Biting Back: A Motorcycle Club, Shifter, Romance (Shifting Steel Book 1)

by Stephanie West

  Her back was turned to the door oblivious. Iris’ voice was sad and sweet as she sang about scarred love. God help him she’d never again be subjected to the pain that tinged her voice. Cain crept back before he disturbed her, waving Eric off. He listened to her from down the hall till the song changed and Iris hummed a more subdued tune.

  God he did have it bad for that woman, no wonder the guys were harassing him.

  12 Finding Enlightenment

  Iris

  Iris wrestled with the corner of the fitted sheet. Something under the bed caught her eye.

  “Ooh a girly magazine.” Iris pulled it out. “Let’s see what Cain’s into.”

  As Iris retrieved it she was distracted by what lay behind it. Cain had cuffs, leather straps and a cane. Iris was bombarded by the image of her hands cuffed to the headboard, knees restrained high, opened wide for Cain to do whatever dirty thing he wanted.

  Iris then realized that he’d probably also used these on some slut like Samantha, and felt instantly sick. She couldn’t help it, she was falling for Cain hard. Iris wasn’t stupid the man had had sex before. But it’s one thing to know it and another to see the things that touched another woman’s body. Iris stood up and found she was shaking.

  Cain

  Cain couldn’t stay away from Iris for long. There was nothing in the clubhouse that needed doing that seemed more important than spending time with her.

  He wandered to his room in time to watch her pull her face from under the edge of his bed. She was a little pale.

  Shit!

  He really didn’t need her to find that stuff. Cain made no apologies for his little kink. However Iris had been abused, restrained, and tortured. She’d watched him kill, turn into an animal and hunt her down. This was the last thing she needed to find.

  Iris startled as she noticed Cain and backed up with the saddest look of betrayal in her eyes.

  “You’ve used these on women?” Was her soft wavering inquiry.

  Cain’s heart cracked wide open. She could forgive the fact that he was a rogue, even that he was an animal. But not the idea that he was some sort of sadistic monster.

  “Yes” Cain said as he shook his head at her. “I would never…not with you.” She’d been tied up enough.

  “Cain… I” Iris began then she closed her mouth and fled the room.

  Cain wanted to chase her. He wanted to pull her into his arms and promise her he would never hurt her, that no one would ever restrain her again. But how could he? He already held her against her will, mounted her forcefully and bitten her shoulder deep enough it would scar.

  Iris

  “You’ve used these on women?” Iris asked. It was stupid question, she already knew the answer.

  “Yes” Cain said as he shook his head at her.

  Iris wanted to tell Cain there was no way she could sleep knowing there were toys he’d used on other women under their bed. Except the moment the thought entered her mind she realized it wasn’t their bed. It wasn’t their anything.

  What had she expected, an undying confession of love. No, but at the very least she wanted Cain all to herself.

  “I would never…not with you.” Cain said. The way he looked at her with such pity, spoke volumes.

  Even after all he’d revealed, he kept this side of himself secret. Cain thought she was broken, too damaged.

  Cain was a dominating Casanova and Iris had played the willing damsel in distress to a tee. No wonder the alpha male in him was drawn to her. But just because he enjoyed fucking her didn���t mean he was looking for anything more than that. Iris tried to reply but the words stuck in her throat.

  “God I’m in over my head. I’m such a fool.” Iris thought. She had to get the hell out of here. Iris ran into Penny in her haste to leave.

  “Can we go somewhere, anywhere?” Iris nearly cried her distraught request.

  Penny nodded and they took off for the bakery Penny ran.

  Hank

  Hank’s good little spy called him. His lucky charm was going to some bakery owned by the giant Reaper’s sister. He had to get her back! Every one of his ventures were going to shit. He’d take what was his and then take off, start new and do it big.

  Watching and waiting near the shop put Hank on edge. There were too many people coming and going. When he went in, the Reaper’s sister was at the register. His bitch must be somewhere in the back. Hank went back to his car with some random pastry he bought, to wait.

  He waited for them to leave except the opportunity didn’t allow him the advantage he needed. He’d be back. The Reapers would give him his lucky charm back one way or another.

  Iris

  Penny’s shop was nice. This was one of the businesses the Reaper’s owned, as Cain had alluded. It was nicer and girlier than she expected considering who owned it. Obviously they let Penny call the shots.

  The bakery was situated in an old Victorian home in a neighborhood populated with hipsters. The customers came and went buying coffee, tea, cookies and pies. The place was successful, probably because Penny was a whiz in the kitchen. It even had a little place Penny’s daughter could play tea party when she brought her to work.

  Iris hung out in the bakery kitchen “helping”, more like mutilating pie crust. Penny tried to talk to her but Iris just couldn’t. She felt jealous, conflicted, and embarrassed for over reacting. It wasn’t like she was Cain’s “Old Lady.”

  She should be touched that Cain didn’t throw her straight into the deep end with his sexual prowess. What they’d already done had been pretty intense.

  Iris couldn’t help but feel insecure. Man that emotion really sucked when it reared its ugly head. She hated feeling like Cain pitied her. The thought that he���d only been drawn to her because she was so needy and desperate, inciting his instinct to protect, made her depressed.

  Iris shook her head. She could either get all worked up over things that might or might not be and ruin shit, or relax and enjoy whatever it was that was going on between her and Cain.

  Iris really wished she could get a clear picture of what was happening between them. But she got nothing. Her gift was like that. She could see death clearly, as well as many things about other people. But things like this about her own life and it was silent more often than not. She had to muddle through like everyone else.

  Sooner than Iris was ready they were heading back to the clubhouse, bringing dinner to the guy. Both Cain and Iris ate in silence, neither quite sure what the hell was going on. Cain slept beside her but made no attempt to do anything else. Iris couldn’t blame him, after having gone all emotional on him. Maybe if she was brave enough she’d try to talk to him tomorrow, and let the pieces fall where they may.

  Cain

  Iris ran from him. She didn���t scent of fear when she left only sadness, but he���d seen the way she looked at his handcuffs. It killed him. If she’d gone with anyone but Penny he would’ve gone after her. The idea of her turning to one of his brother drove him nuts.

  Last night had been torture. Cain had debated sleeping on the couch, but somehow he couldn’t leave her side. Cain didn’t really sleep. Iris was curled on her side facing the wall. He laid there wanting more than anything to hold her, but resisted. His touch would likely only push Iris over the edge.

  Today wasn’t any better particularly since their strip club was being raided. It would be a busy day.

  “I gotta head out.” Cain said to Iris. She’d been quiet. He didn’t blame her.

  “Okay be safe.” Iris said with a tentative smile.

  She moved close to him and tipped her head up looking up into his eyes. Cain leaned forward and kissed Iris. She seemed so nervous and unsure, or maybe it was him.

  “When I get back let’s talk.” Cain said feeling like a girl as the words came from his mouth. But they did need to talk. He couldn’t bear the idea that Iris feared him for any reason.

  Cain did his best to clear his head as he hopped on his Harley and heade
d out with the guys to do damage control.

  Iris

  Iris couldn’t help but clean like her life depended on it. Cain wanted to talk. She did too, but somehow when a guy said it, it meant you were getting kicked to the curb. When he’d kissed her goodbye there was none of the usual passion or zeal that she’d come to know from him.

  It was starting to get late and if she wiped down the bar one more time, she’d wear through the varnish. More than half the guys were still out dealing with the police raid and locking down their other businesses. Samantha trotted in and Iris wanted to groan. This was the last thing she needed.

  “Hey this package was out by the gate with your name on it. What’ve you been up to slut?”

  Iris took the package from her snotty little hand. “Iris” was scrolled across it. Only the people in the club really knew her by that name.

  Iris opened it tentatively, expecting a bomb knowing the redheaded viper. It was a cell phone with a video set to play.

  Iris watched in horror. Penny lay on concrete barely conscious, her face swollen and her little girl, Nola, huddled beside her. Iris knew that basement. She just didn’t know where it was. Hank was ranting maniacally, his disgusting face loomed in the video.

  “The Reapers will return my property and I will return theirs.”

  “Oh God! Oh God!” Iris went numb as Hank continued to level threats in the video.

  Cain

  Cain stormed back into the clubhouse, Eric close behind him. Eric’s phone in hand, but the calls he kept making went directly to Penny’s voicemail. Why the fuck hadn’t his sister been at home or the bakery?

  Iris stood staring at a cell phone, with a look of absolute panic and terror on her face, her eyes red and swollen.

  “Have you seen Penny?” Eric blurted out.

  Cain watched as Iris slumped crashing to the floor. He raced to her side and scooped her into his arms. As Cain glanced over at the cell phone she dropped, the image he saw frozen on the screen had him reeling.

  Iris

  Iris awoke from the most terrible nightmare, only to realize it wasn’t a nightmare.

  “It’s all my fault.” Iris whispered. She didn’t realize anyone heard till Cain gripped her shoulders.

  “Stop-it. You need to tell me what you know.” Cain spoke sternly, his eyes flashing frighteningly. Iris could see that his other side was barely leashed.

  “That’s the place Hank kept me. I don’t know where it is.” Iris sobbed. “Oh God!”

  Cain shook her a bit hoping to snap Iris out of it. Or maybe he was just as pissed with her as she was with herself. If it weren’t for her none of this would’ve happened.

  “Think! Is there anything you can tell me?” Cain demanded.

  Iris shook her head. Her gift was quiet.

  “I see nothing.” Iris cried as she peered up at Cain through wet eyelashes.

  Cain punched the wall. Eric, Penny’s old man, bellowed an anguished sound and Iris knew what he’d finished watching.

  Iris numbly wandered to Cain’s room, collapsed on the floor and stared out the window. Her mind was screaming.

  “Why are you so quiet? WHY when I need you the most? My friends NEED you! What is the purpose? WHAT IS THE POINT!”

  Her mind tumbled around the injustice of this gift she couldn’t control. It was twice as strong as before and yet it wasn’t doing shit. She couldn’t save her friends. Iris hung her head as angry tears fell. Her bleary eyes falling on the bamboo cane under the foot of Cain’s bed. Maybe there was one way.

  Pain.

  Cain

  Cain finished barking out commands to the brothers. “Figure out where that psychotic bastard has my family! I want his fucking head!” He snarled.

  The man was dead, he might be walking around but he was already dead. Cain was going to gut the fucker while Hank watched himself die, only after he’d broken Hank the way he did Iris, the way he did Cain’s sister. If he touches that child…

  Cain had to find Iris. She’d left looking distraught.

  Cain stepped into his room and heard the recognizable parting of the air followed by a resonant crack. Iris knelt on the floor in her bra and panties staring stoically, blindly out the window. There were countless red angry welts covering her thighs many of them oozed rivulets of blood. She was mutilating herself. Iris raised the bamboo switch again but Cain grabbed it halting her downward swing.

  “NOOOOoooo” She screamed.

  Cain dropped down in front of her pulling Iris to his chest. What the fuck was she doing? Her anguish was so thick, the scent of it mixed with her blood overwhelming him. She was ranting as she cried.

  “The pain clears my mind. It banishes everything else till there’s nothing. Then I can hear. Then I can see.” Her eyes rose up pleadingly. “Please it’s the only way to find them.”

  Cain put Iris into the shower then stripped so he could join her. How did he wind up here in his life? Cain felt so much potential and hope, but also fear and dread at all he had to lose.

  He held Iris as he looked at the bloody welts from her self inflicted wounds. Cain hung his head on her shoulder, trying to understand what she was saying. It seemed so crazy! How did pain make her insights clearer. Maybe it was like that Zen place he reached in the heat of battle, where everything else drifted to the background.

  Fuck. That was her secret. That was the thing he’d sensed she kept from him. No wonder. There were evil people out there that would torture her for their own gain. One such bastard already had, a soon to be very dead man.

  There had to be another way. Iris needed something to raise her to a higher place. She needed something to help her transcend herself so she could commune in a place that was in itself pure emotion, pure energy. But to reach that plane she sacrificed herself in a way Cain couldn’t stomach. Even now he watched in horror as her blood mixed with water and swirled down the shower drain. His angel deserved unbridled ecstasy, not agony.

  Cain laid Iris on the bed after toweling her dry.

  “There has to be another way. Please let me try.” Cain practically begged as he thumbed a tear from her cheek.

  Cain had an idea, and hoped like hell it would work. He stepped into the hall and made a phone call.

  “Cain I don’t have any updates. The brothers are a combing the city.” Trip said as he walked into the clubhouse office. Cain nodded acknowledgement. “Why’d you pull me in man?”

  Cain unloaded everything onto his friend, telling him about Iris, right up to the point he’d left her minutes ago. Then he told Trip what he wanted his help with, watching as Trip shook his head.

  “She needs it Trip. I can’t bear to watch her hurt herself and she’ll do it again. It’s the only thing I can think of.”

  “Man Cain! You nearly ripped my head off when you saw me protecting her at the fight. Your beast marked her. You know what that means! Do you really think your animal is gonna allow this? I personally don’t know if I can.” Trip shook his head in denial.

  Cain understood Trip wanted to protect him, Iris, and himself from further pain. But Iris was a hard nut to crack. She needed something beyond intense or this wouldn’t work. Cain couldn’t bear the thought of Iris blaming herself. It would break her, if it already hadn’t.

  “Come see.” Cain led Trip to his room.

  Iris laid listless in the bed just as he’d left her. She made no protest as Cain unwrapped the sheets exposing her to Trip’s view. Trip’s eyes roamed the raw welts on her body along with the other scars. His friend, his brother, grimaced a sad angry expression coming over his face.

  “If I had known what that man was doing to her.” Trip growled.

  Cain understood. It pissed him off every time he looked at sweet Iris. Cain looked at his friend imploring him to understand. Trip nodded his reluctant ascent and then walked to the bathroom.

  Iris

  Iris barely listened to Cain as he murmured “he couldn’t bear” what she was doing to herself, “to please let hi
m try something.” Iris didn’t know what he wanted to try. All she knew was what worked.

  Her skin burned but the pain wasn’t nearly enough to clear her mind. The weeks of unending abuse had seen to that, thickening her skin. Cain wouldn’t permit her to take it any further. Now what would it take? Iris didn’t have nearly enough time to starve herself till she was in that in between state of oblivion.

  Trip emerged from the bathroom dripping wet, a towel wrapped around his waist.

  Iris turned her confused gaze to Cain as he stripped off his shirt.

  Iris sat up to ask what they were doing but got distracted as the bed dipped beside her. Trip sat at her left while Cain knelt by her right knee.

  “We’re gonna take you to that place you need to go baby. I just got a different way to get there.” Cain said with a pained look on his face as he studied her.

  We?

  Trip ran the back off his rough hand up along Iris’ arm then across her shoulder. Iris made a nervous sound watching him. Cain brushed his fingers across her thighs then gently kissed the marks she’d inflicted on herself. Iris shivered bound loosely in the sheet.

  It quickly became hard to focus on any one thing the men were doing. Hands and mouths roamed her body. Her neck was caressed and sucked slowly. A hand exposed her breast and Iris’ nipples puckered in the cool air. The inside of her thighs were stroked teasingly, increasingly higher.

  Iris was persuaded to her back, flanked by two strong wildly seductive men. She opened her mouth to accept Cain’s kiss.

  When had he lost his pants?

  Trip started to lave her nipple with his pierced tongue.

  What had she agreed to?

  Cain’s mouth sipped at hers. Tasting. Claiming. His hand kneading her breast.

  Trip’s hand drifted down her thigh while sucking her other nipple in deep, flicking it with the barbell in his tongue. The pull of his mouth echoed in her core. Trip brushed his fingers tentatively across her mound.