Well, he had me there, didn't he?
NINE
Peyton
"Your. Your," I said, knowing I was slurring slightly, and too happy to care. "Not yer. Yer... is not a word."
"Yer is a word. Ya just don't say it right."
I liked Adler.
I liked Adler as soon as he opened his mouth.
Because, well, he had an accent.
This town was crawling with them, apparently.
What was his accent, you might ask? That would be a good question. Because it wasn't one. It was a melting pot of them. I could make out something guttural under it all - German, Russian, Polish. Something a little rough. But then paired with something soft and lilting - Irish or Scottish. And then a strange American under it all, but undefinable. Not quite a New York, but not a Boston either. And certainly not a southern. It was just... something.
But on top of the accent, he was just... chill. And absurd. In equal turns.
"I'm just saying," Norm said behind Adler. His real name wasn't Norm, of course, but he would forever be Norm now. "They are changing the name of the school just because he owned slaves. It's wrong. That is our history."
"So are chamberpots," I said to him, making him shock back at the sound of my voice. "And yet we don't piss in buckets for nostalgia."
"You can't erase him because you don't like him," he insisted. I was hoping he was simply drunk, not just stupid.
"No one is erasing history. Trust me. I work in the library. I am... intimately acquainted," I said, giving Sugar a sly smile, "with the American History section. Jefferson is still there. Calm your tits."
"Fucking millennials," he grumbled into his drink.
I would have responded to that, but Sugar moved in behind me, curling an arm around my center, and, well, my brain went to mush. But... not because of him. Of course. That would be silly. It was totally just all the tequila catching up with me. That's all.
"Do you have to start with everyone?" he asked, voice down by my ear.
"I can't help it. I have... a condition."
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah... it's quite grave. It's called... Startshititis. I'm afraid there is no cure. Whenever someone is backassward, it just kicks in again."
He chuckled a little at that, the sound rolling through his body and into mine. The warning sirens were going off somewhere inside. But they were covered by a nice, thick layering of booze. "How's that tequila treating you?"
"I have a feeling I am going to get quite hoesome soon," I admitted, his fingers spanning my ribcage proving distracting.
"Hmm," he said, fingers inching upward, touching the very underside of my breast. "Luckily, I do have the cure for that," he told me, voice promising.
"Will it be... hard to swallow?" I asked, making my voice as innocent as possible. When he let out a low groan, I knew I had played my card right.
"If ya two are gonna fuck, I would not suggest the bathroom," Adler declared casually. "Yes, I'm eavesdropping," he told us with a smirk. "Go on, duchess. I believe you were talking about... swallowing something."
"I like this one," I declared, waving my drink in Adler's direction.
My brain may have been tequila-soaked, but a lifetime of pushing my alcohol limits here and there made it possible for me to be able to think at least mostly clearly.
And I was thinking that this Adler guy was someone I needed to get to know better. Regardless of whatever happened with Sugar. Lenny too. Who was currently one faux-leather motorcycle jacket down, shaking her hips as she stood at the stereo system, looking through the song catalog.
It also did not escape my booze-goggles that a certain gravel-voiced, bearded biker was watching her like she was some kind of goddamned miracle.
And while I wouldn't attribute any of my observations to the alcohol, I did blame it for the weird, swirly, almost hopeful feeling I felt in my belly at seeing the way that man looked at his woman. Like all the Mallick brothers looked at their women.
Love, I had always believed was just chemicals creating a temporary high.
But then I had met Charlie and Helen.
That man still looked at his wife like she was the sole reason the fucking sun rose in the morning.
After thirty-something years together.
They shot my theory all to hell.
Those fuckers.
I would have been happy believing that for the rest of my life. That love was fleeting. That disappointment and pain would inevitably follow it at some point down the line. And, therefore, it was not something worthy of dedicating my time to.
But now I knew that it didn't always disappear.
Maybe it aged, shifted, grew in a different way, but it could span decades, a lifetime.
"That's an odd look," Sugar said, breaking through my somewhat uncharacteristically sappy train of thought.
I shook my head, trying to dislodge the weird wishy-washy sensation overtaking me. I shrugged a shoulder, reaching for a refill the bartender had dropped in front of me without asking. "You don't know me well enough to know my looks."
His head tilted slightly, eyes going smaller as he watched me for a second. "Whose fault is that?" he asked, surprising me.
"What?"
"Whose fault is it that I can't get to know you better? Sure as shit isn't mine as far as I can tell."
"What do you..." I started, only to be cut off by Adler's hand landing hard on my shoulder.
"This isn't time for ya to discuss that she's got barbed wire on her heart," he declared, the words landing like a sucker punch to my center, knocking out my air.
Barbed wire on my heart?
Did he actually mean that? Think that?
No one had ever accused me of that before.
Being a bit aloof? Not able to take things as seriously as I should? Committed to non-commitment? Possibly a bit too independent - if such a thing existed? Sure. Yes, to all of those.
But guarded?
No.
But, if I were really being honest, I guess I would admit that people wouldn't accuse me of that because they were blinded by the part of me that was completely, one-hundred percent unguarded.
You didn't look at a woman who had no problem flashing someone - ass or tits - and think Damn, that girl is closed off.
It was the emotional equivalent to the musical hairography.
Distract them with the openness, so they don't see the guardedness.
It was true.
I was guarded.
Not with everything.
I shared my joy and humor and frustration and anger with those closest to me, my friends and family.
But when it came to the other shit? The stuff that hurt when you poked your finger in it? The vulnerability crap?
Yeah, I guess I did hide that, wrap it in barbed wire, put fences and walls around it. Reinforce it with concrete.
But I couldn't let them see these things.
"Then what is it the time for?" I asked, turning to smile at Adler.
"Well, I do believe ya promised that if I got enough tequila in ya, that ya would climb yer fine ass up on the bar..."
For the next hour, I was plied with booze.
Until the inevitable happened.
'No Diggity' came on.
Lenny got up on the bar.
And I followed.
I maybe only got to shake my hips twice before I felt strong hands sink into my hips, yanking forward until I was falling downward, and none-too-ceremoniously thrown over a familiar, wide shoulder.
"What..." I gasped, as Sugar started walking out of the bar part of the store and into the liquor section.
"Shush," he growled at me, reaching up to swat my ass, sending a sting across my butt in a way that should not have been sexy, but totally was.
"Don't shush me, you brute," I demanded, at least pretending to be offended by him being a neanderthal when, really, all it was doing was turning me on.
"The only one getting to see up your skirt is me, P
eyt," he informed me, making my belly do a delicious little swirl as Sugar slammed the front door open, and the nip in the night air made my skin prickle with goosebumps.
"Mmm, well, I'm okay with that," I told him as I felt my body sliding down his as he pulled me off his shoulder, then dropped me down onto his bike seat.
"Don't give me that look," he told me, taking a deep breath as he looked down at me while his hands worked the clasp free on the helmet he always gave to me, never wearing one himself.
"What look is that?" I asked, tone innocent even though I knew I was eye-fucking the hell out of him.
"The one that says you would suck me off right here," he said, lips quirking up at one side.
"Well..." I said, dragging the sound out as my hands moved outward, snagging him at the front of his jeans and pulling him forward a step.
The only thing in the world that could stop me from actually doing it after he made a low, growling, primal sound was the front door of the bar opening again, drawing my attention over to see Edison leading Lenny out, her body plastered to his side, his arm around her back. She was saying something up at him, making him take a full stop, look down at her for a long second, then throw his head back and laugh.
And the thought that moved through me was one I couldn't have anticipated.
I want that.
"Baby," Sugar's voiced called me back.
I looked back up at him, finding those gray eyes boring into me like they always seemed to.
"So this compound of yours," I started. "Do you have a room there?"
His lips twitched at that. "Yeah, I got a room there."
"With a bed?"
"Yeah, I got one of those."
"Then I can't imagine what we are doing here still," I said, making his smile do something different. It wasn't that cocky one he wore a lot, or even just an amused one, or a sexy one. No, this was different. It was almost... sweet?
Ugh.
No.
Not sweet.
He climbed on in front of me, and I scooted in, wrapping my arms around him. But before he could even turn the bike over, I said, tone surer than I felt, "If you fall in love with me, I'm out."
"Yeah, I remember," he agreed, but turned the bike over immediately and peeled out before I could say anything else.
We had barely gotten off the bike in the yard of the compound when the door opened, and a tall, dark figure moved outside, looking up at the sky like he was begging for some intervention from a higher power, before glancing our way.
I didn't know him know him, but everyone knew him.
Reign.
The leader of The Henchmen MC.
Super hot for an older guy.
His eyes went to his man first before slipping to me.
Then his breath sighed out of him, the sound of a man who had put up with a lot of shit from his men over the years, and wasn't up for more.
"You got to be shitting me," he said, shaking his head at Sugar.
"Already heard it from Cash," Sugar told his prez.
"Don't say you weren't warned then," he said, moving to walk toward the back of the yard.
"So..." I started when we were alone again. "I am like the... forbidden fruit here, huh?" I asked, tone teasing.
His smile did that sweet thing again.
"Something like that."
"Well... would you like to... you know," I started, finger walking up the center of his stomach, "take a bite?"
"Fucking killing me," he growled, reaching up to unclasp my helmet, tossing it down into the dirt before throwing an arm over my shoulders, and leading me inside.
As crazy as this was, there was a skipping, swirling feeling in my stomach. Something akin to - of all things - nervousness.
It was such a foreign, uncertain thing that I didn't even recognize it for what it was until we were inside and walking down a hallway of closed doors, spaced too closely to be anything other than bedrooms.
Hell, I hadn't even been nervous on the night I lost my virginity.
We stopped in the middle of the hall, Sugar reaching to push the door open and flick the light on.
"Really?"
Okay, so maybe that was a rude reaction to seeing a man's room for the first time. But, really, it was as bare as a jail cell. I would know. I watched every prison show - both real and fictional - known to mankind. Actually, if possible, it was even more bare than a cell.
There was a bed, queen-sized, pressed up against the wall on one side with a plain gray comforter, white sheets, and a black nightstand with a glass lamp. Across from that was a dresser with a large TV. Beside that was an open door to a very small bathroom with a pedestal sink, a toilet, and a stall shower that was so small that there was no chance of shower funsies in it.
No art.
No personal items.
Not even clothes that missed the hamper.
"What?" he asked, yanking me inside so he could close and lock the door.
"Were you a bad boy?"
His head jerked back at that, brows furrowing. "What?"
"Were you a bad boy? Did daddy Reign take away all your stuff as punishment?"
"I don't have a lot of shit."
"You have no shit," I corrected, moving in, going to his nightstand, pulling drawers open, something he allowed me to do. Most people were touchy about snooping. But aside from a box of condoms and a pocketknife, there was nothing interesting in his top drawer. "Whoa, I stand corrected," I went on as the second drawer revealed to me something I maybe should have expected. Long, silver, lethal. "Do you always keep a gun in your nightstand?"
"Yep."
"Have you ever shot it?"
"That one in particular? No."
"But other guns."
"Yeah."
"Fucking around? Or to maim or kill?"
"All of the above."
He didn't even pause in answering.
About killing someone.
I should have been shocked, appalled, scared.
But, well, that wasn't the life I lived in.
First, because I was a sick fuck with sick tastes in books, movies, and TV. Second, because of my new family. I wasn't naive. I knew the down and dirty stuff Shane especially did, but also all the others, that Eli had nearly beaten a man to death, that Charlie had some bodies in his wake from his early days.
Maybe being accepting of that meant that my moral compass was not pointing quite as north as it should have, but that was just the reality I lived with.
Besides, Sugar was a Henchmen.
You kind of had to assume that he had hurt or killed people. It would have been naive of me to imagine otherwise.
"That night I drove you home, did you have a gun on you?"
"Yeah."
"What about at the library?"
"Couldn't protect Reese without one."
"And tonight?" I asked, resting my hands down behind me on the bed, leaning back in a way that made my tits pop out, making his gaze go there hungrily for a long moment. It drifted back up as he reached up to shrug out of his cut, then pulled his tee off by the back of the neck, the way only guys do. Next, he undid his fly, dropping his pants.
And me, well, I was so distracted by the cock pressing against his tight boxer briefs that I completely forgot we had been having a conversation until he leaned down, reached into something around his ankle, and came back with something a little smaller - but no less intimidating - than the one in his nightstand.
"Yeah, tonight too," he told me, showing me the flat side of it as he moved closer to me, putting it down on the nightstand.
"I've never held one," I admitted as he moved in closer, his legs touching my knees as he towered over me.
"You wanna?"
"Yes."
"You want me to teach you?"
There was no rational reason for it, but those words made my sex clench hard.
"Would you?"
At that, he suddenly reached down, snagging me behind the knees, and yanking hard
enough that my arms flew out, and my back hit the mattress as he pulled my knees up around his hips as he pressed down, his cock rubbing against my cleft.
"Teach you anything you want," he promised. "But first..." he trailed off as he finally came fully over me, his lips claiming mine.
There was no more talking then.
Just feeling.
Just his strong, wide hands on my skin, yanking down my shirt and bra so he could suck my nipples into his mouth, trace them with his tongue, bite them until my back arched almost painfully off the mattress.
His body yanked away suddenly, reaching down to discard his boxer briefs, reaching into the nightstand to protect us, then grabbing my hips, and flipping me over onto my stomach.
"Knees on the bed, baby," he demanded, voice somehow both soft and rough at the same time.
Planting my forearms on the mattress, I pulled my knees up, feeling them teetering on the edge as he moved in a little closer, his thighs brushing the insides of my ankles as his fingers traced up the backs of my thighs until they found my skirt, pulling it up over my ass, and bunching it around my waist.
A low, growling sound moved through him then worked its way into my body.
Because, well, the panties were hot.
Just a small swatch of hot pink lace under each cheek, then fancy strapping over the asscheecks that met into a bow at the top of my ass.
"Wore them for you to rip off," I admitted.
"You were thinking about me, huh?" he asked, sounding way too pleased by the prospect.
"Just thinking about what you'd do to me after ripping them off," I rushed to cover, not wanting him to think I thought of him in other ways even if the truth of the matter was that I did.
"Hmm," he said, hand moving out to massage my left buttcheek for a second before gathering all of the straps in one fist and yanking. The lace between my legs pulled impossibly tight, pressing hard against my already-swollen clit before the sound of it tearing broke through the quiet of the room. "You mean like this?" he asked, fingers sliding up my cleft to circle my clit.
"Yeah, like that," I panted, hands fisting his sheets as my hips rocked, thrusting my ass further out at him.
"Or this?" he asked when his cock replaced his fingers, tapping against my clit.
Sugar (The Henchmen MC Book 12) Page 12