Wet Work: A Dark Bad Boy Romance

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Wet Work: A Dark Bad Boy Romance Page 38

by Carmen Faye


  They both watched Aubrey with Steve through the crowd of people milling about after the race. It seemed like the reporters were particularly interested in the fact that Darcy’s old coach was now training Aubrey, her once best friend, now seemingly her enemy.

  “How the fuck do you guys come up with this crap?” Speed had said to a sports journalist from a Las Vegas newspaper. “Why don’t you try reporting the actual race? Darcy was amazing!”

  But they just kept trying to dig up juicy gossip, and Darcy wanted as much press as she could get. That meant putting up with the insensitive questions about their personal life. At least they didn’t have anything bad to say about Darcy and Speed’s relationship, or The Wild Cards. The sponsorship deal was really doing wonders for their reputation.

  There was one question that every reporter asked Darcy, which she loved: they all wanted to know how she felt about her plans for the Tour de France qualifying race.

  “Like you said,” she replied to one of them, “one more race, and I finally get my shot at the big one.”

  “How do you like your chances, especially now that you’re in such strong competition with Aubrey?”

  “I’m going to make it my race.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Speed was happy as far as business went during the race. Yeah, he was pissed off about what was going on with Darcy's old friend and coach. However, there was no signs of trouble from anyone, not the loan sharks, not any rival MC. Maybe they were just talking shit to try to scare everyone. They might have been waiting to make their move and decided against it. Who knew? These were some unstable people, and that kind of person made stupid decisions, and tended to change their mind a lot.

  He'd gotten sick of the ridiculous questions they were asking Darcy. She was used to it, seemed to enjoy the attention. Who could blame her? She deserved to be fussed over and admired by as many people as possible. It was when they started to ask personal questions about shit that had nothing to do with racing that Speed started to get mad at them. He wanted to tell them to mind their own business and to watch their fucking manners. That kind of thing was not going to look good. It would ruin the progress Darcy was helping his club make, as well, if the public saw their president getting into a fight with a smart mouthed journalist.

  A lot of them were more interested in what was going on with Aubrey, Darcy, and Steve. The more someone in the spotlight was going through a hard time, the happier these people seemed to be. It was disgusting; and society called Speed a low life. At least he didn't make his living by rejoicing in the suffering of others. He committed crimes, and he made a lot of money while doing so, but he didn't go around acting like he was saving the world.

  He decided to move away and let Darcy finish the interviews without his presence. He didn't mind being as far away from the spotlight as possible. Speed had never gotten into the whole biker thing so people would know his name. He'd changed that name for a reason: he wanted to be anonymous and live by his actions, not by other people's ideas about who he was. That was some philosophical shit that his boys would never want to talk about, but that was their loss.

  There was time to stand there and think about what had happened, as well, while Darcy was doing her media frenzy and answering all the journalist's questions about the race.

  Darcy finally started to walk over to where he was standing. He'd found a nice spot that was on a raised bit of ground, where he could see the entire crowd. It was a good place to make sure no one was going to try anything, even though the race was over. She walked up to him and said, "Is this your lookout spot?"

  "Sure is." He put his arm around her and drew her tight.

  "You're like a noble eagle, watching out for his little chicks." Darcy laughed but without much energy. It had been a hard day.

  "I guess that makes you my chick, doesn't it?"

  "What do you mean? You wanna be my man?"

  "I think we're already passed that stage. Should we make this official? What do you say, will you be my girlfriend, Darcy?"

  "Yes! Now I'm going to have to tell my other fellas that I've got a steady man, and I can't see them anymore."

  "You're as funny as you are skilled at riding. Are you finished with your interviews?" He’d been thinking about doing something special for Darcy if she won the race.

  After they’d finally gotten away from those vulture pricks and their questions, they moved through the thinning crowd and saddled up on Speed’s bike. His boys were taking care of Darcy’s equipment now, with a van for her bike and everything else she needed for races.

  “Sweetheart, I want to buy you a tattoo.”

  “What? One with my name on it or something? You sure about that?”

  “Hell no, you never get a woman’s name or face tattooed on you. That’s just common sense. No, I think you should get your first tat, if you want to I mean.” He was having trouble getting the words out like he’d been planning. “Shit, this was meant to be special. If you don’t want to—“

  “I think that’s a lovely idea, Speed. I’m just not into the idea of being stabbed thousands of times by a sharp needle.”

  “I won’t pretend it doesn’t hurt. It’s really not that bad. The worst part’s in people’s heads, and I know you can work through that, no problems. I know that you'll be able to handle it, no problem. And you might get lucky after all; it doesn't hurt much for some people."

  “Well, if I did get a tattoo, it would have to be something to do with cycling.”

  “No doubt.”

  “And I’ve always loved pink elephants, ever since I first saw them in that old cartoon movie,” she said with a girlish grin. Speed pretended he’d never seen it, though he used to love that movie as a boy.

  “That sounds like a good idea, then,” was all he said. “Have you given this any thought before? Sounds like you had this planned out already.”

  “Everyone has their first tattoo planned out. A lot of people just don’t end up following through with it. You think I’d end up dating a biker if I hated them? Yeah right…”

  “You’re a regular bad ass now, aren’t you? Well, you haven’t even felt the first line yet. Give it time.” He did a sinister laugh, in good fun.

  “Stop it,” she said. “If this hurts too much for me to handle, I’ll bite your dick off!”

  “You can’t bite through pure steel, sweetheart.”

  Speed drove her back into Las Vegas, where they had a fancy hotel room booked. Along the strip was a place that was known far and wide for having some of the best tattoos in the country, even in the world. It was called “Las Tats.”

  “Not the most inventive name for a tattoo joint,” Darcy said as they walked up the strip, crowded with all sorts of people, toward the parlor.

  “Trust me, these people do quality work. My boy Gill works here on the side, when he’s in town. These people did some of my work for me.”

  “Hey, Speed, what’s up, man?” said a woman with more metal in her face than she had teeth. She had been reading a magazine about bikes and titties when they walked in. “You looking for some more work?”

  “Yeah, but it’s for my girl here. Darcy, meet Liz.”

  “Nice, she’s sexy,” said Liz. “Did you want me to work on her for you?”

  “Fuck that, you’ll end up working on more than just her tattoo, you dyke. Besides, she wants something a bit too cute for your style. Is Bill here?”

  Bill was there. He looked like more of a biker than any of the bikers Speed knew, but the guy had the soul of an artist. Besides that, he was great at doing sickeningly cute tattoos that teenie boppers always came in asking for. And Bill loved when they asked for work done in private areas.

  “A pink elephant riding a motorbike?” asked Bill.

  “No, a bicycle. Like this one,” Darcy said. She had a photo of her own cycle on her phone. “This is the one that I’m going to use to win the Tour de France, so I want to remember it forever. The elephant, well, I just like them.” />
  “Shit, takes guts to get a tattoo to remember a race you haven’t even won yet. I respect that. So, where do you want it?”

  “On the back of my left hand. I want to look at it while I’m riding and remember that I’m going to win.”

  Darcy didn’t say that much while she was being tattooed. It wasn’t unusual for someone to feel nothing from their first tattoo. It was lucky, though. But Speed couldn’t help feel that Darcy had been thinking things through too much since the race had ended. That was one of the reasons he wanted to take her to get a tattoo then, to take her mind of things. It didn’t seem to have worked quite like he was hoping. Still, the tat was looking great.

  They drove out to the edge of the city, where they could see the lights of the neon monster as the sun was going down. But they could also see the ever expanding desert as the blues and yellows of the day blended gradually into the black and dark blue of the night.

  "This is so pretty," Darcy said.

  "It's a nice spot, isn't it?" Speed replied. He looked over at his woman, but realized that she wasn't looking at the scenery.

  She was checking out her tattoo. She'd peeled back the bandaging to see it.

  "Oh, you mean your tat. You really like it?"

  "It's such a sweet thing, and I know how much it must mean to you. I, you don't know how long I've wanted to make this a real thing."

  "It's been real all along since the first second I saw you, sweetheart. We just weren't smart enough to say it out loud. But I don't care. I don't regret waiting until it was a sure thing."

  "Nothing's sure…even with people who you thought were like family." Darcy drooped her head and replaced the sticky bandaging back over her pink elephant cyclist.

  "I wish I could correct you there. But you're my girlfriend now, and that means I'm going to stand by you until the end. I'm not the kind of man to take a commitment lightly. As far as I'm concerned, this is a commitment. That tattoo represents something special to you, in your riding, but it also means something else to me. It's permanent, and that's how I want us to be, whatever happens."

  Darcy was starting to cry, with a big smile on her face, too. "You're such a hopeless romantic, Speed. I bet you never even knew it before now. I love you…" She waited for him to say it back to her. He knew she was worried that he wasn't going to, despite what he’d just told her.

  He drew in a big breath and said back to her, "I love you, too, Darcy." They kissed and stayed under the stars for hours, enjoying being together.

  Chapter Twenty One

  Months passed and things had not slowed down between Speed and Darcy. They'd had a lot of sex and pushed harder than ever for Darcy to be at the peak of her performance. With everything going on, she'd discovered a side of herself that had never existed before. Or, as Speed like to suggest, maybe it had been there all along but she'd just been ignoring it.

  "You've got to feed that wild child inside of you or it will wither away and die," he told her on one occasion.

  Darcy thought he was just trying to sound cool and edgy, despite knowing him better than that. Later, she started to realize that it was a good way to live and not just a pointless saying. When people stop allowing that fun and daring person they used to be come out and play, that's the day they start to grow old. The next step is to lose the love of life and wonder just what the point of it all is. There might not be a point to life, but you can never lose your inner child.

  Wow, thought Darcy. She could still barely believe that wonderful night, the singular most fantastic moment, when she and Speed had declared their love for each other. It seemed silly to think about it later. They'd been seeing each other for how long already? A matter of months, and together all the time. Before that moment, they didn't even make it official that they were dating. From an outside perspective, maybe they'd been together the whole time. It seemed safer for each of them to just keep the actual words from being spoken, as though they were making it a secret that they had already launched headlong into a deep and dangerous romance.

  She'd catch herself staring off into space sometimes, wondering how long she'd been caught up with all the good vibes that she was experiencing these days. Even with the shit that'd gone down with Aubrey, things were still looking up.

  The words didn't change anything really. I love you was a special thing to hear from someone. It was even more special to honestly say it to another person who felt the same way. But that was where Darcy was in her relationship with Speed, the hot MC president who seemed to have a heart of gold. Even if it were buried beneath a hard mountain of muscle, covered with every type of intimidating tattoo under the sun, he was her guy, and she was his gal.

  "I love you," Speed said to her as they were concluding a phone call.

  "I love you more," Darcy replied. She knew he didn't like all that "sickening" mushy stuff that too many couples did when they were still in the passionate throes of a new relationship. It made her smile to think of the hulking, tough-as-nails biker getting involved in such things. And it made her feel all the more special to know she was the target of such affections.

  "It's not a competition, is it? We know how we feel." He had a very diplomatic way of getting out of full-frontal displays of that kind of affection. Darcy didn't care, though, because he did and said so many other things that truly proved how he felt. Any joker could tell another person anything under the sun, and it would sound so sweet. You could buy a greeting card that had all that stuff inside. It was through actions that a person really expressed how they felt about their partner. Speed was dedicated to making Darcy's life much better, and supporting her in more ways than she could have ever imagined. That's how she knew that the big biker was all mushy for her.

  "I know you lovey-wove-wove me," she said in a baby voice.

  "Yes, of course I do. You really get a kick out of this, don't you?"

  "You bet your ass I do," replied Darcy.

  "I'd bet my ass on a lot of things. Your ass? Not a chance I'd risk losing that for all the money in the world."

  "See, you can be very sweet without even trying." Darcy was beaming with joy, although there was no one with her to see it.

  "Exactly. Why ruin it with effort? So, I'll see you in an hour for training? And then maybe after that, we can try out a little —"

  "Spanking?" she blurted out. Darcy had been asking for Speed to do it lately, but he wasn't the type to want to strike a woman even if it was just some harmless fun.

  "I've been thinking about what you said. It is sexist if I'll punch a dude right in the face, but I won't give my girlfriend a little friendly tap on the butt."

  "Well let's not make it too friendly this time, okay? I wanna see what you've got to give me, big biker man. I'll swing by and collect you before heading to the mountains?"

  "You got it."

  They hung up. She had the biggest smile on her face, and hadn't even realized she'd gotten wet just talking to Speed about the fun they were going to have later. Each of them had been working hard lately, so they deserved all the fun they could get as far as she was concerned. She couldn’t remember the last time she wasn’t either riding her bicycle, or riding her boyfriend – not counting the many, many other, non "riding" positions they did, of course.

  She also managed to find enough time to keep working on improving the image of The Wild Cards. That had been a pleasant surprise, to realize she was a great PR person. Yeah, Speed's boys could act the part when they needed to. There was no way they could actually look the part, though, not with all those tattoos and the like. But they could be as sweet as pie when it was required of them, especially when their commanding leader was the one giving the orders to do so.

  The public was actually buying it, and Darcy only felt slightly guilty about the roundabout lying she was doing. These men were not respectable as far as the law and the general public were concerned. But she had wanted that sponsorship so bad, she'd been willing to make a concession about her morals. Now, however, she t
hought that the club might be able to turn a new leaf. Darcy was kind of doing a good thing, really, by making it possible for the bikers to rehabilitate themselves.

  Sometimes she thought about that and felt like it was all a load of bullshit, stuff she told herself to ease her conscience. Speed made everything feel better anyway; he was one hell of a good man to have.

  All the blogging and dealing with the many questions and comments of the public had become infectious. Maybe managing public relations was in her blood all along. Darcy imagined that she might be able to make a career of it one day, if her cycling fell through in the end. But that was not going to happen, not while she still had a pulse. Still, if she had known that she was able to make so many more fans just by sharing more of herself online, Darcy might have been able to win over a sponsor many years ago. But then she wouldn't be lucky enough to have Speed.

 

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