by Isabel Wroth
“Now I remember. Lemongrass and arnica body butter.”
“It was the shit. I’m out.”
“I’ll make you more.”
She heard a familiar bark and she braced when Cruncher suddenly came flying at her, thrilled to be there and showed his appreciation by jumping like a little grasshopper. “Cruncher! No! Sit down, you’re embarrassing me.” He immediately plonked his butt and let his huge tongue loll out, still vibrating with energy when he sat up on his haunches and put his front paws together. “Excuse my dog, he thinks he’s cute.” Ever, under Roar’s skeptical eye, crouched down and loved on Cruncher until he was tits up in ecstasy. “He’s adorable!”
Her man picked her back up when she shoved a hand at him, seemingly down with the drill due to having a pregnant wife. “I have to tell you, I’m kind of thrilled not to be the only ginger around here with tits. Please tell me, you’re not a pussy.” She liked Ever immediately, “Define, pussy.” Raid snorted his beer and coughed around a laugh when he quit talking to his buddy, whose name was Roar. How sexy was that? “Well, you make girly lotions and potions and shit, that are amazing. And bath bombs that rocked my socks off. So on a scale of ballerina pink to Harley leather, how girly are you?”
“I prefer Army green, personally, but leather is-“
“You made Ever’s Lemongrass Body Butter?”
TWELVE
She turned to face the sound of her name, and goggled to see a stunning brunette in a pretty pink wiggle dress, looking totally out of place and yet perfectly comfortable, bouncing on icepick thin heels with excitement, and she looked over her shoulder to see a smoking hot, hothotHOT, curly haired six and a half foot tall man smiling in amusement at her. “Yeah, that’s me.”
“I’m Ripley. I rent space at a temple to feminism in town, I want your number to buy some stuff from you for the shop.”
“Absolutely,”
“It would be really awesome, mostly for selfish reasons, if you joined the crew and never left, you here with someone?”
She rolled her lips under when Raid growled, jerking her back to his side possessively. Ripley’s man leaned down and whispered something in her ear, making her giggle and blush a little. “Um, right, anyway, Athena, this is Saint,” He gave her one of those manly chin jerks, so hot. She glanced up at Raid and saw him smiling with a smug, satisfied light to his expression. “So? What was Ever’s question?” Ripley asked, changing the subject with ease, “Where I was at on the pussy scale. I do girly shit, but prefer Army green over pink, any day.” She told Ever matter of factly, and the resigned expression on Ever’s face cleared, “You like plants, obvi. What about guns?”
“Very pro.”
“What’s your favorite?”
She shivered at how Raid slid his hand into her back pocket and kept her close, he and his brothers smiling at her in amusement, “My uncle got me a new hand gun every year for my birthday, my favorite one being a Firestar M43, but my all time fav was the Tactical SVR rifle I got on my twenty first.” It made her giggle to remember the look of disgust he’d had on his face when she’d asked him if he couldn’t find a pink one, “He got me up at like, the crack ass of dawn, which was terrible, and after presenting me with the rifle, he shoved me up on the roof where he’d made this little sniper nest. He was kind of a kook, like a Doomsday Prepper, kind of kook, but he loved sniping deer from the roof of his house.”
She didn’t know why, but Everly threw back her head and laughed so hard she cried, while Roar stood next to her and pulled his hand down his face with a heavy sigh. “Your woman can’t come over to play with mine.” Somewhat crushed by the decree he gave Raid, she gnawed on the inside of her lip to keep from letting it show. “Shut up, he’s just pissy because that one time, I got up on the roof to snipe these boar digging up my fields.” Her man scowled at her darkly, “At four months fuckin pregnant with my son, and you slid down the god damn flag pole like a mother fuckin fireman, at four months fuckin pregnant, with my son.”
Raid was laughing at Roar’s tight tone and how Ever just rolled her eyes and told her she could come play anytime she wanted. Raid tugged her tighter to his side, his arm now around her waist, and he turned his mouth to her ear to whisper, “Please stop talking about guns, you’re making my dick hard, and I don’t want to embarrass you by dragging you off into a dark corner.” She rolled her lips under and bumped him with her shoulder, “Whatever,”
He tugged her immediately over to one of those deep seated deck chairs and after sitting, made her squeal when he hauled her down into his lap, jerking her butt right over the rather impressive proof that her talking about guns, really did turn him on. Ever and Ripley were likewise situated on their men’s laps in the same manner she was, and she was glad for the heat of the fire to be able to explain why her cheeks were so red. But in truth, they were red, because Raid was making some kind of weird, sexy statement to his friends, his brothers, just where and to who she belonged.
THIRTEEN
It was a fun, family affair, and all the Prospects were now begging the leader of the club, a very attractive older man with salt and pepper grey hair, and a black tuft of a beard with a stripe of silver down the center, (total, silver fox,) for a pittie to be their club mascot. He’d stolen Ever and Roar’s six month old son, Lyon, who was truly the most adorable baby she’d ever seen, a tiny carbon copy of his dad, with his mom’s beautiful eyes, and was refusing to hand him over. He seemed content to coddle and play with the baby, but the Prospects were bugging him mercilessly. “I fuckin said NO!” He finally roared, the baby echoed that denial with a furious baby roar of his own. It was hilarious, and she got to see a bunch of semi-grown men pout.
She snapped her fingers and Cruncher appeared, worn out from all the attention and play he’d been getting from the prospects, flopping dead at her feet to pass out with loud snore. Until someone declared the pig done, then he was all energy and she had to loudly forbid anyone giving him people food unless it was a vegetable. Which there weren’t that many of to begin with. Cruncher was crushed, until Raid took pity on him and snuck him a piece of pig when he thought she wasn’t looking. When she glared at him, he grinned and loved on her dog. “You’re the one who’ll pay later when he starts up with the toxic farts again.” She warned, but he just winked.
Someone had made amazing cream cheese brownies, Ripley, and while she was thoroughly enjoying her massive hunk of it, she asked aloud how Raid had become, Raid. His head thunked back on the chair and he groaned, while the brother’s who’d known him the longest, cracked a rib laughing. “It’s not that funny,” Raid insisted, but now she had to know, and Saint helpfully filled her in. “He’s a fuckin legend, and it isn’t funny, it’s fuckin hilarious.” Raid tried to get them to shut up about it, but they wouldn’t listen. “He’d just come on as a prospect with Roar,” Saint started, still chuckling, “And ask these little bastards, you do shit to prove to your brothers that you’ve got their back, no matter what.”
She nodded in understanding, shivering because Raid had slid his hand up under the side of her shirt, and while he was sucking back a healthy swallow of beer and shaking his head ruefully, his fingers were swirling around and around on her skin in the most distracting way. “Shit like getting back at your buddy Quill, for stealing your ex girlfriend Sarah Giles during Police Academy. Doing juvenile shit to make her crazy, for instance her entire drawer full of panties going missing.” She gaped at Raid, who was beet red and threatening to kill Saint, and Roar chimed in with a mouthful of brownie, trying not to choke while he laughed and talked at the same time. “Except that there were twenty freaking Sarah’s in that dorm, and because he didn’t know which one was the right one, he stole every panty to be had. He came back, with this huge Hefty bag, like fuckin Santa Clause and I remember looking into it and going, ‘What the fuck? How the hell does one woman wear so many panties?’ And Raid tried to explain about there being more than one Sarah, but I was on a roll, ‘What the fuck did you do?’
Saint says, waving a handful of panties around,” And when he took a breath, five more brothers chimed in to say at the same time, “Go on a panty raid?”
They all busted up laughing, rolling and in stitches that had even the serious looking president, whose name was Top, looked like he was crying with laughter. She turned to look at her big, strong, sexy ass biker and found him struggling to laugh around his final mouthful of beer, “So it’s Raid, as in, Panty Raid?” He shrugged, his smile turning sheepish, “You look out for your brothers, any way they need.”
“What did you do with twenty women’s worth of panties?” He licked his lips and cleared his throat, shooting Saint an evil look. “Tucked them around Quill’s room in places that would be easy to find. Two here, then three a week later, then sit back and watch the fireworks as Sarah accused him of sleeping around with other women.”
“So if any of your panties go missing, you know whose ass to kick.”
Raid scowled threw his empty beer bottle at Saint, unfortunately since Ripley wasn’t in his lap at the time, it hit him dead in the crotch, and more laughter erupted. She leaned back against him, the beer she’d had making her feel bolder than she might have, and turned her lips to his ear to whisper. “Lucky I didn’t wear or pack panties for you to steal. I’d hate to have to kick your ass.” His body jerked under her, and the glare he turned on her was so hot that had she been wearing panties, they’d have melted clean away in the wake of that heat. She just smiled at him, laughed softly when he shifted to widen his knees and growled a soft, “Fuck.”
Her belly clenched a few minutes later, when his thumb slipped down the back of her pants to swipe across the upper curve of her ass like he was testing to make sure she wasn’t wearing underwear. He turned and kissed the soft spot behind her ear, his voice a whole octave deeper, if that was even freaking possible, making her nipples press up tight against her bra. “You want to stay here tonight, or go home?” She opened her mouth to answer, but he wasn’t done. “Either way my mouth is on your pussy, I’m done bein nice.” She sucked in a gasp of surprise, her mind whirling with the, ‘is this too soon? Should I let him?’ and then her inner devil reached up and bitched slapped her inner good girl and told her to shut the fuck up. She shuddered, licking her lips and turned to see that his whiskey brown eyes were almost golden in the firelight. “Whatever you want.” He licked his lips, his tongue tracing that fuller bottom curve, and her vagina clenched in answer, her mind supplying her with all kinds of images of that gorgeous face between her legs. “So how did you two meet?”
Ripley’s question drew her out of the sexual haze her mind had fallen into, and she found herself the focus of several pairs of eyes, which made her want to squirm. But Raid kissed her nape and his arm slid firmly around her waist to draw her back even deeper into the curve of his body. “She sent me a letter while I was in the hospital.” Raid stated, like she’d sent him the Holy Grail, in the mail. “I sent, A, letter. I didn’t know it would get to you.” She murmured, her self-conscious need to make sure no one thought she was a weirdo, making itself known. “Yeah, well, it did.”
Raid went on to tell everyone just how weird she’d been, sending him candles and lighters that matched and shit, but when she glanced around at the faces watching them, their expressions weren’t teasing or even amused. They were amazed, some were gruffly emotional, others were just plain dumbfounded. “You’ve Got Mail,” Ripley said with a romantic murmur, and Ever nodded, “Totally.”
“What?” Roar asked, already looking like he knew his woman was about to make some affront to his manhood, just by looking at the dreamy expression on her face. “It’s a movie, with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. They send one another random emails over a course of so much time, and finally meet at the top of the Empire State Building. I have it, we’ll watch it later.”
“No, we won’t.” Roar insisted, and Ever scowled at her man, “Why not? It’s a good movie.”
“It’s clearly a chick flick, and we won’t be watching it, because you’ll be too busy riding my-“ Ever slapped her palm over Roar’s mouth with a screech, everyone laughed, because what he’d meant to say was obvious, and he made a face at her. “What? You will.”
“You are such a pig!”
“Babe, I don’t think it’s lost on anyone that we fuck like rabbits.”
“Lucas Morningstar!”
“What? You didn’t get pregnant, twice, by drinkin the water around here.”
She was shaking with how hard she was trying not to laugh, clearly able to see that Roar was getting turned on by the earful Ever was giving him about over sharing about what they would, or as the case was now, would NOT be doing once they got home. “His name is Lucas Morningstar?” She asked Raid quietly, and he nodded, jerking his chin up at his friend. “Like, as in The Devil?” He shrugged again, “It was the name he picked after he went into the system.” Her stomach clenched with sadness, knowing full well how awful that was, “Is that where you guys met?” He nodded at her gently asked question, “Him, me and Saint. His stepdad dropped him at a police station when he was three, after his mom died. Saint was born into it. I got taken away from my mom when I was six by CPS. We all got lucky, had the same foster mom.”
She touched a kiss to his jaw and slid her arms around his waist, not being able to imagine spending more than the week she’d had to spend in a group home after her parents died. If her Uncle John hadn’t come to get her, her life would have been so much different, and she didn’t have siblings, or very many friends back then to have made that horrible place somewhat bearable. “And what’s your name, when you’re not being called Panty Raid?” She tipped her head back over his bicep and smiled at him teasingly, getting herself a dirty glare and a quick, hard kiss. “No one calls me by my birth name anymore, not unless they want to swallow their teeth.”
She traced her fingertip over the dent in his chin, wondering if the hardness in his voice, the finality of it had anything to do with him not wanting to carry the name his junkie mother had given him. Out of anger maybe, or something darker. “I’ll remember that,” She murmured, and he gave a sigh, a heavy one, but his eyes softened when they looked at her, “Its Noah.” He grunted, and she touched another kiss to his hard, clenched jaw. “I like it.” He grunted again, but when she didn’t ask any more questions, he touched a much softer, sweeter kiss to her lips and the tension bled out of him on a sigh. “You ready to go?” She nodded and got up, looking around for Cruncher while Raid said his goodnights, her face heating at the leering and the wolf whistles, “Ignore them, they’re just jealous you’re not going home with one of them.” Ever drawled, giving her a wink and a fist bump, “Come out to the nursery for a visit, we’ll shoot some shit.”
“You will fuckin not!” Roar, roared from somewhere across the fire. Ever raised her hand and waved her middle finger at him. “Ignore him. It emasculates him that I can shoot better than he can.” She laughed and accepted a hug from a slightly drunken Ripley. “I’m so, so glad you’re with Raid, part of the lady club now,”
“We just met in person a few days ago, I don’t think that constitutes Raid making any kind of commitment to me.”
Ripley laughed like that was the funniest thing she’d ever heard, and squealed with glee when Saint spun her around and tossed her up over his shoulder, whacking her on her dress clad butt sharply. “Come on you,” He growled, winking at her before he dropped a kiss on her cheek. “Thank you, for bringing him home.” He told her softly, and left her kind of a wreck inside, so touched by that gruff, heartfelt thanks. She just nodded, waving to Ripley after he walked off with her like she was a prize to be very thoroughly had. And from what Ripley had said before, the having was good.
Ruckus followed them in his truck with Cruncher, and he actually pouted to have to let her dog out and give him back. She promised the two of them a playdate soon, to which Ruckus replied, “Rock on!” With devil horns and everything, then bounced back to his truck and when it started up, Def Lepp
ard blasted out of the speakers as he peeled out. “I’m starting to get why you all call him Ruckus.” She commented, Cruncher sitting on her feet and looking after his new buddy longingly. “Come inside, Athena.” Just like that, with three words, her entire body caught fire.
She looked over her shoulder at him and the hand he held out to her. Her throat worked, her body on fire with nerves, but she took his hand and let him pull her inside. Inside, where the niceties ended and the naughtiness began. Thank god.
They got Cruncher situated in the mud room and the second they were alone, Raid gave her no time to be nervous or uncertain. He took her hands and walked backwards with her into the beautiful room in the little farm house, and he pulled her close, rubbing his nose up the length of hers. “Have a good time?” He rasped, and she nodded, pushing her hands under the edges of his cut, “Definitely.” He was smiling when he kissed her. It happened again, her eyes slid closed and she totally melted into him. He didn’t rush, in fact it seemed like he was savoring every second. He kept her with him when he stepped back and sat on the bed, making this gorgeous sounding growl when she climbed up to straddle his lap.