“I’m Chloe,” she said, smiling brightly. “I’m a friend.”
Dax turned wide eyes on her. “Wait. You shot them?”
She shrugged. “I can shoot the wings off a fly if you want me to, but before we get into that pissing competition, help me get Romeo back to my car. I’ll follow you to the clubhouse and treat him there.”
“You’re a nurse?” Boone asked.
“As close as you’re gonna get right now,” she replied. From her bag, she withdrew a small vial of clear liquid and a packaged sterile syringe.
“What’s that?” Dax demanded.
“Just a very small dose of morphine to help manage the pain.” She opened the syringe then filled it with the medicine and injected it into Romeo’s biceps. Almost immediately, his face relaxed as the pain presumably melted away.
“Oh, yeah,” he murmured happily. “I really like morphine. I love you, Chloe.”
She kissed his cheek and he grinned widely at her.
“Okay, enough,” Dax growled.
Chloe dispensed with the used syringe into a small red container. “Let’s get him back to the clubhouse. I don’t want him to bleed to death in this fucking crap yard of junk.”
As Boone helped Romeo to his feet, Chloe met Dax’s gaze. Her eyes were haunting, her lips plump. Sure, she was gorgeous, but that wasn’t what captivated him. Something sparked between them, sucker punching him in his gut and knocking all the air out of his lungs. He swore the earth tilted a little, just enough for his equilibrium to shift. He didn’t know what the hell was happening, but when she turned away to hurry after Romeo, all he wanted to do was punch something.
Never in all his life had he ever been jealous of Romeo—until now. It clawed at his gut that she was here for him. That she only had her eyes set on him. That she was Romeo’s fucking stalker.
Dax helped Romeo out of the junkyard and to her car while she and Boone held point, making sure they weren’t ambushed again. Gabby brought up the rear, pulling the injured Shanks member along. They didn’t have Mendoza, but they had one of his men, which was hopefully good enough to find out the information they needed.
“He can ride in my trunk,” she said, nodding to the still bleeding, still moaning man. She popped the car’s trunk and Gabby unceremoniously shoved the prisoner inside before shutting it with a firm click. “Romeo, you can ride with me—”
“No,” he said immediately. “I need to ride my bike back.”
“You can’t ride with a busted shoulder.”
“And I’m not leaving my bike here,” he argued back. “I’ll be fine.”
She glanced at the other three, but Dax knew better than to correct Romeo and not just because he was their president. No member left a bike behind.
“Your shoulder—”
“I don’t feel a thing.”
“Yes, because I just gave you a shot of morphine,” she argued. “You could crash.”
“One little shot of morphine isn’t going to make me crash,” he said, placating. “I’ve been on worse highs, believe me. Just wrap up my shoulder enough for me to make it back.”
Chloe huffed and puffed, clearly not liking this idea at all, but she opened her bag and pulled out some supplies. Dax helped Romeo take off his cut, then she wrapped an Ace bandage around the upper part of his arm. Minutes later, a huge pressure bandage soaked up any blood still leaking.
Romeo nodded his thanks and walked over to his bike. Dax was about to head toward his, but Chloe yanked Romeo’s cut out of his hands.
“I’ll take this,” she said.
“I warned you to stay away,” he admonished. “You didn’t do as I said.”
“I rarely do as I’m told.”
“Yeah, I’m discovering that about you.”
She stepped up to him until he felt her body heat enveloping him. There it was again, that spark that drove him batty. She may have the hots for Romeo, but there was no denying that chemistry flared between them. Suddenly he was more than willing to make her admit that her pussy creamed for him as well.
“I’ll see you at the compound,” she whispered.
“Definitely.” He lowered his voice to the tone more than one woman had described as sexy. “We need to talk about your listening skills.”
He made sure to put emphasis on the last word, lacing the statement with unspoken passionate promise. Her eyes widened a little and small gasp escaped her.
He turned, grinning. Making her concede to him would be so much fun.
Chapter Seven
Romeo cursed to himself as he rode back to the Men of Hell compound. Shit, the morphine had taken away the pain, but the drug was causing havoc to his eyesight. The fucking world shifted and changed while he stayed still, only he knew that wasn’t right because he was on a motorcycle. Newton’s laws of motion made sure he was still moving.
Maybe the chick was right. Chloe. Maybe he should’ve ridden with her, but he didn’t trust his bike left in front of a junkyard, even if the owner was MIA. He’d worked hard to get his bike just how he wanted it and he’d be damned if he’d let a little bullet give it as a Christmas present to the Shanks.
He had to admit that if he was destined to have a stalker, he certainly was happy she was beautiful. And it was helpful that she knew her way around a bullet wound. Perhaps he could keep her for a little while, until her obsession with him dwindled. What harm was there if she was devoted to him?
When he finally turned into the open gate of the Men of Hell compound, relief gripped him. Sweat poured out of him and his hands shook with the exertion of not laying his bike down. He managed to flip out his kickstand and turn off his engine, but that was the moment his strength fled.
Dax hurried over to him and helped him off the bike. Romeo’s knees wiggled like jelly, causing him to lean completely against his friend. Boone hurried over to help Dax guide him into the clubhouse, and by then, all the other members had run forward to clear a path on the couch so he could lie down. A few of the club girls leaned over him, clucking like mother hens.
“Oh, you poor thing!”
“Please don’t die, Romeo!”
Chloe bustled over and shooed the women away with a death glare. “Get back. Get all the way back. In fact, never touch him again.”
“Bitch,” one mumbled.
“Say that to my face one more time and I’ll break your fucking nose,” Chloe said coldly. Deadly.
She may be a tiny thing, but Romeo saw a fierceness in her that made his dick sit up and salivate.
The girls must have seen it too. They backed down.
“You should go to the hospital,” Dax told him again.
“I can take care of him,” Chloe said, kneeling next to him with a bottle of iodine in her hand. “Are you allergic to iodine?”
“Not that I’m aware of,” Romeo replied.
Dax laid a hand on her arm. “Wait. Do you know how to dig out a bullet from muscle?”
She nodded. “I assisted in a lot of shooting surgeries when I worked in LA. Luckily, this one didn’t nick any of his bones or the brachial artery. Otherwise he would have to go the hospital.”
“Just get the fucking thing out of my arm,” Romeo muttered. “Dax, get that piece of Shanks shit strung up. I’ll be out in a few minutes.”
“You won’t be able to move this arm,” she said. “Definitely won’t be able to torture anyone.”
“That’s why I have him,” he replied with a nod toward Dax. “My own minion of evil.”
Dax snorted. “You’re fucking hilarious.”
“Go, minion, do my bidding.”
He smiled when he heard Dax’s exasperated growl. He did that a lot around Romeo. He cracked open his eyes. Dax stared hungrily at Chloe. Even as horny teenagers sharing club pussy, he’d never seen Dax with such a look of longing. It made him wonder what lay between Chloe’s legs that had the tough man so tangled up—and if his friend had already sampled the delectable treat.
A moment later, Dax turned and
walked out of the clubhouse. Chloe watched him until the door closed, then she returned her attention to his wound. She gave him a series of shots until his arm went nicely numb. Then she swathed the area in a yellowish substance before putting on some sterile gloves. There was tugging but not any sharp pain, and his mind wandered while she took care of him. Her black hair gleamed in the overhead light, the midnight undertones almost blue. Of course, that could be the drug making him hallucinate. Still, he had the strangest urge to run his fingers through it.
“Are you?” Romeo asked softly.
“Am I what?”
“A stalker.”
She shrugged, not looking at him. “I owe you, simple as that. A certain person seems to have taken exception to me learning your habits.”
Her gaze flicked briefly over to the door through which Dax had exited. Something dark and telling shifted in her eyes before disappearing under her poker expression.
“Yeah, Dax mentioned that,” he said. “I’m sorry, but I don’t remember helping anyone.”
She licked her lips. He couldn’t seem to take his eyes off her glistening mouth and all sorts of filthy images filled his head. She’d look fucking gorgeous on her knees while she sucked his dick.
“Last year my cousin, Kaiya, was traveling to a symposium for the deaf,” she said. “She was taken at night from outside her hotel.”
A light bulb clicked on in his brain. He’d helped his brother Branch, his riding partner Charlie, and their old lady, Lily, capture the guy trafficking women. That prick had been the club’s old president, Shepard.
“Wait,” he said. “You’re talking about the Master’s house, in Missouri.”
She nodded. A second later, the smashed, red-tinted bullet thudded harmlessly onto the floor.
“I remember her now,” he mused. The mental picture of a beautiful Asian girl came easily from his memories. “I cut the ties off her wrists. What was her name again?”
“Kaiya.”
“That’s right. She’s your cousin?”
“Yes.”
“How is she?”
She didn’t answer for a moment as she changed gloves and retrieved a suture kit. When the needle pressed against his skin, she answered, “Our grandfather has ensconced her inside a lovely compound back in Japan, behind walls eight feet high with more guards than you can imagine.”
“No shit?” he asked, wondering how much money her grandfather had to employ such round the clock precaution.
“He’s suffocating her, but other than that, she’s fine.”
Chloe flicked her lovely dark eyes up at him and for a long second. When he met her gaze, odd sensations flooded him, a momentary suspension and sudden downward plunge. His stomach reacted as it had when he’d been on a free-fall ride as a youngster at a fair. The feeling didn’t last long, and when she looked back down at her task, he couldn’t help but wonder what the hell had just happened to his sense of equilibrium.
She sat back and slipped off her gloves.
“Done stitching me up?”
She nodded. “You have to be careful or you’ll tear them. Are you allergic to any medicines?”
“No.”
“Great. I have some antibiotics you can take. Listen, I’m not a doctor, but I’m pretty sure your arm will heal if you take it easy. If there’s any sign of infection you should go to the ER.”
Romeo flexed his arm carefully. “Well, it wasn’t a direct hit. The bullet skimmed off something and hit me. I’ll be fine.”
“You’re only saying that because the morphine is masking the pain,” she said with a grin. “By the way, I gave you a tetanus shot since I bet you’ve not had one in a while. I also have some painkillers you can have.”
“There’s nothing like some great drugs.” He smiled.
The door opened and Dax stepped inside. He looked at Chloe with a mixture of longing and mistrust, and Romeo wondered what had transpired between them. Dax met his gaze and nodded to the outside, toward the garage, letting him know that their prisoner was waiting to be interrogated. Romeo acknowledged with his own nod and reached for his shirt.
“Where are you going?” Chloe asked, alarmed.
“To the garage.”
“I just said you have to take it easy.”
“I know,” he said. “But there’s a man out there who could have answers to what happened to Babyface, and I mean to find them out.”
She pursed her lips. “Well, if you have to force those answers then make sure it’s Dax who metes out the punishment.”
He cocked one eyebrow at her. “You have no qualms about us torturing him for information?”
She opened her mouth to say something, no doubt ready to pour out all the recriminations shining in her eyes, but at the last moment, she backed down and simply shook her head.
Interesting.
“You have to wear a sling,” she told him and crossed her arms. The position pushed her tits out, and even though they were on the small side, he still wanted to lick and suck them.
“I’ll wear it if you wait here.”
“Deal,” she murmured and whipped one out of her bag.
As she helped him put it on, their gazes locked and held. Her natural scent drifted to him, tickling his senses. His dick hardened in response, and he suddenly wished they were all alone so he could experience the delights between her thighs. But duty called. He had to be responsible.
He turned and left temptation behind, trying hard to ignore the hard-on he now sported. He adjusted himself before he stepped into the garage, and immediately saw the Shanks member tied to the same cherry picker that Cipher had been chained to not that long ago.
“Where’s Mendoza?” Romeo demanded.
The man threw up his chin. “If you’re gonna kill me like you did the others, do it quick.”
“Others?” Romeo shook his head, perplexed. “What others?”
The man looked between him and Dax. “The other Shanks you killed. Had to be you. Who else would do it?”
Dax shook his head. “We didn’t kill anyone. We want Mendoza to ask if he killed one of our guys.”
The man frowned. “You didn’t do it?”
“Do what, for fuck’s sake?” Romeo bit out. The last thing he wanted to deal with right now was a runaround.
“Last Saturday night, Mendoza was found strung up,” the man reported.
Romeo glanced at Dax and saw the same type of apprehension on his friend’s face that raced through his guts. “Suicide?”
The man snorted. “A big fucking knife stuck a note to his chest, so no, Mendoza didn’t hang himself.”
“What did the note say?”
“It said leave, or more will be hung out to dry.”
“Fuck,” Boone muttered. His phone rang and he glanced at it, quickly turning away to answer the call.
The Shank member looked between them. “You didn’t do it?”
“No,” Romeo answered grimly. “One of our men was killed Saturday too. His body was cut up. The accompanying note told us to leave, or we’ll go in pieces.”
The enormity of what was going on hit Romeo at that moment, and obviously, it did to the Shank member too, because he began struggling with the bonds that held him.
“Let me go,” the man said frantically. “I have to get out of here.”
Dax rested a hand on his shoulder. “Just calm down—”
“No! Don’t you get it? The Shanks are gone!”
Romeo narrowed his eyes. “What do you mean?”
“Mendoza hasn’t been the only casualty. Yesterday someone…or some people…took out half of us. Slit their throats while they slept. Today, most of the ones who survived packed up and left. All that remained were me and four others.” He shook his head. “We thought it was you trying to run us out of town. Just let me go and I’ll get the fuck out of here, even with a bullet in my leg.”
“Are you saying the Shanks are gone?”
“Yeah, man.” The man visibly trembled. “You can
have this fucking town.”
“It wasn’t us,” Romeo stressed. Several possibilities raced through his mind, but the drug was making it difficult for him to focus on one train of thought.
“Oh, yeah? Well, who else would fight over this town?”
“Romeo,” Boone said grimly. All the men turned to him. “That was Hook. Something happened to the Whiskey Lick Her.”
Dread washed through Romeo. He looked at each man before they raced from the garage to the front of the compound. Not now. The drug was really playing havoc with his head and all he wanted to do was lie down, but as he joined his men on the road, looking back toward the interstate, the strip of fire lighting up the dark sky made him realize he had a long fucking night ahead of him. He stood with his jaw hanging open for a few minutes, unable to comprehend what the hell was going on.
Dax lay a hand on his arm. “What’s going on, Rome?”
“I don’t know,” Romeo breathed. “We have to find out. Dax, Hawg, Burrito, you come with me. Boone, stay here. Organize everything for a lockdown.”
“Wait,” Chloe said as she pushed through the assembled group of men. “You can’t ride with that arm.”
He frowned at her. “I thought we made a deal for you to stay inside.”
“I had my fingers crossed,” she replied blithely. “If you ride your motorcycle you could hurt yourself more and end up with permanent muscle damage.”
Dax nudged his uninjured shoulder and gave him a surreptitious nod.
“All right,” he groused. “You can drive me. I’ll meet the rest of you there.”
All the men nodded. They jumped into action as he marched over to the Mercedes. Without a word, Chloe slid behind the steering wheel and started the car, following after his men who throttled down the road. For the entire drive there, Romeo’s insides froze inch by inch as a band tightened around his heart. Someone had taken down the only other gang in Bair, the Shanks, and now it looked as if they were coming after the Men of Hell.
Chapter Eight
Fire trucks and police gathered around the burning building of what used to be the Whiskey Lick Her. A group of people stood off to the side, watching in horror as flames rose high into the sky, soot darkening their faces and clothes. EMTs provided medical aid for several people huddled in blankets.
Mad Delights Page 6