“Pretty damn hot seeing you go all alpha wolf and slam his sorry ass against the wall,” she whispered. “Definitely a good thing we’re in public.”
Cade leaned down, and his voice rumbled in her ear. “We don’t have to be in public. We could go back to your place, and I’ll show you how to make an alpha wolf howl.”
“It will be a howl of frustration,” she said. “There is no being alone when you have two little girls who only see their mommy on Sunday.” And thank God for that because after Cade’s show of dominance, and with the adrenaline still streaming through her veins, she was ready to tear off his clothes at the first available opportunity.
For the next half an hour, Dawn and Cade took turns pushing Maia and Tia on the swings. Cade took Tia’s refusal to speak to him in stride, including her in their conversations even though she didn’t respond. Dawn hadn’t seen the girls as relaxed around a man as they were with Cade, and when he finally told them he had to leave, Maia didn’t hold back her disappointment.
“Do you have to go? You pushed Tia three times and you only pushed me twice.”
“Got work to do, Maia-who-wears-pink, but I’m glad I passed the swing test.”
Her mouth turned down and she squeezed Tia’s hand. “Will you come back? You make Mom smile.”
Cade didn’t miss a beat. “Your mom has a beautiful smile. Just like her girls.”
Dawn fought back a sigh. So charming. And yet why would he be interested in a woman with a fucked-up life, two kids, three jobs, fifteen extra pounds, and baggage in the form of a psychopathic outlaw biker ex who had already tried to kill him? Maybe it was just his way of getting back at Jimmy, or maybe he wanted another notch in his belt.
Cade leaned down and brushed his lips over her cheek before mounting his bike. “See you later, beautiful.”
Or maybe not.
FIVE
I shall savor the ignorance of those who do not know me.
SINNER’S TRIBE CREED
“He’s on his way.”
Cade startled when Zane stepped out of the shadows. He’d brought Zane and four brothers with him after receiving a tip that Rusty, the redheaded bastard from Mad Dog’s van, was at Peelers Strip Club, but Zane had the unnerving ability to move without making a sound and damned if he’d known his brother was right behind him.
“Christ.” He lowered his weapon and drew in a calming breath of night air, cool but damp with an oncoming storm. “Don’t sneak up on a man with a gun. I almost shot you.”
“Your gun was pointed in the other direction,” Zane said. “Mine was aimed at your back. Wasn’t feeling the threat.”
Shaggy joined them from the far side of the parking lot, located at the side of the small brick building. “He’s got a woman with him. There’s a buncha Brethren inside, but doesn’t look like they’re planning to go anywhere. We should be good if we keep it quiet. If any of his buddies decide to join him…” He raised his weapon. “I figure the only good Brethren is a dead Brethren.”
“In a normal situation, I’d agree with you.” Cade checked his magazine and holstered his gun. “But we’re here for Rusty only, and the rest of those Brethren will soon be our brothers.”
Shaggy’s face curdled beneath his beard. “I voted to protect the club, same as you, but I still don’t like it. The Brethren can’t be trusted. We learned that lesson the hard way and had to run them outta town. Why the hell are we bringing them back?”
“To win the war against the Jacks. I don’t want to bury any more brothers over at Sandy Hill Cemetery.”
The front door opened and Rusty emerged with a woman beside him, her red hair twisted into a messy bun on top of her head. She wore workout clothes, and not stripper gear, and Cade didn’t recognize her until he heard her raspy voice.
“C’mon, Rusty. I’m in big trouble here. I need the cash you owe me and I need it fast or Jimmy’s gonna slit my throat.”
Shelly-Ann. What the fuck was she doing at Peelers when she was supposed to be looking after Dawn’s kids?
Rusty shoved her away. “I don’t owe you nothin’, bitch. I paid for that coke by giving you the pleasure of my dick.”
“That’s Mad Dog’s sister,” Cade murmured to Shaggy. “The one who’s blackmailing Dawn.”
“You want her taken out?” Shaggy jerked his chin in Shelly-Ann’s direction. Vicious, loyal, and trigger-happy, he’d once claimed he would shoot his own mother if it would benefit the club.
“Just keep her quiet.” Motioning to his brothers to follow, Cade unholstered his gun and crossed the parking lot, blinking to clear his vision when the first few raindrops fell.
“Hey, Rusty. Remember me?” He smashed the butt of his gun into Rusty’s head, and the smaller man staggered back against the wall.
“Stop! No!” Shelly-Ann’s hand flew to her mouth as Cade threw punch after punch, easily dodging Rusty’s retaliatory strikes. He hit Rusty’s nose and blood sprayed over Shelly-Ann’s jacket and splattered on the wall.
“Oh God.”
Shaggy grabbed Shelly-Ann and pulled her away when Zane and Gunner joined the fray, the three men pummeling Rusty until he fell to his knees.
“You like that Rusty?” Cade kicked him in the ribs. “You want my boot prints on you to match the ones you left on me?”
“Damn Sinner. We shoulda fucking killed you when we had the chance.” Rusty heaved in a breath, and pushed himself to his feet. Then he ran at Cade, knocking him back.
“Your mistake.” Cade grabbed Rusty and twisted his arm behind his back, then pushed him to the ground. Raindrops splattered on the pavement around them, streaming off Cade’s jacket. “Six against one and my hands tied? You must have known I’d come for you.”
“Didn’t think you were that stupid,” Rusty grunted, his cheek flat against the wet pavement. “We’re patching over to the Jacks, and then we’re all coming for you. There won’t be a Sinner left alive when we’re done.”
His free hand slid out from beneath him and Cade caught the glint of steel. “Look out!” He dived to the side just as Rusty fired. The bullet hit Shaggy in the leg and his brother went down.
“Die, fucker.” Rusty jumped to a crouch and aimed his gun at Shaggy’s head. Cade threw himself forward, knocking Rusty off balance. Rusty fell to the side and his head cracked against the cement parking bumper. Then he went limp.
“Fuck.” Shaggy fell back, clutching his leg. “One more second and I woulda been a dead man. Gratitude, brother.”
“Oh. My. God,” Shelly-Ann shrieked. “You killed him. You killed Rusty. He owed me money. Now what am I going to do?”
His body still pumped with adrenaline, rage seeping through his veins, Cade grabbed Shelly-Ann by the shoulder and shoved her hard against the wall. “You are one damn coldhearted bitch. Man’s dead and all you care about is money. And what the hell are you doing at Peelers when you got two kids at home to look after?”
Shelly-Ann’s face twisted in anger. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I got a babysitter. And I need money. Since you killed Rusty, his debts are your debts. You owe me.”
“Son of a bitch,” Gunner said. “She’s either incredibly stupid or she’d got the biggest fucking balls this side of the Bridger Mountains.”
“You owe me,” Cade growled. “I saved your fucking life. Shaggy here wanted to off you the minute you stepped outside.”
“I know you.” Shelly-Ann leaned up and stared into Cade’s face. “You’re the Sinner who was with Dawn outside the school. Just wait till Jimmy hears you offed Rusty.”
Cade snorted a laugh. “You tell him, princess. Let him know I’m coming for him, although I think he’ll guess.” He tipped his chin in Rusty’s direction, drawing her attention to Gunner, who was spray-painting the Sinner’s Tribe symbol on Rusty’s cut.
Shelly-Ann’s eyes narrowed. “Kinda hard to go after him if you’re in jail. Gimme the money Rusty owes me and maybe I won’t say anything to the police about what I saw.”
&n
bsp; “How about you go home to those girls and I won’t tell Shaggy to slit your fucking throat?”
“How about I get someone to slit yours?” Shelly-Ann gave him a sly look and then she screamed. “Help! Shifter! Trey! The Sinners got Rusty!”
Cade clamped a hand over her mouth a moment too late. The door to the club burst open and Brethren bikers flooded the parking lot.
“Let the fun begin.” Zane drew his weapon, and the brothers followed suit.
“Stand down,” Cade ordered, gesturing the brothers back to their bikes. “Zane and I will cover. Everyone out of here now. We’ve done what we came here to do. They know what Rusty did. Even with the possible patch-over, they’ll have been expecting some form of retaliation, although it wasn’t meant to go that far.”
Cade’s heart pounded in his chest, adrenaline crashing through his body in waves. Yeah, he wanted to off that Brethren scum. But tonight wasn’t a good night to die.
* * *
“You staying for a drink?”
Banks handed Dawn her share of the evening’s tips as she untied her apron. Not a bad night. If she could find more ways to cut costs, she might be able to scrape up another couple hundred dollars for Shelly-Ann. Enough to keep her quiet, at least in the short term.
“I have to get going. I have an early shift tomorrow.” And she wanted to get home and lock her doors tight. Before Jimmy crossed the Conundrum border, she wouldn’t have been concerned, but something spurred him to take the life-or-death risk of coming into town, and she desperately wanted to know what it was. Jimmy only took chances when he knew he would win. She could only hope he wasn’t after the girls.
“Just one drink.” Banks held up a glass. “Then I can finish up and walk you out.”
“Thanks, but I have to run or I’ll miss the last bus.” Usually she caught a ride on the back of Arianne’s motorcycle. Her bestie bartended at Banks Bar four nights a week, and they tried to arrange their shifts so they could work together, but Arianne’s work at the Sinner garage was taking up more and more of her time and she’d cut her shifts this week down to two.
Dawn grabbed her jacket and picked up the trash bags near the stockroom door leading to the parking lot. Although she missed her car, she wouldn’t trade the extra time it had bought her with the girls for anything.
“Don’t like you taking the bus at night,” Banks said.
Dawn put her hand in her purse and pulled out her .22. “I have this to keep me safe. A present from Arianne.”
“Jesus Christ. Put that away before you hurt someone, namely me.” Banks jerked to the side. “Don’t know why Arianne would give you a gun. You aren’t in that life.”
“She gave it to me because that life won’t let me go. And until I get my girls back…”
“You won’t be shooting anyone.” He placed a gentle hand on her wrist, and she lowered the gun. “And I know this first, ’cause I know you got a soft heart; second, ’cause I can see that gun isn’t loaded; and third, ’cause I got faith you’ll find a way to cut Jimmy deep and get back those girls without spilling any blood and landing your pretty ass in jail. You’re a fighter, but not a killer.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” She tucked the gun into her purse and zipped up her jacket.
“Meant as one.” Banks twisted his lips to the side, considering. “How about I call you a cab?”
“You don’t give up, do you?” Dawn unlocked the dead bolt on the door leading to the parking lot. “It’ll take at least an hour to get a cab out here at this time of night. The bus is coming in five minutes. I’ll be fine. It’s not like I have far to go.”
“I’ll wait at the bus stop with you,” Banks called out. “Just gimme a minute and I’ll meet you there.”
The door closed behind her and she crossed the deserted parking lot toward the Dumpster. She tossed the bags, and pulled her leather jacket tight around her neck. Where had the warm spring weather gone? This winter had been the longest ever, and she so wasn’t a winter kind of girl. Now, Florida. That was more her style. Her parents had owned a condo on Miami Beach and she’d spent the summers with them building sand castles, learning how to in-line skate, and never appreciating her safe, secure loving world until it disappeared when a drunk driver crossed the median and hit her parents’ car.
She wanted that kind of happy life for her children—a life without stress or fear, a life where they were surrounded by love and laughter, a life where parents kissed you in the morning and didn’t disappear in the afternoon.
Keeping to the lit side of the street, she walked toward the bus stop. The streetlights had been changed out for energy-saving orange a few months ago, giving the area an eerie glow. She reached the crossroad and looked up and down the street. Time to jaywalk. She just couldn’t help breaking the law. Maybe it was genetic. After all, her uncle had broken at least ten different laws the first time he trapped her in the bedroom.
Footsteps rang out behind her, and she turned, half smiling, expecting to see Banks. But her smile faded and her pulse went into overdrive when Jimmy stepped out of the shadows.
“Time to come home, love.”
Dawn’s gaze flicked back to the bar and then down the street. Where was Banks? The drunks were still inside. The streets were deserted. It was just her and Jimmy, and a lifetime of regret.
“I’m not going anywhere with you.” She took a step toward the bus stop, and Jimmy grabbed her arm and yanked her back.
“You’ll come with me or you lose those girls forever. I’ll take them someplace you’ll never find them.”
She stared up at him, his face at once foreign and familiar. They’d shared a bed every night for seven years. At first, she’d thought of him as her knight in shining armor, rescuing her from a pimp who had discovered her unprotected and living on the street. It was only after Jimmy turned vicious that she saw him for who he truly was: a monster. In biker’s clothing. There was no way she would allow herself to get caught up in a relationship where she could fall into that trap again. Especially not in a world where women were property and everyone turned a blind eye to abuse.
Still, it had taken years to push aside the childish teenage fantasy, break the emotional bond, and gather up the courage and enough money to leave him. And in the end, she’d done it for her girls. Not for herself. Caught in an endless cycle of abuse, she’d lost her sense of self-worth. Her mama bear instincts had saved her as much as she’d saved her children and taught her an important lesson: She was a fighter and a survivor, and she would never let anyone take that away.
“I’ll find a way to get them back.” Her heart thundered so hard she thought she might break a rib. She was intimately familiar with Jimmy’s moods. Her safety had depended on reading him correctly and responding accordingly. And right now, she read danger with a capital D. He wasn’t just angry; he was enraged, and his control would slip the longer they dragged out the conversation.
Jimmy gave a bitter laugh, tightening his grip on her forearm. “You’ve tried for a year and what do you have to show for it? Nothing. Shelly-Ann has you over a barrel and now I’m gonna have you back in my bed. I lost the last election ’cause the brothers thought I was too weak to control my woman. But there’s a new election coming up and I’ve let this stupid little game go on long enough. You’re mine until I let you go. Until death do us part. Nobody leaves Jimmy, especially not you, and never for a Sinner.”
“Wrong.” She tugged the unloaded .22 from the pocket of her jacket and Jimmy released her with a jerk, his hands flying up in a defensive gesture.
“You don’t want to that, love. Think about the kids. You’d go to jail for life. They would have no one but Shelly-Ann.”
Love. The term of endearment made her feel sick inside. He’d called her “love” from the day he took her back to the clubhouse. New name for a new life, he’d said. Now she associated that name with only one thing: Pain.
“Drop the gun and stop playing games.” His grin turned feral. “I kn
ow you. And I know it’s not loaded.”
For a split second, Dawn wondered what she would have done if there had been a bullet in the gun. But he’d called her bluff, just as Banks had. Now she had only one option.
Run.
Turning quickly, she raced across the street. In the distance, the headlights of the bus glowed warm in the night. It would all come down to timing.
“Fuck.” Jimmy’s voice echoed in the darkness, and the thud of his shoes on the pavement sent her heart into overdrive.
But although she was fast, Jimmy was faster. Just as she reached the bus shelter, he grabbed her hair and yanked her head back. Using her momentum, he slammed her face into the glass. Pain shot through her skull and she shuddered beneath his grip.
“Wrong. Fucking. Decision.” Jimmy pressed his lips to her ear and growled, “Looks like someone needs to be reminded of her lessons.”
Well conditioned to what usually followed those particular words, Dawn froze. Jimmy had rules, and every lesson she’d learned after breaking one of his rules resulted in a trip to the hospital.
The growl of an engine shattered the silence. Light flooded the shelter and the bus slowed to a stop. In the distance the bar door slammed and she heard Banks curse.
“Let me go or I’ll scream.” She mumbled the words against the glass, unable to move an inch with his body pressed hard against her. “They have armed security on the night bus, and my manager is coming.”
Her gamble that Jimmy knew nothing about buses or the limited resources they had to run at night—resources that most certainly didn’t include salaries for security guards—paid off. With a last smash of her forehead against the glass, he released her and backed into the shadows.
“We’re not done, love.” His words sliced through the darkness, piercing her heart. “Not even close.”
* * *
“Son of a bitch.” Cade slammed his fist on the chipped Formica table, and the six customers seated at the counter of Table Tops diner on the corner of Fourth and Pine stilled.
The Sinner’s Tribe Motorcycle Club, Books 1-3 Page 40