Hardcore

by Jenika Snow

  “I’m not letting you leave again, Claire,” he whispered, but she was already asleep. He held her tighter, willing to draw blood and leave bodies in his wake to make her his world.

  ****

  Claire was wide awake, staring at the ceiling, and thinking about what she’d done with Big. This changed everything, put her right back in her situation before she’d left, but it was also different. He’d confessed his love for her, told her that he wanted her as his old lady. Turning just her head and staring at him, she took in the masculinity that came from him. His face was square, and not classically handsome in any sense. His dark hair was mussed around his head from lying in the bed and from fucking her. God, just thinking about him between her thighs, his powerful body thrusting into hers, his dominance covering her, controlling her, had Claire warm all over the place.

  She breathed out slowly and knew that she wouldn’t be able to walk away again. She wouldn’t.

  His eyes were closed, but she knew the dark color would be like looking into a bottomless pit. His cheeks and chin were covered in scruff, and she felt the tenderness between her thighs from that short, coarse hair, from when he’d licked and sucked at her. She moved her gaze down his big body, over his broad shoulders, and took in all of the tattoos he had.

  Bleeding Mayhem was tattooed right on his chest in large, bold Old English script, a tattoo all the guys in the club sported to show their loyalty. She lifted a hand and ran her finger lightly over the ink, and continued to move her gaze over the sparse hair that covered his abdomen, along the ripples of his six-pack, and to the tented sheet over his groin. She felt her eyes widen, removed her hand from his chest, and swallowed roughly. When she lifted her gaze to his face she saw her was awake and staring right at her with a hooded expression.

  “You see what you do to me?” he said in a deep voice.

  She licked her lips, her body ready to go again, but reality coming to the forefront. “We can’t gloss over our lives with sex.”

  He sighed heavily, stared at the ceiling for several seconds, and then turned his big body toward hers. Big cupped her cheek, smoothed his thumb along her healing bruises, and she could see the plethora of emotions cross his face. He was angry, sad, and this fierceness, protectiveness came from him and slammed into her, moving outward and covering her completely.

  “Did Mayhem tell you I’m going with him to take out the fucker?” Big said softly in the darkness. The lights were off, but Big must have done it because she had passed out after he fucked her into unconsciousness.

  “I haven’t talked to him again about it. Aside from me telling him when I first got here we’ve talked about other things.”

  “It’s because talking about it pisses him off. Me, too, baby.”

  She swallowed, saw the shadows move across his brutally handsome face, and knew she’d fallen down the rabbit hole. There was no going back, but as she looked into his eyes she didn’t want to. “I know, and a part of me hates that I put all of you in this situation, but another part of me just wanted to be with my family.”

  He pulled her into the hardness of his body, and even though she felt how hard he was, even though she was wet and ready to be with him sexually again, Big just held her and she welcomed the comfort.

  “I’m glad you came back, Claire.”

  The silence moved between them, and she absorbed it all.

  “I’m going to kill him, Claire. I’m going to kill him for making you hurt.”

  Chapter Ten

  Steven pushed away the woman currently draped over his chest and sat on the side of the bed. He was hiding his annoyance well, but he’d snapped a few times when he had these loose bitches in his bed, especially when they wanted more than a little dick and pussy action. Running a finger over his temple, he felt the wound that that fucking whore Claire had given him. He’d find her eventually, although if she had gone to that MC that her brother was in it might take some time. But Steven would get her alone, and then he’d make her pay for what she did.

  He gritted his teeth as his head pounded from the sudden movement of sitting up. He was still slightly drunk from the previous night, and the scent of the bitch’s pussy that was lying in the bed beside him covered him.

  Clasping his temple as it throbbed in pain, the image of Claire slammed into his head. She’d been fierce, that’s for sure, but she’d crossed the line, and she was going to pay. Standing, he walked into the bathroom and turned on the light. Staring at his reflection, he grew angrier over the wound on his head. Even after it had started healing, and he’d had the stitches removed—yeah, the fucking bitch had hit him hard enough that he’d needed stitches—it still looked like someone hit him with a fucking fireplace poker.

  He grinned at his reflection, the thoughts of getting even with her playing through his head. He felt his cock grow harder at the very thought of having her within reach. But if she did go to see her brother and that big motherfucker that he’d seen in those pictures with her it might prove to be a problem. Steven might fuck with women, exert his power over them, but those men in the MC were something altogether different. They didn’t play by any rules.

  But she distanced herself from her brother, moved away from him.

  She might have when they were together, but Steven had a feeling she might have run back there for protection. He could wait, though. Steven could wait until she came back, and when she did, when she came back to town because time had passed and she thought she was safe, he’d get even. Yeah, he’d really get even.

  Her anger was like an aphrodisiac, and he wanted more of it. He gripped his cock and stroked it a few times. What he really wanted to do was have Claire here to slap around, maybe tie up until she begged him for mercy. A moan from his bedroom had him grinning wider. He may not have who he wanted, but he had a female in his bed, and one who was about to understand the kind of submission he really liked, the kind of power play that got him off.

  He stepped out of the bathroom and stared at the cunt lying in his bed. Her hair was mussed, her body void of clothing. She crawled over to him, knowing what he liked. When she was on her knees facing him, her lips pouting, Steven reached out and grabbed her throat. He tightened his fingers around her neck until she started struggling, his grin widening, his cock hardening. He pushed her back on the bed, and she started gasping for air. That was just the start.

  He was about to have some real fun with her.

  ****

  “How do you want this to go down?” Big asked Mayhem. Both of them were in the back room, Mayhem staring out the window at the club girls that could be seen on the other side of the glass.

  “All I know is I’m going to find him, and make him hurt like he hurt Claire.” Mayhem turned around, the VP’s cut wrapping around his big body like he was born to wear it.

  Fury walked in, his face a hard mask. “I know you two want to do this alone, and I’m all for that, but I am sending Dirty and Dealer with you, just in case.”

  “We don’t need a ‘just in case’,” Mayhem said.

  Fury looked at the VP hard. “I don’t care if you use them as back-up or not, but I’d feel better knowing that you guys have the extra muscle if it turns out this fucker is crazier than normal and has a whole herd of little bastards on his side.”

  “I don’t need anyone helping me take him down, not even Big, but the brother has a fight in this given how he feels for Claire,” Mayhem said.

  Fury placed his hands on the table and eyed Mayhem. “This isn’t up for debate, Mayhem. You take the guys with you or this shit gets real, understand?”

  The silence was thick, the tension tangible. Mayhem straightened, looked at Big, and the hardness in his eyes was clear. “You want to send more guys, fine. But they stay in the back as we deal with this.”

  “That’s your call. They’ll just be there in case things get messy.”

  Mayhem nodded once. The guys had done some digging on that little fucker Steven, gotten the lowdown on him, and found o
ut he was a petty drug dealer in town. He tried to keep a legit day job to avoid suspicion from the local PD, but it wasn’t the police that would bring the asshole down.

  Mayhem took out his phone, and started looking on it. “We got info on him from digging into his past and hacking into his personal files. He has a record, a long one, mainly in drugs and domestic violence.”

  “What are you looking for, man?” Fury asked.

  “I got a hook-up in Claire’s town that’s been keeping an eye on the little shit for me since she came here.”

  “We got the info on him,” Big said.

  “I know, but I wanted to know his day-to-day bullshit happenings.” Mayhem’s stare was challenging.

  Big shrugged. “Whatever, brother. The more information the better. What did you find out?”Mayhem showed them the phone and the picture on it. “This is the fuckwad we’re going after, and it was sent to me just a few hours ago.”

  Big stared at the picture of the pansy-ass motherfucker staring off to the side. He’d already seen a mug shot from when they’d hacked the local PD database, but he still engrained this bastard’s face in his mind. The picture was slightly pixelated, most likely because it had been taken from a distance and zoomed in on. No way he was forgetting that face, no way in fucking hell.

  “When you heading out?” Fury asked and straightened from the table.

  “Probably tomorrow night. It’s about a three-hour ride to where Claire lived, and that asshole was close by. My contact says he stays in most nights, but he’s been hitting up the bars asking around about Claire. We need to lay this motherfucker down for the count.”

  “Who’s your contact?” Big asked.

  Mayhem looked at him for a second before answering. “Just some chick I fucked one of the times I went to visit Claire. She became a hook-up whenever I was in town, and surprisingly since that was only a few times she kind of grew on me.”

  “Old lady grew on you?” Fury asked, but he didn’t sound like he cared much.

  “Fuck no. She’s just a piece of pussy.”

  Big chuckled. “Nah, he’s got a hard-on for Butters.” Mayhem had recruited Butters from Claire’s town as well, but from what Big heard it was on the other side where Claire had little chance of actually knowing the woman.

  “What kind of name is Butters anyway?” Fury said and smirked.

  Hell, all their names were all a little fucked up, but even though Fury was a badass, he did like to give the guys a hard time, even with something as small as this.

  “It’s a name she got apparently ‘cause she’s slippery when wet.”

  The room was dead silent for a suspended moment, and then they all burst out laughing.

  “Well, that’s as good a reason for a name as any I guess.”

  They were silent for a moment, and Big knew he had to tell Mayhem and the rest of the crew he’d claimed Claire. “Things have changed.”

  Mayhem and Fury stared at him, their expressions stoic.

  “I know Mayhem wants me along because of what I shared with Claire in the past, but I want to do this not because of the past but because of now.”

  “What the fuck you talking about, man?” Mayhem asked, not sounding angry, but confused.

  “I want to do this because Claire’s my old lady.”

  The silence was deafening. There were no angry words from Mayhem that Big had claimed his sister, no words of warning from Fury about getting involved with a female like this. This was Big’s business, his decision, and even if one of the club members tried to talk him out of this or stop him, Big would have gone down fighting for what he wanted.

  “Okay, she’s yours,” Fury said.

  “‘Bout fucking time you claimed her, declared she’s your old lady,” Mayhem said, his voice even.

  Big grunted in response. “Mayhem, you good with all of this, with going after that asshole?” Fury asked.

  Mayhem was staring at Big, but he nodded. “I’m good, prez.” A moment of silence passed. “You treat her good, Big.”

  “I’m not about to fuck this up again, Mayhem. She’s my world.”

  Mayhem nodded. “Well, then shit’s settled. Let’s get drunk and party before things get ugly.”

  Big was glad they were light and easy right now, because what they were going to do tomorrow night would be the total opposite.

  ****

  Claire knew a decision had been made as soon as she saw Big come out of the meeting room. Mayhem and Fury were next to follow, the air coming from them screaming that things had been planned. Of course Claire would never know what those things were, not the gritty details anyway, and she didn’t think she wanted to know.

  She moved over to the bar and took a seat, her mind heavy as she thought about what she’d need to do, what she’d need to talk to Big and Mayhem about.

  Did she think Steven needed to be killed? At first she did, right after he’d hit her and she was driving toward Desertion, thinking about how stupid she was to have even given him the opportunity to hit her, that she hadn’t seen the signs of who he really was. But as the days passed she realized that yes, Steven needed to be taught a lesson, but death wasn’t the lesson that needed to be dished out. It was going to be hard explaining this to Mayhem and Big, making them see that although she loved them because of their protectiveness, over the fact they wanted to avenge her, she couldn’t have a death like that hanging over her. She was going to tell Big and Mayhem that, tell them that she might have wanted blood at first, and lots of it, now she’d rather that asshole live in fear.

  “Hey,” Mayhem said, and Claire snapped out of her thoughts and turned to look at her brother standing there with his big body blocking out everything behind him. She could see the Bleeding Mayhem Old English script tattoo on his inner arm, angry in appearance, violent in nature. “Can I sit?”

  She lifted a brow at him and smiled. “When have you ever asked to do anything?”

  He smiled and pulled the barstool out. “Good point, but I was trying to act like a good guy asking first.”

  That had her chuckling. They sat side-by-side, the silence between them lingering even though the voices and music were earsplitting.

  “You talk to him since coming back in town?” Mayhem asked, his focus on the mirror behind the bar. The bottles on the back shelf of the bar looked doubled because of their reflection, but she focused on her brother again.

  “Why would I?” she answered. “I don’t know why you’d be talking about him anyway.”

  Mayhem looked at her then, and she turned just her head to stare at her twin. “Because he’s our dad, Claire, and I’m curious.”

  “He’s a drunk that didn’t do anything for us while growing up.” She picked up her beer bottle and took a long drink from it.

  “You’re right. I don’t give a shit if we ever talk to him again. I was just wondering is all.”

  Ash handed Mayhem a beer then, but didn’t stand around and talk to them. Maybe he sensed the heavy conversation bouncing between her and the club’s VP.

  “Last I talked to him was when I told him to fuck off all those years ago.” She looked down at the bottle, picked at the peeling label, and knew that this was her family. This club and the men in it were the only ones that gave a shit about her.

  After their mom died when they were in their teens they were stuck with their drunken, verbally abusive father. When their mom had been alive she’d at least been a buffer between their dad and the nastiness that came from him often. It took a lot of years for Claire to understand why her mom would stay with such an asshole, but when she understood how things worked she finally realized reality. Her mother had been scared, broke, timid, and had nothing. Leaving him meant taking care of two kids on her own, and with no money, no job experience or family to lean on, she’d been stuck.

  She had been stuck until she died, and it was so fucking tragic.

  Claire looked at her brother again. “You talk to him recently?”

  Mayhem di
dn’t answer right away. He lifted his beer and took a long pull from it before setting it back on the counter. He breathed out heavily and nodded. “Went out with some of the guys last year. He was drinking at the bar we stopped at, all trashed and shit.” Mayhem took another drink from his beer, and after he finished it off he lifted it up to show Ash. The Patch brought him a new beer right away and set another cold one in front of her even though she wasn’t finished with the one she had.

  “Did he talk to you?” Once they’d turned eighteen they’d left. By that time Claire had been working her ass off, saving every penny she had, and Mayhem had been prospecting at the club. They’d shared a shitty one-bedroom apartment, with Mayhem sleeping on the couch. For two years they did that, both working to make ends meet, but having each other’s backs the whole time. And then when Mayhem had gotten his Patch with the MC she’d gotten a new family. They both had. She’d grown to know all the members, become close with them. As the years passed and Mayhem took over the VP spot, of course after putting in a hell of a lot of blood and sweat into the club, she realized that she didn’t need anything but what was right in front of her.

  “He didn’t even look up from his drink, and I sure as fuck didn’t stick around until he saw me. I was barely hanging on to my control by then.”

  She saw Mayhem tighten his hand on the beer bottle, his knuckles white. “I could have killed him ten times over throughout the years, Claire. I could have done that for all of us. Maybe I should have done that.” He said the last part softly.

  “No, let him live by himself, drink his life away and then die alone. He never cared for us, and I for one think we are better off without him.”

  Mayhem lifted his bottle to her, and she did the same. They clanked the necks of the bottle together and drank.

  “I know you got something on your mind,” Mayhem said and stared at her with those bright blue eyes she saw every time she looked in the mirror. “Hit me up, Claire.”

  “I know you and Big are going after Steven.”