Lady Sings the Blues

by Sarah Zolton Arthur

  “Yeah,” he laughs humorlessly.

  “Yeah? That’s it? Care to expound?”

  “Not really, not tonight.”

  “Beau, I just agreed to marry you and still you don’t trust me?”

  “No, not that, darlin’. Just, especially tonight with you just agreein’ to marry me, this shit’s…unpleasant to say the least.”

  “Okay,” I mummer and turn away, tucking my hands under my pillow to lift it closer against my face.

  “Shit—alright. Okay.” He sighs sadly before starting up again. “You remember your pops’ friend Rex?”

  I turn back to him and nod. “I met him only a few times. Whenever he and my dad hung out, they’d do it away from the house.”

  “Not surprised. Your pops wanted to keep you away from all that shit.”

  “Shit?”

  “Rex was your pops best friend all his life. When they were teens and your pops went off to college, Rex became a prospect with the Lords. Their lives took ‘em in different directions, your pop to medical school, a husband and eventually a father. For Rex, his eventually led him to becomin’ our prez.”

  When he stops talking, I suck in a breath.

  “He was also Duke’s older brother.” Beau finishes.

  “Really?”

  He nods. “Really. The club was located farther outside town then. Almost to the edge of the county. Anywho, the club was into some bad shit back then, baby girl. Bad shit. I won’t go into it, but if you ever watched any TV shows or movies about outlaw biker gangs, that’d be about right.”

  Inside, I’m freaking right the hell out. But somehow, somehow I know that if he senses it, he’ll shut down and likely never open back up. To keep our conversation flowing, I push back any thoughts of a freak out, and nod my head to tell him I understand and to continue.

  “We were at war with the Horde for years over territory, this was before I came in at the end. Shit got real, too real. Brothers ended up dyin’, a lot of brothers ended up dyin’ includin’ their prez and ours. Hell, the only one of his lieutenants left standin’ was Duke and that’s only cuz he’d taken a leave of absence. Dawna’s cancer had come back and he’d been stayin’ outside Chicago while Dawna got some specialized treatment from that big cancer hospital up there.”

  “I know the one.” My response feels as stupid as it sounds, as the big cancer hospital is hardly the point of this story.

  If my stupidity bothers him he doesn’t show it. “I’d been hangin’ at Lady a lot back then, drinkin’ my pain away.” He continues on. “Logan dead, you just gone. The baby. It was all too much. I was lost. Couldn’t go back to school. Everything just—well, since I was such a hanger-on, some of the brothers looked to recruit me. I was all alone and they offered me a place, a family. So I took ‘em up on it. Was a prospect when the big shit went down. I won’t go into what I saw or what I had to do to stay alive. You don’t need those images in your head and I never want you to think of me as anything but the Beau you know. This ain’t up for negotiation. Take it or leave it.”

  “Okay,” I tell him right away, figuring I’ll eventually find out, but if he’s not in the mind frame to share yet, who am I to force the issue? “I’ll take it.”

  A beat. Then two. Then three he stares at me as if waiting for me to argue, and shakes his head. I can see the ‘what am I going to do with you’ question dancing in his eyes.

  “Duke had to come back to take his place at the head since they were all gone. But he promised Dawna that if he took over, they’d get outta all the shit they’d been into because he needed to be there to take care of her. So he needed lieutenants who wanted outta the life. Who wanted the family but not the shit. I got patched in when he took over because of how I handled the shit I had to do. Mick, who shoulda been Duke’s VP got sent up for takin’ out a cop in a bar brawl. That left me to take the spot ‘cuz Duke knew I didn’t want the shit, like he didn’t. Chaos and Blood got patched in a few months after me. And a few months after them came Carver and ended with Sneak. We called a tentative truce with the Horde while they regrouped. Although we never trusted ‘em to stay down. Eventually brothers either left or decided bein’ outta that shit was a better place to be. So here we are.”

  “I don’t know what to say.”

  “Nothin’ much to say. It is what it is, darlin’.”

  I suppose he’s right. That was then. That’s not the club they are now. So be it.

  “How soon we talking?” I ask, changing subjects. “The wedding?”

  Swiping a finger along the apple of my cheek, he leans over to kiss my temple as he laughs lightly through his nose, seeing my subject chance for what it is.

  “Soon,” he says, showing me that crooked smile of his.

  And that’s it. He gave me heavy without making it too heavy. I love him, I’m sure of it, and I think it’s about time he know.

  “I love you, Beau,” I say confidently, and lean up to kiss him.

  Beau closes his eyes just a moment, squeezing me tighter. “Say it again.” He pleads.

  Since I don’t mind, I say it again. “I love you, Beau.”

  “Love you too, darlin’.”

  17.

  Beau

  “Holymotherfuckinglordoftheuniverse!” she cries out in one long, jumbled mass of profanities. Loud. So loud, I think prospects guarding the gate can hear her.

  My ring on her finger, life is falling into place. It didn’t take much to divest my fiancé from all her clothing. Just a nightshirt and panties. Every time I look at her like this, it’s hard to believe she’s finally mine. She’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen in my life. Her eyes are closed now and I prefer she keep them open so I can drink in their depths when she comes. Just knowin’ why those soulful, blue beauties are closed, I’ll let it pass this time.

  Starting at her navel, I licked and sucked my way down, kissing on each thigh until she whimpered. Then I put my mouth to her, the woman so ready her back arched off the bed, fisting the sheets, she ground against my mouth, my tongue. Those thighs trembling the closer she got to the edge.

  Needing to up my game, I dragged my thumb through her wetness. But when I pushed it into that tight, puckered hole of her ass, her legs snapped together so fierce, I thought she’d snap my head clean off my neck.

  “Holymotherfuckinglordoftheuniverse!” she cries.

  This is how life should be. The smell of her, the taste of her on my lips, I trace a trail of kisses up her abdomen, over each swell of breast, taking extra care with each pink, pert nipple, up her collarbone. Then again more attention to the dip of her throat, licking and nipping the way she likes it, over her chin, jaw, behind her ear until finally I reach her mouth, kissing her hard, deep and wet so she can taste herself, how amazing she tastes.

  “On your stomach, baby girl,” I whisper, as I’ve decided to change tactics after making her come so hard already. This is gonna be fun. She flips over and I crawl on top of her. Spreading her legs, I slide my knee under her thigh to give me more leverage, and slide inside her. We both groan as I fill her slowly, inch by inch, until I’ve filled her completely. Before I begin to move, I tilt her chin back kissing those lips again, taking that mouth deep again. Then begin pumping slow and rhythmic. This ain’t no race, I’m not fucking Elise tonight. I’m making love to my fiancé. My fucking fiancé.

  It’s a beautiful word for a beautiful woman. But I end up losing all that rational thought as she pushes her sumptuous ass back against me, grinding, trying to take as much of me as she can get. My girl is a voracious lover. Hungry for my cock, always so hungry for my cock.

  Easy from our sweat-slicked bodies, when I start to get close, I flip her around onto her back without disengaging from her tight heat to pull her calves up over my shoulders. This way I know I can go deep.

  “Beau,” she practically sings, and I’ve never loved the sound of my own name so much.

  “I’m here, baby girl. Come for me. You got it in you.”

&nb
sp; ***

  “What the fuck is that?” Chaos, of all people, grabs Elise’s left hand, shoving it in my face.

  “Manhandle my fiancé again, I’ll put you in the ground.” Although I keep my tone light, he’s known me long enough to read the words loud and clear.

  “You’re rewarding her? Christ.” He turns to look at her. “You know I think the world of you, doll. But you’re shit for an old lady and bad for the club.”

  I have no idea if Elise responds or was even plannin’ to respond. Have no idea if Chaos opened his stupid yap again. Not when all I can see is red, and crack him so hard in the jaw blood and spit fly from his mouth. He stumbles backward hitting the bar which stops him from stumbling any further.

  “Say another word, we got issue, brother. I love Elise. I’m marryin’ her and I want you standin’ up with me when it happens. Nashville was an honest mistake. Even Duke realizes it.”

  And then Candy, the hot mama I’d been fucking before Elise showed back up in my life has the nerve to get in my face, resting her hand on my chest. “Bossman, you can’t be serious. You’re gonna marry her? I did everything you ever asked. You needed it, I got it. Wanted to fuck, I dropped whatever I was doin’ for you exclusively, but you make her your old lady—now your wife? That’s fucked up.”

  “Shut it, Candy.” I swat her hand off me like it’s a mosquito, she’s just as annoying.

  “I thought after what she did, you’d come back to me,” she whines.

  “Did I ever lead you on?”

  “What?”

  “Did I ever lead you to believe we had anything more than fuckin’ between us?”

  She sucks in a breath. “No.”

  “Did I talk about takin’ an old lady?”

  Now she lets that breath out. “Yes.”

  “Tell ‘em who, Candy. They already know but I need you to say it.”

  She says nothing.

  I give her arm a light shake. “Now.”

  “Elise.”

  “So then why in the hell do you think it’s okay for you to come at me the mornin’ of my engagement to the woman I always said would be my old lady, layin’ your shit at my feet?”

  “I just—”

  “Get the fuck out, Candy. You wanna fuck other brothers, that’s your deal. But hear me now, you pick this shit up—toss it out, carry it with you—I don’t give a damn. But you keep it out of my life, away from my woman. You don’t say one god dammed word to her. You don’t look cross-eyed in her direction.”

  “Beau, it’s okay baby. After what I did—”

  “No you don’t.” I cut her off. Putting a stop to this now. “Don’t you ever take that shit on. What you did was a mistake. This world—my world—is new to you. So no, it’s not fuckin’ okay.” I turn to point my finger in Candy’s face, actually poking the skin of her cheek to drive my point home. “Know your place, woman. You’re a hot mama, a good fuck and loyal to the club. But Elise is a great fuck, the best I’ve ever had. Loyal to me, and she’s not just an old lady. With Dawna gone she the top lady. I know even she didn’t realize her place, what agreein’ to marry me means. But now, no one’s in the dark. So what do you have to say to Elise?”

  “Fuck. I’m sorry. Welcome to the club.” She puts no warmth behind that lame apology we all know she don’t mean a damn word of, but I can see my woman squirming next to me, so I decide to drop it for now.

  “I’m takin’ Elise to see the new club, meet the girls we’re keepin’ from the acquisition and set up for some new hires.”

  I grab her hand, tugging her along behind me. My brothers, other hot mamas, leftover pieces from the night before, they part for us like I’m Moses, all staring at her. At me. Yeah, I’m the VP, but I don’t usually throw that power around. But fuck it if Chaos and Candy didn’t bring that asshole out in me. If prez would’ve wanted her gone, well she and I would’ve sold our stakes in the businesses and moved somewhere, maybe out west. That’s how serious I am about this lady. But he was there. He talked to me, talked to Elise. Someone gets in my face over this, I will knock them down literally or figuratively. You don’t mess with mine.

  “We’re taking the bike?” she asks, as we move through the lot in front of the compound.

  “Think you know the answer to that.” I’m gonna enjoy today’s ride. Wanting to create a business environment, being the new manager she decided to dress like a manager in this sexy as sin black pencil skirt which she has to hike way the hell up her thighs to be able to mount my ride. As her thighs straddle me, her barely there lacey thong presses up against me, her arms wrapped around my chest. I feel those tits pressed against my back.

  Not that she don’t get me hard just by looking at her, but I know those tits sit cupped in a matching barely there lacey bra, both white. Which she wears underneath this fitted white blouse with pearlescent buttons keeping it secured. Buttons she didn’t begin to button until the third button down to give me a peek of cleavage. She accentuates her hourglass figure with a thin black belt. Yeah, this gets me hard. Revving my engine—pun intended—I look down needing to adjust myself, and notice the cherry red sex kitten heels she’s wearing. The only color she’s wearing aside from the same cherry staining her lips.

  We’re out of the compound riding toward town when she yells to me, “I’m nervous.”

  “Nothing to worry about, darlin’. Your resume is good. Best we seen—truth.”

  “Fuck me,” she says.

  I hear her but ask, “What?” thinking she means it like she forgot something. She don’t.

  “Fuck me,” she says again. “Calm my nerves.”

  “Where you want it, baby girl?”

  “Here. On your bike. Pull over, bend me over your bike Beau, and calm my nerves.”

  Never let it be said that I don’t keep my woman happy. With just the trees to watch us, I pull the bike over to the shoulder of the road. She immediately jumps off the back. I dismount and pull her in for a long, wet kiss before pushing her head down against the seat so her ass sticks up in the air. With those heels she’s the perfect height.

  “Let me get you ready.”

  “Already there,” she whimpers, and I reach my two fingers inside her thong to check.

  This is why I love her on the back of my bike, she’s dripping for me.

  “I just need you.”

  “You got me, darlin’,” I growl.

  Never ceases to amaze me, Elise. I unbutton my jeans, pull the zipper down and tug them around my hips only. Kicking her feet apart to widen her stance at the same time tugging her thong to the side, I plunge in hard and fast. She gasps loudly from the intrusion, yet shoves back greedily against me. We go at it, pounding. Punishing.

  “Harder!” She demands, practically screaming. “Oh gawd, harder Beau!”

  I laugh. “I go any harder…my cock is liable…to punch a hole…through your abdomen.”

  Then we hear it, both our heads turn to the rumble of a car engine in the distance. “Don’t you dare stop.” She keens.

  Same, I tell her, “Come on, baby girl. Gotta finish this.”

  The rumble gets closer. Not big on going to jail, but no way I’m pullin’ out if we don’t finish before the car catches us. Still I shift down, pounding as hard as I can physically pound. I feel it, the moment she tenses, her walls undulate, then clamps those tight pussy muscles around my throbbing cock. And that’s all she wrote. I lose it, spilling into her as she continues the vice grip, milking every drop from me. Fuck, I can’t hardly move, but that car is close. We don’t even have time for a proper comedown before I pull out with a hiss from Elise at our quick separation.

  And I don’t even have a napkin or anything to wipe myself down with, tucking back inside my jeans and zip, then help her stand. We hardly have her thong back in place, her hands smoothing down her skirt when the car passes us.

  Couldn’t have been any closer. She laughs. I laugh, falling into each other.

  “You want to go back, clean up?”

>   “No,” she answers, surprising the hell out of me. “The squish as I walk feels sexy. I like knowing you’re inside me.”

  Wow.

  “Woman, you can’t say shit like that to me or we will never make it into the club today.”

  She only shrugs. “I love you.”

  “Never gets old hearin’ that.”

  ***

  Several of the waitresses and a few of the dancers fawn all over me. I push them away tellin’ them what seems like for the hundredth time, “Not me you have to impress. I’m a man who likes tits, I’m already impressed. Bosslady,” I point to Elise, who seems a little startled by this new nickname, although there’s amusement and excitement dancing in those eyes. “She’s the manager. She the one you need to impress.”

  You can see it, each one of those women thought coming on to me was a way to further their careers. Guess I can’t blame them, for a long time—too long a time—I was single and up for being impressed. Kind of bitin’ me in the ass, though, as I keep tryin’ to let it be known, understood, that I’m totally, completely, officially off titty radar. Unless we’re talkin’ Elise.

  “Can I get you anything?” Heidi, a pretty, little blonde waitresses, one of them failing to clue in and continuing to lay it on pretty thick with me, finally turns her attention to the manager.

  “Yeah,” Elise answers, sharply. “Can I get you to keep your hands off and quit eye-fucking my man as he’s already explained he’s taken, and I control your employment?” Don’t see that very often. I know she trusts me, so this show of possession is for the women here. She’s setting up dominance. MC must be rubbing off on her. And I gotta say, this jealous bit is as sexy as fuck.

  “I wasn’t…” Heidi fumbles.

  Elise stands from the table. She folds her arms across her tits, and cocks her head, pinnin’ Heidi with a hard, take no bullshit, stare. “Save it. I hear you’re good, those double Ds and tight ass will get you good tips and bring back regulars who’ll want in your section, hoping to get in your pants. But try that shit again, you will find yourself sans job, got me?”