When my breathing started to slow, I realized that Cal was still holding me tightly against him. His hand was in my hair, caressing me, as his lips softly grazed my cheek, my neck, my shoulder. It was so tender, so soft. As I stayed there in his arms, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt so safe, so protected.
So loved.
No. I wouldn’t go there. I couldn’t. Cal had just caught me at a weak moment. The fact that no man had ever held me like that, touching me so gently, didn’t mean anything. I was just feeling vulnerable. I couldn’t let myself believe that it meant anything. I’d only end up getting hurt.
Besides, I reminded myself. Cal is your best friend’s brother.
A wave of guilt washed over me as I forced myself to remember this increasingly inconvenient truth. Oh, God. What was I doing?
Somehow, the first time anything had happened between Cal and me, I’d told myself it was just a stupid mistake, a one-time thing that didn’t mean anything as long as it never happened again. Then, last night when we had sex for the first time, I convinced myself that it was okay because it was only sex and we were two consenting adults.
But now? Now that we’d had sex four times in twelve hours? Now that Cal was kissing my neck and whispering softly to me that I was beautiful? And I was kissing him back?
We had clearly crossed a line. A big, dark, unmistakeable line.
And I had no idea what to do about it.
13
Cal
CAL
That?
That wasn’t just sex.
In fact, I didn’t even really know what the hell it was. All I knew was that Andi Wagner was fucking beautiful, and sexy, and I wanted to chain her to this bed and never let her leave.
I couldn’t figure out why it was that being with Andi was so different. Maybe it was because practically every other woman I’d ever fucked was basically throwing herself at me. I’d never really had to try very hard to get a female’s undivided attention. Hell, Seton even told me that when we were kids, I could charm the pants off every old lady who lived in our neighborhood with just a smile — even if I’d just trampled their prize hostas.
Most of the time, women were just a fun distraction. Like a bottomless toy box filled with all sorts of stuff to play with that would always be there waiting for you when you wanted it.
But Andi…
She was different. She had this effortless cool about her. And she was mouthy as hell, which was pretty damn funny. Whenever we’d sparred in the past, she always gave as good as she got. She had this aura about her, like she didn’t need anyone or anything. She was tough, and smart, and hot, and definitely not the kind of girl to throw herself at anyone. In fact, even though there’d always been a pretty strong sexual flirtation between us, her flirtiness toward me was always laced with a joking tone that I could never really get a bead on. Like she wanted me to know there was nothing behind it. She’d always call me Romeo in this half-sarcastic teasing tone, like she was making sure I knew she was just playing a part.
So it was a pretty huge rush when we were alone, just the two of us, and I got to see her completely lose control under my touch. It was like I’d won a prize, or something. Like I got to see a side of her that no one else ever did. I can’t lie, I’d wondered more than once over the years what Andi would be like in bed, and holy hell, my imagination didn’t even come close to the reality.
Now that I knew what she was like with me, I wondered about the other guys she’d been with, and whether she’d ever let herself go like that with them. I wasn’t sure why, but I didn’t think so. Andi hadn’t said anything about it, but I got the feeling that the explosion of chemistry that happened whenever we were together was something completely new to her.
It sure as hell was for me.
Then there was the fact that Andi had actually confided in me. She’d told me a secret — a terrible, traumatic secret — that I was sure she hadn’t ever told anyone else before. Not even Seton. It had become clear to me, watching her struggle painfully with the words she spoke, that she was trusting me with the darkest, most vulnerable part of her. It made me feel incredibly protective of her, and incredibly proud that she’d chosen me.
Sure, I knew that part of it was just coincidence. I’d happened to be at the right place at the right time to piece together some stuff that she was trying her damnedest to hide. But still. I hoped, with a ferocity I could hardly believe, that a tiny part of why she’d chosen to tell me was because of me. Because she’d trusted me to be the one to keep her secret. That she’d chosen me, above anyone else, to keep her safe. To know something so terrible about her past — something she couldn’t bear for anyone else to know — and to trust that I wouldn’t judge her for it.
And I didn’t. At all. Hell, if anything, I…
Well, I…
I shook my head. I had feelings for Andi, that was clear. I was already probably in too deep for my own good with her. But I couldn’t let my mind go down the road it was headed right now. What we were doing was probably dumb as hell, considering that she was my sister’s best friend and all. It wasn’t going to make things any better if I started letting myself think about what it would be like if this wasn’t just a temporary thing. If it was more than just friends with benefits.
Because it couldn’t really be more than that between us.
Could it?
Shit. The last twenty-four hours had really fucked with my head. And in a crazy way, they had also been maybe the best damn twenty-four hours of my life. As long as things between Andi were just casual — just sex, even if it was the most mind-blowing sex I’d ever had — then I told myself Seton didn’t have to know about it. After all, we were two consenting adults. As long as we were careful, no one had to know. But the more I made Andi’s body come under my touch, the more I couldn’t imagine breaking this off when all this stalker shit was over.
And if we didn’t break it off…
Then I was fucking my sister’s best friend behind her back, and eventually she’d find out about it. And she’d be pissed at both of us. Maybe really pissed. And it might even cost Andi Seton’s friendship, which would suck so bad it made my heart hurt to think about it. After all, I was Seton’s brother, and her man was the president of my club. Realistically, there was no way she could push me out of her life, even if she was furious with me.
But Andi had no family to support her and love her, and it made me sick to think about her losing her best friend because of me.
Goddamnit. All this shit could snowball so far out of control, so quickly, and the only thing I could do to stop it would be to stop seeing Andi right now. But I knew I wouldn’t. I knew I couldn’t.
There was no way I would walk away from Andi Wagner, unless she told me herself to get the hell out of her life.
Andi and I had stayed in bed, kissing and talking, until I’d had to leave to get to the clubhouse for church. She had told me she was tending bar at Hammie’s later that day, and I filed that information away for future reference, thinking I might stop by and say hello.
I’d driven to the clubhouse in a ponderous mood, my mind a jumble between everything that was happening between me and Andi, and what the hell to do about figuring out whether her stepdad and her stalker were one and the same.
When I walked through the door of the chapel, a few of the men were already there, sitting around the table in their customary places. Trig and Grey were talking in low tones at the head of the table, and Trig glanced over in my direction and gave me a chin lift as I took my seat next to Frankenstein. Other men started to file in after me, and soon all the chairs were filled.
“Okay, let’s call this meeting to order,” Grey called.
A few minutes into it, Trig spoke up and said we needed to figure out a plan for getting to the bottom of whoever the hell was bringing heroin into Lupine. He told the club about the fifteen year-old the cops had picked up for trying to sell over at the high school. According to Chief Atkins, th
e boy was swearing it was his first time dealing. The kid was scared as hell and talking his head off, but he hadn’t been able to tell them anything useful.
“They’re gonna let him go for now on the off chance that whoever provided the smack will contact him again. He’s promised to tell the cops everything if they do,” Trig concluded. “But I’m not optimistic.”
“The cops ain’t gonna be able to do anything,” Repo snorted. “They have their heads so far up their asses half the time, the only way they’d find them is if the suppliers were living in their colons.”
“Agreed,” Moose nodded. “We gotta do this ourselves.”
“I’m open to suggestions,” Grey remarked. “I don’t see any of us able to go undercover and pass ourselves off as high school kids, though.”
“I’ve got an idea,” I said. “How ‘bout I take a ride over to the high school after classes let out and spend a little time having a little chat with the burnouts?”
I was never a student at Lupine High. When I was that age, I was living out in Scottsdale with my ma and her then-boyfriend, an orange-tanned dentist named Darryl. Darryl and Ma are married now, and I guess she’s pretty happy. We don’t talk too often, and I think we’re both mostly fine with that.
I never took much to Scottsdale. Sure, the weather was nice. But there were way too many retirees and rich fuckers with sticks stuck up their asses. It was fuckin’ oppressive. It’s like I heard someone say once: Scottsdale is exactly like the Wild West, without the wild part.
After I graduated from school — barely —I got the hell out of there and came back to Lupine, where I’d been born. I’d had good memories of the place, and Seton was here, so I figured what the hell. Not long after I’d moved back, I’d started hanging around the Stone Kings, and the rest is history.
So, I didn’t know much about the Lupine High itself, except where it was located. But some things are more or less universal to all high schools, and that’s what I was counting on now.
I pulled up about half a block away from the front entrance of the school about two-thirty that afternoon, just as classes were getting out. I sat on the bike and had a smoke as I watched the students filing out, taking note of the various groups that formed according to the cliques they belonged to. I watched laughing young girls flipping their hair self-consciously as they walked down the sidewalk toward the parking lot or toward downtown.
A group of them, dressed like they were probably part of the popular crowd, glanced over at me and gave me a once over. I raised my hand in a half-wave and took my shades off to wink at them. Their cheeks turned red and a few of them began to giggle, picking up their pace nervously. I scared them, I could tell. But not nearly enough for their own good.
However, my goal in coming here had nothing to do with corrupting young impressionable jailbait. I scanned the crowd for the burners, the ones with self-consciously wild, unkempt hair and unshaven scruffs covering their cheeks. The ones who lit up a smoke as soon as they were out of the building. Finally, I spied a group of three of them, sauntering away from the front door with cigarettes dangling from their lips. They were talking too loud, enjoying the irritated looks of the students around them, and sometimes one would punch another one in the shoulder or feign clocking someone in the face.
These were the kids I wanted. The ones who thought they were badasses.
I knew that, because I used to be one of them.
I kept smoking as I watched them out of the corner of my eye, my gaze hidden by my shades. The three kids swaggered away from the school, across the street to a remote corner of the parking lot, and eventually came to a stop at the very last row, where a beat-up maroon Toyota Corolla with no hubcaps and one navy side panel sat next to a small, rundown outbuilding with peeling green paint. One of the kids straddled the long low bench that sat in front of the building, and the other two leaned against it as they continued to smoke.
This was clearly their kingdom.
These were the kids I had come to see.
I tossed away my smoke, fired up the bike and took it around the block the other way, then pulled up to them from the opposite direction I’d come, so my bike would be parked next to the building about fifteen feet away from them. Cutting the engine, I took off my shades and called to them.
“Hey, you fuckers got a smoke? I’m all out.”
If anyone ever told these kids about stranger danger, they had chosen to forget the lesson. The tallest one looked over at me, his eyes widening as he took me in. His eyes went from my leather cut to the Harley between my legs — my “in” with them. Kids like this love bikes and leather.
The tall kid glanced over at one of his buddies, who raised his eyebrows. “Sure,” Tall Kid said nonchalantly, ambling over to me like he talked to biker club guys every day of his life. He took a crumpled pack of Marlboros out of the pocket of his flannel shirt and shook one out for me. “Here.”
“Thanks.” Using my own lighter, I fired up the smoke and took a long drag. “Appreciate it.”
The kid next to him, a shorter guy with dirty blond hair nodded toward the Harley. “Sweet bike.”
I lifted my chin. “You ride?”
He reddened slightly. “No, but I’m saving up for one.”
I didn’t question him about it. The more I let these guys think they were down with me, the more info they’d give me.
“You go to school here?” I asked, my eyes, lifting toward the building.
The tall kid spat on the ground in disgust. “Yeah,” he said with a sneer.
By now the third kid had stood up from the bench and came over to us. “Hey,” he said. “You’re a Stone King?” He wasn’t as tall as Tall Kid, but he was skinny as fuck, so he almost looked taller. He had a prominent Adam’s apple and a low forehead with thick, dark eyebrows. He kind of reminded me of my brother Frankenstein.
“Yeah.”
“How do you get in the Kings anyway?” he asked me.
“It’s a long process.” I shrugged. “Usually, someone recommends you, or you can just show up and hope they don’t run you off. If you’re lucky and you’re not too much of an asshole, you can get hangaround status. That means you can hang around us, but you gotta keep your fucking mouth shut and know your place.”
He nodded. “Then what?”
I didn’t feel like spending my time telling this little shit about the ins and outs of joining an MC, but I figured if I told them something, they’d tell me something. “Then after that, you become a prospect. Someone needs to sponsor you for that. It’s kind of like a hazing. You go through a period where you gotta do any grunt work and anything that any of the patched members ask you, no matter how shitty or dangerous or illegal. You hesitate, or you question what they ask you to do, and you’re out.”
Skinny’s eyes had grown wide.
“Then, if you succeed in showing your loyalty and respect to the club, they have a vote. If it’s unanimous, you’re in. If not, you’re gone.”
The short blond one nodded. “That’s cool,” he said casually. I almost laughed, but kept it together.
“So, guys.” I took another pull on my smoke. “I could use some information. I’m guessing you might be just the people to help me out.”
Tall Kid looked at Skinny, then back at me. “Uh, sure, what do you need to know?”
“First, I need this to be confidential between just the four of us. I don’t need anyone knowing my club’s business, you feel me?” I couldn’t be sure they’d keep it secret — probably not, in fact — but I though maybe, just maybe, they’d manage to keep it between themselves.
Skinny nodded so hard I though his head might snap his neck. “Sure, yeah. Of course.”
“Okay, listen.” I leaned forward on the bike. “You guys know anything about any kids dealing drugs at Lupine High? The hard stuff. Specifically heroin.”
“There’s that one kid, Tyler, who got caught a couple weeks ago for it,” Blond Hair said.
“Yeah, I know abo
ut him. But I need to know whether you know any kids who haven’t been caught. Anyone dealing that only kids know about. Anyone you’ve heard through the grapevine, whether you know for sure or not.”
Tall Kid looked worried. “Are they gonna get in trouble if we talk?”
“Kid,” I smirked. “Do I look like I’m gonna go to the cops?”
He laughed weakly. “No, I guess not.”
“The reason ain’t something I’m gonna share with you, but no, the kids aren’t gonna get in trouble. This is a turf issue. Lupine is Stone Kings turf. These drugs are coming from outside our territory without our permission. We don’t want the kids. We want their bosses.”
“I know someone,” Blond Hair said.
The three of them ended up giving me the name of a kid in the grade ahead of them, and enough information about him that I could find out where he lived and the club could start to track his movements. I reassured them again that the kid would not get in trouble and made them promise they would not tell anyone about our conversation, figuring I had about a fifty percent chance that they’d keep their word.
Then I rode back to the clubhouse to tell Grey and Trig what I’d found out.
14
Andi
ANDI
After Cal left to go to church at the clubhouse, I spent most of the day in a haze, trying not to think about him — and then catching myself thinking about him and trying not to think about the fact that I was trying not to think about him.
It was like my brain was shorting out. All the wires and signals felt crossed, frazzled, when his face appeared in my mind’s eye.
Cal was by far the best sex I’d ever had. Like, it wasn’t even a contest. He’d made me feel things I had never felt before. Against any preconceived notions I’d had about what he would be like in bed, he had turned out to be an incredibly generous sexual partner, and holy shit, did he know what he was doing. He’d found spots on me that I didn’t even know about, and seemed to be able to read every shiver, moan, and movement of my body. The Cal I’d come to know as a lover was completely different from the shallow, selfish womanizer I had been flirting with for close to five years.
STONE KINGS MOTORCYCLE CLUB: The Complete Collection Page 63