Like the ocean at night.
His heated gaze sends a rush of warmth through me, and at the same time chills spread over my skin.
Hot and cold.
He expels a puff of smoke in my direction. And though it disrupts my clear view of him, I can still see that’s he’s perfectly made, clearly growing angrier by the second, and unequivocally the sexiest man I’ve ever seen.
I study him. His leather vest and the way it’s cluttered with pins and patches, fitting over his nice, wide shoulders. Around his neck hangs a silver chain and I’m curious to know what hangs at the end. But it disappears beneath his fitted black T-shirt. His jeans are faded, dirty, and sexy as hell. Threadbare spots reveal delicious bits of tan skin. The hand resting on his thigh is large and manly. He wears one ring where most bikers wear many, a silver H that transforms into wings. His arms are veiny and one is unmarked, where the other is a sleeve of colorful images.
A darkness hovers around him like a shroud, and the tension in the room rises, as if it vibrates off his very skin.
I’m brought back to reality as Mav, Maverick, Rick the Dick, Ricky Boy, whoever in the hell he is, reaches forward and flicks his cigarette over the ashtray. His eyes, which stay locked on my face, narrow, the skin around them wrinkles and the muscles in his jaw tighten and then ticks. Further proof that Goose, Dozer, and the blond biker Dozer referred to as Bodie were right. He doesn’t like what he sees.
I gnaw on my lip and try to figure out if it’s my red hair or something else about me that sets him off.
For some reason he’s looking at me as if I stole his hopes and dreams and I have no idea why.
His gaze leaves my face and trails down over my body. It’s like a living, breathing thing as it descends, touching my chest as if it were a finger drawing down over my cleavage, my stomach, two hands running over my thighs.
An achy, needy sensation sparks between my legs. Something I haven’t felt for a long time. It was there in the beginning with Warner, but nowhere near this magnitude. I’ve been worried Warner ruined my desire for men, for sex. But obviously, that’s not the case because my body’s lighting up at the mere sight of Mav. A man I just met. A man who, for some reason, starts a fire inside me. One that grows with every bit of oxygen I take in.
It doesn’t take a genius to see this biker is the last person I need to be attracted to. He’s undoubtedly hazardous to my health. Because not only does he look at me like he wants to kill me, I’m quite certain he’s capable of doing so.
God . . . Have I fled from one monster, only to land in the lair of the devil?
A resounding yes! has my heart beating faster.
He may appear to be the exact opposite of Warner physically. But he’s equally as beautiful, just in a different way.
Warner was blond, blue-eyed, and at first, I thought he was an angel. He swept me out of the hovel I lived in with Sundown and Will, and helped me support them. He treated me as if I meant the world to him. He bought me things and took me everywhere. I thought he was an answer to my prayers. Proof that God did actually care about me.
But I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Soon after I moved in with him, he showed me the monster he’d hidden from me while we were dating. The darkness I couldn’t tame and he couldn’t contain. The one that had me living with a good large dose of fear running through my veins every day. Expecting the worst, and praying for the best.
Mav has the same inner turmoil churning in his eyes. It’s unmistakable once you know what it looks like. He comes in a similar delicious packaging. Only he’s dark where Warner was light, and he’s not masking who he really is. His darkness shows plain as day on the outside. It’s not hidden. It’s out there for all the world to see.
Like Lucifer, his presence is rife with malevolence. The very image of him screams DANGER. He’s utterly tempting, a delicious looking bad-boy in leather and a vision of sin in the best of ways. A stealer of hearts and souls, no doubt.
The warning signs are right there for me to see, and this time, I can’t afford to ignore them.
MAVERICK
I can tell by the look on Dozer’s face when he peeks his head into my office, he’s about to make my already shitty day worse.
With a dower expression, he says, “Mav, need a word.”
I rarely find time these days to catch up on work. In fact, I’m a week late on this current project. And today is the first day since Cap was shot that I’m not letting club business take precedence. I can’t keep letting the continual shit-storm, which seems to be circling the club, distract me, and put my own responsibilities off any longer. I hate disappointing clients, breaking my word, and missing deadlines.
It makes me look like a lazy, no good biker, and I hate that stigma.
So today, I’m not a HOC. I’m simply Maverick Gunn with my own shit to take care of before I go back to running the club in Cap’s absence.
I’m pissed off further because it’s Dozer interrupting me. Dozer, as Cap’s son and the club V.P. before he stepped down, should be the one dealing with the club shit right now. Not me.
I never aspired to be club president. Nah. I’m happy being a patch member and the Sergeant-at-Arms, or I was until everything went to hell. I’m the right hand man, the one who gets his hands dirty, not the leader who makes others do it for him.
Edge’s release can’t come soon enough. Then we’ll take a vote and put in a new president. Which should fall to Edge. However, some members want Griz to take up the gavel. Though Griz, himself, isn’t one of them. But only Cap and I know why.
I’m still uneasy about Edge’s return. I can’t sleep for shit lately. I don’t know how he can forgive me so easily for what happened. Since my actions, my decisions stole five years of his life. He swears we’re good though. Every time I’ve visited him in the pen, he’s told me I need to let that shit go. Move on.
But I can’t.
I can’t move on until I’ve made amends. Might take five fucking more years or my whole goddamn life, but I’ll do it somehow.
I hope that Dozer’s here because he’s had a change of heart. And he’s ready to man up, put his pride aside, and help me take care of business.
Without lifting my head from the sketch, I tell him to come in.
He enters and out of the corner of my eye, I see the color of crimson beside him. That color makes my blood run cold. My chest instantly aches. The color of something . . . someone . . . I never want to lay eyes on again. Lower, I see a pair of feminine legs and confirm it’s her.
The woman I hate with every beat of my blackened and damaged heart.
White-hot rage fills me, rushes through my body like water down a river filling every part of me. A barrel of emotions I’ve long kept at bay threatens to break the dam I’ve forged to hold them back. For the last five years, the ever-present ache in my chest, which has been plaguing me on and off, is now throbbing and screaming for attention.
I envision exploding out of my seat and lunging toward her, choking the life out of her with my bare hands. Or using the knife on my belt to mar up her alabaster skin.
I reach for my cigarette knowing it will help calm me the fuck down.
How dare she fucking come here. How dare she show her face and breathe the same air I breathe. After what she stole from me. From Edge.
Just thinking about it causes more murderous thoughts to run wild through my mind. Does she not realize I’ve fantasized about delivering her death a thousand times? That I’ve strangled her and buried her in my dreams? Thrown dirt over her cold, dead body? For the last five years, every waking moment of my life has been poisoned by this bitch. Now she’s here. Why? To stomp on what little is left of my heart? To snuff out what’s left of my soul? To send Edge back to prison the second he gets out?
Slowly, while trying to contain the rage I feel, I sit up, turn, and face her. Only my eyes find slightly tanned and freckled skin, not white alabaster. My gaze lands on eyes the color of the sea, teal, not the deep brown I anticipated. A pretty face sans make-up.
The ache in my chest cools for an instant.
Who the fuck is this?
Confusion floods through me, and I take in the girl standing beside Dozer. She’s not Dana, but there are similarities. The hair for one. The state of desperation another.
The blistering hatred for Dana is all I feel though, and I can’t help but cringe at the sight of this girl. A reminder of all that I’ve lost. Of who I was, and what I am now. All because of one fucking redheaded girl.
I can’t help but see every woman with hair like fire as poison ivy in disguise. A disease. A fire starter. A plague ruining all it touches. Not something I want within ten feet of me.
As my eyes travel down her body, I take in her cheap and ragged clothing. She’s short, and thin, but tan for a ginger. I can’t deny she’s attractive. She’s everything I’ve always been attracted to, long red hair, toned petite body, beautiful innocent face, and a nice handful of curves.
Only now, some of those attributes I despise.
The girl is young, maybe late teens or early twenties. The way she’s dressed . . . reminds me of . . .
I can’t even think about it too long, or what’s left of me may shatter into a million fucking pieces.
The girl looks like she’s been living on the streets. Malnourished. Dirty. Desperate. Red eyes and sunken cheeks. A junky?
I loathe junkies. They’re like zombies. Starving and greedy for what they crave. And they’ll hurt anyone to curb their craving. They’re the worst possible version of themselves at that point. I’m not a hundred-percent sure that she is one. But I’m not a hundred-percent sure she isn’t either.
The only thing I’m certain of is she’s definitely a stray. Like Dana.
That she needs help is evident. Something about her screams for it. And some caveman instinct inside me tries to rear its ugly head to tell me I’m just the strong male to take care of her. Clean her up. Feed her. Bed her. Claim her.
Yeah well, fuck that.
Been there. Done that. Got the Lesson-Fucking-Learned-Because-The-Bitch-Tore-My-Heart-Out T-shirt.
Blowing out the drag I pulled in, I shut an impenetrable gate over that instinct and tell it to find some other fucking idiot to do its bidding.
But the attraction’s still there. On simmer.
For some reason, this alley cat, with her fiery mane of hair and cinnamon-dotted skin have an effect on me.
Looking back up at her face, I find her biting her lip. She’s also checking me out. Yeah, babe, I’m not harsh on the eyes, am I? Girls love the tattoos. Love the cut. Love guys that look like they’ll treat them like shit and can fuck them into oblivion.
But I definitely don’t want this girl looking at me like she wants to be in my bed.
My cock twitches as if her hand and not only her eyes are passing over me. It pisses me off . . . my body stirring to life. Rising for her. This girl who reminds me of all that I’ve lost and how far I’ve fallen.
I stamp out my cigarette in the ashtray on my desk and decide I need to do everything in my power to get this chick as far as fuck away from me as humanly possible. I need her out of my office. Out of my club. Fuck. Out of this city preferably.
And it looks like I’m going to have to go toe to toe with a friend to do it.
“What’s this? A fuckin’ tabby cat, D? We’re not takin’ in strays today, brother.”
The girl cringes. Pain and fear flash over her features. But she quickly masks it and tries not to show how my insults affect her. I follow the line of her shoulders down and see her tiny fists curled, and then I notice slash marks, scars over her wrists.
Great . . . she’s fucking suicidal.Of course she is. Why would I expect any different?
Whatever reason she’s hitting the drugs is probably why she’s attempted to take her own life. She’s merely looking for her next fix and thinks a bunch of bikers will have plenty of drugs she can score. Well, she’s in for a rude-fucking-awakening.
It’s my job to protect the club. And this club doesn’t need any more trouble than it already has.
“What you lookin’ for, Doll, your next fix? Think we got the goods here? That it?” I shake my head, and add, “You ain’t gonna find that shit here. Just turn your ass around and keep on walkin’.”
Drugs ruin lives. Weaken clubs and member loyalty. You can’t be loyal to anyone, a brother, the code, or the club when all you give a shit about is getting high.
It’s the reason I joined this club and not any other. We don’t allow hardcore drugs into the clubhouse. Yes, we revel in chaos. Always have. We run weed, guns, and launder money, which is our main source of green. But we don’t bring trouble, chaos home. Not to the clubhouse. Not to our families. Not if we can help it.
Dozer spits out some shit about me being an asshole and her being a friend of Lil’s, and that he’s already told her she can stay.
My blood fucking boils. Of course he did. He wants authority but no damn responsibilities.
“Not your fuckin’ call, brother. It’s mine. Ain’t no fuckin’ way that”—I point at her—“is welcome here.” I will not relive my past. I do not want one reminder of it whatsoever.
Goose, who’s standing behind D, mutters, “Fuck. Here we go.”
“That’s where you wanna go with this?” Dozer snaps.
“I’m just statin’ a fact. You fuckin’ lost the right to have a say in who fuckin’ stays and who goes when you cut your patch off and left me to deal with this shitstorm alone.”
“Fuck you.”
“Get her the fuck out, D. I said no outsiders. I meant it. We already got enough of our share of shit to deal with right now. I don’t want anybody but brothers and clubpieces in the clubhouse. She could be a snitch. GBs are breathing down our necks. I can only hold them off so long before they take action. I wouldn’t put it past them to send a piece of pussy to be their eyes and ears.”
I pick up my pencil and turn back to my work, because if I don’t, I can see this escalating and us coming to blows.
It’s true. We’ve suspected for a while now that the Greenbacks, another MC we’ve been longtime allies with, are going to double cross us. Maybe even try to infiltrate our club. They’ve been waiting for word on whether or not we’ll allow them to establish a chapter in Albuquerque. The problem is they’re not simply looking to open a chapter here. They want to take over the gun, pussy, and drug business in New Mexico and push their merchandise into Texas, and other neighboring states. They don’t want just to control the southwest. That’s not enough for them anymore. They want to own the Midwest too.
However, letting them set up a chapter here means they’d be muling their shit straight through our territory, not to mention stirring up a turf war with the Thirteen Devils who currently hold a monopoly on all of those businesses. And our support of the GBs moving into New Mexico would make our truce with the 13 Ds null and void.
We could be starting a war either way we vote.
For years, because of their long-standing friendship, Pappy and Smoke, the president and VP of the Greenbacks, have respected Cap, our president’s, decision to stay in our own respective territories unless we’re paying a friendly visit. But times are changing. The Greenbacks are growing, multiplying and spreading like cockroaches. And now, with Cap somewhat out of the picture, everyone’s feeling antsy.
The new president of the HOCs is going to have a lot of sway when it comes to what side of the fence we land on. No doubt, the GBs will want to know who that’s going to be, and what their take is on letting them into New Mexico.
GBs could press the issue and force our hand. But, they also don’t want to start a war with their strongest allies, and the people who clean their dirty money. Not unless they have to. Plus if shit ever goes south with their supplier, the Escarrá Cartel, they’re going to need us covering their backs since their Irish ties to the motherland aren’t what they used to be.
As far as I’m concerned though, our values differ. Our visions of the future do too. We’re not saints. We’re restless sinners with a bit of a conscience. But we know what’s important. Our brotherhood, our families, and our freedom. It’s that simple. Why complicate it by allowing the Greenbacks into our borders?
And who the fuck wants to invite cockroaches into their house? Allowing them to come here is like saying, “Yeah. Go ahead. Move in. Hey, and while you’re at it, why don’t you dump all of your garbage on my doorstep.”
I don’t give a shit how much green they throw our way; it’s not worth the fucking misery they’re going to bring with them. And what the hell would I do with piles of money? The same I do with it now. Nothing. But I’ll fall in line with the vote and back whatever the club decides either way.
I’m torn away from my thoughts as Dozer leans over my desk. Practically gets in my face. Touches my design and thrusts it aside. Motherfucker. I see fire engine red and no, not from the girl’s hair this time. I face him and ball my fists.
“She’s for Edge. That’s why Lil’ brought her in. Alister’s already checked her out and put her on birth control. She’s clean and hasn’t ever been touched.”
Hasn’t ever been touched.
Those words float around inside my mind. It takes me a minute to understand their meaning. Which is what? She’s a virgin?
Unclaimed in every way?
I seek her out again. Try to find the truth in her eyes, but Dozer keeps talking and blocks her from me. Something about that bothers the hell out of me.
A virgin.
Fuck. My dick thickens at the thought, and I fight it.
Then his other words register. She’ll cook, clean, and earn her way around here. Wait . . . did he just say she’s for Edge? What the fuck?
“Me and Goose will watch her. You won’t have to worry about her. And after the party, if the boys want to make it official, then she can take Bird’s place.” But I’m still struggling to leash my arousal, and hold back the demon inside me who wants to beat his face in.
I can’t fucking focus on what it all means just yet. And I’m trying to understand why I care she’s never had sex, and why it pisses me off that if Dozer has his way, she’ll be having sex with one of my brothers in a few short days.
Get fucked by every brother in the clubhouse after that if she becomes a clubpiece.
My grip on my pencil becomes fatal, breaks and falls to the floor.
I stand. Some sort of animal is rising inside me and taking over my limbs. I’m a heartbeat away from letting it at Dozer.
God . . . What am I doing?
I internally shake myself.
She can’t stay.
For all I know, she’s been sent by the GBs or the feds, though we’ve done pretty good to stay off the FBI’s radar the last few years. Either way, she’s a problem I don’t need right now.
Dozer looks over his shoulder and speaks to Goose. “Take her out and get her a drink or something while we settle this, yeah?”
Goose tugs her out of the room. Our eyes meet. Mine with the girl’s. Her face is beautiful and her eyes are so tired. They’re pleading for help I simply can’t give. Not now. Maybe not ever.
All I have left now is the club. And I’m sorry, but I won’t give another broken girl the opportunity to poison what’s left of me and what matters in my life.
I don’t say the words I feel echoing out of my soul.
This place isn’t the place for you, Doll. I won’t be the fool who tries to fix you. I’ve already had my fair share of suicidal junkies. Maybe if I still had a heart, but mine was ripped out a long time ago. We’re ruined, you and I, and there’s no fixing what’s utterly broken.
She’s a stray and looking for a home.
But this isn’t it, Doll. This isn’t it.
