SOULLESS (Black Thorns, #2)

by Franca Storm

  As I navigate my way through the confusing winding corridors of the clubhouse, intending to head to Neil’s room where I’m assuming he’ll be, loud, abrasive voices catch my attention.

  I stop and take a moment to figure out where they’re coming from.

  The door right at the end of the hall.

  As I approach, I distinctly hear Neil’s voice.

  I’m too riled up to remember to knock, so I just end up turning the knob and pushing open the door.

  The second I take a step inside the room all eyes are on me.

  Oops.

  A bunch of the club members are sitting around a long table. Neil is at the far end, sitting at the head of the table with the Black Thorns crest on the wall behind him. He has a gavel in his hand. He’s facing me and his eyes go wide as soon as he sees me standing in the doorway. Grit and Smiter are sitting either side of him. Runner is further down and, surprisingly, my dad is here too…beside Runner. And then I spot the guy that my dad and I talked to for a while last night when Smiter had to leave for a bit to deal with some sort of security thing. Mullet. I don’t know the others.

  Runner smirks at me slyly and looks me up and down. “Wow. Ain’t you a sight for sore eyes, darlin’? Jesus Christ.”

  That earns him a slap across the back of the head from my dad. “How many times I gotta remind you? That’s my daughter, fucker.”

  I see Smiter eyeing Neil with disbelief.

  It looks like Neil is in shock or something, because he doesn’t move or say a thing for several moments. He just sits there staring at me with his mouth hanging open slightly.

  “Babe, what you doing in here?” he finally says.

  “I woke up and you were gone,” I snap without thinking and completely forgetting about our audience for a moment.

  I see realization in his eyes then. He gets up and crosses the room towards me. His eyes fixed on mine, he calls to the boys, “Give me five.”

  He reaches me and gently ushers me out of the room and then closes the door behind him. He leans against it and folds his arms.

  “You mad at me?”

  “Yes, I’m mad at you. You just snuck out! You treated me like some cheap whore, or something!”

  A grin spreads over his face. “Except there weren’t no fucking, remember?”

  “What?” I huff. “What’s that got to do with it?”

  “Pretty much everything, babe. I mean, the word “whore” implies some fucking was had, yeah? And that weren’t what went down between us last night,” he answers, highly amused.

  Why is he finding this funny? There’s nothing funny about it. “Why are you smiling?”

  He pushes off the door and steps into me, sliding his hands around my waist. “Cuz this is the Rox I remember.” He pulls me against him and leans down to whisper in my ear. His hot breath on my neck sends a sudden rush of excitement through me. “But, babe, I need you to go back to your room.”

  I pull away roughly, forcing him to break his grip on me suddenly.

  “Excuse me? Why?”

  “A shitload of reasons. One…” he says, holding up his hand and bending one finger slightly, “You can’t be walking ‘round the clubhouse dressed like that and showing off those sexy as fuck legs of yours. I can’t take the boys seeing you and you’re making me hard as hell when I’m supposed to be concentrating on shit right now. Two…” he says, bending a second finger, “Me and the boys ain’t just sitting ‘round shooting the shit in there. That’s church, babe. Can’t have you in there. You ain’t a club member.”

  I’m about to argue back on all points, when he closes the distance between us again and presses me into the opposite wall of the corridor. “Three. I got one of the prospects heading on down to the room to talk to you ‘bout a list of shit you need to stay here. Know you left your bag of stuff back at your place cuz of that gunfight, so you ain’t got nothing with you. He’s gonna pick up whatever you want. And four…” he whispers, licking along the side of my neck, “You don’t walk away now, I’m gonna be fucking you up against this damn wall, cuz this Rox attitude you bringing now is turning me the fuck on.”

  His words and his tongue are setting my entire body on fire—on fire for him. All the anger from our argument is just instantly channeled into this indescribable need to have him. The desire in his eyes, the urgent way he’s gripping my arms so powerfully, is fuelling mine.

  I grab his cut and jerk him closer so his body is pressed tightly to mine, smothering me with his heat. I lean in and scrape my teeth over his ear as I whisper, “Then fuck me, Neil.”

  He groans and moves his head away so he can look down at me. I see disbelief in his eyes. But it’s not enough to conceal the animalistic hunger I can also see there. He wants to do this, but something’s stopping him. He’s fighting himself.

  “What?” I ask, the frustrated edge in my voice obvious.

  His hands release my arms and come up to cover my hands that are still fisted in his cut. “Can’t, babe.”

  “Damn straight, you can’t,” my dad’s voice growls from behind Neil.

  Shit. When did he come out of that room? Seriously, he and Neil really do move like ghosts. I’m so shocked and…embarrassed that he probably heard us, that I can’t do anything. I can’t even move, let alone speak.

  Neil’s eyes flash with irritation and he calls over his shoulder, “I’ve got this, Dealer.”

  “Yeah?” my dad questions. “You sure ‘bout that?”

  “Yes,” Neil hisses.

  “Then explain it to her.”

  I’m really confused now. Explain what? I meet Neil’s gaze and he seems to be struggling with whatever it is. A pained look clouds his features. And…guilt?

  “Neil?” I ask quietly. “What?”

  He breaks my grip on his cut and steps back. I watch him draw in a breath, but before he can get a word out, my dad takes over.

  “You know who gets fucked down the halls of the clubhouse, in the bar, all over the damn place out in the goddamn open, Roxana? Club whores! That’s what the boys do and the way shit works here when the place ain’t on lockdown.”

  Neil spins around and roars, “Shut it! Told you I had it!”

  “Yeah? Well, I didn’t fucking trust that. Not after you fucked her like a whore in that alley.”

  Neil makes a move towards my dad. I react quickly, stepping between them and pressing my hand to Neil’s chest.

  He flinches at my contact, like my hand has burned a hole right through his rage.

  Indecision flickers in his eyes for a few seconds, before he blows out a breath and steps back. He scrubs his hand over the rough stubble on his chin, then he throws up his hands and says, “Can’t fucking be doing this. Got church.”

  He adjusts his pants quickly and then makes a beeline for the door. He throws it open and storms inside, slamming it behind him.

  I can’t believe he just…left me standing in the hallway like an idiot. What the hell?

  “Go back to your room,” my dad says, cutting into my thoughts.

  And with that, he walks back into the room as well.

  Well, I guess that means I’m dismissed then.

  What the hell?

  There’s not much else I can do, but head back to the room and try to wrap my head around what the hell actually just happened here.

  Chapter 13

  ~Ax~

  Things ain’t good right now. The club’s real tense and most of the members are pissed at me. Even though they ain’t ballsy enough to say it to my face, I’m good at reading people.

  It’s all cuz of that fucking backseat Prez, Dealer. Asshole sold me out in front of all of ‘em during church last week.

  We coulda dealt with this Malcolm Kent threat without me having to tell any of ‘em ‘bout my hit list and the fact that I’d planned on taking care of it on my own so I could finally walk from the club with no consequences or threats hanging over my head.

  But then Dealer went and put all that shit out i
n the open.

  I know why.

  He’s tryin’ to stop me from working the list.

  He don’t want me going down that dark path.

  Instead, now he’s brought the club in on it. They ain’t gonna let me do it alone now. They won’t let their Prez risk his life. It’s how it works. So, now I got ‘em with me by default. Fuck. The club’s supposed to be legit now. I don’t want us getting into all this down and dirty bullshit. It’s bad enough we gotta deal with this Kent shit, but now when that’s done with, we gonna go down my list, too, and fucking murder people. It was fine with just me doing it. I could keep it away from the club. But now Dealer’s fucked all over that.

  All his damn warnings have me hearing my old man’s last words to me, before I killed him, on goddamn repeat in my head:

  “Never make a deal or get into a situation that’ll take you down a dark road, cuz you’ll never find your way back. Never works out that way. It’ll seep into every fucking pore of you. Blacken your goddamn soul. And that ain’t you, son. You’re better than that. Keep it that way. Don’t end up like me.”

  But it’s all bullshit. I ain’t gonna end up like Skinner. I ain’t nothing like him. I’m doing this shit for the right reasons, unlike the way he always operated. He was a sadist. He liked to hurt people. I ain’t that same guy. I ain’t like him or Kent.

  So, I dunno what Dealer’s so worried ‘bout. Besides, it ain’t like I ain’t never killed before. Sure, it’d been in self-defense—except me killing the Mavs and my old man—while the hit list is completely calculated and with twenty names on it, basically a massacre. But I can handle it. Hell, I can handle anything if it means I can finally take back the life I want.

  A life with Rox.

  Shit, Rox.

  There’s something Dealer was right ‘bout.

  I did fuck her like a whore, taking her in that alley like that. Jesus fuck. I can’t believe I let that happen. She’s the farthest thing from a whore. But, yeah, my actions said otherwise. I shouldn’t have done it. It was just that the second I’d laid eyes on her—after all our unwanted time apart—my control had been hanging by a real thin thread. And then feeling that barrier from her. The change in her. I couldn’t make the connection I’d craved. But I’d been able to make it physically. I always could with Rox. Even if we were fighting, or if some other bad shit was going down, that’s a way we could always connect. As soon as I touched her, she was mine again in every way. And feeling that from her is addictive. So damn addictive.

  I was so close to taking her in the hallway right in the middle of church, too. Especially knowing Kent’s had her, my need to take her and claim her again as mine is at an all-time high. I’d nearly let it take me over.

  And I hate myself for almost taking her like a fucking club whore. She’s better than that. She’s mine. She needs my respect, not…that.

  And that’s why I walked away from her.

  She probably hates me for leaving her standing there in that hallway like that. But I had to. If I’d stayed a second longer, I woulda made the wrong decision where she’s concerned. I didn’t have control. So, I had to take a fucking step back.

  I’m Prez now. The boys need me. Yet, there I was, interrupting church to talk to her and…fuck her? Unacceptable. I gotta get a grip and I can’t do that with her ‘round right now. It’s why I’ve been keeping my distance for the last week. Dealer’s been helping running interference, keeping her away from me. It ain’t an easy feat seeing as though she’s staying here in my club. But ‘til I can get my head on straight when it comes to her, I gotta do what I can to stay away.

  At least she ain’t giving any of us grief ‘bout us keeping her outta all this shit with Kent. The old Rox woulda been all over it, insisting on being brought in on it. But she ain’t that woman no more. Thing is, I know she’s still in there. I saw a flash of the old her that day in the corridor when we nearly fucked. She got mad and she challenged me like she always used to.

  I had one of the prospects bring her a laptop and Dealer tells me she’s been working on some of her designs for her new business on it and just keeping a low profile. Me and Dealer ain’t told her ‘bout what happened to Ralph either. We both been worried it might set her off and the last thing I need is her demanding to leave the clubhouse to go see him. Kent will be all over that—all over her—the second she steps outside back into the world beyond my protection. There ain’t no way that’s happening.

  Although I don’t like this new her, it’s working in all our favors right now. We can concentrate on this Kent crap. He’s real difficult to find. We’ve had guys searching for him for the last week and none of ‘em have turned up a damn thing.

  I just got another lead, so I’m heading up to Runner’s room to put him on it. Would do it myself but, cuz of my damn shoulder injury, I can’t ride the distance yet. A couple more weeks and it should be fine. Besides, Runner’s good at keeping a low profile. Nobody will see him coming. We need the element of surprise when we do manage to get a lock on Kent’s location. The guy’s got more muscle and more resources than us, so it’s pretty much our only advantage.

  I reach Runner’s room and knock. It’s always a good idea to knock when it comes to him. You never know what the hell you could be walking into otherwise.

  “Yeah?” he calls out.

  I take that as an invitation that he’s decent and open the door.

  Fuck! He’s the farthest thing from decent.

  “Jesus Christ!” I say, holding my hand in front of my face to block the image of him sitting on his bed on top of the sheets, jerking himself off. “Why’d you say “yeah” when I knocked?”

  “Relax. It’s just a dick. With you calling lockdown, I ain’t got no other option but taking matters into my own hands.”

  “Put it the fuck away!”

  “Wow, okay. Calm down, boss man.” I hear him rustling ‘round and then he tells me, “All good. You can take your hand away now.”

  I move my hand away slowly. Thank Christ, he’s actually decent again, tucked back inside his jeans.

  “So, what’s up?” he asks, standing up from his bed like nothing’s happened.

  Fine. Good. I’m all for playing it that way, too.

  I hand him the piece of paper in my hand with the address we got on Kent’s possible location. He takes it and reads it.

  “Need you to check this out.”

  He pockets it and nods. “Sure.”

  He moves to walk past me, but I press my hand to his chest, holding him back. “After dark.”

  “Ax, you know how discreet I am. Don’t need the dark for that.”

  “Not taking that chance, brother.”

  He eyes me in surprise. “You worried? ‘Bout me?”

  “Kent’s a dangerous motherfucker.”

  I see him scrutinizing me and I know why. Since our blow up over Rox, things ain’t been the same between us.

  “Guess me coming down there to save your ass has sorted shit out between us, yeah?”

  “We’re good,” I tell him.

  He sighs with relief. “Thank fuck, Ax. Hated not being good with you.”

  “I know.” I ain’t gonna get all mushy ‘bout it, but I did miss our friendship. How close we used to be. But it weren’t easy just to get back to that after the shit he pulled and the way he didn’t have my back before. Anything to do with Rox, he just went against me on. That weren’t the actions of a brother, or a best friend. But what he did recently put him back in my good graces. He proved himself to me.

  Fuck. Ever since I met Rox, everything’s been so fucking complicated. Alliances changing, my whole world spinning on its fucking axis. The rift with Runner was just the tip of the iceberg. And now she’s back in my life, shit ain’t ‘bout to get no easier.

  But she’s something else.

  Worth it.

  Always was. Always will be.

  And, once I’m done with Kent, I can go back to that damn list and take all those assholes
out. We can be together. I can leave the club without taking a fucking bullet the moment I do from one of my enemies. There won’t be no more complications. I just gotta ride all this bullshit out ‘til then.

  “All right. Let me know when you head out and keep me posted,” I tell him as I turn to leave.

  “Ax, you know why the boys are upset, right?”

  I grunt, my hand on the doorknob.

  “Ain’t why you think,” he pushes.

  That gets my attention. Didn’t wanna talk ‘bout it, but what’s he tryin’ to say here? Ain’t why I think? Why else is it then?

  I turn ‘round and fold my arms. “What?”

  “Boys ain’t upset, cuz you kept shit from ‘em. That’s just part of being Prez sometimes. We all get that. Nah, what they’re upset ‘bout is losing you as Prez once you complete that hit list of yours.”

  “Grit will take it on. You’re all fine with him.”

  He shakes his head. “You really don’t see it, do you?”

  “See what?” I snap, getting pissed. I hate cryptic crap. Why can’t he just spit it out?

  “Trig nearly wrecked the club, Ax. Then, with you becoming Prez, it was back to being what it was before. A family. It’s cuz of who you are—what you bring to the role. Club ain’t been this way for a while and now it’s finally good again, the boys don’t wanna lose that. They don’t wanna lose you. Not just anyone can bring what you have as Prez. I mean, I’d respect Grit becoming Prez if I had to, but he ain’t you. Even he knows that.”

  What? Wow. “Runner, listen—”

  “Nah, man. Just answer me something, yeah? You ever think ‘bout bringing your girl into the club?”

  I scoff at the ridiculousness of it. “Come on.”

  “She’s been here for over a week now and shit’s been fine. More than fine. She ain’t been such a bitch like she was last time. Boys have accepted her.”

  “She ain’t Old Lady material. You told me that.”

  “Does she need to be? Live at your house away from the club. You don’t need to sleep here, just be here in the day and shit. You got Grit for the rest. Just like running a business, right? Just keep her away when we throw pussy parties so she ain’t seeing any of that going down.”