Austin's Ward

by Lynn Burke

  “Austin’s a good man.”

  “Yeah.” He hadn’t pushed me. He’d pulled back when most would have just taken what I’m sure he’d obviously seen I wanted and felt in my body’s reaction to him. A shiver slid over my skin. “He is.”

  “He doesn’t fuck around with the whores a whole lot from what I’ve seen -- and from what Gunner has said,” Shelby said. “He takes his position in the ranks here pretty seriously. Doesn’t act rashly and weighs possible actions before committing them.”

  “How long have you known him?”

  “Not long.” She glanced at the office door. “But Gunner talks about his brothers a lot. They’re his family, you know?”

  I nodded, twirling my empty glass in my hands. I didn’t know, though. I didn’t know what it meant to have a close family. Hannah had breezed into my life, and we’d connected like what I expected sisters might, but since she’d hooked up with Bowie, I rarely saw her. She spent most nights in his bed rather the one in our apartment’s second bedroom.

  Shelby changed the topic, asking about work and then we moved onto what she had planned in her own search for a job since returning from overseas. I’d noted the shitkickers on her feet, evidence of the military background Hannah had told me about Shelby.

  She seemed just as eager to spill her guts, and before an hour passed, I felt like I’d found a new friend even though we didn’t have much in common.

  “You should give him a chance,” Shelby said, so completely off the subject of the PTSD she suffered from and had been explaining, that my brain took a few seconds to catch up.

  “Austin?”

  “Yes.” She smiled, and the door beyond her opened, spilling Outlaws. Austin brought up the rear, his height giving me a clear visual of his face. His brow drawn as though deep in thought, he opened his mouth, ready to say something.

  “He’ll keep you safe,” Shelby murmured.

  I didn’t doubt it. The furrowed brow above his glinting eyes eased the second our gazes connected, his mouth closing without speaking. His lips twitched as though he wanted to smile, and I found my heart fluttering, my lips lifting in response.

  Shelby snickered. “You are fucked.”

  Torn over happiness and wariness she spoke truth, I clasped my hands in my lap to keep them from shaking. The man more than turned me on. He lit me up inside like a burst of fireworks, my insides all Oh-ing and Ah-ing with delight.

  Fucked. Yep.

  Chapter Four

  Austin

  “What are you going to do with her?” Gunner asked me seconds before walking out into the club’s lounge.

  “Either drink myself into a damn stupor or fuck her until I can’t walk.”

  He chuckled and pushed the office door open. “I’d go with the latter.”

  I opened my mouth to say what I’d told Cadence -- that I wouldn’t push her -- but she sat directly in front of me, hair tousled as though we’d just fucked, her big blue eyes sucking my soul out of me. I wanted to drown in her. Lose myself in her body, in her head, in her soul.

  The fuck? I scratched my chest absently while following Gunner to the bar, wondering over the rush of emotions that had intensified ten times since that morning I’d kissed her.

  “I’ll catch up with you later,” Val said, heading toward the exit with his laptop clutched under his arm, but I merely nodded I’d heard.

  He had been hacking left and right, getting into the senator’s personal email while we’d been discussing what to do to help Cadence out -- and how to maybe make a few grand in the process.

  Turned out, Cadence wasn’t the only woman the senator had been fucking. The fucker’s IP address from his home computer had three different emails, one being his means of communicating with over a dozen women.

  He’d also used the same to contact someone the Outlaws knew, a hitman and ex-Navy friend of Gunner’s named Breslin. The senator’s indirect questioning about hiring someone to off a certain person came across clear he meant Cadence, especially when he mentioned the diamond bracelet I’d seen on her wrist.

  She still wore the damn thing, I noted, while sliding onto the stool beside her, my brow furrowing again. Why the fuck would she continue to wear a gift from that fucker? Did she have real feelings for him? Had she really expected -- hoped -- he would leave his wife for her like she’d confessed to the night before?

  Again, I wanted to snort at the thought. Any woman with half a brain would know the senator would never leave his wife. Because of her and her daddy’s money, the senator had gotten his seat in Congress the year before. Rumors abounded he had his sights set on the White House, and that wife of his had the funds to get him there.

  He needed to stop fucking dancers and strippers unless he wanted a shitstorm riding his ass -- exactly what we hoped to give him.

  Cadence shivered as I leaned close enough my shoulder brushed hers. “You smell like me,” I whispered, all kinds of hell yeahs thickening my dick again.

  She swallowed, her smile shaky as she glanced up at me. “When can I go to my apartment?”

  Fuck. I sat back, my scowl returning, my heart dropping like a weighted fist. “Until this is over, you can’t.”

  “I need clothes. Female stuff.”

  “Oh.” I cleared my throat and grabbed my cell out of my back pocket, relived she hadn’t meant for good. “I’ll have a couple brothers head over there since I don’t want you out and about where that asshole might find you.”

  “What about Hannah?”

  “I already spoke to Bowie and told him to keep Angel away, too, until we get this mess figured out.”

  Cadence heaved a sigh, and Drac answered the call I’d put through to him. He’d already been caught up on what was going on with Cadence, and said he’d be willing to take Brewer over there right away before either had to get into work.

  I handed the phone to Cadence. “Tell Drac what all you want. He’s going over there now.”

  She listed a few things, but paused to meet my stare. “How long am I going to be crashing with you?” she asked me.

  “As long as it takes.”

  She huffed and returned her attention to Drac on the line. “Just empty my damn drawers and closet into the trash bags under the kitchen sink.”

  I barely kept from grinning at the thought of her moving all her shit into my tiny ass apartment and cluttering it up with girly things.

  It wasn’t lunchtime yet, but I’d skipped breakfast. While Cadence finished up on the phone, I ordered a burger and fries from the pledge working the bar.

  “Want anything to eat?” I asked Cadence as she handed me my cell.

  “I made myself some eggs earlier, so I’m good -- unless you’ve got Pop Tarts?”

  The pledge shook his head, snickering, while the thought of her cooking on my stove -- something I hardly knew how to use -- played with my mind.

  In my T-shirt without panties… frying and swaying her ass back and forth… perhaps bending a bit, pushing her ass up into the air.

  I adjusted my dick, which didn’t go unnoticed by Cadence.

  Pink stained her cheeks, and she tore her focus off my groin and turned toward Shelby, their voices low while chatting.

  My food came out, and I dug in, fucking ravenous, my thoughts on what we needed to do, the next steps to take to get cash out of the senator’s pockets and keep Cadence from falling into his.

  Being with me twenty-four seven would take care of that last bit, but I doubted she would want to sit in the gym out back while I worked out. I doubted she would want to go to work with me at my auto shop two blocks down the street, either. The two pledges working for me had opened a few hours earlier, and while I’d hoped to stop by to finish up the brake job I’d started the day before, I doubted I’d be donning my grease monkey coveralls that day.

  With Cadence not being allowed to dance for Jackson until the shit ended, maybe she’d be willing to help me out with filing and shit in the office I’d neglected for far too long. Mayb
e she’d help me get all my files from the cabinets into the computer Val had set up for me two months earlier.

  My cell rang before I could put the job offer on the table, and I grabbed it off the bar.

  “What’s up, Drac?” I asked around a mouthful of burger.

  “Someone came looking for Cadence and trashed the fucking place.”

  “Shit.” I swallowed without chewing properly, wiped my mouth, and tossed the napkin down.

  “What?” Cadence asked, and I glanced down at her, shaking my head.

  “Just get what you can,” I said to Drac.

  “What should I do with the asshole I knocked out cold on her Goddamn kitchen floor?”

  “What?”

  “Caught the motherfucker in the act.”

  A shot of adrenaline ripped through me at the thought of kicking the shit out of the fucker. “Shed. I’ll deal with it later.” I hung up. “Someone trashed her apartment,” I said, leaning forward to tell Gunner on Shelby’s other side.

  “Fuck,” he muttered.

  “Looks like we’re going to be roommates for some time,” I told Cadence, not too upset at the thought.

  Her lips pursed when Shelby nudged her with an elbow.

  I wondered at the two women’s silent communication, but without having too much experience in the sister field, I came up empty at what went on in their pretty heads.

  At the image of my older sister flashing in my brain, I clenched my jaw and waved the pledge over.

  Pale skin mottled by bruises. Blue lips. Her lifeless body sprawled in the tub.

  Memories of her rarely hit me with such force, the kind that sucked the oxygen from my lungs. “Whiskey,” I muttered at the pledge, deciding perhaps drinking myself into a damn stupor wasn’t a bad idea after all.

  Screw the shop and the brake system waiting for me. Last thing I needed was memories, reminders of why I never wanted to have another woman entrusted to my care again. I’d fucking failed the one woman I had loved. The woman who had looked after my ass when our mother passed and our father couldn’t be bothered.

  I told the pledge to leave the bottle.

  * * *

  Cadence

  Something overcame Austin like a tsunami, anger radiating off him like a wave. He downed three shots within three minutes. Gunner didn’t seem to notice -- or care. Neither did Shelby, so I guessed the big man’s drinking wasn’t out of the norm. They left a few minutes later, hand in hand, and I slouched on the barstool, eyeing the hulking beast beside me.

  “Are you okay?” I asked quietly as Austin poured a fourth shot.

  “Yeah.” He all but grunted the word -- and was full of shit.

  Worry for me or pissed about something else entirely? I chewed the inside of my lip while considering what I ought to say, what I could do to make him open up.

  “Call Jackson and tell him you won’t be in for a while.” The order and his tone brooked no argument, but I had bills to pay.

  “I have to work, Austin.”

  “You’re not going down to that Goddamn joint and stripping on stage when the fucker is out to get you.”

  “So what am I supposed to do?” I turned fully to face him, scowling as my blood heated for a whole different reason than the fucking I’d been focused on until he’d taken to the bottle.

  “Stay the fuck away from every place you usually go. Stay hidden from the motherfucker. Stay safe.” He slammed back a fifth shot, and I grabbed the whiskey away when he reached to pour another.

  “I have a life.” I bit the words out one at a time. “I can’t ignore my bills. Can’t ignore my job!”

  “I’ll pay your fucking bills.”

  I snapped my jaw shut, but held his pissy stare, the whiskey bottle still in my hand at arm’s length away from him. “And I suppose you’ll want something in return,” I said, hating that arousal flooded my body at the thought of what he might want. Even well on the road to drunk and seething with anger, he pressed all my “yes, please” buttons.

  “I’ll give you a Goddamn job.” He pushed the plate away and climbed off the stool to tower over me. “Let’s go.”

  “Where?”

  “Gym.”

  He strode away, and all I could do was follow, glancing around to find a few of his brothers watching us -- and smirking.

  * * *

  The sour stench of sweat and dirty socks of the Outlaws’ weight room behind the lounge was bad enough to curl my nose, and I sat in a chair in the corner while Austin took out the aggression that’d had him drinking whiskey like water.

  Even buzzed -- he had to be -- the man behaved like a tank, unstoppable and strong as fuck. He piled weights onto a bar and bench-pressed until sweat dripped of his chin. Pull-ups, push-ups -- the man stayed at both longer than I thought humanly possible.

  He’d ripped off his T-shirt not long after getting there and continued to work out like a man possessed, still wearing jeans and boots while the two other brothers lifting wore nothing but shorts and sneakers.

  God, the muscle. The bulging arms, the flexing tattoos. Enthralled by Austin’s every move, I even dismissed the stink of lingering odors that weren’t those of him. He grabbed a towel off the bench beside me and wiped down his face and chest.

  I reminded myself to breathe past the desire to lick him from head to toe, taste the saltiness of his skin, the musk of his groin.

  “Come on.”

  Like a meek little lamb, I followed on his heels without a word, breathing in the clean scent of his sweat mingling with his soap. My mouth flooded with drool, but the blast of cold air that smacked my face when he opened the door made me hurry after him for an altogether different reason.

  I scurried up the outside stairs leading to the apartments, shivering and sighing as the door closed us into the warmer hallway.

  Austin went straight into his bathroom, and I sat on the couch, grabbing my phone off the coffee table where I’d left it.

  Hannah had texted again, so I shot off a reply, letting her know about the apartment. She texted back immediately that she’d already heard from Bowie -- and that I wouldn’t be going into work for a while. I begged her to come visit me when her next text came through saying they’d had a change of plans for the afternoon, because boredom would end up tossing me into Austin’s bed -- and not just to sleep.

  No groaning and moaning came from the bathroom, and I sat back, eyes closed. What the fuck was I going to do? Shelby had told me Austin owned a car shop close by to the compound, so he would have to go to work. Did he expect me to sit in his damn apartment and twiddle my thumbs all damn day?

  A knock sounded, and I hopped off the couch. “Who is it?” I asked at the door, my heart pounding from the sudden invasion of my private moment.

  “It’s Drac, Cadence.”

  I pulled the door open.

  Blond curls fell in a riot over Drac’s brow, and his quick glance down and up my body let me know all I needed to about Austin’s brother. Womanizer. Wouldn’t ever be tamed.

  I stepped back, and the man who guarded the Outlaws’ strip joint entrance followed on his heels, two trash bags in hand -- and sporting the beginnings of a bruise on his cheek. “Hey, Brewer.” I smiled as he nodded his head in greeting. “Sorry for trying to push past you last night.”

  “Quite all right.”

  I frowned when he passed me, the nasty swelling on his cheek more prominent in profile. “What happened to your cheek?”

  “Fist.”

  No elaboration came from either as the two men dumped my bags of stuff in front of the couch.

  “Austin in there?” Drac asked, tilting his head toward the bathroom.

  I nodded and glanced toward the kitchen. “You boys want some coffee?”

  “Naw.” Drac shoved his hand through his hair, but curls spilled back onto his forehead. “Tell that fucker we’re downstairs eating lunch and will meet him in the shed later.”

  The two men left, and I closed the door behind them. The showe
r shut off a few seconds later, and I made myself comfortable on the couch, digging into the first bag to see what all the two men had brought me.

  I ignored the opening bathroom door, expecting Austin wore nothing but a towel.

  “What did Drac and Brewer have to say?”

  “They’re eating lunch downstairs and will meet you at the shed later.”

  Keeping my focus off him proved difficult, and finding the contents of my bed stand drawer in the bottom of the first bag heated me through. Dildo and vibrator -- along with the latter’s charger. God. I closed my eyes, hating that Austin’s two brothers had even touched my toys.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Face flaming, I shoved some things back into the bag, covering up what shouldn’t have embarrassed me. “Drac and Brewer were thorough.”

  He chuckled and sprawled beside me on the too small couch.

  He still wore the damn towel, and the ends opened a bit as he spread his legs in lounging comfort.

  The heat in my face rushed over the rest of my skin. “What made you drink like that?” I asked to keep my mind off his dick and how good it would feel shoved up my pussy or ass.

  “Long fucking story.”

  “The same one from last night that isn’t any of my business?”

  “Yes.”

  I sighed and angled to face him, pulling one of my legs beneath me. “Is there any other place here on the compound that I can stay?”

  He scowled. “You don’t want to stay with me?”

  My pussy clenched at the violence in his eyes. I’d never been turned on by aggression before, but something about Austin and his size -- the thought of his fists rearranging the senator’s face definitely did it for me.

  “I do want to sleep in your bed,” I admitted. “But I can’t trust what I’m feeling.”

  The scowl eased up a bit. “Which is?”

  “Wanting you to fuck me. Wanting you to do all those things to me that you daydream about.”

  “Fuck.” He scrubbed a hand down over his face as the towel over his groin tented. “You can’t talk like that and expect me to keep my hands to myself, Cadence. I’m having a hard enough time as it is.”