HAMMER: Wolves MC (Riding With Wolves Book 1)

by Faith Winslow

  I’d never touched a pregnant woman’s belly before, so it was an odd sensation to begin with. And the fact that it could be my brother’s baby in there made it even stranger. Terry was dead. Lifeless. He was done. No more. But maybe—just maybe—a piece of him lived on in that baby, which was both an exciting and intimidating prospect for me.

  On the one hand, if the baby was Terry’s, it’d mean I’d still have some connection to my brother even though he was gone. But on the other, it’d mean I’d also have a connection to Hannah and Sam, and that I’d have to watch my nephew be raised by the same pack of Wolves that was ultimately responsible for his daddy’s demise.

  “Whoa,” I grinned, still somewhat startled. “That feels so weird.” Hannah giggled at my response a little—and I swear I heard Sam laugh a sweet laugh as well, though I wasn’t familiar with what his brand of sweetness sounded like—if he even had one, that is.

  “I’ll be right back, Hannah,” Sam said a second later. Hannah nodded, and I stayed still and silent. I kept my eyes focused on her and my hand planted on her belly. I felt a little strange paying so much attention to her bump, but those feelings of strangeness were much more tolerable than the feelings I’d felt only moments earlier when I confronted her brother.

  Sam turned and headed toward the main area of the funeral home, where several other, more respectably dressed men stood near Terry’s coffin. I felt a sense of relief as he walked away, as if someone had dropped a bucket of ice into my boiling blood, bringing it back to its normal temperature.

  But even though I was relieved, I remained on guard. I didn’t know Sam Hammond well, but I knew him well enough to know that he was unpredictable and couldn’t be trusted. He might have been out of arm’s reach, but I didn’t want to keep him out of sight or out of mind—so I kept watch on him out of the corner of my eye, just to make sure he didn’t do anything inappropriate, uncalled for, or alarming.

  It’s not as if I expected him to cause a scene or anything. But if his past behavior was any indication of his personality trends, I did have valid reason for concern. I’ve already told you about the last time I saw Sam before all of this started (at Terry’s birthday), but that was just the icing on the cake. I’d already formulated my opinion on him long before that, and the one I’d formulated wasn’t very good.

  The first time I met Sam was about two years ago—when Terry first joined the Wolves. I was determined to give my brother’s “new friends” a chance despite all the horrible shit I’d heard about “biker gangs” over the years.

  For the most part, Terry’s friends proved to be all right, even though some were wild and rough around the edges. But then there was Sam. Sam Hammond wasn’t like the rest of them. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but something about him was different, and it didn’t sit well with me.

  When Terry first introduced us, Sam acted as if he needed no introduction. Either I was already supposed to know who he was, or he didn’t care to learn who I was—whichever the case, the exchange of our names seemed unimportant to him, and he was more focused on undressing me with his eyes.

  I could sense that he was trouble at that point, and I decided, right then and there, that I didn’t want anything to do with him. I was twenty-six years old and had already had my fair share of experiences with guys like him. I didn’t need to play his games. I knew how it would end up. He’d get another notch on his bedpost, and I’d get another entry on my list of “stupid mistakes.”

  I decided to ignore him that night and kept my distance, but I kept my eyes and ears opened. And, in that one evening, I learned volumes about Sam. I watched how he treated his biker brothers, how he treated women, and how they all treated him. I listened to whispers, conversations, and gossip… And from it all, I gleaned plenty of evidence to support the conclusions I’d drawn.

  On or off of his bike, Sam Hammond was the kind of guy my mother had warned me about. In fact, he was the kind of guy that all mothers warned their daughters about. And I wasn’t about to cave to his bad boy charms.

  Plenty of other women were willing to cave though, and it was a pity that they didn’t listen to their mamas’ advice. After I met Sam, I saw him out and about around town a few times—and each time, he was with a different woman. First, it was a busty blonde, then a bohemian brunette, then a young black hipster chick, and then a pink-haired, large-framed woman. I never saw him with the same woman twice—and luckily, he never saw me noticing him. I only saw him in passing and managed to hide myself, or run, whenever I thought there was a chance that we’d cross paths.

  But I couldn’t hide or run from Sam forever. The next time I “met” him was at a summer party Terry had invited me to. I made my obligatory appearance, and when Sam waltzed over my way, I gave him the cold shoulder and pretended that I didn’t remember him from the first time we’d met. I didn’t want him to know that he’d left an impression on me, either way, and I certainly didn’t want him to think he had a shot with me.

  Sam seemed pretty offended that I didn’t remember him, and he quickly went from being a pig to being a prick. He no longer looked at me with lust in his eyes. Loathing had taken lust’s place, and rather than undressing me with his eyes, he used them to silently pass judgment on me.

  But fuck it! Who cares?! My “trick” worked, and Sam got the message that night. After the party, whenever we were in the same place at the same time, he made no effort to screw me or win me over, and he avoided me just as carefully as I avoided him. It was the best way to sidestep an ugly situation, and for a long while, it worked beautifully...until now.

  Chapter 4

  ~ Rachel ~

  “I know you don’t like Sam,” Hannah said, changing the subject. She must have noticed that I was only half-invested in her and was keeping tabs on her brother. “But there’s a lot you don’t know about him,” she continued. “He’s really not a bad guy. Yeah, he’s a player, and he plays it tough on the streets—but behind all that, he’s actually a good person. He’s always been there for me, and for the Wolves. He’s stood up for us, fought for us, and even… Well, let’s just say, he’s done a lot to protect and help us—and you really don’t have to be so on edge around him.”

  I stopped spying on Sam and focused both eyes on Hannah’s. There was something very sweet about her, despite her somewhat hardened biker babe appearance, and it was that sweetness that stopped me from saying what I was really thinking.

  I wanted to tell Hannah that her brother couldn’t be the “good person” who’d “helped” and “protected” her and the Wolves as she’d said. If he was, where was he when my brother needed help and protection? And beyond that, if Sam was so great, why’d he let his little sister get involved with a gang in any way to begin with? Shouldn’t a big brother try to prevent something like that? Shouldn’t he want a better life for her?

  No matter what Hannah said, I knew what kind of guy Sam really was, but it wasn’t my place to tell her or dispel her delusions. She could think whatever she wanted. It was no concern of mine—and really, neither was Sam. All of my concern centered on Terry. Even though he was dead, his life story wasn’t over… and I was determined to complete it and fill in the gaps.

  And believe me, there were plenty of gaps. Just like Hannah said there were things I didn’t know about her brother, I was certain that there were things she didn’t know about mine—and I did feel a responsibility to bring those things to light.

  Three months ago, when I got the call that Terry was in custody for killing a biker from a rival gang, I had to pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming (or rather, having a nightmare). I knew my brother wasn’t capable of such a thing. He simply didn’t have it in him to kill someone, especially not under the circumstances described to me.

  The other biker’s name was Jake Keller, and he was a member of the Street Seraphs motorcycle gang. I don’t know a lot about gangs, even though my brother was in one, but from what I could tell, the Street Seraphs were a pretty rough bunc
h—and this Jake guy was one of their lowly street minions whose primary job was to “protect the Seraphs’ turf.”

  Apparently, Jake and Terry had “exchanged words” before, or in other words, had a few verbal altercations in the past. But the shit really hit the fan, so to speak, one afternoon when Terry’s bike got vandalized on the street outside of a place Jake Keller frequented. Someone had slashed the leather on Terry’s seat and keyed the “W” moniker on both sides of his gas tank. Since the “W” monikers were targeted, it was clear that a rival had to be responsible for the vandalism—and since it happened to Terry’s bike that was outside of a place where his known nemesis hung out, all fingers pointed to Jake.

  Supposedly, Terry went looking for Jake that same afternoon and eventually found him in an abandoned house where the Seraphs were known to take women, party, and conduct some of their shadier business deals. The two of them “exchanged words” again, and then things, allegedly, escalated to a physical level, and Terry ended up stabbing Jake in the gut with a pocketknife… six times.

  Six times.

  The same little pussy who wouldn’t stand up to Sam Hammond in the bar on his twenty-fifth birthday stabbed Jake Keller in the gut with a pocketknife six times.

  The same faint-of-heart kid who used to make me bait his hooks when we went fishing with our uncle as teenagers—the same guy who gagged when he saw a used tampon floating in the toilet at my apartment, the same sap who balled his eyes out and needed me to come with him for “emotional support” when he put his terminally ill dog to sleep last year—that same person stabbed Jake Keller in the gut with a pocketknife… six times... over a vandalized bike.

  Something just didn’t add up.

  “I’m glad you have Sam, Hannah,” I finally replied, trying to sound as sincere as I could. “And I’m glad you guys are so close… But right now, I’m on edge about everything—and I won’t step back and rest until I get answers and find out what really happened.”

  I, too, took my turn to change the subject, and Hannah didn’t like where I’d redirected it. She bowed her head and shook it slightly, then looked back up at me with her thickly lined doe eyes.

  “What happened to Terry is horrible,” she said, sounding sincerely sorry. “It’s a sad, tragic story—from start to end. But it’s cut and dry. I don’t know what else you expect to find.”

  I shrugged my shoulders and shook my head. Over the past three months, Hannah and I have had a few other conversations just like this one. And when I say “a few,” I mean a few, which isn’t that many.

  I never really knew Hannah that well before all this happened. If you’ll recall, she and Terry had been secretly dating, and it seems like I was the last person to find out about it. And when I did, it wasn’t under the most ideal circumstances. There was so much else going on, I barely had the chance to talk with Hannah at all, let alone get to talk extensively and come to actually know her. Plus I think Sam and the Wolves had her under careful watch, out of fear of retaliation.

  In any event, the few times I did have the chance to see and interact with Hannah over the past three months, I always brought up the same topic—and though we might have used different words in each different conversations, the bottom line was always the same… I knew that Terry didn’t kill Jake, whereas Hannah, like the police, Sam, the rest of the Wolves, and the rest of the world, fully believed, or at least accepted, that he did.

  “The truth,” I said after deliberating a moment. “If you knew Terry as well as you think you did, then you’d know, he didn’t kill that guy. And, now he’s dead because of something he didn’t do… I can’t bring him back to life—but don’t you think he deserves justice? Do you really want your son growing up thinking his daddy was a killer?”

  Hannah turned her thickly lined doe eyes away from me and scanned the room.

  “He confessed,” Hannah said, still scanning. “He turned himself into the police, told them what he had done, and wrote out a signed confession. He gave them the pocketknife and told them where to find Jake’s body. He pled guilty at the preliminary hearing and waived his right to a trial. What more do you want, Rachel? I don’t like it any more than you do, but we’ve got to come to peace with what happened.”

  Everything that Hannah had said about the sequence of events was accurate. Indeed, Terry had done each and every one of the incriminating things she listed. But so what? At best that made him a puppet—and I had my suspicions about who was his master.

  “I’ll come to peace with what happened when I find out what really happened,” I said, reiterating what I’d said earlier. Hannah looked at me, grinned a hollow grin, and turned to scan the room again.

  “Where’d Sam wander off to?” she asked, bringing up the one thing that could derail my current train of thought. I’d let him get out of sight, even if not completely out of mind, and I had no idea where he was or what he was doing.

  “I’m not sure,” I answered, glancing from one side to the other.

  “Well, I’m starting to feel a little tired and bloated,” Hannah replied. “I think my legs are starting to swell… I should probably go lay down or something.”

  I wasn’t sure if Hannah really was suffering from pregnancy pains, or if she was playing the pregnancy card to get out of an unwanted conversation. Regardless, I turned and joined her in her Where’s-Waldo-like search, and together, we eyed the room in search of her brother.

  I did a couple takes of the room and hadn’t seen Sam, but on my third take, I was able to surmise where he was.

  In the far right corner, there was a collection of four young, bubbly babes, standing with their backs to the rest of the room, all facing something worthy of their undivided attention.

  “He’s over there,” I told Hannah, pointing toward the girl-girl-girl-girl pile-up. I still hadn’t actually seen Sam among them—but come on, what else could keep four women so preoccupied and entertained in a funeral home?

  Hannah peered over at the hive of honeys and rolled her eyes. “Thanks,” she said, turning towards me and running her hand over her distended belly. “I’ll just go get him, and we’ll be on our way.”

  I nodded and grinned a hollow grin, just like the one Hannah had grinned a moment ago, then watched as she waddled over toward the group of girls in the far right corner. She tapped one of them on the shoulder, like Moses tapping his staff on the shore—then miraculously, just like the Red Sea, the pile-up parted.

  And, lo and behold, right there, at its center…was Sam Hammond.

  Hannah leaned in and whispered something in Sam’s ear, and his face remained expressionless as he listened. As soon as she pulled away, he smiled and said something to his cluster of ladies, then took Hannah by the hand and swiftly exited Bradley’s.

  They took the short route to the door and didn’t pass me in the process, which didn’t bother me one bit.

  I did, however, find it disturbing that in the entire time she was there, Hannah didn’t even go near Terry’s coffin.

  Chapter 5

  ~ Sam ~

  “What happens next, Hammer?”

  “Are you gonna try to find the guy who did this to Terry?”

  “Are you gonna kill him?”

  “What are you guys gonna do to get even with the Seraphs now?”

  I don’t mean to sound like a pig or ruffle any feathers, but there’s really no other way to say it: The biker world is mainly a man’s world, and women have only a limited role in it.

  There are those women whom we value by nature of who they are and the blood we share with them—such as our mothers, sisters, daughters, etc. And there are those women we choose to share our lives with—such as our girlfriends, wives, and occasional associates. And then there are those women like Thing-1, Thing-2, Thing-3, and Thing-4… the hot pieces of ass who would bend over backwards to please us.

  They are our groupies. Our fans. Our followers. They are the girls who trail us, track us, and dream of one day being elevated off of their k
nees to “girlfriend,” “wife,” or even “occasional associate” status. When they aren’t stroking our cocks, they’re stroking our egos and doing whatever else it takes to make us feel like gods among men.

  Mmmm, you gotta love those kind of women! They mix things up and keep life interesting—and their constant flattery and fawning is very reassuring. I can’t tell you how nice it is to know that, anywhere I go, any time, or for any reason, there’s usually a steady supply, just waiting.

  I knew, when I went to Bradley’s, that there’d be some groupies there—probably some of the chicks that hung around us in the bars or on the streets—and I figured they’d be even more eager to please than usual. (It’s common knowledge that funerals make some people horny, and these kind of women are always looking for an added excuse.) So it was no surprise that Thing-1, Thing-2, Thing-3, and Thing-4 bombarded me the way they did. But to tell you the truth—I can’t believe I’m saying this—I wish they hadn’t.

  When I left Hannah and Rachel to their discussion, I left to go pay my respects at Terry’s casket. And that’s exactly what I wanted to do. I wanted to go to his casket, pay my respects, and get the hell out of Bradley’s. Rachel didn’t want me there almost as much as I didn’t want to be there, so I wanted to do what I had to do and be done with the place, and with Rachel (at least for now).

  As soon as I got to the casket, I kneeled down, closed my eyes, and said a few words inside my head—and I tell ya, something hit me really hard at that moment, and I felt like I was so heavy that I’d never be able to get up again.

  When I first found out about Terry and my sister dating, I was pissed off. I wanted to kill the punk for touching her, and for touching her without my permission. In our world, you don’t just go after one of your biker brother’s sisters. Our kin are typically off limits.