Born to Ride
Page 80
There’s a pause, and then he roars so loud it rattles the drywall of the tiny bathroom. “I AM NOT YOUR SON! I stopped being that the day your retaliation got Lil and Mum killed!” There’s a loud yell and the sound of plastic thwacking against the wall and shattering across the tiled floor.
I’m frozen to the spot, caught between breaking down the door and demanding an explanation or running in the opposite direction. And, while I’m contemplating my retreat, I hear Elijah mutter to himself, “Pull it together arsehole.” And then he wrenches the door open and stands there, staring at me.
I know the guilt of overhearing his conversation is written all over my face so I’m not sure why I try to pretend like I’m in the dark, but I smile sweetly. “Hi.”
“How long you been standing there, Ana?”
“Not long, I just got here.”
“Oh yeah?” He eliminates the distance between us and slides his hands around my waist. Then he lifts me up and sets me back down on the workbench, easing his way between my thighs. He’s shaking slightly and I can feel the caged violence in him, and the effort it takes him to be gentle with me. “You’re a terrible liar, you know that?”
“Nice outfit.” He tugs my zipper down an extra inch until my boobs are practically falling out of my jacket. Then he slips his hand inside my bra and rolls my nipple between his thumb and forefinger. “You got a hot date tonight?”
“Yeah, actually I should get going. Scott’s picking me up in a minute,” I joke, just to relieve some of the tension between us, but it has the opposite effect. Elijah growls and tugs hard on my nipple, causing my breath to catch in the back of my throat and a shot of fiery pleasure to arc between my breast and my already drenched crevice. “Now is really not the time to be putting images of you with other men in my head, Ana.”
“You wanna talk about it?” We both know I don’t mean the ridiculous idea of me with other men.
“No,” he says, a little too quickly, and then presses a hard kiss to my lips.
“Elijah—”
“I don’t wanna talk about it. I wanna put you over my knee and spank you til your arse is raw. And then I wanna flip you over and eat you out until that beautiful pussy can’t come any more.” He peppers my face and neck with kisses, then slides a hand between my legs and begins working me into a frenzy. The seam of my jeans rubs against my clit with every stroke until I’m a sighing, shuddering mess of a woman. “Then I wanna fuck your mouth until you drain every last drop from me.”
I have my own ideas about that last one. As much as I love going down on him, I’d much rather he fucked me than my mouth, but I’m not prepared to admit that little detail yet. Besides, I’m under no illusions that if he took me now while he’s in this dark—and frankly, kinda scary—mood, I wouldn’t be walking for a week. As hot as that makes me, it’s really not the way I think my first time should go.
Not that it matters at this point. A few more strokes of his hand and I’ll consent to anything as I’m riding that delicious post-orgasmic high. I think he senses this, too, because he withdraws his hand and tilts my face up to his. I’m panting and desperate and aching for him to finish me off, but the wicked glint in his eye tells me he has no intention of doing so. I let out a ridiculous whimper that shames me beyond the point of no return, which says a lot when you consider who my best friend is. Elijah laughs, low and so sexy that it sends a fresh frisson of yearning through me.
“What’s the matter, baby girl? Cunt got your tongue?”
“You’re cruel,” I whine and slap playfully at his chest. He catches my hand in his and brings it to his lips.
“Ah, but I promised you a date.”
“And it couldn’t start after my orgasm?”
“Usually that happens at the end of the date.” Elijah carefully zips me back into my jacket and leads me out through the side door before locking up after himself. He falls into step beside me and slides his hand into my back pocket, then he leans down and whispers, “If you’re a very good girl, I might even tie you to the bed and take more from you tonight than just your orgasm.”
I freeze midstride. Does he already know that this is where tonight is leading? Is it written all over my face? Did he somehow hear Holly from across the street? And is he kidding me with this whole bondage thing, or have I bitten off much more than I can chew?
All these questions run through my head as I watch him jump on the bike and turn the key in the ignition, though the questions I should have been asking Elijah have nothing to do with losing my virginity.
Why do I get the feeling that the answers to the questions Elijah’s so eager to avoid are the ones that will ruin everything?
Elijah
The streets are lined with people; adults and kids, voices, music and the smell of fried food everywhere. People jostle one another for space in order to get a better view of the parade. Several big-arse lanterns pass us by, ships and dragons and something that looks like a giant fertility goddess, each more elaborate than the first and most requiring four or more people to carry them.
We stand across the road from a pub, huddled in with the other spectators. There’s several big biker dudes drinking and making a raucous outside the pub, though no one but me seems to be paying them any mind. I’m not sure why my eyes keep sliding from the parade to them. I don’t recognise a single face, and they certainly don’t know me from any of the other coat-clad revellers here but these days, anyone wearing a cut instantly forces my hair to stand on end.
I wrap my arms tight around Ana’s waist and pull her into the warmth of my jacket. She’s got to be freezing. Earlier, the sight of just a sheer lace bra beneath her jacket nearly had me tearing off her knickers and nailing her on her father’s work bench, and wouldn’t that be fun to explain to her old man come Monday once he’d seen the security feed footage? But I made a promise to myself that I’d never touch her in anger and, after talking to that scumbag of a father of mine, anger didn’t begin to explain what I was feeling. Ana deserves more than that, deserves more than some angry ex-con shithead just looking to get his dick wet.
And speaking of shitheads ... one of the guys across the street must feel my eyes on him because he meets my gaze, makes a show of checking out Ana and then salutes me with his beer. He’s big, about my height actually, and equally as ripped, but I reckon I could take him because he has about fifteen years on me. I can’t take him with his biker boyfriends standing around, though. Audience or not, they’d have me on my knees and crying for my mummy in seconds.
“You need to be wearing more clothes,” I gripe as I tug her zip up to the hollow between her collarbones.
“Alright, who are you and what’ve you done with my boyfriend? Because he seemed to lurrrrve my outfit earlier.”
“Baby girl, every man with eyes loves you in that outfit. That’s the problem. I’m gonna wind up behind bars defending your honour.”
Ana has some witty reply, but it’s lost on me on account of the group across the road. It’s grown in the time I’ve been distracted with her, and now there are six sets of eyes on us, and only four sets of those are unfamiliar.
Fuck!
My heart thunders inside my chest. For a moment, I’m frozen where I stand while I watch recognition set in. The two new additions know my face just as well as I know theirs, and several heartbeats pass in the time that I glance between their eyes and their Hell’s Angels patches. Patches I should have been wearing, and the lack of those patches will more than likely mean the end of me. My mind is running through an endless and really unhelpful cycle of ohfuckohfuckohfuckohfuck.
Ana lets out a delighted little squeal as a pair of drummers begin beating out a rhythm, and a troupe of belly dancers twirl and twist in front of us. I glance from the dancers to the bikers, and it’s as if our standoff suddenly shatters.
“Time to go,” I whisper and yank on her arm.
“But the parade hasn’t finished yet,” she protests, but hurries along behind me anyway.
“Oh my god, are you seeing this? Those guys just—”
“Ana.” I grab hold of her shoulders and give a gentle shake her to get her attention. “Is there a back alley we can use to get back to the bike?”
“What? It’s just around—”
“Yes or no?”
“Yes. Elijah, what’s going on?”
“I’m gonna need you to run.”
“What?”
I don’t take the time to explain, because if I did we’d both be dead. Instead, I yank her along with me and we take off running, pushing past the throng of people. I gotta hand it to her; she may be the only woman I’ve met who can run in heels and still look fucking sexy doing it.
“This way,” she yells and we slip into an arcade that I wasn’t even aware had been there until we were running through it. We come out the other side into a dark alleyway; no street lights, no people. I don’t think they’ve followed us, but that doesn’t mean they won’t find the bike before we do. And, though the license plate was changed the minute I got out of prison, it’s still the same bike my grandfather handed down to me, and there really aren’t a lot of 1979 Moto Guzzi California’s in Australia.
I should have traded the thing in, or at least let her gather dust in storage for a few years. Instead, my simple decision to cling onto the one thing I truly loved from my past could cost us both our lives. And maybe I even deserve to go out like a rat, to be strung up by the balls and beaten bloody, but Ana sure as shit doesn’t deserve to be anywhere near that.
We come tearing out of the alleyway into the empty street. We’re alone. For now.
“What the hell was that all about?” Ana’s standing beside me with her helmet in her hands, but she’s not moving.
“Put on your helmet,” I command and find my patience stretched to its breaking point when she stands there demanding an answer. “Ana, put on your god damn helmet and get on the fucking bike!”
“What the hell is wrong with you, Elijah?”
“Ana, baby girl, if you don’t get on this bike right now, you’re going to get us both killed,” I plead, and my fear must finally resonate with her because she hurriedly straps on her helmet and jumps on behind me. The engine roars to life and I twist the throttle and gun it down the road. We’re almost to the town limits when two single headlights appear in my side mirrors.
My head is pounding, my heart racing, veins running cold with fear. Not for what they’ll do to me. Sure, it’s gonna fucking hurt like a bitch, because that’s what we do to traitors. We take them apart, slowly. We poke and we prod and we strip them of their cuts and burn off their marks and we hurt the ones they love—not because we’re sadists, but because once you patch in, the club doesn’t just become your family, it becomes your whole fucking world. And once you fuck with a good thing that good thing fucks with you.
When it comes to taking someone’s old lady it’s never personal, it’s just the quickest way to rip out a man’s heart and force him to watch it beating in his hands. Even though I was merely just a prospect when my arse was carted off to prison, I grew up in the club. My dad is sergeant-at-arms, I’ve been privy to what goes on in those darkened rooms beneath the clubhouse countless times and I’ll be dead before I let Ana see the inside of them.
I shout to Ana to hold on and thrust the throttle all the way. The bike shudders and lurches forward. I check the speedo and feel a weird swell of pride that my little baby’s still got some kick in her. I can feel the tension in Ana’s grip around my waist and for once I’m thankful for the fact that we can’t communicate freely on the bike, because I know she’s dying for answers that I’m still not ready to give her.
The headlights in my side mirrors are rapidly gaining on us and fear has my balls disappearing inside me. I should have left Ana behind, somewhere she’d be safe until Bob or Holly could come get her. Instead, she’s holding tight to my waist and my stupid decisions will more than likely get her killed.
Ana points to a turn-off up ahead and I slow the bike just enough to take the corner without gutting the underbelly. Once we’re flying down the straight I breathe a bit easier because my vision isn’t hindered like it was in the winding hills outside of Lismore. I can see exactly what lies ahead of us, and at the moment it’s nothing but cattle fields and straight bitumen. The relief is short lived, though, because I’m already pushing the bike as far as she’ll go and the two Harleys are no longer in my rear view. Instead, they slide up beside us playing some kind of fucked up game of pong where we’re the ball, caught dead in the middle, drifting back and forth across the road between them.
“Pull over!” one of them yells above the roar of our engines.
I shake my head at the Angels’ VP, Rocker—nicknamed that because he’s completely off his—a man who scared the shit outta me as a kid and still does. “Fuck you!”
“Come on, Moose,” Kickstand says—yeah, you guessed it, his road name came from the fact that he forgot to put his kickstand up while taking off in front of a bunch of über hot girls one day. And mine? Well, it’s kinda self-explanatory.
Kick and I were close, both made prospect at the same time. We’re both the same age, and both came when the club called because we’d never known any other family than the one our dad’s had indoctrinated us into. I glance at his cut and realise he’s now a fully patched in member, which is exactly what I would have been if I hadn’t taken the fall for him and been ordered to run. “We just wanna talk, man.”
“Got nothin’ to say!” I shout back and give the throttle one more sharp twist, praying like hell she’ll pick up speed and not die under us. Ana has a death grip on my waist, and I wish I could say something to comfort her but my energies are better focused on getting us the fuck out of here. Up ahead there’s a crossroads, and though I know it’s ridiculous to think we might get away from our tail all I can focus on is it. If we can somehow get ahead of them, it might not be hard to lose them along the road between here and Sugartown.
If I thought heading in the direction of the nearest police station would help, I would, just to keep Ana safe, but I’m not fool enough to believe the badges would make even the slightest bit of difference. After all, you can’t hide out at a station forever.
As we approach the crossroads I don’t slow like I should. Instead I quickly pat Ana’s arm so that she knows to hold on tighter and attempt to take the corner at holy-fuck-high-speed when, from out of nowhere, some arsehole with no headlight decides on a game of motorcycle chicken. I almost didn’t see him, but as I swing hard to the left and the bike slides along the gravel shoulder I realise that that was the point.
Ana and I are airborne in seconds, and I reach out a hand to grab her but she’s so much smaller than me so she flips in the air through two full revolutions before landing hard on her side in the gravel. Fuck. I hit the ground before her, but there’s much more to me than skin and bone, so I’m probably hurting a lot less than she is right now. My leg’s torn up pretty badly and there’s blood pouring from my head. A single tooth rattles around in my mouth and I spit it onto the ground with a wad of blood and dust. I unstrap my helmet to make sure there are no more teeth dancing around inside my mouth that might choke me.
“Ana?” I yell, as I attempt to climb to my feet but settle instead for crawling my way toward her because my leg won’t take the weight. Dazed, she rolls toward me. There’s a small cut on her forehead that’s bleeding like a bitch. She’s clutching her arm to her chest and there’s a patch on her upper arm where the gravel ate through her jacket and sliced up her bicep like a cheese grater.
“I’m okay,” she mumbles and then lets out a scream. That’s when I feel the foot i
n my back pressing me down against the asphalt. Someone cocks a gun and shoves it into the back of my neck.
“Don’t move, motherfucker.”
“Hey, Rocker, ease up, okay? It’s Ethan.”
“Ease up? Prez wants this fucker’s head on a platter and you want me, his VP, to ease up?” he punctuates each word with jab of his gun into the back of my head. “He fucking sold us out, Kick. He’s a rat!”
He spits beside me. I glance over at Ana, who’s being forced onto her stomach as I lie here, helpless to do anything but watch. I don’t know the man holding her down but I could tear him apart with my bare fucking hands for the way he’s touching her arse as he pats her down for a weapon. He’s wearing a cut with a Wolf on it. Not an Angel, then, I think, relieved, but I know with certainty he’s the guy who was standing outside the bar, watching, just a half hour ago. Which means whoever these Wolves are, they’re running either drugs or guns with the Angels.
Fuck! We are so fucking screwed.
“Get up.” Rocker hauls me to my feet, his gun now thrust up under my chin. “We been lookin’ for you a long time, boy.”
“Been runnin’ a long time.”
“You been shackin’ up with this pretty bit of pussy, here? You always could pick ’em, Son.” He whistles low as the guy holding her to the ground slides his hand over her arse and then dips it down between her jean-clad legs. Ana lets out a startled cry and tries to go completely still, but she’s shaking so hard I know she’s in shock.
“Touch her again and I’ll rip your fucking face off!” I sneer at him.
He just laughs and yanks her to her feet by her pony tail. He unbuckles her helmet and throws it to the ground and the pinches her cheeks together, titling her head this way and that to get a better look at her face. Then he looks at me with a shit-eating grin. “You mean like this?”