“Consider it done.”
“Good. All right, let’s get the fuck on the road and get this shit going.”
Tank claps his hands together like an excited school boy. “One head on a platter, coming up.”
Our bikes eat up the gravel as we hurry up to the house, we don’t have time to spare. Intel just pinged in that the man I am now hunting may have caught word that we were on our way. Nash Easton, the millionaire playboy up the road in Billings, has gotten sloppy these days, and I’ve been waiting for a reason to pay him a visit. I knew it would happen, it always does when too much power and money goes to someone's head. It doesn’t help when they start tapping into their own drug supplies either. Any good hunter has a shit ton of patience, knows their prey, and just how and when to pounce.
As we arrive, Luna’s pale face catches the moonlight as she peaks through the window. In my periphery I catch sight of the little Ruger I gave her as she scoots away from the curtain. Good girl, I think to myself.
Clomping up the front steps, flanked by the two bastards deemed necessary to accompany me, I slightly smirk to myself at the chance to wrap my hands around the neck of that piece of shit, Nash. I’ll take great pleasure in making him scream like the little bitch that he is. If I get the chance, of course. There is a reason that Blue made sure Tank came along, I was just supposed to extract information and send a message. But it isn’t a secret that I’ve had a hard-on for his head on a platter. Hence the babysitters.
The minute we enter the house, I feel the energy shift and immediately go on alert. Fucking Edge has locked his hungry gaze on my woman curled up on the couch with her tits pushed up high. Those fucking tits would start a world war. Before I even can react, he’s walking forward, hand extended, ready to introduce himself. Grabbing him by the collar, I yank his Puerto Rican ass back before he can take another step. No way in hell is this Casanova laying a hand on her even if it is in a polite greeting.
“That is mine, don’t you fucking think about even touching her,” I threaten in his ear before pushing his ass back into the kitchen, far away from her. Tank snickers in the background as he flips open the cabinet to raid my pantry.
“All right, jeez boss, didn’t know there were rules around your best kept secret.” Edge puts his hands up in surrender while throwing one last glance at Luna. My fist clenches, and, if it wasn’t for the Tank throwing me a warning glare, I would have planted it firmly in this twat-swatters face. Love him like a brother, but as with any sibling, this asshole knows exactly which buttons to push and does it just for a reaction.
“I need to talk to her, so stay in here and shut the fuck up.”
Edge nods once and takes a stool, pouting like a brat. Dude gets more pussy than any of the brothers, and he acts like he’s being forced to give it up for life. Tough shit.
Luna’s eyes are trained on the TV, she's pretending like she's not paying us no mind, when in reality I know that she’s taking every detail in to an uncomfortable degree. Sliding in front of her, I plant my ass on the coffee table, fully and intentionally blocking her view.
“Excuse you,” she huffs out, but the little tilt of the corner of her mouth tells me all that I need.
Placing an elbow on my knee, I lean forward. “There is no excuse great enough.” I wink. “Listen, storms rollin’ in again, but I have to head out on the road. Bex is gonna come stay with you.”
“I don’t need a damn babysitter.” Her brow pinches as she bites on her pink lip. Lord have mercy.
“I didn’t say you did now did I? I ain’t leavin’ you out in the middle of nowhere by yourself with a storm brewin’.”
“You didn’t even ask me first.” Her voice drops in disappointment.
“I don’t have time for this. She’ll be here within the hour.” My fingertips reach up on their own to brush a runaway hair off of her cheek before retracting back to my side. For the first time in my life, my mind quickly runs off to a place that makes me want to start praying or some shit to make sure I get back here safely. Don’t that beat all.
“Be careful.” Her soft voice holds a deceiving amount of strength, making my heart squeeze.
“No need to go on worrying about that. See you tomorrow night.” I brush off the emotions threatening to make themselves known. Shit like that does someone like me no good. What she does next is something that I will take with me to the grave.
Her hand darts forward as I start to get up, stilling me as it connects with mine. She leans forward and places the lightest peck on my cheek. “I mean it.” The sincerity in her words derails me.
Like a deer in the headlights, I sit there motionless, unsure of what to make of it. Clearing my throat uncomfortably, I quickly get up, run my hand through my hair while throwing her one last sideways glance before calling to the boys and flying through the front door. Smooth, Leo, real smooth. As we near the bikes, the vein in my neck begins to throb as anger bites, sinking its venom deep into my bloodstream. Fuck this shit, I don’t need this. At this rate, Blue will be lucky if Nash makes it through this alive. I certainly don’t give a shit either way. Hell, we can easily absorb his little operations between the regional chapters without blinking an eye. It’s not like anyone but the rich bastards he serves will miss him. With the exception of one arm of his business, that shit ends now.
My fist connects with Nash’s sharp jaw again; I can feel the crack of his bone reverberate up and into my hand. Blood drips from his ears, eyes, nose, and mouth as I hold him by the neck, his body bowed backward in an impossible angle. Drip...drip...drip… I hear it pattering onto the marble floors of his overdone kitchen. The inaudible words his mouth is trying to formulate lost meaning a while ago. Looking at his puffed up face, black and blue fading up into his once blonde hair but now stained dark red, one might almost feel remorse or sympathy. His one eye that is not swollen shut glazes over as drool begins to mix with the stream pouring from his mouth. My blood thirst is not satisfied in the least; if it wasn’t for Tank behind me, now latching onto my free arm, I would have let completely go and brought out the knives.
“Come on, you gotta let it go. We got what we need.”
“Yeah, boss, it’s all good. Let the cleaner in now.” Edge’s worried voice trails right behind Tanks.
The demons dance in my mind, their smoky veils of blackness veiling over my senses, baiting me to slip off the cliff and into their embrace. It would be easy to squeeze the neck gripped in my fist a little tighter and seal the deal. I can feel the ghostly memories now of throats succumbing to death… gurgling, straining for breath… the way the lips begin to guppy as the struggle is slowly lost. The power rush that comes knowing how they inevitably lose. My fingers tighten just a hair as I flirt a little further over the edge. Sweat drips from my creased brow, heavy with contemplation. As I am about to tip fully in the wrong direction, Luna’s moonlit eyes flash in the forefront of my mind like a beacon in the night. The invasion of her profound essence scares the shit out of me, and I drop Nash instantly, his near dead corpse crumpling like a ragdoll to the ground. My eyes lock on a swaying tree on the other side of the big, bay window as I try to get my rapid breathing under control.
“There ya go. Here─” Tank hands me a dish towel, and I absently begin dabbing my hands. The cleaner and medic cast shadows in the back as I turn toward my brothers. Edge takes a startled step back before turning and heading for the door. We follow behind, stopping off at the bathroom long enough for me to wash my hands before we are on our way back to the house, back to Luna. Her homing signal was calling me in something fierce, and I couldn’t deny it. Lord only knows what it is about this woman but I can’t get enough of her, which is strange considering all I’ve ever done was hold her hand.
Chapter 8
Luna
Not long after Leo and his PMS attitude storm off, a knock sounds out. I’m still trying to figure out what set the bear man off while making my way to answer the door when the whole damn thing bursts open. Bex, Wingz, a
nd all of their glory blaze on in, a rustle of bags and smartass remarks to one another. They barely give me a second glance as they throw everything down on the counter with matching huffs before turning their sights on me.
“All right short stuff, dinner will be up in twenty. What do you got to drink around here?” Wingz plants a hand on her hip as she scans the kitchen.
“Um, Leo doesn’t drink so I think the only thing around is the cheap beer he keeps in the garage for the guys.” Wingz’s face screws up like she is about to have a heart attack.
“Don’t worry momma, I got ya covered.” Bex snickers as she pulls out a bottle of vodka from one of the bags. “How ‘bout you short stuff?” She holds up the bottle, giving it a shake as she suggestively waggles her brow.
“Um, I don’t know.” Aside from a beer a few times in college, I never touched alcohol.
“Well, no one is gonna pressure you. I’ll make you a drink, you can try it, and if you don’t like it, I'll drink it for you.”
“Or I will.” Wingz barks out a laugh, and they happily begin to buzz around the kitchen as I hover just behind the island, a safety zone of sorts.
“Y’all don’t have to go through all of this trouble, I can manage. I’m sure you have better things to be doing.” I try to give them one last out of this asshole mandated supervision.
“Heck no honayyy, the boss spoke. Plus, we’ve been aching to get to know the mousy little thing holed up in this place.” Wingz pops open a jar of spaghetti sauce as Bex inclines her head slightly toward us as she puts the frying pan on the stove.
“Mousy? I’m not mousy.” I’m kind of offended for a moment even though I can see how they might think that.
“Ah sug, don’t take offense. We just haven’t gotten to know you, that’s all,” Bex jumps in.
“So tell us about yourself, how have you been doing cooped up in this creepy place,” Wingz inquires.
“It's not creepy, I like it here.” They both look at me strange.
“How? Whip isn’t the most social person I know,” Wingz pushes.
“He’s got some edges but we get on okay. He gives me space and lets me help with the animals, which keeps me busy.”
“He lets you work the horses?” Bex sounds surprised.
“I need something to do or I might go crazy.”
“Truth. What did you like to do before…” Wingz looks uncomfortable finishing that as Bex loudly clears her throat, handing Wingz a glass.
“Before some piece of shit from hell kidnapped me, and raped me repeatedly for two years?” I bluntly reply, not interested in tiptoeing around what I already knew they knew.
Wingz sputters on the vodka concoction she was trying to sip and swipes at her mouth with the back of her arm as she recovers.
“What? Why sugar coat it?”
“Amen sister,” Bex pipes as she drops in the ground beef, the searing sounds hissing across the way. “Well, now that that’s out of the way, how are your mentals hanging in there? Your body looks like it’s healing up nicely.”
“Meh, as good as they can I suppose. Day by day, I feel a little more like myself. The weirdest shit still sets me off.” Like the other day, one of the horses kicked the stall, and I ended up in the corner of the tack room curled up with Steel for half the day like some scaredy cat. They kick stalls all the damn time, and it doesn’t usually bother me.
“I’m sure that it’s going to take quite a bit of time,” Wingz adds compassionately.
“You gotta learn to walk again before you try to run.”
I knew what she meant, especially after the Thanksgiving debacle. “Yeah. Sorry by the way. I just wasn’t ready for Thanksgiving.” I’m currently working on trying not to beat myself up over that.
“Girl, don’t even worry about it. Shit, I’ve grown up in this life and some days I can’t handle all them drunken ass bikers.” Bex snorts as she pushes the meat around the pan, and Wingz begins chopping up an onion.
“Can I help?”
“Nah, you sit yourself right there, try that drink, right, and tell us where you come from.”
“How about you two go first.” My fingers wrap around the cup Bex hands me.
Bex blows out a long breath. “Tank and I first hooked up in college. He was a football star with a hidden geek side. I was popular enough and we’d see each other around here and there. He had it for me, but I wouldn’t give him the time of day, I was too tied up in school. Asshole lied, pretended he needed calculus tutoring and trapped me into a weekly commitment. Every Wednesday, for an hour at the library, he won me over bit by bit until I fell hard. Especially when he’d come armed with the craziest little things. Like the time he picked all the marshmallows out of a Lucky Charms cereal box, and brought just the marshmallows in a baggy with a note saying, ‘The best is yet to come, but I’m a broke ass college kid so for now you can have me charms.’ Anyways, he went off into the military and I went to medical school. We’d write here and there, but eventually slipped away from one another. A decade passed, one that saw me back around these parts. Ran into him one night at the local biker bar. I walked passed him sitting on a stool and didn’t recognize him. He was like twice the size as our college days. Fucker didn’t even say hello first, just pulled me off my feet, right up into his lap, and kissed me on my damn mouth. Stole my breath away. He had a shit-eatin’ grin while I tried to figure out what the hell just happened. He called me by my old pet name and welcomed me home… I haven’t left that lap since.” Bex sighs in complete contentedness. “Anyways, another decade later and a pair of bad mouthed twin boys, we are still going strong.” Bex turns back to turn off the boiling noodles.
Wingz is staring off into space for a moment before she comes back around. “God, I love their story. She’s leaving out so damn much. Guess it’s my turn. Stitch and I have been together about eight years, we have a daughter. I moved to Bozeman to take care of my uncle when he got sick, started working part time in an ED there doing intake. Stitch moonlights as a paramedic when he’s not wrapped up in club business. I’d see him at the hospital, all the women would make eyes his way, but he paid them no mind.” She sighs and rolls her blue eyes. “He asked me on a date once a week for six months before I finally agreed, the rest is history.” Wingz giggles, and Bex barks out a laugh.
“Now who’s leaving out details? Little girl over here got knocked up on the first date, and almost locked up in the slammer.”
“Shhhh!” Wingz slaps Bex’s arm. “It was a wild night… that turned into a couple of crazy days on the run. That’s all you need to know.”
I sip my drink, and make a face before looking at the cup like a stranger. “I don’t know, you might need to tell me more about that story as I drink some of this liquid courage over here.” Being the bookworm I was, friends were few and far between. Plus, my mother was a handful who demanded any free time I might have had.
“Like you need it, you’ve probably got more sass in you then this entire bottle.” Bex holds up the vodka and tips it toward me before pouring herself another.
“Don’t people normally drink wine with Italian food?” I grin.
“Fuck normal,” Wingz grunts as she reaches up into the Cherrywood cabinets for the big plates in the back. The rustic kitchen has more storage than I thought possible for a quaint house in the woods.
Another sip passes my lips, and heat races through my shoulders, relaxing them. I hadn’t even noticed they were wound as tight as they were. “Amen to that.”
“So, Luna, back to where you came from.” Bex leans over the opposite side of the island, her big boobs pushing up through her button down shirt, blonde hair falling forward in waves as her brown eyes lock onto mine, willing me to speak.
Unsure of myself, the cup turns up for a gulp. Licking my lips, I smack them together like they are foreign to my body. “Not much to tell, my daddy died when I was young, he was in Afghanistan. My mom did okay until my grandparents also died when I was a teen, then she slipped into t
he bottle, and I had to take care of everything while trying to finish up school. I was kidnapped from my college campus, and here I am.”
Wingz eyes crinkle up. “Girl, we better get some food in you before you drink anymore of the Kool Aid. Then you can tell us more.”
One giant bowl of spaghetti, a pan of garlic bread and another vodka drink later, I feel like a new woman.
“So, Luna, you think about going to the police and letting them know you’ve been found? Certainly someone's looking for you.” Wingz points her fork my way.
“Pft please, no one is looking for me.”
“How do you know, you’ve never even checked, I can have Tank look in on some intel for you.”
“Shit, at this rate my mother probably drank herself to death, and she was really the only family I had left aside from a few cousins I never talked to.” A hiccup bubbles up as I reach for a leftover end of garlic bread.
“I’m sorry to hear that. If you change your mind let us know. What were you studying in college?”
“Psychology,” I deadpan and they start to laugh at the irony. “I know, I know. And thus the student becomes the stereotypical head case pursuing the degree noted for head cases.” I chuckle.
“You gonna go back and finish?” Wingz eagerly asks.
“Haven’t thought about it, seeing how I can barely make it to the end of the drive.” A pang hits me at the thought, school had been my primary focus for so long.
“What about online classes?”
“I was pretty far in my doctorate, some of it I could do online but I’m pretty sure the rest I’d have to do in clinic, hands on.” The thought of clinical hours in a psych ward sends shivers up my spine. Not sure I can ever sit in front of people, hear their stories in a psychotherapy session and not freak out.
“You’re pretty young to be that far in school.” Bex’s eyes dance, she knew.
Winter's Absolution (Obsidian Blades MC Book 1) Page 10