HIS
YOUNG
QUEEN
(Steel Jackals MC #1)
By
Tiff P. Raine
~ Copyright ~
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Text Copyright © 2015 Tiff P. Raine
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without express written permission of the author. For permission requests, email [email protected]
Cover design by No Sweat Graphics
Edited by Kimberly Cannon
Warning: This story contains scenes of an explicit, erotic nature between an older man and a younger woman +18. It is intended for adults.
~ Contents ~
~ Copyright ~
~ Contents ~
~ Prologue ~
~ Chapter One ~
~ Chapter Two ~
~ Chapter Three ~
~ Chapter Four ~
~ Chapter Five ~
~ Chapter Six ~
~ Chapter Seven ~
~ Chapter Eight ~
~ Chapter Nine ~
~ Chapter Ten ~
~ Chapter Eleven ~
~ Chapter Twelve ~
~ Coming Soon ~
~ About the Author ~
~ Acknowledgements ~
~ You might also like… ~
~ Prologue ~
Tish O’Malley sat on the very edge of the couch in the rundown apartment, continuously picking at her swollen cuticles. She’d promised herself when she turned six she’d stop doing that, but yesterday had been her birthday and here she was, still pulling at those little bits of skin. She put her thumb in her mouth when she felt a wetness and knew she’d made herself bleed again. She didn’t look at it, though. Not because blood made her sick or anything, she just didn’t want to take her eyes from her mom.
Rachel, she corrected herself.
Rachel didn’t like being called Mom. She said her friends liked her better when they thought she was only babysitting Tish, so Tish had to call her Rachel. That was hard to remember sometimes, and Tish got hit on the back when she messed up.
Rachel was on the floor. She’d started out on the couch that morning, but after using her bent spoon to, well, Tish didn’t know what her mom did to the stuff she bought from Freddy. Warmed it up? Cooked it with her lighter? Burnt it? Who knew? All she knew was that after the smoke was sucked in, Rachel usually looked really tired. And she smiled a little. Rachel didn’t smile very much.
But the past couple of days had been different. Every time her mom, er, Rachel, breathed in her smoke, she got sick. Real sick.
Tish yawned so big her eyes watered. She wanted to sleep but was too afraid—
She jerked forward and flew down to land on her knees beside her mom as she lurched upright. Tish grabbed the chipped brown throw up bowl she’d used when she’d had the flu at Christmas and shoved it under Rachel’s face just in time to catch the rush of vomit that came out. It pushed forcefully through her mouth and nose and smelled awful, but Tish was used to it now. She patted Rachel’s shoulder and waited for it to pass. When it did, she got up and ran into the bathroom to dump the throw up in the toilet and wash the bowl out in the bathtub.
She went as fast as she could, and when she got back to the living room, there was a smell in the air. Like burnt plastic. Rachel was leaning against the couch, her spoon and lighter sitting in her lap.
Tish approached slowly and placed the bowl on the scratched table. “Maybe you can not do that tomorrow?” she asked quietly. “I haven’t been at school since Thursday…” It was Wednesday. Almost a week had passed since she’d sat at her desk.
Rachel raised her sleepy-looking eyes. One had a spot of blood on the white part. Tish had seen it appear after a really long throw up session last night where she’d had to run and empty the bowl twice before it was over.
“So go. I don’t need you here.”
She went down on her knees but stayed more than an arm’s length away. Rachel didn’t like to be touched. “But I’m afraid you’ll be sick when I leave.”
“So?”
She shrugged and nibbled on her lip. “So I can’t clean it up if I’m at school.”
Rachel started moaning and holding her middle. Tish reached for the bowl again, but she was too late. The remainder of the chicken soup she’d heated up earlier, along with a brighter yellow liquid, spewed out of her mom’s mouth to land all over them and the floor. As it soaked into Tish’s jeans, she pushed the bowl—
Rachel shoved it away, and rather than save Tish a little work, she laid down where she was and retched onto the floor until her tummy was finally empty. She kept making those terrible heaving sounds, but it wasn’t until a watery sound came from her bum that Tish jumped up and started cleaning up the soggy noodles and throw up that was running in a little river under the couch. She eventually got Rachel out of the dirty clothes and into the bathtub.
“What are you doing? I’m freezing! Where’s my clothes?”
Tish held back her tears as she ran and grabbed the pillow and blanket off her bed. Her limbs were shaking because she was starving and so, so tired. She came back to find Rachel in the same position, curled on her side, and she was peeing. Tish quickly rinsed the urine down the drain, and shrugged, not minding it so much because it was easier than cleaning it off the floor with the already dirty towels. After drying her mom’s legs and bum—she wiped her up there as best she could, until she was back-swatted on the chin for her troubles—she pushed the pillow under Rachel’s head and covered her with the blanket. Her blond hair was dark with grease, but her skin, which looked shiny, was white like paste.
As fast as she could, before it all started again, Tish loaded up the basket with all the dirty laundry that she’d piled in the corner over the past couple of days, and raced to the second floor to toss it and some soap into one of the old washing machines. As the cycle ran through, she ran back upstairs, grabbed a handful of coins from the can on the counter and took off for the variety store at the end of the block. It was getting dark. With a loaf of bread under her arm and her knees feeling shaky, she ran back home. Two kids in her class shouted at her as she whizzed by, asking her where she’d been lately, and as she jerked open the apartment building door, Tish called out that her mom had the flu.
“Your mom has the flu?”
Mrs. Reed. The round landlady who always wore bright pink lipstick was in the hallway.
“Um, yes.” Tish was panting as she held up the bread. She felt her face go red when her stomach rumbled loudly. “I had to run out to get us some supper. She’s very sick, but she’ll be better soon and she’ll have your money to you in a jiffy.” She smiled and felt her lips shaking. That was the spiel Rachel had taught her last year when she’d made Tish answer the hard knock that had rattled the door where they’d lived before coming here.
“Do you have a minute?” Mrs. Reed waved her forward as she headed for her apartment.
Tish looked up the stairs. “Um. I have to go put the towels into the other machine because I cleaned throw up with them.”
“It’ll only take a second.” Mrs. Reed disappeared into her place that always smelled like pancakes. She left the door open.
Tish inched over but stayed in the hall. She peeked around, and her eyes widened. It looked like a house on TV. It was clean, and there was even a plant under the window and books on the coffee table. She jerked back when s
he heard footsteps, and then a plate with some bacon strips and a mountain of macaroni and cheese was being shoved into her hands.
“You take this up and eat as much as you can before your mom sees it, okay? Then you can share with her, but only if you want to. Bring back my plate when you can.”
Tish wasn’t sure what was happening. She bit her lip and swallowed because her mouth started to water. “What?” she finally said.
Mrs. Reeds face went all soft, and she talked slowly. “After you put your towels in the dryer, go upstairs, get a fork, and eat. When you’re full, you can give your mom some, too. The next time you go out, leave my plate in front of my door. Okay?”
“But this is your food.”
“And I want you to have it.”
“How come?”
“Because you’re hungry, sweetie.”
“But aren’t you hungry?”
Mrs. Reed shook her head and patted her round belly. “I’ve had enough. You take it. Go on. Up you go. I heard the washer shut off, and if you don’t get up there one of the other tenants will likely poach your towels.”
Not sure what she’d do without the towels, Tish bolted for the stairs. She paused halfway up and turned back to lift the plate she was cradling in both hands, being careful not to drop any. The bread was getting squished under her arm. “Thank you for this.”
“You’re very welcome.”
As she ran up and into the cramped laundry room, Tish was pulling up the plastic wrap and using her fingers to scoop up the macaroni. She stood there chewing, her eyes closed, as she savored the meal and tried to figure out why Mrs. Reed had given it to her. Maybe she was just nice?
Nah, she thought as she put the towels into the other machine and went up to check on her mom.
And that was the routine for the next seven days, which was how long Rachel’s bad batch of drugs lasted. Tish missed painting and a math test at school, and a no-work-day party the teacher had thrown for the class. Rather than watching a Disney movie, she’d spent her time washing every surface affected by her mom’s throw up and poop. She’d made peanut butter sandwich after peanut butter sandwich and mixed jug of Kool-Aid after jug of Kool-Aid, in between running down to the second floor because she’d had to do load after load of laundry. She had to sneak up and down the stairs because she was avoiding Mrs. Reed. Tish was uncomfortable, and still didn’t understand why the landlady had given her that food—she’d returned the plate after washing it.
It wasn’t until the following Wednesday that Freddy, the guy who gave Rachel her drugs, showed up. Tish was sitting in the corner of the couch, her head bobbing because she still hadn’t slept much. Rachel heard the door slam and came out of the bathroom, her stringy hair clean, her shorts and T-shirt hanging off her because she was a skeleton with skin now. She saw Freddy and went right over to the coffee can on the counter that doubled as a piggy bank. Tish was fading, her eyes just closing when she felt the blow land on the side of her head. Her ear instantly started ringing as she sat there, stunned, not sure what had happened. Until she looked up and saw a furious Rachel with the can in her hand.
“There’s five dollars missing!” her mom shouted.
“I-I needed to buy b-bread,” Tish stammered as she rubbed at her ear.
“From my money?”
As Rachel went on and on about thieves and how she’d be in a better place today if it weren’t for Tish and why hadn’t she listened to her friends and dealt with her pregnancy like other girls did, Tish sat there, confused. Not about what her mom was saying because she’d heard it all before. But why would Rachel say these things now, when Tish had spent the last two weeks taking care of her? She hadn’t complained. She hadn’t gotten mad at the things she’d been forced to do. But then, she hadn’t been forced, had she? She’d done them because Rachel was her mom, and she’d needed to be taken care of, so Tish had done it.
“Hey!”
Tish looked up when she heard Freddy through the ringing in her ear that wasn’t going away.
“I’ll eat the five bucks,” he said to Rachel. He looked mad, too. “Just shut the fuck up and leave the kid alone.”
Rachel glared at her the whole time she made her deal.
And through it all, Tish loved her mother.
And continued to love her and help her and try to care for her as best she could, year after year. Even when Rachel OD’d when Tish was nine, and she had to sit with the man on the phone and do everything he told her to make sure her mom didn’t die, Tish loved her. When she’d sat next to the hospital bed and held Rachel’s limp hand while answering the social worker’s questions, knowing exactly what to say so she wouldn’t get taken away, Tish loved her.
She even loved her the day Rachel uprooted them for what had to have been the twentieth time. Tish was ten, and she came home from school to find everything they owned stuffed in a cab sitting at the curb. That cab ended up taking them from Phoenix to Queen Creek, Arizona, which was where Tish found out she had an uncle who had blond hair like hers and rode a loud motorcycle. There was a name on the back of his and his friends’ vests; Steel Jackals. Apparently, that was also when her Uncle Nick found out he had a niece.
It was just over a week later when cracks began forming in the thick hovering clouds, and light began to seep into Tish’s dark world.
It was Saturday afternoon, and she was reading a book Mrs. Reed had given her. She didn’t understand much of it because the words were big, but she had a dictionary beside her and she’d stop every little while to look stuff up, just like her teacher had taught her. She was just getting back to reading after having wasted a few minutes searching the word “Heathcliff”—not realizing that was the boy’s name in the book—when she heard a heavy knock on the door. Rachel had left without a word not long ago so Tish put her book down.
She went over and pulled the door open, and looked up, and up, to meet a pair of eyes that were honest-to-God gold. She and the giant stared at each other for a few seconds, him frowning, her in awe.
“You didn’t even ask who I was before you opened the door,” he said in a disapproving tone that was a low rumble.
Tish didn’t look away from those gold eyes. She knew adults didn’t like it when you looked away when they were speaking to you. “Who are you?”
His eyebrow moved up. “Josh Sylvan.” He put his hand out. “But my boys call me The Guardian. Your uncle sent me over to sit with you until your mom comes home.”
She shook his huge, colorful hand and stepped aside so he could enter the apartment. To sit with her? She didn’t need anyone to sit with her. Why would her uncle think she did?
“If I come by another time, and that door opens without you asking who’s on the other side of it, I’m not gonna like it. You got me?”
“Okay.”
His big feet made solid thuds when he walked. She followed him into the living room and watched him look around. He picked up the book she was reading and flipped through it.
“You reading this?”
“Yes.”
“Where’d you get it?”
“Our old landlady gave it to me last week. She said she finished it and didn’t want it back. She said I could keep it.”
He put it down. “Kind of heavy for a little kid to be reading, isn’t it?”
“Then I guess it’s lucky I’m not a little kid,” she said, completely serious.
He gave her a sidelong look. And then he smiled. “We’ll see about that.”
Tish O’Malley fell in love right then and there. She fell in love with her Uncle Nick’s best friend as a ten-year-old girl would her protector, and never would know when that love began growing, transforming into something deep and everlasting.
Over the next few years, for the first time in her life, Tish experienced a continuous stream of something most people took for granted; happiness. Josh, her defender, babysitter, playmate, and best friend in the world, became her beacon of joy and peace and everything good. He sheltered he
r from her mother’s poison and gave her a sense of security she’d never had before. He became her sounding board, the first she’d ever had. He listened when she talked, and seemed genuinely interested in her problems, big or small. He was gentle and patient and fun, but he could also be stern and unyielding and wasn’t afraid to give her shit when she deserved it, which wasn’t often. But best of all, he was always there.
Until the day he left.
Jumping off the bus at the corner, Tish raced up the sidewalk wearing the McDonald’s uniform she hated. No one looked good in a McDonald’s uniform, but today she was particularly resentful of it and her job because both had kept her away from where she really wanted to be. Where she was coming to feel she needed to be. With Josh.
She turned the corner, aiming for the Steel Jackals’ clubhouse where he’d promised to meet her. He wanted to know about the marks she’d received from the summer school classes she’d taken to be ahead when she started her junior year the following month. She’d be sixteen in a few weeks and was already working toward qualifying for scholarships so she could go to college, at Josh’s urging.
She almost tripped when she saw flashing lights ahead. Her heart seized and then started hammering. Police cars. Oh…no. Please not one of mine, she thought as she ran as fast as she could the remaining half block and rudely pushed through the group of onlookers watching a police officer walk someone to one of the patrol cars. Please not Josh or Uncle Nick, please not Josh or Uncle Nick—
Her legs nearly gave out when she saw who it was.
Josh. Handcuffed.
“No!” she gasped, her blood turning to ice. “Josh!” She dropped her backpack, purse, and the sealed envelope containing her marks on the driveway and ran to him on legs she could no longer feel. “No! What are you doing?” She grabbed the cop’s arm and jerked. “You can’t take him! He’s mine!”
“Aw, fuck.” Josh’s whisper was tight with regret, and she saw more of the same when he turned. His forehead had a deep crease, and his jaw was ticking. “Gimme a second,” he said to the cop, who had to have seen she was having trouble catching her breath through the horror pouring through her. He and Josh exchanged a look. They obviously knew each other.
His Young Queen: (Steel Jackals MC #1) Page 1