Not his fault. That drunkard at the bar had the guts to pick a fight with him. Ripper should’ve walked away. He promised himself he’d turn a new leaf but look at him. An hour out of Windsdale, and he’d already bloodied his fists, ruined his jacket in the process with that asshole’s blood.
Frustrated, he threw the jacket at the shower wall.
“Ought to just leave trash behind,” he grumbled under his breath. Ripper thought about burning it, but he shouldn’t be setting unnecessary fires.
He got out of the shower, about to leave the bathroom, but he paused by the doorway. Ripper gripped the shoddy wooden frame and looked back at the jacket. The grinning skull mounted on a bike sewn on the left shoulder stared back at him. Taunted him mercilessly with its blood-red eyes.
Despite his misgivings, Ripper retrieved his jacket and lifted it up to his eye.
“Vice President, my ass,” he muttered, about to rip the patch on the chest area.
He pulled his fingers back, thought about the club, the brothers he left behind. Bear, President of the Skull Riders MC. Bear’s daughter, Liliana. A sweetheart who shouldn’t still be cleaning up her father’s messes. Guilt heavily weighed down on him.
He clenched his jaw, shut his eyes, and counted silently to ten in his head.
Once again, he heard Jeanne’s voice in his head.
Promise me, Ripper. One day, you’ll get out of this life.
Jeanne had been dead for four years now and he still couldn’t bring himself to fulfill the oath he made to her. He opened his eyes again and stared at his bruised knuckles. Ripper washed off the blood when he tried to get his jacket clean. Deciding he needed another drink, he left the jacket and the musty motel room.
The night air felt cool on his face and skin. Ripper looked for his bike in the parking lot and spotted the Harley where he’d left it hours ago. Good. Ripper headed toward it and mounted up, not bothering with a helmet.
Ripper recalled spotting another roadhouse a couple of miles from this shithole, a little further than the bar where he’d punched that asshole’s face in, but it would do. The engine gave a sexy little purr and he was off, gripping the familiar handlebars of his baby.
Fifteen minutes later, he arrived at the rundown establishment. From outside, he could hear the speakers blasting country music.
Ripper shook his head. Didn’t matter anymore. He wasn’t a member of the club and no longer had to watch his back every single damn minute. Ripper didn’t even have his jacket with him.
The sad truth? He felt naked without the familiar texture of the worn-in leather on his body. Does it feel like armor? Ripper remembered one of the prospects asking one of the members.
“Gotta get used to it.” Ripper dismounted his bike. A couple of youths hanging out by their car eyed his bike. He didn’t miss their bloodshot hungry eyes or the gang tattoos they sported on the side of their necks. Shoddy work, not like the ink on his own skin. Meth heads.
Ripper gave them his finger, a warning. Walking past them, he said, “Any of you so much as touch my bike, I’ll rip off your heads.”
One of the teenagers laughed but a wiser one nudged him in the shoulder and told him to shut up. Ripper meant every word. His bike was sacred to him, one of his more valued possessions.
That done, Ripper entered the bar. Not his type of crowd or music, but it had to do. He found a spot by the bar and ordered two beers.
“Two? You’re starting the night the right way,” said a sarcastic female voice. A familiar one.
Ripper narrowed his eyes at the bartender who slid him two cold ones. He swore under his breath.
“Lily, what the fuck are you doing in a joint like this?” he demanded, suddenly sober.
He eyed her up and down. A critical error. Being Bear’s daughter, Lily hung around the club house often. Not the best place to rear a child. Bear couldn’t afford a babysitter and the woman who bore Lily had died.
Lily had grown up while Ripper wasn’t looking. Bear would skin her if he saw her dressed in a black halter top that bared her shoulders and her soft curves. She wore tiny denim cut-offs underneath. What the hell? Lily should know better than to strut around, dressed like one of the women who hung around at the club.
Ripper saw red. He wanted to drag her out of that bar, out of this place. Stow her away somewhere safe.
“Don’t look at me like that, Ripper.” She served another guy two beers.
The guy’s friend had the gall to whistle at her. Ripper told himself back in the motel room that he’d be more civilized, but right now? All he wanted to do was march up to the bastard and rip him a new one, just like his name.
“Fuck off, junior,” he told the two men. “Or I’ll bash both your heads in.”
The guy’s friend looked like he had plenty more to say but the wiser of the pair took one look at him and quickly spirited his friend away.
“Look at you how?” he asked her pointedly. “I thought you were working at Skid’s place?”
“I quit right after you left.”
“Why? Someone giving you a hard time?” Ripper swore he wouldn’t step foot in Windsdale again, but for Lily? He’d hunt down the bastard who harassed her and make sure he couldn’t speak or move again.
“There you go again,” she said with a sigh.
“What?”
“Acting overprotective. I’m not that skinny twelve-year-old who couldn’t protect herself from bullies in the schoolyard anymore, Ripper. You’re no longer in the club.”
Lily leveled those fiery emerald eyes right at him. She might be twenty years younger than he was, but God. Lily knew how to flay a man alive with one look, expose all his flaws, and knew which place would hurt the most.
Lily wasn’t done either. “No reason to act like my uncle or the big brother who’s obligated to watch me.”
Ripper gripped the beer bottle in his hand tight. Uncle? Big brother? Was that all she thought he was? Fuck that.
“Don’t ever call me those words again,” he said, looking Lily right in the eye.
Surprise registered on her face.
“Why? You’ve said it so many times. You don’t feel anything for me.”
Now, he couldn’t stop looking at her mouth, the perfect curve of it. Ripper bet she’d taste like raspberries, like the lip gloss she used. He took a long pull of his beer, but it was no use. Not enough to dull the image of him thrusting his tongue down her throat while her big tits pressed up against his chest. Ripper bet she’d feel tiny and warm against him. Perfect.
He said nothing and continued drinking his beer. Ripper thought by leaving the club and all its bullshit, he’d no longer have to worry about wanting his best friend’s daughter. Fate brought him right where he started, and Lily? She was asking for trouble, working at a joint not under the club’s control and dressed like that.
Ripper wished he’d brought his jacket so he could cover her up. Punching out the lights of any fucker who so much as looked at her wrong would get him immediately thrown out. He couldn’t have that. Ripper sat where he was, sipping his beers.
He didn’t plan on leaving until her shift was over. Then he’d give her a good talking to. Once Ripper deposited her back on Bear’s doorstep, he’d leave. He didn’t have a reason to stay. Did he?
“I thought you’d be as far away from Windsdale as possible by now. I don’t see your jacket either,” Lily remarked once the crowd had thinned down. She began to set down another beer in front of him but he shook his head.
“Four’s enough,” he told her.
She laughed softly, the sound like music to his ears. “That’s the difference between my old man and you. You know when to stop, Ripper. By the way, you haven’t answered my question.”
“I didn’t hear one.”
Lily furrowed her brow and he unthinkingly reached out across the bar, scattering peanut shells along the way, to smooth out her brow. She stilled but didn’t stop him from trailing his fingers down the bridge of her nose, her lips. Li
ly expelled a breath. Ripper pulled away, despite his misgivings.
A beast resided in his skin, lurking so close to the surface Ripper knew it was only a matter of time before it would get out. He needed to get out of this place and get some air, except he sure as hell didn’t want to leave Lily alone here.
“Fine. I’ll phrase it like a question this time. Is there a reason why you haven’t left this area, Ripper?”
End of sample chapter
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