HARD RIDE (The Slayers MC Book 2)

by Tara Oakes

  Of all my guys here today, Gryff is the one who I’ve got to keep under reins the most. You’d think that by now his hairpin trigger has gotten him in enough trouble to learn to control it. Nope. The motherfucker is a loose cannon. If it weren’t for his other skills, he never would have been elected as my VP.

  It’s those other skills that make him invaluable to me. I’m hoping this situation doesn’t turn to the point where I need to call him into action, but it feels damn good knowing he’s there if, and when, I need it.

  “They tell time differently south of the border?” Twist asks, breaking the grumbling silence of pissed off men.

  Before I can answer, Esè juggles three paper cups of coffee in his hands while shuffling into the bunker. “They’re here.”

  Even I sit up straight at the announcement, sharing looks of understanding with each man. They know to wait for my signal. Even Gryff knows it, although sometimes he waits a little too eagerly for it, ready to pop off.

  “Gentlemen,” I greet them, standing up. Now, normally, I don’t do that shit. The only people that have earned me getting to my feet for them are other Slayers. But, considering how delicate these negotiations will be, I figure it can’t hurt to show some manners.

  “Mr. McCade.” Mateo leads two men into the room.

  We all size each other up.

  “Vasquez,” I return the greeting, using his surname.

  We stand opposite each other, with about three feet in between. “I was hoping we could take the proper measures to be able to speak alone.” Mateo Vasquez is forward.

  I contemplate it. I could take him if I had to, if that’s what he’s trying to do here. I can tell from the body language of my men behind me that they are uncomfortable with the idea, but, ultimately, it’s my decision.

  I nod over to Uno, “Do it.”

  Normally, Chase, as the club’s enforcer would be the one to do what Uno is getting ready to. I trust him, though. He may only have one eye, but it’s a good one. He’s been around long enough not to miss anything.

  One of Vasquez’s men steps forward at the same time as Uno, almost like a hostage exchange. Each man pats down and searches the leader of the opposition. I’m not carrying. Don’t need to. I know my guys are. After Uno’s search, it appears Vasquez isn’t carrying either.

  With this being our place, there’s no need for Uno to search for bugs, but I don’t hold it against the man who’s just patted me down from doing so. A small little black device is taken out of his pocket and scanned through the air cautiously, covering every square foot of space.

  He’s looking for signals, charges, electronic devices that may be recording what’s going on in here. After two trips around the room, both he and his boss seem satisfied.

  Vazquez nods to me and then his men, who file out through the door they entered. My own men follow suit, unhappily. I can actually hear Gryff grunt as he passes.

  He’ll get over it.

  The security door is closed tightly after the last man, to give us the privacy Vasquez requested.

  “Shall we?” I offer him a seat and take the one next to it.

  Guardedly, we assume the positions for negotiating in good faith. He sees me. I see him. Nothing to hide. Nothing to make the other nervous.

  I decide to open up the dialogue. “Where do we stand on our little compromise?”

  He’s got one hell of a poker face. I can’t read him. My stomach drops, thinking we might not be able to get this thing done.

  “Seven o’clock this evening.” Mateo Vazquez responds cryptically. At this point, it could mean anything. Is that the time another attack will be ordered, like the last attempt on my vulnerable brother?

  I raise an eyebrow in question.

  “He’ll be on parole. Will be wearing an ankle monitor. That’s the best I could do.” Vazquez’s explanation isn’t much more forthcoming than his vague response. I’m able to fill in the blanks on my own.

  He did it. He was able to get Stitch out. With strings, of course. I had expected them, just wasn’t sure what they would be. He’s a smart man. Stitch may be released to a degree, free to come home to his wife and kid, but there are limits to what a parolee can do.

  He won’t be able to step foot near most other Slayers, with most of us being prior felons ourselves. There’ll be a curfew and a shit ton of rules, and even with that, there’ll be no guarantee that he wouldn’t be yanked back as easily as he’s being released.

  Stitch will be a pawn. His freedom will continue to be used as leverage. It’s not ideal, but it’s a step in the right direction. At this point, that’s all I can do. I’ll have to think of another way out of this later.

  “Now, Mr. McCade, I believe you have something for me?” he asks.

  I nod, simultaneously withdrawing my cell phone from my inner vest pocket. Chase is on standby, been expecting this call. I don’t hit the button quite yet, though.

  “You can see her. Through video chat only. You getting my guy out is a step in the right direction, but you’ll still have a hold over him. As long as that arrangement is in place, I’ll be keeping the girl right where I can see her.”

  This seems to surprise the man. “He’s on parole for six months!”

  I have to admit to myself that’s longer then I had anticipated playing babysitter to the girl. Oh well, I can’t change my stance now. I can’t look weak. So I stand firm.

  “Ain’t that long in the grand scheme of things.” She’ll have to be Chase’s problem for the six months.

  “She’s got plans for school,” Mateo advocates for his cousin.

  I think quick. “We got a real good University about one town over. Look, you want this to work? We gotta trust each other. That ain’t gonna happen in this situation unless we each have an insurance policy.”

  He’s not happy. “I’m gonna need a little more than insurance. I had to pull some pretty tight strings to get that guy out. It’s gonna come back and haunt me.”

  I listen.

  He pauses, unsure of how to proceed. “I didn’t get your man sprung for good faith. I know exactly where Catarina is right now. If I wanted, I could get her back within the hour.”

  A chill runs up my spine.

  “Is that so?” I ask, not sure if I believe him or not. But he’s not the kind of guy I want to be playing this game with. “Then why aren’t you?”

  I call his bluff.

  He looks me dead in the eye. “Because I need something else from you besides my cousin back.”

  Here we go. This is diplomacy at work.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CAT

  “Really?”

  Is this some sadistic trick? Chase holds out the phone, as if proving that it isn’t. It’s real. It’s happening.

  Oh my God! I—I have to check my hair. My breathing starts racing and I move back and forth in place. One step toward my room to check the mirror. One step back, changing my mind to say the hell with how I look. Back toward the mirror to make sure Mateo won’t be able to tell what I’ve been doing a few hours ago even though I know I’ve showered and dried my hair.

  I don’t know why I feel like it’s so obvious. It’s probably because my insides have been screaming ever since.

  “Take it, Tush.” He pushes the phone forward.

  To hell with the mirror, I decide. As soon as the plastic phone touches my fingertips I realize what he’s just called me. “Tush?”

  Chase shrugs his shoulders and smirks. I’ll deal with that later.

  He steps back affording me some privacy while I take the call. I know that thanks to our many tutors growing up, Mateo speaks both languages just as fluently as I do, but I think this conversation calls for some added privacy. Whatever few words Chase will be able to translate and decipher from his minimal Spanish classes won’t matter. He won’t be able to decode enough to make sense.

  I fumble with the buttons on the screen until I see Mateos, my handsome face, with my own blocked in the corner.

>   “Teo?” I use my nickname for him, the one I used to use as a child when the few syllables of his name were too many to speak.

  His brown eyes are almost as dark as my own as they search the screen, registering my appearance. “Cat? Are you alright? Are you sick? Are you getting enough to eat? Are you hurt?”

  Exhaling, I feel a flood of relief wash over me at his concern. I try to answer but a lump forms in my throat. “Teo, I’m okay. I’m not hurt. I’m not sick. I’m getting enough to eat.” I try to make sure I’ve answered all of his questions.

  There are several things you can see through a video call that you wouldn’t be able to notice in a regular phone call. I see Mateo’s shoulders relax slightly as I update him on my condition.

  Just seeing that, knowing that he genuinely cares for my wellbeing, is a lot to handle, as I don’t know of anyone else other than the father’s servants that would even shed a tear over me.

  “Did you get my letter, Cat?”

  My eyes dart up to Chase, who’s leaning against the wall in the small kitchen. “I got the letter, Teo.”

  What we’re about to do is considered treason. Father has always been suspicious of Mateo, as he’s the only male heir who could possibly oust the Cartel leader one day. If he were to find out about that letter, about the conversation we’re about to have right now, then there is no doubt in my mind that father would have him killed. Just like he had tried to do years ago before Mateo’s own father intervened and saved his son, buying him some more time. It was a very costly thing to do, as Mateo’s father paid for it with his life.

  On one hand I feel like I know Chase, that I know the kind of man he is on the inside, especially after what’s happened to us lately. On the other hand, though, I remind myself that I do not in fact know him at all. He could turn on us, turn Mateo in, revealing him as a traitor.

  I can’t risk that happening. Not until I’m positive that Chase and the Slayers would side with us.

  “How is father?” I not only speak in Spanish, but I speak in code. Mateo knows nothing would please me more right now than to find out that my sire is rotting in the ground.

  He smiles. “The same as always. However long and hard you believe he’s working to have you returned, you can rest assured that it does not equal the agony he feels in his precious daughter being taken from him.”

  I learned a long time ago to shield my heart from any pain regarding my father. I don’t let Mateo’s hidden meaning have any effect on me. He’s telling me the truth, and he’s telling it to me for a reason.

  Father is not searching for me, not trying to broker any sort of long lasting truce with my captors. He’ simply waiting, biding his time until he can exact revenge for them having the audacity to challenge him in any way.

  I know that.

  Mateo knows that.

  However, do the Slayers know that? Does Chase know that? Inexplicably, my chest tightens thinking of what will happen to Chase if he underestimates father. I’ve never seen the bloodshed, the gore, that happened to father’s enemies or those who had outlived their usefulness to him and the Cartel, but the stories were horrifying enough to reach even my ears.

  Every horrible thing that was ever ordered on my father’s behalf has been to send a message, to instill fear. That’s how he operates.

  “I’m glad to hear father is so concerned for me. It only makes my love for him grow. Please tell him that I miss him dearly and that I cannot wait for all of this to be over, and for those guilty of unspeakable crimes to be punished.” If anyone else were to be listening to this call it would sound innocently enough, as if I wish that punishment on the Slayers and not on my father. But, Mateo knows better. He knows who I’m referring to.

  “Please assure father and yourself that I am doing everything possible on this end to secure that outcome.” I once again veil my true meaning. I’m no longer trying to escape, although that may change at some point. Instead, I’m working on the inside to hopefully broker a deal with these bikers that hold me captive, and with Chase, one that will help bring retribution and vengeance to the man who deserves it most.

  Teo nods, signaling his understanding of our secret plan. “I am glad to hear it. It should not be long now, Catarina. Stay strong. Remember what is important. Remember your family that loves you and remember me.”

  A tear begins to well in my eye at the mention of my family, my true family, the one Mateo is surely referring to. The one I knew. The one whose deaths were some of the most gruesome of the tales those in fear of father speak of.

  My eyes begin to swell and I fear my voice will crack while thinking of the mother I never knew, the uncles, cousins and grandparents I never had the chance to know. All because of father.

  “I’ll see you soon, Catarina. Stay safe.” Teo senses the conversation’s become one sided, that I’m incapable of speaking. He knows me well enough to know when not to push.

  Therapy wasn’t even an option when I was growing up. Instead, I had to learn how to deal and cope with my life on my own. Teo helped. He never pressed me to say anything or do anything I wasn’t able to. He can sense it now, I know he can.

  My cousin and most beloved friend smiles genuinely before ending the call. Once he’s gone, once I can no longer see his familiar face, I close my eyes.

  It’s all right, I tell myself just as I have over the years. I’m strong.

  With my eyes still closed, I hear Chase move towards me, his heavy boots crossing the space to where I am. “It’s okay Cat,” he soothes me.

  I shouldn’t let his voice do the things it does to me, but with my mind raging like a summer storm, his voice seems to calm it. I nod, seeming to agree with him. It will be okay. It has to be.

  Breathing deeply, I take a breath that seems to have him mixed in it. He’s that close. I smell him, taste him, and my mouth starts to water for more. There’s a slight swooshing sound as he bends to his knees in front of where I’m sitting. I’m afraid to open my eyes, afraid he’ll see what I’m thinking, what I’m feeling, so I keep it guarded and keep my eyelids closed.

  “It’s all right,” Chase whispers, mimicking the unspoken self reassuring words I’m repeating over and over in my head. It’s as if he can hear them and is agreeing.

  The worn and rough palm of his hand cups my face, with his thumb caressing the plush skin of my cheek. “You’ll see him soon, Cat. I promise.”

  “Will I?” I ask, my eyes prying to open. “How do you know that? How do you know that something terrible won’t happen?”

  I don’t really expect an answer to the rhetorical question, but, surprisingly, he gives one. “Because I will never let anything happen to you. I swear that. Do you believe me?”

  I want to, really I do, but so much of this is out of his control, and he doesn’t even know it.

  “You don’t know how dangerous this can get,” I try to warn him.

  That makes him laugh a bit. “Baby, if there’s one thing I do well, it’s danger.”

  It’s almost as if he’s trying to lighten the mood with a comment like that, but when I look in his eyes, I see he’s serious. Dead serious.

  “You wouldn’t be worried about me, now would you? It wasn’t that long ago that you were trying to kill me.” His voice is lighter.

  I roll my eyes. “If I had wanted you dead, believe me, I’d have found a way to do it by now.”

  He seems intrigued. “Oh, yeah? I guess that means I’ll just have to keep a watchful eye over you, never let you outta my sight.”

  As if that would be any different from what it is now. I already feel his gaze everywhere, all the time, but mostly on my ass. That reminds me.

  “Wait a minute—what was that thing you called me before? Tush?” I remember having reminded myself to address that moniker.

  A smirky smile begins to spread over his tempting lips. “A nickname.”

  I feel heat rise to my cheeks. “I already have a nickname. It’s Cat. I don’t need another one.”

&
nbsp; His large shoulders rise and fall. “Sorry, babe. Sometimes a name just sticks.”

  Oh, no, he doesn’t. “Well, unstick it.” I’m serious. I know I’ve got an ass. I know he likes to look at it. I actually like that he looks at it the way he does, but we don’t need to go naming it.

  He lets out a hard breath. “Can’t. There’s no way in hell I’m ever gonna get the sight of that glorious ass taking every inch I give you from behind outta my head. No way I’ll ever get the feeling of it under my hand to go away, or how it feels when I push up against it and you moan.”

  A thick delicious tension begins to build between us.

  I can see I’m getting nowhere by asking nicely. Reaching forward, I brazenly let my hand slide over the growing bulge of his erection, stroking it through his jeans. “If you love my ass so much, I’d think you’d be smart enough not to jeopardize seeing it again.”

  He listens to me, to my threat, but masks himself well. I can’t tell how he’s taking it, kneeling in front of me as I continue to patronizingly pet his raging hard dick. He likes it, I know he does. Not by anything he says but by how the thick flesh reacts under my touch.

  I can feel it throb, almost feel its ache.

  “You like to give orders, huh?” he taunts. I guess you could say I do. I’m a naturally independent person. “Let’s see how you take orders.”

  Instinctually, I swallow, gulping hard as a flood of wetness escapes me at the possibilities of what his words imply.

  “Let go of my cock,” he commands.

  My fingers stop their exploration, but my hand doesn’t move as he’d like. “Why?”

  There’s a deep, all knowing gleam in his eyes as he answers. “Because you’re about to come harder then you ever thought possible.” I freeze. As if he’s somehow found a way to control my body against my own will, I let go of him. He smiles. “Now undo my belt, Tush.”

  The nickname being used again only serves to piss me off, and he knows it. This causes me to pause instead of completing the task he asks.