The Sinner Within (L.A. Sinners MC Book 1)

by J. L. Leslie

  “We are just trying to survive!” she argues. “Just like our brothers were trying to do!”

  “I just don’t want to lose sight of who I am!” I yell, but then lower my voice. “I don’t have to be held down by Gavin’s past and the war he was caught up in. I can let it go and be happy. Don’t you see that?”

  “You’re fucking blind if you think that those men, those Sinners, will ever stop this war!” she hisses. “They are cold-blooded killers, and they all deserve to die for what they’ve done, including Lucien! You will pay the consequences for betraying your club! We all have to!”

  She rises from my table, quickly wiping the tears from her eyes. I stand up with her, going to her side but she backs away from me.

  “I thought when we took you in you would see that we were your family and would always take care of you, but he came along, and you turned your back on us at the drop of a fucking hat! Or should I say at the stroke of a dick!”

  I smack her hard across her face, the sound echoing throughout my kitchen. “You took me in, and I have always been grateful! I may not have done what you thought I should have for the club, but I never turned my back on our friendship like you are right now! I love Lucien, and I honestly thought I would never have that, so I’m not giving it up!”

  “Keep him!” she tells me. “Keep him and keep the Sinners! You made your choice!”

  She stomps into the living room, grabbing her things. Layla sits on the sofa, her eyes wide and it’s clear she could hear our argument.

  “Mackenzie, I don’t want to choose between the two of you!” I cry. “You’re my best friend!”

  “Then I’m choosing for you!” she yells and slams the door as she walks out.

  I tell Layla I’ll be back and go to the door. When I step onto my porch, Mackenzie is already at her door,, and Lucien is getting off his bike. I debate on what to do. I should go talk to Mackenzie, but I want to know what happened with Donia. He wasn’t gone very long. I watch him cross my lawn and I decide to find out how his meeting went. I’ll patch things up with Mackenzie soon. She needs some time to cool down.

  “Well?” I ask him.

  “Well, what?” he grins.

  “Lucien,” I groan. “Now is not the time to fuck around with me. How did the meeting go?”

  He puts his hands on my hips and pulls me to him. “She agreed to give us the trucks and product back.”

  Thank God.

  “That’s good,” I murmur, wrapping my arms around his neck and resting my head on his shoulder.

  “You okay?” he asks me, and I nod.

  “Yes, I’m okay. You’re here, and you’re not killing my friends.”

  He laughs. “Not today anyway. Everyone gets to live today.”

  Everyone gets to live today.

  His joke replays in my mind as we walk inside. We’ve both lost so much that it feels good to just live and be happy for once. He makes me happy, regardless of that fact that he carries a sinner within him that he can’t escape. I’ll help him escape from himself.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Lucien

  I open the fridge and grab a soda and a juice box out. I slide the juice box across the counter for Layla, and she opens the straw, pushing it in the little slot and taking a sip before continuing to work on her homework.

  I check the incoming text on my phone and see that Reid has confirmed the preacher for Soco and Ian’s funeral service. It took some time for us to locate Ian’s family and get them flown in, but everything is set now so we can lay our brothers to rest. After the funeral, I’ll officially announce Wiggie as our new VP.

  “You almost finished?” I ask Layla, and she nods, taking another sip of her juice.

  Harper should be back soon. She was going to meet with her club today. It’s the first time she’s met with them since she stole my truck and since our attack on Jiminez. It’ll also be the first time she’s spoken to Mackenzie. She told me about their argument and how Mackenzie feels she betrayed their club.

  When I met with Donia, she asked me about the attack on Jiminez. She wasn’t aware that Harper knew anything about our plans, so I was surprised that Mackenzie lashed out the way she did. If Harper didn’t tell them about our attack, then who did?

  Harco is checking into who this other source is. Unfortunately, Jiminez’s phone died with him. There are ways of checking phone records without the actual phone though.

  After I met with Harper’s president, Donia, she turned our trucks and product over the next day. She wasn’t happy about it, so I get the feeling our rift with Hell’s Fury is far from over.

  I made good on the payment to Wakeford and Warren contacted the governor to set up a meeting. Apparently, he was planning to work with another dealer, but their supplier fell through. We should be good to go with him.

  “I’m all finished,” Layla says. “Did you tell mom where we’re going today?”

  “Not yet,” I let her know.

  “I thought you liked this place.”

  I smile at her. “I do, but your mom suggested that I get my own place. We can still stay here sometimes.”

  It is time I got my own place. The Sinners haven’t complained when Layla has been here, but if I continue to bring her around, I’m sure they’ll let me know that she’s cramping their style. Having a kid here means they can’t behave the way they want to, which means fucking club whores and snorting coke wherever they want.

  “Lucien!”

  The door opens, and Warren walks in carrying Harper in his arms. She’s nearly unconscious. I rush over to them, asking what happened and she reaches her hand toward me.

  “She was sitting in the Suburban outside. She didn’t even get the door open,” he says, laying her down on the sofa. “You think it was the Sicarios?”

  “The club voted,” she manages, wincing in pain. “Twenty lashes.”

  Twenty lashes? She closes her eyes, and I move her arm, looking for her injuries, and it’s then that I see blood on the side of her shirt.

  “Shit,” I mumble. “They gave her lashes on her back.”

  “Like with a whip?” Warren asks, and I nod.

  “Yes, for not telling them about our attack on Jiminez. She didn’t turn over intel that she had.”

  Layla comes to us, looking down at Harper. “Is mom okay?”

  I stand up, reluctantly letting go of Harper’s hand. “Yes, sweetie, she’s okay. She’s just not feeling well. Tell you what, do you feel like making her a get-well card while I go run her a bath?”

  “Are we still going to go to the place?”

  I pick her up and walk over to the counter, placing her down on the stool. “We’ll plan on going tomorrow if she’s feeling better.”

  Layla opens her binder and takes some paper out, getting to work on the card while I head down the hall to my room. I shut the door behind me and slam my fist into the wall, anger rising inside me.

  Mackenzie had to have told Donia that Harper knew we were attacking Jiminez. She ratted out her best friend. Caused her to be whipped, hurt like that.

  I tell myself I would have done worse had a member in my club kept intel from me, but this is Harper. This is my Harper.

  And I want to kill them all.

  Harper

  I open my eyes, and I’m lying on my stomach on Lucien’s bed. I’m naked and his sheet is draped over my waist. He’s cleaning my wounds with a warm washcloth, dipping it into a bowl of water and rinsing the blood from my back. It’s painful but necessary.

  I went for our weekly meeting, just like I do every Tuesday. I had hoped that Mackenzie would talk to me. She hasn’t answered any of my texts or calls since our argument.

  I walked in, and she ignored me. I sat in silence while she stood beside Donia and told the club that I knew about the Sinners plan to attack Jiminez. That I put Hell’s Fury in jeopardy and I’ve cost us our supplier. I’ve cost us everything we worked for.

  Being a prospect, I know that the club members hav
e the right to vote on how to handle issues like this. I could’ve been voted out altogether. Instead, they chose to punish me and allow me to remain in the club. I’ll have the scars to bear to remind me that of what I did.

  I’m not angry that this was done to me. It’s part of the life I live. Part of being in Hell’s Fury. But I am hurt by Mackenzie’s actions. I would never have snitched on her. She could have at least respected me enough to tell me she was going to the club about me. I was blindsided.

  “This will not go unanswered,” Lucien says, his voice thick with emotion. Anger. Rage.

  “No,” I tell him. “I took my punishment, and it’s over. There’s no need for retaliation.”

  “Fuck that,” he grits out.

  “It’s done,” I say firmly. “And not up for discussion. You will not harm them.”

  He tosses the washcloth into the bowl and then curses, slinging the entire bowl across the room. Bloody water splashes onto the wall and floor.

  I slowly ease up into a sitting position and grab the clean t-shirt he has lying on the bed. I manage to pull it on, and then I tell him to come to me. I see his jaw clench in frustration, but he scoots over to me, and I put my hand over his.

  “Would you rather they have masturbated in my face?” I tease, and he gives me a look.

  “That is not fucking funny.”

  I rest my chin on his shoulder. “Let this go. I betrayed my club, and I was punished for it.”

  “I don’t know how to let it go,” he confesses. “I was supposed to protect you and I didn’t.”

  “Sometimes protection isn’t physical, Lucien. This time I need you to protect me emotionally, and you can do that by doing what I ask, and I’m asking you not to hurt my friends.”

  “Sometimes it’s not that simple.”

  I smile at him. “I think I told you before that sometimes things are just simple.”

  “Yeah, and I told you before that we’re wrong for each other,” he says, smirking.

  “I don’t disagree with that,” I joke, and he gives me another look. “But it feels so fucking right.”

  He closes in, his lips only inches from mine. “You damn right it does.”

  Epilogue

  Lucien

  “For some Sinners, it takes months to earn this honor. For others, they never earn it. But after we laid two brothers to rest today, I learned that we aren’t always guaranteed another day. Warren, you have proven yourself as a Sinner, and you deserve this honor,” I announce, and the Sinners clap.

  I hold up the leather cut with our emblem emblazoned on the back. It’s a symbol that officially makes Warren a patched in member, no longer only a prospect.

  He allows me to put it on him and I can tell he’s proud of the honor. He may have once been a Ryker, but now he’s one of us. He’s a Sinner.

  I look at my members, my brothers. When I became president, I feared that I would fail them. That I would let them down somehow. This club was in bad shape, but I have turned it around. Me and these men, we turned it around.

  We took down the Jiminez cartel, and now we are prospering. We have all his money and all of his product. We have a supplier, and we have buyers.

  Of course, we have enemies too. That will never fucking change. But I don’t fear them. I don’t fear those that despise us. And I don’t fear myself any longer. Harper has shown me that the darkness I have inside of me, the sinner within me, is someone I can control. When I can’t control him, she can, and I trust her with that part of me.

  “Now, it’s time to fucking party!” Reid yells, and he flips the music on, blaring it throughout the clubhouse.

  “I’m heading out, man,” I tell Warren, slapping my hand on his back. “You fucking earned this.”

  I make my way through the clubhouse, letting my men cut loose tonight as I head over to Harper’s. I stop by and pick up Chinese on my way, making sure I get Layla’s favorite.

  When I arrive, she opens the door, greeting me with a quick hug before asking me if I brought her orange chicken and if we’re going to show Harper the place. I laugh as I tell her of course I did and that we will go check out my new apartment tomorrow. I want Harper to take it easy until she’s healed.

  “You spoil her,” Harper tells me as we walk inside.

  “That’s okay.”

  “Mark told me he would buy me orange chicken any time I wanted him to,” Layla tells us as we sit down at the kitchen table and I cock an eyebrow at Harper.

  “Who is Mark?”

  Layla blushes and smiles. “He’s in my class at school.”

  “She’s going to grow up at some point, you know,” Harper says.

  “Tell me about this Mark kid,” I tell Layla. “Who’s his parents?”

  Layla laughs, ignoring me as she eats her chicken. We finish our meal and Layla goes to pick out a movie, deciding on Big Hero 6. I start clearing the table while she gets it ready.

  “I want to know more about this Mark kid. I mean, he’s offering to buy her orange chicken any time she wants it? These kids are in middle school, right?”

  “Lucien, you do realize that she will date one day, don’t you?” Harper asks me. “She’s going to date a boy, and eventually she’ll have sex and get married and maybe have kids.”

  I shrug. “Good thing I have guns.”

  Harper rolls her eyes. “Guns do not solve everything.”

  “Lots of guns,” I tell her. “And lots of friends with guns.”

  She rolls her eyes. “God, this is why we’re so wrong for each other.”

  Yet, so fucking right.

  THE END

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  The Sinner Unleashed

  Chapter One

  Warren

  I lean back against my headboard, placing a cigarette between my lips. I reach over to my nightstand for a lighter and hear Reid rustling around for his clothes. I light my cigarette and take a long drag as Reid walks out of my room, his jeans undone and his t-shirt tossed over his shoulder.

  I peek over at Sabrina who is lying on her side, her leg curled over mine. Her once red hair is now black with purple streaks through it. She surprised me with it like this the day I received my cut, somehow trying to make the day about her. I have no idea what possessed her to change her hair, but it’s her hair. She can do whatever the fuck she wants with it.

  I take another drag of my cigarette, blowing the smoke upward as I exhale. I drop my hand down to my lap and my eyes are instantly drawn to the “R” tattooed on my wrist. I rub it with my thumb before glancing up at my Sinners’ cut. I scan the word emblazoned over the back, officially making me one of them.

  I haven’t been an official Sinner for long. I put in my time as a prospect for them, starting over from the very bottom. I was the fucking vice president for the Rykers in Verdana, so lowering myself to become a prospect was a humbling experience for me.

  I washed bikes, cleaned the clubhou
se, and ran errands. I did jobs too, dangerous jobs, but always got the shit end of the deal when they were over. Clean-up duty is not my favorite thing in the world. The bodies stink to high heaven and it’s a scent that stays on you even after you’ve scrubbed yourself raw in the shower.

  I suppose it could be worse. I could have run off to San Diego to join the Rykers’ chapter there and been under leadership that I didn’t agree with it. Not that I always agreed with Cal, the president I worked for with the Rykers. I respected him, but I didn’t always agree with him. He had some off-the-wall ideas and didn’t give a shit what the club thought of them.

  The same goes for Lucien. He’s done a damn good job as the Sinners’ president, but some decisions were questionable. For example, not retaliating against Hell’s Fury, the club his old lady is a member of.

  Sure, I bet it was a difficult pill to swallow to find out that the woman he was fucking was in a rival club and one hell bent on getting revenge on our club. I didn’t expect it out of Harper, but I won’t say that I’m surprised. Nothing in this fucking world surprises anymore. At twenty-eight, I’ve seen a lot of awful shit and become numb to it.

  “Did you nut?” Sabrina asks, sitting up and taking the cigarette from my lips.

  She climbs over me, straddling my lap and stroking my dick with one hand while she holds my cigarette with the other. What she’s doing feels good, but I’m not in the mood. Hell, I wasn’t in the mood when she brought Reid to our room and suggested we have a little fun. Sabrina is always up for fun with whoever and whenever.

  Tonight wasn’t our first night with Reid, so I pretty much let him take the reins. He wanted her ass, I took her cunt. She came, I didn’t. Oh fucking well. Shit happens. I haven’t nutted in over a fucking month.

  I tell myself it doesn’t have a damn thing to do with a certain smartass, brunette. Mackenzie Salizar may have made me come harder than any woman I’ve ever been with, but she’s still a traitor.