by Addison Jane
And I fucking loved every second.
My heart skipped a beat, sinking for a minute even as the pleasure inside my body seemed to grow stronger. His hand slipped from my hair, wrapping itself around my breast, pinching my nipple between the spaces in his fingers.
I groaned loudly. “Please fuck me.”
“Not until you come for me.”
He pushed two fingers up inside me, and I threw my head back against his shoulder, my legs threatening to give way as they began to shake. He thrust them in and out quickly, not deep, but with his palm pressed hard against my clit, the jerky movements lit the fuse, and my entire body began to shudder.
“Oh my god,” I groaned, Shotgun continuing relentlessly, his arm wrapping around my waist, holding me captive as I squirmed and writhed against him. My orgasm rolled over and over, like wave after wave. “Shotgun!” I pleaded, feeling like I couldn’t breathe, but not wanting it to stop at the same time.
He finally pulled his hand back, both arms curling around me, keeping me from collapsing on shaking legs while the shock waves continued to twitch through my body. His mouth moved up and down my neck and shoulder, his kisses light and warm as I eased back into his arms, my eyes drifting closed.
His lips tickled my neck as he hummed softly like he’d just been thoroughly satisfied, though I could still feel a very hard cock pressed against my ass. “Breathe, baby,” he muttered, sounding slightly amused. It was like he enjoyed making me fall to pieces just so he could be the one to put me back together. I let out an airy laugh, enjoying the way my heart was racing and my body tingling. Shotgun slowly turned me to face him, his gaze dark and needy, his hand cupping my jaw. “I like seeing you like this.”
“Like what?” I questioned softly, taking his club cut in my hands.
It kept me grounded.
He kept me grounded.
“At peace. Content.”
Not crazy, he meant.
Though, he wasn’t wrong.
I knew I could be crazy, a little bit too reckless.
But somehow, Shotgun seemed to be able to rein that in, even if only for a minute, and when he did, it was like coming home. That place where you were safe. Warm. Comfortable.
You’re getting too close.
What happens when he leaves too?
If you give him everything, you’ll have nothing left when he’s gone.
Run. Now.
And there it was—the panic setting back in.
He pressed his forehead to mine, his tongue tracing his bottom lip for a second. “Goddamn, I want to fuck you into next week.”
I swallowed the instant lump of emotion in my throat and tilted my head to the side. The words that tickled on the end of my tongue tasted fucking bitter, but I spat them out anyway, knowing they were going to poison this moment. “Well, that’s what I’m here for.”
I felt his body still, his muscles tense. He took a step back, my fingers slipping from his leathers as he backed away. I could see this hurt in his eyes, though he disguised it well.
Hurt them before they hurt you, right?
Wasn’t that the way to do it?
My head screamed yes, but my heart was crying no.
“How long are you gonna play that game, Ave?” He held his arms out wide. “You been fucking with my brothers? You taken anyone else’s cock lately but mine?”
I licked my dry lips. “I’m a club gir—”
He stormed forward, his hand at my throat, pressing me back against the desk, my naked ass sitting just on the edge. “When’s the last time anyone but me made you fucking come?” he whispered, his fingers tightening and forcing my eyes to stay on him when I tried to look away. “You wanna fuck my brothers, Avery?”
No.
This was him letting me know I wasn’t about to get away with my usual shit. This was him reminding me that pushing him was a bad fucking idea.
Yet, I didn’t know anything else. “I belong to the club,” I whispered, holding his gaze and lifting my chin. “Not you.”
He leaned in close, our lips brushing softly. “For now,” he growled under his breath before taking a step back. His hand slipped from my throat, and though he’d never squeezed tight enough to stop the airflow, I couldn’t help but suck in a deep breath.
Though maybe, it was more a relieved breath.
Relieved he’d backed down.
For now.
I didn’t know what that meant, but what I did know was that I hated the fucking look in his eyes as he backed away. It was hurt, though well-concealed. He shook his head and turned away.
“Come on,” he ordered, grabbing my shirt and bra from the floor and handing them to me. “Get dressed. I’ll take you to see Holly.”
“Thanks,” I murmured, hating the way the room had cooled around us, thinking I should have just kept my fucking mouth shut as per usual.
My gut twisted as he pulled the door open and walked out.
Leaving me there.
It was my doing.
I fucking knew it was, but it didn’t change the way it hurt. The disappointment was real, but a small price to pay for what would happen otherwise. If I gave in and let myself feel those things he made me feel, I just knew I would be risking it all.
Losing him—would break me.
Losing the club—that would destroy me.
And I knew this time, there might be no surviving.
This time, I might just lose myself too.
SHOTGUN
I pressed my hand to Avery’s back, ushering her in through the hospital doors. Despite the anger that brewed in my veins at her fucking stubbornness, I couldn’t help but fucking touch her.
She wanted to scratch me with her little claws and force me to take a step back, fine. I’d play. Let her think she had the upper hand, but I could already tell by the way she was looking at me out of the corner of her eye, she was scared this time she’d pushed me too far. Or perhaps scratched me a little too deep.
I don’t remember a time when another woman fucking compared to this pull Avery had on me. Maybe fucking never. It’d been months since any of my men had gone near her, or even fucking looked at her. It’d somehow become this unspoken rule without me even having to say shit.
They saw it.
I felt it.
But Avery was determined to destroy it before it pulled her in too.
What was it? I wasn’t even really sure. There was something there, something I couldn’t explain to anyone who had the balls to fucking ask.
My calm was drawn to her chaos.
And I still couldn’t decide if I fucking hated or loved it. I just knew at first, it had been the sexiest fucking thing I’d ever seen. Like I was watching this beautiful woman spend her life like she was dancing in the rain. But the closer I got, the more I realized maybe it wasn’t about the dancing, and more about the way she craved the danger of the storm, how she teased the lightning, daring it to strike.
It was like she was the negative and I was the positive, opposite as fucking hell, but put them together, and the sparks that were created were off the fucking charts.
Ty was at the front desk waiting for us when we walked through the front doors. “She’s doing fine. Awake. Alert. Annoyed.” He explained with a smirk. “Come o—”
“Give me the prescription,” a man roared, just off to the left. “I don’t need to see a doctor.” I frowned, watching him grab the desk in front of him as his body swayed. The girl behind the desk had her eyes wide, her hand below the desk, no doubt pushing the panic button.
“Sir, just sit down, and I’ll see what I can do,” another nurse tried to placate him, stepping around the desk with a gentle smile. One I fucking knew. Emma. She held her palms up flat, showing him she wasn’t a threat. “Just give me a second, let me see if I can get you something.”
Her sweet tone I remembered.
It was soft.
Calming.
Born to be in this environment where she could use it to help people,
to make sure they felt safe.
“Shotgun,” Avery whispered, my back straightening at the urgency in her voice. I looked over my shoulder to find her wide-eyed and nodding to the man’s foot. Following her eyes, it only took a second to see the knife handle tucked into the side of his steel-capped boots.
I gritted my teeth, my body already swaying toward the guy and Emma. “Ty, take her back to see Holly,” I ordered sternly under my breath.
“Shot—”
I paused for a second, jerking around and lowering my voice. “For once, Avery…”
Do as you’re fucking told.
Tyler wrapped his arm around her shoulders and began to pull her backward, though I could tell she wasn’t the only one of them apprehensive about leaving. I had no doubt it wouldn’t be long before he was back out here after depositing Avery with her friend, though.
I needed to patch the kid already.
“I need the drugs,” the man roared, jump-starting my body into action. “You don’t fucking understand!”
Emma was backing away now, her eyes wide and worried, the man walking toward her, his hands shaking as he curled them into fists.
He bent over, reaching down.
Too late.
I was already across the room, drawing my fist back and swinging before his hand could reach past his knee. He caught the movement of the air, looking up as my knuckles connected with his temple. People screamed, leaping out of the way as he hit the floor with a hard thud, his eyes rolling back into his head.
The air stilled.
Quiet.
My hand instantly beginning to throb.
Heavy footsteps rushed the room behind me, but my eyes didn’t deviate from the bastard on the tiles, making sure he wasn’t about to get back up again and this time with a vengeance.
“Please take him,” Emma’s voice urged, her perfume striking my senses as she stepped up beside me. I finally looked up to find two cops breathing heavily, looking between the unconscious man on the floor and me.
Excellent.
Just what I needed tonight.
To be arrested for assault.
“He’s got a knife in his boot,” I informed them simply, hoping that would be enough explanation or that someone would at least have my back.
“He’s right. The man was reaching for it, I was lucky Marcus got to him first,” Emma rambled, using my government name like she always did. I was never entirely sure why she was so opposed to using my road name.
Marcus was the name I was given at birth by two parents I despised.
Shotgun was the man I’d grown to be.
And he was so much fucking more than that kid before.
“All right, we’ll get him out of here,” one of the officers grumbled, removing what looked to be a steak knife before the two of them dragged his still unconscious ass from the emergency room. But not before pausing at the door to scold me like a child. “Next time, wait for the police before you take things into your own hands.”
“Sure,” I growled, my lip curling. “I’ll stand around and watch him slit a few peoples’ throats before I fucking do anything. Gotcha. Noted.”
The way the one officer narrowed his eyes told me if he didn’t have a body in his hands, I’d be walking out in handcuffs.
But I had no fucks to give.
It wasn’t in my nature to stand back while some bastard hurt people.
No fucking sir.
“Come on.” My head snapped to Emma, who was looking down at my hand with worry. She took my forearm between her hands, and for a second, we both paused, both looking down where we were touching like maybe we were expecting something different.
Something more.
Maybe a spark of some kind?
But there just wasn’t.
Did I care about her? Fuck, yes.
She’d always been there to help out, to patch someone up whenever we needed her. But the truth was, it was usually at a time where there was high tension, and I think we both simply found each other in order to ease it. She put her ass on the line for the club, risked her career for the club, so my respect for her was high. But essentially, that was also what ended up being the reason there was nothing between us. Because she decided it wasn’t an option anymore, that her future was more important to her.
In my eyes, the club came first—fucking always.
In her eyes, it simply couldn’t—ever.
And thankfully, we walked away before there were any stronger feelings than just two people who fucked occasionally. The moment of wonder over, she began to pull me toward the hallway, or at least should I say she tried. My feet were planted. Unmoving. “I want to check your hand.”
“It’s fi—”
“Humor me.”
It wasn’t the way she narrowed her eyes or folded her arms across her chest in this not taking no for an answer kind of way that made me follow her down the corridor. No. It was the dark circles under her eyes. The way her shoulders seemed like they carried more weight than usual. And to top it off, it was the fact that she looked half the size she did the last time I’d seen her, maybe a year ago.
So I followed, allowing her to usher me into a tiny triage room, even forcing me to sit on the bed as she settled herself between my legs and took my hand in hers.
“It looks a little swollen.” She examined it, wiggling my fingers, pressing different points, and occasionally, I’d cringe a little, but for the most part, I knew it was just your typical sprain.
“I did just plow it through a man’s head,” I tried to reason, stretching it myself when she stepped away, frantically pulling at drawers and cupboards for a few seconds before finally finding what she wanted. One after another, they flew open and closed while she murmured under her breath.
“You all right, Em?”
She froze.
A roll of strapping in her hands.
Her knuckles going slightly off-color as she squeezed the life out of it.
“Woah.” I shoved off the bed and stepped in front of her, pulling the roll from her hands and placing it on the bed behind me. Her eyes looked up, wide and full of tears, almost like she had forgotten I was still there. “Hey. It’s okay. You’re good. That bastard can’t touch you, you know that, right?”
The air around us was thick, though I had no fucking idea why.
Emma and I had always gotten along fine.
There’d never been anything but a mutual understanding between us about what we were or where things were going.
She let out a shaky laugh and took an urgent step back. “Yeah. Sorry,” she mumbled under her breath before inhaling deeply and pushing her shoulders back. “Just gave me a fright, you know.”
“Make your life flash before your eyes,” I joked, forcing a smile.
“More like question the future.”
I raised my brow. “What do you mean?”
The fear in her eyes instantly changed to worry when they flicked up to meet mine. “Nothing. It doesn’t matter.” She shuffled backward, attempting to put some kind of distance between us but running into the cabinet behind her.
“That’s bullshit.” I cursed myself instantly for the harsh tone of my voice when her entire body jerked in fear. “Goddamn, Emma. What the fuck is going on? You in some kind of trouble?”
She held my gaze, her mouth falling open like at any second, she was going to break down, and I was going to learn exactly what the fuck had happened to her during the last twelve months. The reason she looked like she didn’t sleep anymore or maybe even eat. The reason she looked like she could break at any second if I breathed too hard.
“Let me help you,” I growled, trying not to be demanding, but honestly, it was hard because it was simply in my nature to control the situation and get what the fuck I wanted, including answers. I knew I needed to push her that little bit further, hoping she was close enough to the edge to take the leap.
Her lip began to tremble. “I—”
The door flung open,
another nurse rushing inside, her eyes looking around the room in a panic. “I have a four-car pileup coming in. Emma, I need you on the floor. Now.” The nurse was gone as quickly as she appeared, and before I could register what was happening, Emma was already moving toward the door.
I lurched forward, grabbing her arm. but she quickly yanked it from my grasp and spun on me. “I can’t do this right now, M-Marcus,” she stuttered before clearing her throat, the thick emotion stuck there making it hard for her to speak.
“Are you in trouble?”
“No!” she spat out, her nose crinkling like she suddenly realized just how horrible that lie tasted on her tongue. “Not right now.”
There was something else.
I could see it in her eyes.
In the way she looked at me like she couldn’t figure out if she should trust me or if she should run far away.
“I’ve got you, you know that?” She held my gaze, and I hoped in it, she saw that this was real. That she could trust me. “No matter fucking what this shit was between us or with the club. All that bullshit to the side, you need to know I’ve got your back. Fucking always.”
Emma and I might not have a romantic connection, but at one point, the girl put her ass on the line for the people I love. She risked her career and her prospects for the future of my family. You don’t turn your back on that shit.
Tears dripped down onto her cheeks, her lip quivering. Emma’s eyes flicked quickly back and forth between the corridor and me like she was second-guessing her escape just for a moment. “I know now.”
I watched her back toward the doorway, letting her have that air to breathe. “You know where to find me.”
She paused, her hand on the doorframe.
And for that second, she took a deep breath.
One that wasn’t shaky or painful.
But one that seemed like reassurance that perhaps things would be okay.
AVERY
“Don’t leave the room until me or Shotgun come and get you, okay?”
My head bobbed up and down, though my eyes kept being drawn to the short hallway we’d just come down. My heart rate was high. Every fucking ridiculous scenario that involved Shotgun being stabbed was rushing through my damn mind, making me feel like I needed to be sick.