by Em Petrova
The guys closed the door with a firm slam. Juliette glanced at the ladies clustered at their usual table.
At least she wasn’t the only one wearing her worries on her face.
Chapter Two
Dixon, the club president and Blade’s good friend since before he dropped out of high school, narrowed his eyes on him. “We can’t help you if we don’t know what you’re up against, man.”
Blade shook his head. In the old days, they called him by his first name—Titus. Then Blade left school, only reuniting with the guys from Mersey High School later on. Looking at Dixon, he knew the man had his back then and still did.
But Blade couldn’t ask him to guard it.
He folded his arms across his chest. “I only came to warn you, not to ask for help.”
Dixon, Tank, Patriot and Diesel all stared at him. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Rio scrub a hand over his face.
“When will you learn that you don’t need to ask for help—the brotherhood grants it?” Dixon asked.
He loved these guys. Which was why he couldn’t implicate them.
“Look, I can’t talk about it. If I could, you’d be the first to know. I’m here to tell you that I just walked away from some bad shit, and if anyone comes lookin’ for me, send them my way and I’ll handle it. Just don’t try to take it on yourself, okay?”
“Jesus, Titus. What the hell’s going on?” Patriot found it most difficult sticking to his nickname of Blade. To him, he’d forever be Titus, the scrawny motorhead who hated school and loved cars and bikes. But now he only worked on engines in his spare time, because he earned his living breaking his back laying concrete.
“I can’t talk about it.”
“Are you runnin’ from the cops?” Tank braced his legs as if preparing for a fight.
“No. They can’t know either.” Irritated, he swiped a hand through the air. “Just…don’t ask. Be on the alert is all I’m asking. You won’t be seeing me for a while either.”
Dixon stepped up to him. They were matched in height and strength. “You know I out-rank you in the club. I can force you to talk or banish you.”
Blade found himself smiling despite his fears for his cousin’s recovery and his family’s safety. “You can try.”
Dixon stared at him for five full heartbeats. Then he chuckled. “Asshole. You never did know when to step away from a fight.”
Which had earned him the scar on his hand and nickname. He’d been young and dumb then. Now he knew better than to walk into a fight without first analyzing his opponent. In this case, the Engers.
The moment of amusement snuffed out quickly, and Blade looked Rio in the eyes. “If I don’t come back, give my spot to Rio.”
Tank issued a low growl that sounded as a challenge, but Rio sent Blade a glare. “I don’t fucking want your spot. I never did.”
At least Rio’s declaration took the fire off Blade for a moment as they all turned to him. “Why the hell not?” Patriot demanded.
“You’ve never explained it to us, and we’ve given you space, Rio. But you can’t just drop that bomb on us and walk away. We’re not good enough for you?” The challenge in Dixon’s eyes had Tank silently shifting into position to defend his president if shit went down.
Which it wouldn’t.
“This isn’t about me. It’s Blade’s heat.” Rio had kept in touch with Blade long after he left school. They hung out together—even the first time they got drunk, they did it together. The next day, they suffered together too.
He shook his head at Dixon. “He’s right. Don’t put your irritation with me on him. Until now, you’ve let him stay regardless of not wearing a patch on his leather.”
“No. Everyone has a right to know.” Rio’s statement had them all whipping in his direction.
Standing closest to Rio, Blade heard the man’s short sigh. Then the words shot out.
“I have a daughter.”
Blade blinked. Of all the things he believed to be holding Rio back, he never suspected this.
“What? When? How old?” he fired off the questions.
Rio dropped his gaze to the floor. “She’s a year and a half. Her mom and I were a short-lived fling, but I do my best to see my daughter when I can. For a year, I’ve been trying to convince her mother to grant me partial custody. Weekend visitation.”
“Holy shit, man. I never suspected,” Patriot said.
“None of us did,” Tank added. “That’s heavy.”
Rio nodded. “I don’t want my ex to have any reasons for not granting me the visitation. I’ve cleaned up my act over the past year. I’m working full-time with my uncle’s forestry business.”
“Why isn’t the court involved? A father’s got rights,” Dixon put in.
“I don’t want to make things ugly with her mother. I want her to come to trust me to take care of our daughter.”
“What’s her name?” Blade’s focus turned to his buddy’s own dark secrets.
A grin spread over the proud daddy’s face. “Annie Freeze.”
Dead silence met his words.
“I was lucky my ex let me name her.”
Patriot’s lips twisted as he attempted to bite off a smile. “You’re shitting, right? Tell me you did not name an innocent baby girl Annie Freeze?”
“It was either that or Gasolina.” Rio wore a deadpan expression, but Blade knew him well enough to guess he was fucking with them all.
“Jesus Christ.” Tank groaned.
Rio traded a look with Blade and dropped his act. “I’m joking. We named her Harley Rae.”
More silence filled the conference room and then they all burst out laughing, which lightened the atmosphere.
“I hope you don’t take offense that I want to keep my distance from some of the things that go down in the club. Trouble seems to find us.” Rio glanced at Diesel, who’d just rescued his woman from a drug kingpin, with the Dark Falcons at his side.
Exactly the reason Blade couldn’t draw the brothers into his darkness. The minute they knew his issue, they’d be hopping on their motorcycles and heading in mass force to hunt down the Engers.
He stared down at the back of his hand. He accepted responsibility for that fuck-up then, and he’d do the same for his family. His father might be the reason they were all under fire, but only Blade could finish it.
Again, he saw the glow of Juliette’s blue eyes when he walked through the door. She was in another man’s arms, but that didn’t stop the throb between them. Christ, he could almost hear the electric zap in the air whenever their gazes met.
He couldn’t drag her into his shit any more than Rio wanted his daughter in it.
When Blade walked into the clubhouse, he knew without a doubt that the Engers were pinning a big crime on Creed. And if he didn’t stop them, his cousin would go to prison next. After the doctor at the clinic patched up Creed, his cousin told him since he hadn’t died, they planned to frame him for a crime.
Blade also walked in today thinking to call on a favor from his best friend. Now that he heard Rio’s reason behind not becoming an official member of the Dark Falcons, he realized this had to be a solo mission.
But that wasn’t possible. He needed Rio.
Dammit.
He glanced up at the guys. They had families too—he couldn’t ask a single one.
He was closer to Rio. He’d ask just this one time, and he’d never ask again.
Juliette’s wide blue eyes loomed in his mind once more.
He didn’t have a diploma and his old man was a murderer. But those weren’t all the reasons he wasn’t good enough for Juliette. Fact was, he was an asshole who would put a friend in danger to save his own ass.
Son of a bitch, he couldn’t do it. Bringing anybody into his mess was wrong.
Using all his muscle, Blade raked the concrete pad he and his team just laid. This job sucked, and he hated the men he worked with, but it was good money. Without a diploma or a degree of any kind, he couldn’t ask
for more.
For a while now, he’d been thinking of how to make himself into the man Juliette deserved. Someone she could kiss after a long day of wrangling little kids and not get a whiff of the sweat of hard labor on her man. Or wait for him to shower before he could lay a hand on her.
Plenty of women out there liked a hardworking man. He didn’t know Juliette’s preferences, either. But he’d seen the types she dated now and then. They were clean-cut if not on the dull side.
She was so far out of his league.
“Hey, Blade. Take a break, man. You’ve been bustin’ ass for hours,” one of the guys called out.
He looked at the expanse of concrete left to rake. “After I finish this.”
“Suit yourself. It’s not drying immediately, though. You got a few to grab a drink.” The guy wandered off a few feet and congregated with the other guys. They stood in a circle BSing and guzzling water to rehydrate themselves after working in the hot sun.
Blade listened to their discussion which included the location of the big party this weekend. He joined them at times, and could outdrink every one of them. But if he was drinking too much, he preferred to do it in the clubhouse or in his own home. Lately, he hadn’t touched a drop—he had to stay alert in case the Engers decided his hour was up.
They talked about the women they banged and one told them about something funny his kid did at school. When he overheard a discussion about an opening on the other crew that worked outside of Mersey in the neighboring areas, his ears perked up.
“They’re lookin’ for a foreman. Someone to just stand around all day and give orders.”
“Damn, that sounds like the job for me,” another guy said.
“What kinda background are they looking for?” a third man questioned.
Blade threw a look over his shoulder. He could out-perform any of these assholes any day of the week. And he knew how to rally men to work harder and could provide them with the knowledge about how to do this job more efficiently.
“They want at least two years of college,” came the answer.
His hopes flat-lined.
Everything these days required some college, it seemed. Hell, you could barely flip a burger with less than an associate degree. And he didn’t even hold a high school diploma.
He busted his ass the rest of the day, and when he drove home, all he could look forward to was a hot shower—alone. Fantasies revolved through his brain, of him lifting Juliette and carrying her to the shower. Stripping her down and bending her into the warm spray. Kissing her laughing mouth.
Christ, he was a piece of work. All kinds of lofty ideas were filling his mind today.
When he reached his place, he took a minute to sweep the area for danger. The only danger he saw was a rain gutter that needed replaced.
He went inside and called for his dog. Champ was a mutt he found along the road, so skinny from being starved that all his ribs were exposed. Blade hauled him home with him and in a few weeks he found the best companion a man could ask for.
Champ didn’t come, and he walked to the back door which had a dog door leading onto a plot of grass outside. He opened the door and started to call for him again, but the name strangled on his lips as he saw what those fuckers had done.
The Engers.
He pulled out his phone and called Creed.
His cousin answered at once. “You okay, man?”
“No,” he grated out. “They got Champ too. When I find them, I won’t leave a single man alive.”
Juliette could clearly see that Blade wasn’t okay tonight.
In fact, he hadn’t been all right for several weeks now. He avoided her gaze so much that she was beginning to believe she’d imagined any connection at all.
He sat in the back, drinking alone. If one of the Dark Falcons approached him, he’d wave them off. Beer bottles littered the table in front of him, and the slump of his shoulders broke her heart.
Selena shook her head. “I don’t know what’s going on with him, do you?” she asked Juliette.
“No.” The word came out as a hot rasp. “But there must be some way to help.” Decision made, she stood and started toward Titus. Several honeys shot her dirty looks, but she continued toward her friend.
And he was her friend as much as he was Rio’s. Blade hung around her house growing up so much that her mother joked that she bought an extra box of cereal just for Titus.
At her approach, he looked up. The slice of his stare made her feet falter. A throb hit the air between them, fluttering like wings of a massive bird that would swoop down at any moment.
Her breath punched from her chest at the intensity of his gaze. Insides knotting, she forced one foot in front of the other. The magnetic pull he had on her got her across the room and suddenly, she stood before him.
“Titus…”
“Go, Juliette. You can’t do anything for me.” He spoke so clearly, she realized he was totally sober.
Ignoring his warning, she pulled out a chair and sat across from him.
“Get away from me. Your brother won’t like it,” he grumbled.
“My brother’s not here tonight. And I’m not leaving. You need a friend.”
Agony burned in the depths of his eyes, shocking her silent. Only deep-seated pain made a man look that way.
She jerked her head toward the exit. “C’mon. Let’s grab some air.”
Without waiting for his answer, she stood and walked outside. As soon as she pushed through the entrance of the clubhouse, she felt the scorch of Titus’s body heat against her spine.
Her nipples bunched in reaction, tightened to sharp peaks beneath her T-shirt. She turned her head slightly and caught his attention on her. Her pulse picked up, and she managed to draw in a ragged breath of fresh mountain air.
She walked down the line of motorcycles parked at an angle down the front of the building. She knew which belonged to him, and she stopped beside it. Looking up into his eyes, she felt that bolt of awareness and primal attraction between them.
“Talk to me, Titus. What’s happened?”
He glanced away, throat working. “Lost my dog.”
“Ohhh. I’m so sorry to hear it.” She reached a hand toward him but saw his stiff pose and retracted it. “He was a really good dog. So friendly the times I met him.”
He made a noise deep in his throat. “He liked you.”
She wanted so bad to put her arms around the hurting man and draw out some of his pain. Somehow, she felt her touch could work some magic in him, a healing balm—if he ever allowed it, that was.
Her feet crunched on the gravel as she stepped toward him. “Why don’t we get out of here? Go for a ride.”
The surprise in his eyes replaced some of the pain, and the depths heated once more as he centered his stare on her. “It’s not a good idea.”
“It’s just a ride, Titus. Or do you believe all that bullshit the honeys think? That as soon as you have a woman on your bike that you’re bound?” Her insides jittered at speaking the word bound. Because that was exactly what she thought lay between her and Titus. That he may fight and even turn from her, but in the end, the two of them would be left standing.
Her words brought a twitch to the corner of his hard lips. “Fine. A short ride.” He swung his leg over his leather seat and walked the bike out of the space in order to give her room. She climbed onto the back.
For a heartbeat, she didn’t know what to do with her arms. If she gripped Titus, she might never let go.
“Hold onto me,” he gritted out.
She did. And it felt so right. So perfect. As if her arms were designed for holding his hard body, and he was made for being in her arms.
As they pulled onto the road, she looked over his muscled shoulder. The wind blew her hair behind her, and she’d fight with tangles later, but this was all worth it.
They drove through Mersey and onto some of the roads leading toward the mountains. The rumble of the engine beneath her had her throbbin
g as much as the man settled between her thighs. Her insides tightened in a clenching tug, and she wondered if she reached a hand between his legs and set it over his fly, if she’d find a bulge there.
Miles slipped by them, and the stars dotted the midnight sky. She had to wake up early in the morning for class, but she didn’t care right now. The long road stretched in front of them, and Titus was relaxing in her arms.
They road for hours. Neither spoke. He didn’t stop the bike, but she grew increasingly more familiar with his body against hers. She knew when to lean into a curve just by feeling his muscles shift. Some deep, possibly immature, part of herself wanted to read more into the body language between them.
When he turned into the parking lot of the clubhouse, not a bike glimmered in the moonlight. The place had cleared out while they were gone. Only her car sat there in the darkness.
He drew up beside it. He didn’t cut the engine as she climbed off. On wobbly legs, she walked to her vehicle and unlocked the door. His eyes on her spine felt like a caress.
Just before she climbed behind the wheel, she shot him a look.
Fire blazed from his eyes, and her breath caught.
Without a word, a nod or a wave, he waited for her to close the door and start her car. When she backed out, he looped the bike through the lot and hit the road again—alone.
Juliette paused with her lotion-coated hands hovering over her freshly-shaved calf. Tilting her head, she listened harder. Then she heard it—a light knock at the front door.
Had Rio forgotten his key again? Her brother was lucky she was still awake and it wasn’t a school night.
She quickly dropped her foot from the edge of the bathtub and wiped her hands on her bath towel. As she hurried through the house she and her brother shared, the knock sounded again.
She opened the door, mouth open to give Rio a good telling off. When she saw who stood there, her jaw dropped further.
“Titus.” Cool air rushed across her throat, and she pulled her robe ends closed.
His gaze traveled over her face and down over the silky nightgown she wore to her bare toes. She curled them, thinking the bold pink polish wasn’t at all her style even as she considered dropping the robe and stepping nude into Titus’s arms.