by S. E. Jakes
“Obviously, I did.”
I threw up my arms. “Here we go again.”
“Life’s all about compromise, Rush. I’ve never said different.” Casey looked determined.
“What’s really going on?”
Casey leaned forward. “The Albanian guys who gave you trouble? They’ve got my Sergeant-at-Arms’s old lady.”
“And I’m the best person you’ve got for an extraction because they like me so fucking much?”
“You’re the most unexpected.”
I wouldn’t deny that. “What aren’t you telling me?”
“She’s Greta’s kid. Name’s Donna.”
My gut tightened. “Shit.”
“Yeah.”
I sat back down. “Give me the details.”
“If you do this . . .”
I held up my hand. “I’m not doing this shit for favors or for threats. I’m doing this for Greta, and because I hate that there’s an innocent woman dragged into this crap. Got it?”
“Got it.”
“Then I don’t want to hear anything but the details.”
“You really push it, Rush, know that?”
“I’ve been told.”
“I’d have fun with you over my knee.”
“Casey . . .”
“Guy can dream, right?”
I scowled. “I don’t think I want to be in your dreams.”
He smiled wickedly. “Too late.”
“Jesus. Details, Casey. Focus.” I stared at him. “Why are you being nice to me?”
“Because I want to fuck you.”
At least he was honest. “Ryker’d kill you.”
“Ryker used to have no problem sharing.”
And because I couldn’t help myself, I asked, “When’s the last time you guys shared?”
Casey didn’t bother to hide his grin. “It was supposed to be you.”
I tried to wrap my head around that and failed. “Change of subject. I thought we took care of Edmund.”
“We did,” he said. “But Edmund’s associates had a little problem with letting go.”
“All because of that shi . . . fantastic car of yours?”
“Yeah, Noah told me all about what’s wrong with it.” He rolled his eyes and stood. “And it’s not about the car, Rush. It’s about shit you should know better than to ask about.”
I held up my hands. “Point taken.”
“I can’t ask Noah. They’re familiar with him. And as much as I wouldn’t mind handing him over, my daughter’ll kill me.”
I raised my brows but wisely kept my mouth shut on that subject. And I guessed that Jethro was still keeping track of Noah, so I wondered if he knew all about this new development. “So what do you need?”
He slapped down a list on the table in front of me. “These cars. By midnight tomorrow.”
“Fine. But what’s to stop them from doing this again?”
“Rush, you’re going to steal me these cars. In exchange, no one’s going to know who you are. Bring the cars to the address at the bottom. Memorize this shit. Clear?”
“Yeah, crystal.”
ou’re not doing this alone.”
I froze at the sound of Ryker’s voice behind me. In my apartment. Where I’d come in ten minutes ago, saw no other cars or people out front, and I’d locked the goddamned doors and windows.
I turned and demanded, “How the fuck do you do that?” Because if I didn’t, I’d either punch him or fuck him, and at this point, I actually wanted to do both. At the same time.
He looked so damned good. Black T-shirt. His vest with the cut. His eyes deep and dark and focused only on me. “Why’d you agree to do something for Casey?”
“Because I couldn’t say no where Greta’s concerned,” I shot back and his expression softened with shock and then, “Ah, fuck, Sean.”
“Don’t. I can’t do this if I’m all fucked up over you. Again.”
It was his turn to demand, “What, you were over me?”
Jesus, talk about some serious arrogance. And I’d been doing a damned good job of pretending I was. Seeing him now, my body informed me that I was a fucking liar. So, of course, I ignored the question. “How long have you known where I was?”
When he didn’t answer, I assumed both he and Casey’d been tracking me. The fact that they’d kept their distance . . . it pissed me off. What, would they have just watched me forever?
Fucking Linc. I should’ve told Gypsy to let him stay in jail, where he couldn’t tell people shit, like where I was supposed to be secretly living.
“I’m doing the job,” I said firmly. Crossed my arms and stared him down.
He mirrored my stance and my tone. “With me. Or else it doesn’t happen.”
We could be at this all night. “Alone. I work alone. You can talk to Casey.”
“I don’t have to fucking talk to anyone,” he growled, and yeah, I was hard. His possessiveness turned me the fuck on. Sue me. “I will put you on my bike, drive you back to Havoc, and chain you to my bed before you do this alone.”
“Right. Because I’m so wanted back at Havoc. Tell me, Ryker, in the very beginning, did you follow me because you wanted to make me part of Havoc? Was it a job interview?”
“Just the opposite,” Ryker told me.
I frowned. “I was competition?”
“Complication.”
I swallowed. Hard. “You were going to . . .”
“Get you out of the game.”
“How?” I demanded. “Say it, Ryker. How did fucking me and killing me get mixed up?”
“Being real dramatic, Sean.”
“Not kill then. Threaten. Push out.”
“Yes.”
“And if this thing between us doesn’t work out?”
That got him more angry than my accusation that he was going to kill me. He was backing me into the nearest chair, pinning me there, his big body surrounding me.
“You,” he said, his drawl like syrup, making me hard. Er. “Are. Mine. So where are you planning on going?”
“This mine stuff is . . .” Hot. So fucking hot it made me ache. But I couldn’t admit it when I’d come so far—nearly a fucking month. But his hand was palming my cock, and it was really hard to figure out why I shouldn’t admit it.
“This mine stuff is . . .?” His hand went down my pants now. His finger brushed my slit, pushed in, and I bit back a whimper.
“It’s fucking hot and you know it,” I managed, then, “Why, Ryker?”
“Why what, Sean?”
That echoing thing he did was mesmerizing. “Why do you want me as yours?” I managed. “Because I’m easy?”
He smiled then, a short laugh escaping. He cupped my balls. “You think you’re easy?”
“I, uh . . .”
“You, Sean Rush, are the farthest fucking thing from easy. You’re the most frustrating, intense man I’ve ever met.”
My body—fucking goddamned traitor—completely ached for him. There was no chance I’d kick him out of my bed. “But if I’m yours, then . . .”
Then I am easy. Which meant, no challenge. No danger. No thrill.
He stared at me, like he was reading my fucking mind. Or hell, maybe I said it all out loud, because I could never tell what I was doing around him. “You’ll never be easy, Sean. No matter how hard you try. And that’s why I’m proud you’re mine. Don’t you get it, babe? This isn’t a game to me. Way beyond that.”
His face was inches from mine. We were both vibrating with anger and want and everything else in between. I don’t know which of us leaned forward first, but it didn’t matter. We were kissing, tongues dueling, bodies grinding, a dry humping slow dance that had me holding onto him like I’d never let go.
“Sean,” he murmured as he brought me back to life. Because I’d been a goddamned zombie for the last month.
“What did you do to me?”
“Whatever I wanted to.” He paused, then added. “For the record, it’s the exact same thing you d
id to me.”
At his words, my body was liquid—he could do anything he wanted to me, and I’d let him.
I was letting him. But I also couldn’t help adding, “You weren’t supposed to follow me here.”
“Remember what we discussed, about how you don’t get to tell me what to do?”
“You’ll have to remind me.”
Ryker’s grin spread, the humor finally reaching his eyes. “Keep pushing. I’ll put you over my knee and your ass will burn the entire time we’re stealing those cars.”
“We?”
Ryker nodded slowly, the intent clear in his eyes.
“You’re not involved. I chose to help Casey. Nothing to do with the MC wars.”
He continued to stare at me, pinning me to the spot with his gaze, shooting daggers at me from his eyes. But I wasn’t backing down. He also knew that going over his knee was no hardship for me, no matter how hard I outwardly fought it.
And I would fight.
He pushed all my limits. Had from day one but this . . . this was new. Exciting. And scary as hell. And I was over his lap, my jeans pulled down, his hand on my bare ass. Just like he’d promised. There wasn’t anger in those slaps. No, there was control. There was an apology. And a reassurance that he was always going to find me and bring me back.
When I thought about that, I came with a howl, stiffening in his lap. His hand caressed my sore cheeks for several long minutes, until I could breathe without hiccupping. I wiped my face with the back of my hand.
And then Ryker pulled me up and off his lap. I sank to the floor by his knees and he carded his hand through my hair. “Stop fighting, Sean. You don’t have to. Not with me.”
Bullshit. He didn’t know that—or me—or anything about what I really wanted. And I told myself that while I let him lead me between his legs, press my head down to kiss his cock. I told myself that while I swallowed his cock, his grip now firm in my hair.
God, I loved that. I loved taking his control, the hard-earned victory of watching him, for just those few moments, lose it. Lose himself, because of me.
Triumphantly, I swallowed what he gave me as I watched him. His big body shuddered, muscles tense as his hips jerked erratically.
I was hard again. Rock hard. I rose as soon as his grip on my hair fell away. I led him to the bedroom, pushed him back on the bed, and climbed between his legs as I did so. My finger pressed his hole, and he stared at me and said, “Go ahead, Sean.”
Go ahead, Sean, like he was going to be in control while I fucked him.
He was in control while I fucked him. If I wasn’t the one inside of him, if I was watching a movie of this play out, I would’ve said that he was faking it . . . or that I was.
But from the second I entered him, I couldn’t stop watching him, getting more and more turned on by his movements, the way he hissed. The way he enjoyed it.
And when I was buried in him, he flexed his ass, and I almost came. Yelled and holy fuck, he reached down between our bodies to put pressure on the base of my cock, stopping me from coming.
“Son of a . . .”
“Yeah, Sean. Fuck me. Take it all out on me, babe. All that anger and pain and frustration—pound me with it.”
“You are not the boss of me,” I growled back, began to pump into him—because apparently he was the boss of me, and I followed orders well, even though I told myself it was what I wanted too.
He closed his eyes while I set a rhythm, watching smugly, thinking, Gotcha.
As he thrust his hips up, riding me from the bottom, I pushed at his hips to stop him, but it was like his body had a motor attached.
I barely hanging on. His hands went to my hips, positioning them, showing me not only how he wanted to be fucked, but also how under his spell I was.
“Ryker!” I shouted, and he stopped me from coming again. A jumble of arms and legs later, I was on my knees, and he was on his in front of me, pushing back against my cock. I raked my nails down his back, and he practically howled.
“More, Sean. Come on.”
I slammed into him as he took me, than I came in a blinding rush, murmuring, “I love you,” in his ear.
“Pull out and clean me up,” he ordered, and fuck it all, I did. He watched me lazily lick the cum spattered on his belly and chest. And he dragged me up and kissed me for a damned long time, holding me against him.
Finally, he broke the kiss, pulled back. “Sean, Jesus Christ, I fucking love you . . .”
I swallowed hard, realized I didn’t ever want to go anywhere without him ever again.
yker at least let me come up with the plan. Somehow, I had not only one Havoc MC guy, but four who were suddenly part of my car boosting team. Tug and Sweet, Chino and Lex. Gavin was there for backup, but he wasn’t coming with us.
“He’ll pinch hit, if necessary,” Lex said and Chino nodded his agreement.
I supposed at least those two were involved in Havoc’s car stealing ring, based on how easily they dealt with the list of cars, helping me find them and break them down.
Six cars. One night. The biggest obstacle was, of course, the rarest car that the Albanians had demanded, a 1962 Ferrari 250 LM. There were only thirty-two in the world, and they sold at auction for nearly seven million dollars. Nothing like stealing something that was being transported from two hours west of my new place to an auction house in New York for sale, since that’s the one Casey was told they wanted.
We scoured the area to find one that wasn’t being transported into the state, but no such luck.
“They said they did all the work finding it,” Casey told me. “All you have to do is get it.”
“Right, piece of cake,” I muttered, echoing Edmund’s early words. Which was not a good sign. I shoved that shit right out of my head and, when the others were busy with their boosts, Ryker and I worked together. Like he’d wanted.
In the end, I couldn’t have done it without him.
It involved stealing the car off the back of the truck, which meant disabling the truck and driving it straight to the warehouse. After fucking with the GPS chip, which Ryker seemed to think wasn’t an issue.
So we rode along the truck on the deserted stretch of highway. Ryker assured me it wouldn’t be bodyguarded, because that would draw too much attention.
“It’s the way we do it,” was all he said, so obviously, he’d done this before.
So now I’d never be sure if I was seeing an actual delivery truck or a truck housing a stolen vehicle. “How can you be sure about this?”
“I called in a favor.”
The favor was a big fucking deal, because the guy driving the truck basically got out and handed it over to us, no questions asked. He got an envelope from Ryker, which I assumed was full of cash and he took the junker car we’d been driving, and we got into the truck.
I drove. He let me. It was an hour to the warehouse, a tense, quiet hour as I kept thinking about how badly this could’ve gone without him. How this was almost boring.
And how, sometimes, boring was actually the better choice when it meant keeping Ryker safe. I guess he felt the same way about me.
Finally, we pulled into the back of an old warehouse, where Ryker directed me.
“We were a good team.”
“Were?” Ryker rumbled.
“This doesn’t change anything, Ryk.”
“Nothing had to change, as far as I was concerned.”
“I couldn’t save Billy. I could barely keep Noah in line, and I put Havoc in danger without even trying. And the club’s all about keeping each other safe. So yeah, shit has to change.” I sighed. “I don’t want to talk about this. Not now. Let’s just get Donna back, okay?”
“Yeah, let’s do that.”
I was under no illusions that this would make up for everything, for Billy, or that this would bring me into Havoc. I couldn’t live with that responsibility.
So of course, we weren’t going to just hand everything over to the Albanians. They had five of t
he six cars, but we’d held ours back until we saw Donna. In the meantime, Casey had found out where Donna was being housed.
Before we turned the car over, we were taking Donna. From there, we’d give the kidnappers what they’d wanted, although Casey and Ryker planned to exact a little revenge of their own. Because they wouldn’t go back on their word for the trade, but that didn’t mean they were going to sit back and take what the Albanians had done to them.
Ryker and I got to the warehouse where Donna was being held. It wasn’t the same place where we’d been directed to drop the cars. Ryker handed me a gun before he went in.
“We’ll clear the place,” he said as Casey, Chino, and Gavin looked on. “You go past when you can and grab Donna.”
I nodded, and weapon in hand, I walked in behind them.
They definitely surprised the guys who were there, probably waiting for word from their bosses. I don’t know if they’d have let Donna go—but a big part of me figured they wouldn’t have.
The guards turned and then things happened fast. There were more men here than I thought there’d be. Didn’t seem to bother Ryker or the others, though, and I stayed, half-outside.
But there was yelling, and I came in farther to make sure they were all right. At the same time, shots rang out. I froze for a second, the Florida heat baking the warehouse morphing into the heat of the desert. And I swear I saw Billy . . . he was trying to get to me, and he was pointing and bleeding. I turned and raised my gun at the man coming toward us, and as I stepped in front of Billy, I fired.
He dropped.
I heard yelling. More shots. I blinked again, and I was firmly back in the warehouse, and there was a man down in front of me. Another in the corner.
“Sean.”
Ryker’s voice. His hand was light on my shoulder, like he knew it might make me freak or bolt.
In truth, I had to fight that urge. But in the end, I did neither. For me, that was a big goddamned step. “Ryker, did I . . .”
And then I turned and noticed the blood dripping from Ryker’s arm. “Ryker, did I do that?”
“You saved me.” His voice was hushed with emotion and pain as he pointed to the man crumpled ten feet from us. “He shot me. And he wasn’t finished.”