by Sassie Lewis
Contents
Copyright
Acknowledgment
Dedication
Chase
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Epilogue
Copyright
Chase – Hell’s Exiles Book 1
Copyright ©2016 Sassie Lewis
All rights reserved.
As an Australian author, all rights are reserved under the 1968 Australian Copyright Act. And also in accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976. The scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the author or publisher constitutes unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use the material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained from the author.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead, are coincidental.
[email protected]
Acknowledgment
As always, a big thank you to my family for putting up with my crazy ways. My life would be incomplete without each of you, big kisses. To Willsin Rowe, without whose efforts this book wouldn’t be finished. He not only makes the bestest covers but kicks my ass into gear and spanks my words into shape. Love ya babe. To the Presidents of a few of Australia’s largest MCs; each one of these men helped me with answering countless questions. Thank you all.
And to you the readers, thank you for your continued support. It’s your comments, reviews and friendship that encourage me to keep writing.
Big wet ones
Sassie Lewis.
Dedication
I dedicate this book to those who coast the blacktop on two wheels. Ride hard and ride safe.
Chase
Hell’s Exiles Book 1
Chapter One
Nessa inspected the page again. Something wasn’t right and she couldn’t see what the problem was. Gah. Pushing back her stool she walked through the curtained-off area; the shop was a bustle of activity. Clients chatted, some letting out little whimpers of pain, and the smell of ink mixed with antiseptic filled the air. Damn she loved it; loved the career path she’d chosen. Just not when what she was working on was pissing her off.
“What’s up, Nessa?” Frog sauntered over and dropped his big arm around her shoulder.
“Piece of shit not doing what I freaking want it to.”
Her boss laughed down at her. “Sure it isn’t. Nessa, you might be the youngest here but you’re also the best artist I’ve got. Your issue is you over think it. Let’s have a look before my next client arrives.”
“Fine! But I’m telling you it’s shit.”
Frog led her back to the drawing room. It was one of the things she loved about working there. A massive room set up so any of the tattooists could spend time at one of the many drawing desks, and with enough art supplies to have any girl wetting her panties. With money being tight, free art supplies were freaking awesome.
Nessa had never had a great relationship with her parents. She just wasn’t like them. Not perfectly put together or a brain trust. So when she’d told them she was dropping out of school to start her training early, things had slid down hill fast—not that they had far to go. Within the last month, she’d left school, left home and started working. Thank Christ for her best friend Becca and her parents. They were letting her bunk at their house. The fact she was living with the local MC president just pissed her parents off more. Which to Nessa was an added bonus. But she did have to start looking for her own place soon. She couldn’t keep sponging off her BFF’s parents for much longer. It wouldn’t be right. Besides, alpha males were so not her thing and all the overbearing testosterone of the MC being flung around was starting to give Nessa hives. Therefore, not having to spend what little money she earned on art supplies was freaking brilliant in her book. It meant she was able to start a decent savings account.
Pushing through the curtain, Frog walked over to the piece she’d been working on. Hands in his pockets he leaned forward and studied it while Nessa waited for the comments to start. The same ones she’d heard from her high school art teacher all the time.
The contrast is off.
Why do you have this? It doesn’t fit.
It’s too busy. It’s too simple…
Frog didn’t say anything, just kept staring down at the large piece. “This for a chick?” He finally looked up at her. Nessa nodded while chewing her thumbnail.
“It’s a big piece, Nessa.”
She nodded again. The piece she’d drawn would be a full back covering. It was a mix of all the things she loved in life and in tattoos. A clock, to mark the passage of time. A Harley wrapped and trapped in vines. A face which was beautiful on one side and blended into a skull on the other. The rising sun and setting moon, which reflected over a pond of Koi, all combined to make one large image.
Leaning closer Frog continued to inspect the piece. His lack of reaction was starting to annoy her. “See told ya, it’s shit!” She stormed toward the drawing table, ready to destroy the piece of crap she’d spent most of the past two days working on.
“You touch that, little girl, and I’ll never let ya work another tattoo again.” The big burly man caught hold of her hand before it connected with the paper. “Who’s it for?”
Snatching her hand back, Nessa ignored his question and studied her art. Even upside down there was something wrong, or was it something missing? She just couldn’t put her finger on it.
“Nessa, answer me. Who’s it for?”
“Me, okay. It was going to be for me.”
“Well damn girl. You ain’t starting out small, that’s for sure. But I do see a problem with it.”
“See I knew it was coming—”
“No one here has the skills to do this. No one but you. So unless you can reach your own back?” Frog’s words floored her. Really, if more things hadn’t popped to mind as she’d worked, she could’ve scribbled the piece in a few hours.
“I don’t understand. I’m not loving it… It’s missing something. Or something’s not right. But what do you mean no one can do it? I’ve seen everyone’s work. You’re all brilliant—”
“And that’s your problem Nessa. You are better than the lot of us and you don’t see that.”
Sally stuck her head through the curtain and interrupted Nessa’s next question before she could even open her mouth. “Frog, your customer’s here.”
“Thanks, be there in a sec.”
“Take your time boss.” Sally wiggled her pierced eyebrows. Obviously the waiting client was a hottie. Poor guy wasn’t going to know what hit him if Sally got her hands on him.
Resident piercer, Sally was a five foot ten, long legged curvy goddess, who went through men with the same vigor Nessa devoured candy.
“C’mon, you might as well get some ink time.” Frog’s words were like a shot of caf
feine directly to her veins. She forgot about the piece on the desk as the creative neurons in her brain crackled to life and her fingers twitched to wrap around the inking gun. Squealing in delight Nessa ran through the curtain and into the main waiting area. Her boots skidded along the floor as she suddenly stopped in front of the guy standing there waiting. Six-foot-four of muscle bound biker—the bane of her adolescence, Chase Anderson—rested against the counter, his eyes shooting daggers at her.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Her words came out louder than she’d expected. A few of the clients looked at her and Frog slapped a hand over her mouth. Chase just continued to sneer at her.
“Shouldn’t I be asking you that, Vanessa? Aren’t you meant to be in school or something?” The asshole crossed his big tattooed arms across his chest and lifted one of his eyebrows at her, as if waiting for her to answer. It wasn’t going to happen, not just because Frog still had his hand over her mouth, but because she owed the prick nothing.
Biting her boss’s hand she pulled away from him. The buzz she’d gotten from the idea of tattooing flesh was completely gone. In its place pure anger reigned. She was going to kill her best friend. Becca hadn’t once mentioned her brother was coming back to town.
Ignoring the stares, Nessa spun on her heels and stormed back to the drawing room. “Fucking asshole bikers. Think they know everything. Yeah you know nothing. Asshole. And I am so killing your sister…”
Nessa twirled around as male laughter followed her into the room. “You won’t touch Becca. You love her too much. Or has that changed while I’ve been gone?”
Nessa ignored the arrogant man. Really he’d been nothing but mean to her the last time she’d seen him. At fifteen she had thought the thirty-year-old biker a total hottie. Then he’d gone and opened his mouth, shattering her not-so-fragile ego. Not an easy feat when you were already considered the fat girl in school. The way he’d treated her was made worse by the fact he wasn’t a teenage boy but a grown man.
“Nothing’s changed and I see you still can’t read. The sign above the door says staff only.” She jabbed her finger in the direction of the sign for emphasis, then glared at her boss in the hopes the big man would throw Chase out. And not too gently.
“Don’t give me sass, Vanessa—”
“It’s Nessa! The only people who call me Vanessa are the ones that bred me. Now piss off, Chase.”
“I’ll call you whatever I goddamn please. And answer the question, why aren’t you in school?”
“Why is it any of your business?”
He smirked at her, revealing two deep, poke-your-tongue-in-worthy, dimples. “Have you forgotten who I am, Vanessa?”
Oh, he was going to play the big bad biker card, was he? He obviously didn’t know she was in bed with the Prez. Well, sleeping under his roof anyway.
“What? That you’re some out of town biker, who happens to be my best friend’s jerky older brother? Nope haven’t forgotten.”
“I’m not an out of towner, Vanessa. I’m the damn VP.” Okay, so she hadn’t known that, not that it mattered.
“Well, you’re not the president, Chase. And the current one happens to love me. Lets me live in his house and everything.” She threw a sugar sweet smile at him. The little kid inside her was singing, “Yeah take that you overgrown bully”. The asshole laughed at her again. It was the same laugh he’d given her when at fifteen she’d asked him to take her for a ride on his bike. If at the time, she’d been ready to ride much more than his Harley, he didn’t have to know.
“What the fuck are you laughing at?”
An angry look crossed his face and Chase began to stalk towards her. With each step he took, Nessa took one back, until she was literally backed into a corner. Before he took that last step he froze, his eyes darting down to her drawing desk and the piece she’d been working on.
“Who did this?” She wasn’t going to answer him, even if his voice was filled with awed appreciation. Screw him, he was an asshole…
“That’s Nessa’s work. I was going to get her to do your new ink.” Damn, Frog. She’d forgotten he was even in the room with them. Where had her boss been when the rabid-biker had been stalking her?
Freaking men, they always stuck together.
“You did this?” His fingers caressed the paper like he was running them over a woman. Nessa cursed the shiver that rocked her body. After that day, three years ago, when he’d made her feel like a fat waste of space, she had vowed to hate the man. It had been easy when he’d gone off to a different chapter of Hell’s Exiles. She couldn’t crush on someone who wasn’t around. She freaking hoped he was just back for a visit and she’d never have to see him again. But a sinking feeling in her gut told her, he was here to stay. Fuck.
Screw him; she wasn’t going to let Chase get under her skin. Straightening her spine, Nessa pushed away from the wall and slid her piece away from his still caressing fingers, placing it in her folder. His meaty hands wrapped around her arm when she was finished.
“I asked if that was your work, Vanessa?”
God, he was like a damned dog with a bone. “And Frog answered you. But yes, it’s mine. Now let me go.” Being the overbearing asshole he was, he ignored her and continued to hold her tightly.
“Sorry, Frog I love your work man, but I want Vanessa to do the next piece.” He still didn’t let her go, or look away from her, as he spoke to the other man.
“Not a problem. As I said, I was going to get her to do it anyway. She needs gun time. But do you trust her not to screw it up? She seems mighty pissed with you.” They talked like she wasn’t even there.
Chase looked down at her. Something passing over his emerald green eyes before he let her go. “Yeah, she wouldn’t dare… My sister would kill her if she did.” Bastard played his trump card. If he’d simply said he’d kill her, Nessa might have been seriously tempted to screw the piece up, but bringing Becca into it was just low.
“But I’ll leave it a day. Give her the piece to look at. I want to see what she comes up with.”
“Sure thing, Chase. Same time tomorrow?”
What, did Frog not have to check the appointment book? Or was he going to shuffle others around just to accommodate the asshole?
“Make it around five. I’ve got stuff to deal with first.” With that the arrogant man walked out like he owned the damn place. Shit.
“Please tell me this place isn’t part of Hell’s Exiles business holdings?”
“Nah, Nessa. The shop’s all mine. Why? I thought you were all chummy with our Prez. You’re living there, right?” Fuck, Nessa often forgot that Frog was one of the members. Probably ’cause the man spent more time in the tattoo shop than anywhere else.
“Oh I love the club. I just can’t stand that man.” She pointed in the direction Chase had left.
“Yeah, whatever you say, Nessa. Whatever you say.”
Chapter Two
Chase parked his bike in front of the clubhouse. After spending three years with the northern chapters, learning how they ran things, he was back for good. The night before, his dad had thrown him one hell of a homecoming. Booze had flowed; the boys had all been welcoming and the pussy plentiful. Today was meant to be about letting everyone in town know he was back and getting some fresh ink done. That was until some half-pint had screwed his plans.
Ignoring the sweet butts, Chase stormed through to his father’s office. The man hadn’t mentioned that little Vanessa was living with him. Or that it looked like she’d dropped out of school. Not knocking, Chase threw open the door and was greeted to the sight of his dad’s bare ass and his stepmom screaming at him to get the fuck out. Thank Christ the woman wasn’t his real mother because that visual would have scarred him for life. Gagging at the sight he slammed the door closed and headed to the bar.
The main club area looked like any bar: wooden tables, comfy sof
as and a gaming area. Big difference between other bars and an MC one was those tables were reserved for food and drink. Not naked bodies pounding out their lust. Like Horse was doing with some little sweet butt at that moment. This was club life and Chase wouldn’t change a thing about it.
Beer in hand he waited at one of the tables for his dad and watched the sexual play going on.
Tracey? Stacey? Sandy? Whatever her fucking name was, sashayed over to him. “You seem mighty tense there, Chase. Want me to take care of that for you?” Looking at the woman he’d been buried in the night before, his cock didn’t even twitch. And he knew it was all because of some curvy girl with a sassy mouth. His sister’s best friend and the one chick he should really stay away from.
“No.” Was his snapped response. The chick pouted at him before walking away.
Three years ago Vanessa had been cute, following him around like a lost puppy. And at fifteen, completely off limits. Now the damn girl had gone and grown up. She’d only be eighteen but fuck had she developed in all the right places. Thick mahogany hair hung to her rounded hips. Hips made for digging his fingers into as he slapped his balls against that full ass of hers. And her tits, Jesus he could spend hours just exploring those babies. Shifting in his seat, Chase adjusted his now fully erect and throbbing cock. Maybe he should call what’s-her-name back over. But he had a feeling the moment she came near him, his erection would disappear.
Taking a swig of his beer he fished out his phone and found the number he wanted.
“Hey big bro—”
“Why isn’t Vanessa in school?”
“Well, hello to you too, sis. Long time no see. How’s life been—”
“Becca, I’m not in the mood. Why isn’t Vanessa in school?”
“What’s it matter to you?”
Chase pulled the phone from his ear and looked at it for a second. What was with the women in his life? Seemed they all wanted to piss him off. First Vanessa and her sassy mouth, then his stepmom telling him to get the fuck out, when all he wanted to do was talk to his dad. And now his damn sister was being a brat.