Patch (The Black Cobras MC Book 3)

by Savannah Rylan

  I tried to keep my eyes open, to watch him, but they were pressed close. It was like mini-explosions were going off in my head and an orgasm was beginning to take over me. Just before this, I thought I had control, but Patch was proving that I was wrong. I had no control over anything.

  My body gave in to him and I came while his tongue continued to slide in and out of me, taking over me and I cried out and moaned and moved against him. My back slid on the couch, but he was holding on to my wrists, still keeping me pinned underneath him. My orgasm shook me, shook the couch, made me cry out with pleasure and amazement.

  This wasn’t going to stop till I was completely satisfied, and it seemed like ages later, that my orgasm finally began to descend. I was beginning to return to normal, though my breathing was still harsh.

  Patch stood up and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. I reached for his discarded t-shirt on the floor and picked it up. He cleared his throat. I could sense things starting to get awkward in the room.

  What was going on? We couldn’t keep our hands off each other. Whenever we were together, even if it was just to eat breakfast—this was what it led to!

  I sat up straight on the couch and watched him wipe out the remaining coffee in his mug.

  “I think I have to go back to the Clubhouse soon. We still have a lot of shit to sort out,” he told me.

  “Of course.”

  “You should maybe get yourself some change of clothes and whatever else you need to live here. But I don’t want you going back to your apartment.”

  “I…” I was going to protest but he stopped me from continuing.

  “I’m leaving some cash on the kitchen counter.”

  “Patch, I don’t want…”

  “It’s not a favor. You can pay me back when you have the means. For now, you need stuff.”

  I couldn’t say anything to that. He was right. How long was I going to live in his oversized shirts?

  “And don’t worry about being watched or abducted. One of the prospects from my club will be following you around, keeping an eye on you. You’ll be perfectly safe.”

  I nodded.

  He left then, to go take a shower before he left the apartment. We hadn’t spoken about anything other than the basic stuff. I had no idea what he was thinking. He couldn’t be thinking what I was thinking! It’s not like just in a matter of days he’d developed feelings for me. That would be completely insane. If anyone between the two of us was insane, it was definitely me.

  I finished breakfast at the coffee table and eventually Patch came out of the bathroom, looking clean and fresh and freshly shaven.

  “Gotta go.”

  I nodded.

  “I’ll see you soon. There’s a key on the counter along with the cash.”

  “Patch…”

  “You don’t need to thank me. Not yet. Not till I’ve solved the problem,” he said, and I bit down on my lip.

  There was so much I wanted to say to him. So much that needed to be discussed between us. Maybe that wasn’t how he felt. Maybe this was normal for him, but it wasn’t for me. I was starting to feel things, things that were going to keep me up at night.

  Things I assumed were just a part of a teenage fantasy and nothing more than a crush. But now it seemed like it wasn’t going anywhere. Those feelings were here to stay. How was I going to get out of this if Patch didn’t feel the same way?

  23

  Patch

  The following two days were busy for me at the Clubhouse, working with my club to think about anything else other than solving this shit. Which was fine with me because now that Samantha was living in my apartment; I was actively trying to avoid thinking about her constantly.

  She was right there. I could feel her, smell her, see her…so close to touch. I had her already, repeatedly, and still I wanted more. It was like I was never going to be satisfied. I would always keep wanting her. This felt more than just reliving a teenage crush. This felt like wanting a woman and her body and her soul—like I’d never wanted anything before.

  I’d seen it happening to Cash in front of my eyes just a few months ago. I knew what the consequences were of falling that hard for a woman in that way. This was exactly what I wanted to avoid.

  As far as the club and our plan was concerned, Grimm had finally given in to the fact that we had no choice but to go to war with the Sons of Satan. They thought we were going to just lie down and roll over because we had no other choice, but we were preparing for a final attack behind the scenes.

  On the side, we were also pretending to get ready to hand over our weapons trade and our Mexican contacts to them in a few days. That way, when they searched for underground intel on us, hopefully the message they would receive would be that we were giving in. Giving up. Calling it quits on our club and surrendering to them.

  We wanted Lynch, Gunther and the rest of the men to think that we had no other choices. And even though it was true that we were a much smaller club than them and not as strong; Cash, Bones and I were confident that we’d be able to plan out a worthwhile counterstrike on the Sons of Satan. We’d have to use all our prospects in training and strategize intelligently, but it could be done.

  It was going to be dangerous; we knew that too.

  The Sons of Satan had it in for us. We’d gone pretty far at crumbling and crushing them. We’d taken Samantha from Lynch and Gunther, and she was a part of their property. All of this combined was definitely not a sweet deal for them. So, we knew we had to be careful.

  On the second night of Samantha’s stay, I was still lingering at the Clubhouse, drinking my fourth beer after Church had been dismissed. We’d already spent hours strategizing and trying to come up with best possible attack methods against the Sons of Satan…given that they’d already managed to double themselves in size and strength in the past couple of weeks of silence.

  Now Bones and I were sitting at the bar, drinking more.

  “What are you still doing here, man? The others with old ladies have gone back home before they get the broom.” Bones thought it was a funny joke because he was still squeaky clean. No woman was bogging him down.

  “If you’re talking about Samantha, she’s not my old lady.”

  “Maybe not yet.”

  “That’s not how things are between us. I’m just trying to help out an old friend. Make sure she lands on her two feet now. She’s had a tough time.”

  Bones was watching me closely as he knocked back his whiskey.

  “There are a lot of women like her out there. Who else do you give a shit about?”

  I tried not to look at him. I didn’t want to admit that she’s special.

  “Are you trying to avoid going back to your place because you’re worried about what’ll happen if you see her again?”

  I said nothing. Bones was hitting too close to the nail now and it was making me uncomfortable.

  “She scares you?” He slapped my back and I clenched my jaw. He was right. I tried to stay away from my own apartment for as long as possible, just so that I wasn’t tempted by her again. Every time we had sex, I felt like I was falling deeper into a pit.

  “She doesn’t fuckin’ scare me!” I growled at him. Bones was still laughing.

  “Then I dare you to go home.”

  I glared at him while he smiled at me. I banged my bottle of beer down on the counter and stood up to leave.

  “Fuck you,” I hissed at him as I picked up my jacket.

  When I got back to the apartment, I saw that Samantha had cooked dinner. She didn’t know when I would be back, if I would be back at all—so she was in the process of packing everything up in Tupperware and stowing them away in the fridge.

  I walked into the kitchen and it smelled of cheese and lasagna and it was delicious.

  “Hungry?” she asked with a twinkle in her eye, and I pulled out a chair at the small kitchen table in response and she smiled. I watched her as she worked at making a serving for me on a plate. She’d gone shopping,
so tonight she was in a cute floral wrap dress. Something completely different from what I saw her in when she was associating with the Sons of Satan. Clearly, that was how they wanted her to dress up for their own benefit.

  She had her hair tied up in a loose high bun, but most of those red curls came tumbling down around her neck and shoulders. No makeup, no fuss and she was the most beautiful woman I’d laid my eyes on.

  She brought over a plate of the lasagna to the table and sat down across from me.

  “I can’t remember the last time someone cooked an actual home-cooked dinner for me. Maybe when I was a teen, when Nancy used to cook for us,” I said. Samantha smiled, then brushed some curls away from her face. I noticed that dusting of freckles on her nose and cheeks again and it made me twitch in my chair.

  “How’s the plan against the Sons of Satan coming along?” she asked.

  This was good, this was neutral territory. I could talk about this without making a move on her.

  “We’re trying to work out the best possible way to attack them, given that we are a smaller club. We need to find a way to have an upper hand,” I said as I dug into the lasagna.

  Samantha was watching me eat, but from the expression on her face, I could see that she was also thinking deeply about something else.

  “We’ll get there, don’t worry. It’s just a matter of time and we’ll figure something out. You’re going to be safe here in the meantime,” I said, and she shook her head.

  “No, that’s not what I was thinking about. I think I know a way by which you guys can have the upper hand.”

  My fork full of lasagna was suspended in mid-air and I stared at her in surprise. Samantha had a plan? There was a sparkle in her green eyes now and was she actually starting to smile?

  “Use me, as bait,” she stated.

  “What?” I put the fork down on the plate.

  “Lynch is definitely not happy about the fact that I escaped, right? I mean, that is an obvious fact. In his eyes, you are already one-up because you have me. Because I got away. So, use me. I can help lure them in, play on his fragile ego. Maybe he’ll be willing to take a lot more risks if I’m in the picture and he thinks there’s a chance of getting me back. He’s an idiot hothead. He’s going to slip up and you guys might have an easy win.”

  I was glaring at her. Had she gone mad? Was she seriously talking about putting herself and her safety on the line so we could get the upper hand in this crazy war?

  I pushed my plate away on the table. Suddenly, I wasn’t so hungry anymore.

  “Samantha, look, I don’t think you understand the dangers…”

  She cut me off.

  “I’ve been involved with Lynch and the Sons of Satan long enough to know exactly what the risks and the dangers are. You don’t have to worry about me being naive in this situation.”

  I was shaking my head.

  “Patch, when you think about it, you know it makes complete sense.”

  “We just rescued you. We just got you out of there!”

  “And this is the least I can do to repay you!”

  “I don’t need any repayment.”

  “This is the only thing that makes logical sense and you know it. I’m not a delicate little flower from those days when you knew me as a kid. You don’t know about my experiences, the kinds of things I’ve had to do to survive…”

  It sounded like she was choking on her own words now and I watched as she stood up and went over to the kitchen sink. She’d turned her back to me, like she couldn’t look at me anymore.

  “Samantha…I can’t let you go back in there. Risk yourself again. I made a promise to you and to myself that I was going to keep you safe.”

  I stood up and walked over to her, keeping my distance. She slowly turned to face me, and I could see her eyes were reddish, her face was flushed; but she was trying to hold her chin up high in the air.

  “I know you want to protect me and keep me safe, and in an ideal world, we would all live happily ever after and not have to keep looking over our shoulders and worry about our lives. But that is not the world we live in. The choices I have made in my life have led me to this and I need to follow through. It’s the only way I can live with myself. Only way I can move on. I want to give something back to Lynch and his men for everything they have made me endure all these years.”

  I was watching her as she spoke and from the glint in her eyes, I knew that she was not backing down now. Samantha was going to follow through with this plan of hers whether I liked it or not.

  She took a quick step towards me.

  “Patch, please, tell me you’re going to involve me in this,” she said, and I squared my shoulders, breathing in deeply as I looked over her beautiful perfect face. I wanted to kiss those lips but now was not the time to take liberties.

  “Yes, I’ll involve you in our plans.”

  She sighed and nodded.

  “Good, now finish your lasagna,” she said and stepped past me. She didn’t want to make a big deal of it.

  24

  Samantha

  Of course, I was afraid, I had no clue what I was going to do. I’d suggested a plan to Patch at the spur of the moment. Technically, the truth was that I had no idea how I would make this work. I was safe back there in Patch’s apartment. I had everything I needed. A bed, clothes, enough food and drink, warmth, a hot shower whenever I wanted and, most importantly, I had my independence. Patch had promised he was going to keep me safe. I even had one of the prospects from his club watching me constantly so that I never felt alone or vulnerable.

  And now, I had thrown all that away and ended up here—at the Black Cobras’ Clubhouse, surrounded by Patch and his friends from the club. I could sense they were all intrigued by me and the suggestion I had made to Patch. They all knew it was a good idea, even though he didn’t agree.

  He had tried multiple times in the past twelve hours to get me to change my mind, but I stuck to my guns.

  What kind of person would it make me if I just sat back in that apartment, with my feet up on his coffee table eating the food in his pantry—while Patch and his friends were out there, risking their lives? They’d rescued me. I was here and alive and healthy because of them. This was the least I could do to help them, because this was literally the only thing I could do.

  “Are you absolutely sure about this?” Grimm asked me. He was the President of the Black Cobras and had personally apologized to me earlier when Patch introduced us for not trusting me when I first came to this Clubhouse. Up until now, everyone I had been introduced to in this group was very different from the men I was accustomed to dealing with at the Sons of Satan.

  Even though these guys were tough, meant business, and lived on the wrong side of the law—they seemed to be respectful towards women and lived by a moral code. They were not going to treat me the way Lynch and his men did.

  So, even though I was afraid, and I knew I was putting my life at risk—I trusted these men now more than I had trusted anybody else before. And I wanted to help them.

  “Yes, I am sure. I want to do this,” I told Grimm and he looked up at Cash and Patch. He had the same worried expression on his face as Patch did, and it was Bones who sat down beside me now and nodded.

  “Okay, we think the best way to go about this is for you to try and convince Lynch through a phone call, that you are not involved with us and that you want to meet him again. Settle old scores or have some kind of conversation with him…whatever. You guys were in some kind of twisted relationship, so it wouldn’t be far-fetched to assume that you still want to talk to him.”

  Bones was speaking softly and slowly, giving time for the words to really sink in. I nodded.

  “Yeah, I think I can do that. Lynch thinks he has broken me down mentally enough to be able to manipulate me. Even when I’ve tried to run away from him. I can try and convince him that I still want something from him. Maybe that I still have feelings for him…there is nothing he likes more than getting hi
s ego stroked,” I said.

  The men exchanged looks again. Patch was rubbing his face over and over again and I could see how distressed he was by the whole thing. He was definitely not a fan of this plan, but it had to be done.

  I was determined to see it through now.

  “Alright, get her the phone,” Grimm declared.

  Lynch answered the call pretty quickly, and immediately I knew from the tone of his voice that he was in a bad mood.

  “It’s me,” I said, and I heard the ragged deep breaths he was taking at the other end.

  “So…you finally fuckin’ call. What the fuck do you want from me now, bitch?” His words made me flinch, but I tried to stay focused. He wasn’t going to break me this time. Not when I had the support of the Black Cobras behind me.

  “I wanted to speak to you about something important. In person. Can we meet somewhere, please? Just the two of us.” I was trying my best to sound neutral. I was hoping he wouldn’t hear the desperation in my voice and suspect something.

  I was standing in the corner of the bar now, pacing around and trying to stop my heart from thudding out of my chest. Patch and the rest of the members of the Black Cobras were watching me. I could sense their eyes on me the whole time. So much was at stake here, all riding on this phone call’s success.

  “You want to meet me? After the kind of shit you pulled on me! What is your precious boyfriend going to do about it?” he hissed.

  “I’ve been telling you, Lynch. He’s not my boyfriend. You got the wrong intel from your guy. We used to be friends when we were in school and he thought he needed to get me out of there. But it’s not like I’m a part of his life now. I have nowhere to go.”

  “Those fuckers shot Gunther!” Lynch shouted, and then in the next moment he was laughing. Obviously, that part of the raid had pleased him.