Coal (Regulators MC Book 3)

by Chelsea Camaron

  I try to shake off my emotions. Anxiety, guilt, frustration, and sadness all toy with my carefully balanced core. I feel myself tipping, falling, and stumbling down into the darkness. I feel stuck to this man, like our worlds have aligned for a higher reason. Fate, destiny, the Mother Earth, or God—something has us linked, and I don’t know how to explain it to him or myself.

  Instead, I do what every respectable twenty-six-year-old woman does when she is faced with a scarier than a horror movie biker, I follow him.

  Chapter Two

  ~Coal~

  Watching the car following me, I twist the throttle and hit the highway a little faster. Believe it or not, when I check my mirror again, I find that battery-powered machine she calls a car keeping up. Thirty minutes later, we are in Fort Lauderdale, and she is still on my ass, but at a safe distance. When we clear the city, I pull over into a grocery store parking lot, and she follows.

  Climbing off my bike, I walk to her driver’s door, which she promptly opens and climbs out. The woman in front of me doesn’t show an ounce of fear.

  Like a magnet pulling me in, I’m drawn and unable to fight this temptation inside of me. Inside, I stumble at my own emotions, but outside, I show nothing.

  I don’t believe in love at first sight. In fact, I don’t even really believe in lust at first sight. I believe in science—the human need to procreate, the need for a release, and the body’s carnal desires to plant a man’s seed in a woman’s womb. As many times as I have held off until I found a hooker to handle my needs, I have never had an attraction and intrigue like this. I have never had such curiosity and amazement over a stranger. Anyone else, I would be mad as hell. Yet, this woman has me twisted in knots, needing to know more about her in an instant.

  She is so short that the top of her head hits my chest, and she might weigh a hundred and twenty pounds with her clothes on dripping wet. She’s skinny, but not in the way that says she skips meals like most of the South Beach women. No, this woman works out. Her arms are toned with muscle, the T-shirt she’s wearing is tight enough to see that her nipples are hard on her little breasts, and the yoga pants she is wearing doesn’t leave much to the imagination.

  I have a fucking wicked imagination. Right now, it’s running a bit wild as I take in the small woman in front of me with a sweet face and fiery red hair that is braided loosely behind her. It’s so long it hangs down her back to the top of her ass. An ass that I would bet my motorcycle on is firm enough to bounce a quarter off of.

  As much as I want to get wrapped up watching the pretty, little thing and picturing her naked, I don’t have time for this. As much as my body is suddenly alive in a way I can’t remember ever feeling, I don’t have room for this in my life. More so, as much as I should scare her far away, there is a part of me that wants to protect her from all hurts, including the ones that aren’t physical.

  “Look, Pixie, it was a bump. Didn’t even tip me over.” Pointing at my chest, I continue, “See, I’m a big man; takes a lot to knock me on my ass. You didn’t, so move on.”

  “I can’t,” she responds with her hands crossed in front of her chest, making her breasts stand out more as her breathing picks up. “I have to make this right.”

  “Nothing wrong, Pixie, so no need to make it right.”

  She pokes my chest. “Look, Mr.”—she studies my cut—“Coal.” She clears her throat, and I find the whole thing cute. “I bumped you. While I’m thankful you weren’t harmed, I have to make this right.” She stutters, “I-I know it doesn’t make sense to most people, but our energies are entangled now. I’ve messed up and must make it up to you so that we aren’t entwined together in a negative balance.” She’s not afraid of me, but she’s nervous in explaining herself. Again, I find this all cute.

  Wait, I just found something cute. This isn’t in my genetic makeup. Did I hit my head or jar myself when she hit me?

  “Looks like we’re at a standstill, then,” I tell her, knowing that no matter how strong this pull to her is, I won’t get involved.

  “Dinner.” She looks up at me, and I swear she has eyes so crystal blue they must come from Heaven because those are the kind saved for angels. She studies me while rolling her shoulders back to gather her confidence. “I owe you dinner, at least.”

  Stepping into her space, I do so in hopes of intimidating her. Still, she doesn’t back away, even as her eyes widen, giving away her insecurities.

  “Made a living for myself reading people, Pixie. You don’t want dinner with me.”

  Steeling her face, she looks me in the eye again. “Breakfast.” Her gaze drops quickly. Ah, the confidence slips.

  I laugh before stepping closer to stand toe-to-toe with her. My entire upper torso towers over her. She doesn’t look up but rather stares at the middle of my cut. Tipping her chin, I force her to look at me. I expect her to pull away. I expect her to retreat.

  She doesn’t.

  No, the tiny pixie of a woman reaches out, grabs the sides of my cut in a tight grip, then rolls up on her tiptoes, still not able to reach my face.

  Curious as to what she’s trying, I drop my head.

  My forehead rests on hers in a way that is far too intimate for my comfort. It’s like my body, my spirit, is in control instead of my mind. Every inch of me wants to cover and touch every inch of her.

  “Please,” she says before licking her lips.

  My instincts scream run. My body hums kiss her, and my mind … blanks.

  “Please, Coal, let me at least have dinner one night so I can know I did something to make up for my distraction.”

  Distraction. A perfect word to describe Pixie. She’s a distraction, and she doesn’t even know it.

  I don’t say anything in reply. I’m too busy trying to stop the hard-on growing in my pants.

  “Breakfast, lunch, dinner—something,” she pleads in a serious way.

  “I don’t even know your name, so dinner doesn’t seem like a good idea, Pixie,” I tell her as her hot breath mixes with mine.

  Primal feelings erupt deep inside of me like never before. I don’t remove my forehead from hers, and she makes no effort to pull away from me.

  “Paisley Asher.”

  I watch as her chest rises and falls in heavy breaths. “You’re in over your head, Pixie.”

  She smiles before sucking in her bottom lip. “Or maybe I’m right where I’m supposed to be.”

  Like a knife cutting me to the core, I jump back at her words. Does she feel the pull, too? Like this is some fucked-up destiny?

  It’s one giant joke … Has to be.

  My history, my sorted past that is full of blurred memories, is one that should scare every woman away.

  “I’m not at all a man you should have dinner with. In fact, Pixie, you need to get in that tin can you call a car and drive as fast as you can away from me.”

  I see the rejection hit her like a slap to the face.

  “You don’t see it, do you?” she whispers before backing away. She doesn’t turn around, though, and for some reason, it nags at me.

  “Don’t look for the good here, Pixie. Coal.” I point at my name patch. “Dirty, dark, and hard. I’m scarred, marred, and more than you can take on.”

  She studies me before she slides into her driver’s seat again. “Or maybe, Coal, this is about finding what makes you combust so you can use your energies for fuel instead of staying in your hard form, all locked up tight.”

  Shit! I have never encountered a single person ready to challenge me the way she does, with her own verbal twist on the one word that has described me for far too long.

  “I know it sounds crazy, Coal, but maybe, if you take a chance and allow me to re-center our alignments, your aura will go from this gray and murky brown shade from the many things you are holding on to into the bright reds where you can live your life passionately.”

  Her words strike me deeply. Have I met my match?

  My mother used to take me back to the reservation an
nually when I was growing up. The elders would always smoke their pipes and talk about the stars, the energies, the Great Spirit, Mother Earth, and the beliefs of a time past. Everything in my Native American ancestry was tied to an animal energy; your life source of sorts.

  Hard, unyielding, a rock, I am coal. The lion, they always called me, left the pride many years ago before I was even a man. Instead, I have been rock hard in my tolerance of others and dealing with my past.

  In an instant, a stranger just called me on far too much without even knowing me. Pixie sees through me in a way no one else has.

  I watch as she closes her door, starts her car, and drives away, leaving me standing near my motorcycle and wondering if I’m still in the middle of the tornado that is Paisley Asher, or if the pixie sprinkled some magic dust over me and somehow read my every secret in less than five minutes.

  It takes a lot to knock a man like me on his ass. Pixie may have just done it.

  I can only stand here, feeling like, in one day, everything somehow has started to change.

  ~Paisley~

  A bit dejected, I drive back to my place, all the while thinking about the man on the motorcycle who wouldn’t give me a chance to rebalance both our chi’s. I know he can’t see it, but surely, he feels the tension that runs through his core. The lights and emotions radiating off of him are all dark. Only, they aren’t dark in an evil way like he’s a bad person. His darkness, I sense, derives from holding on to negatives in his life.

  Most people love riding motorcycles because of the freedom of the open air. I have read it in many books and listened to Des and Morgan go on and on about the feel of the wind when they ride with their men.

  Then, an epiphany hits me, and I can hear Des’s voice in my head. “Honey, I live with a biker…”

  Des! I can call her to find out if she knows anything about my badass biker!

  Picking up my cell phone, I wait until I stop at a red light to pull up her name on my contact list and call her. The phone rings four times before she finally picks it up.

  “Hello?” she asks breathlessly.

  A smile spreads across my face at the tone of her voice. “Was I interrupting something?”

  Des giggles on the other end. “No, not really. Hammer was just giving me a very thorough good-bye kiss. What’s up, honey?”

  “Speaking of Hammer,” I mumble awkwardly, “I was wondering if either of you know a biker named Coal? I know it probably seems crazy that I’m asking you about random bikers, but—”

  “Why are you asking about Coal, Paisley?” Des’s voice is suddenly the epitome of seriousness.

  Taken aback by her change in tone, I get a little flustered. “Well, I sort of ran into him today. As in, literally … with my car … while he was on his bike.”

  “What!” Des yells into my ear. “Is he all right?”

  Now I find myself all but shaking. I’m flustered, annoyed, and feeling guilty. I hit the man on his motorcycle with my car! Sure, it was just a bump and I was going slow, but seriously, I hit him with my car, and he wants to shrug it off like it happens all the time.

  Nothing is chance. Everything has a purpose and reason. There was a significance to me crashing into him. We have been brought together, and until things are sorted, neither of us will feel balanced.

  I felt something, sensed his pain, and my heart longs to heal him. His energy pulled at me. Yellow, it’s my color. Healing. Everything inside of me screams to lay my hands on his temples and center him.

  Living down the rabbit hole of depression, as I refer to it, I remember wishing I could see some light at the top. I longed for someone to stand up with a rope and pull me out. Something tells me that Coal needs someone at the top of his rabbit hole to pull him into the light and help him let go of whatever holds him back.

  Pulling my car into the parking lot of my apartment complex, I put it in park and try to calm Des and myself down. “He’s fine, he’s fine. I swear, Des! I stopped to check on him and everything!”

  “Oh,” she replies, sounding dumbfounded. “Okay,” she drawls out, then finally says, “If Coal is okay, why are you asking about him?”

  “Well,” I mumble uncomfortably. It’s not every day a girl has to tell one of her closest friends that she was turned down flat for a dinner date. “I kinda, sorta asked him if I could make him dinner, and he told me no. I guess … I guess I just want to know more about him.” I don’t tell her that I see he’s holding on to the negatives, and if he would let me, he could be released from the darkness.

  Des and Morgan are good about my eating habits, my yoga, crystals, and talk of chi, but that doesn’t mean Des will be kosher with me trying to explain a cosmic connection to a man she clearly isn’t comfortable talking about.

  “You’re barking up the wrong tree with that guy, sister,” Des replies back automatically, making me cringe

  Who likes to be told twice in one day that they aren’t good enough for somebody? Not that those were my friend’s actual words, but it’s how her comment makes me feel.

  It’s more than being good enough for him; it’s making this right. I did wrong, and until I do something for him, then we are karmically unbalanced.

  “Maybe I’m not the sort of woman he usually dates.”

  Des snorts. “You can say that again.”

  I actually raise my right hand in the air like I’m making some sort of oath before quickly dropping it, realizing people may actually see me.

  “This isn’t coming out right,” I concede as I decide Des may not be the person I should ask about Coal.

  “Look, Paisley, you are the sweetest person I know. Like chocolate on strawberries sweet. You’re so sweet you give the tooth fairy a cavity. It’s what makes you … well, you.”

  I sigh and look ahead of me at my tiny apartment complex. “I feel a but coming on.”

  She laughs lightly. “Coal, well, he’s anything but sweet.”

  “I don’t need sweet. Des, this isn’t about, like, dating the man. It’s my need to make this right.”

  “If Coal let you leave, take your exit. That is your energy giving you back all the good you give out.”

  “You really think?” I ask, feeling hopeful.

  “Yes, honey.”

  With a sigh, I end the call and make my way to my apartment. Maybe she’s right. Maybe this will be my one pass in the cosmic energies, and I shouldn’t press it further. Maybe I read his aura wrong. He could be ill, and I don’t see that.

  My key promptly gets stuck in my lock, and I have to call maintenance.

  Waiting on the man to find a way to get my key out, I lean against the stucco wall and slide down until my butt hits the concrete.

  Closing my eyes, I inhale deeply. Exhale. Another inhale. Tuning out the noises around me, I center myself.

  The deep, dark circles of his pupils draw me in. He towers over me. My breathing pattern matches the one he had when he stood toe-to-toe with me. I inhale and swear I can smell the leather of his vest.

  The energy between us is strong. The emotions the man pushes down somehow come to my mind.

  He’s skeptical.

  He’s hurt.

  He’s hard.

  He needs light to his dark. He’s not what he thinks he is. I see it. I feel it.

  Blinking, I force myself back into my own headspace. Why is the man so on edge? Why do I care?

  The maintenance man makes quick work of freeing my key. Without a word, he hands my keys over then walks off while I enter my space.

  Immediately, I kick off my shoes and wiggling my toes that are happy to be free from their confinement. Walking through my small place, I open my windows, checking my window box gardens and letting the fresh air in. Everything looks the same in the garden.

  Inhaling, I breathe in the fresh air I love coming through my space. I hate having to close it up, but the apartment complex frowns on me leaving the windows wide open all day and night. In Florida, it rains practically every day, mid-afternoo
n, sometimes late afternoon. Whatever time, there is a daily shower. Apparently, it’s bad for their flooring to continually get wet like that.

  Opening the fridge, I pull out a head of romaine lettuce, baby spinach, carrots, radishes, shallots, and a lemon. I managed to grow everything myself in a plastic pool left by some previous tenants on my patio. Rather than let the plastic spend years disintegrating in a landfill, I drilled a few holes for irrigation drainage and created my own backyard garden without the backyard. The lemon came from a lemon tree at a grove down the road where I pick most of my citrus from. In return for the free fruits, I work one day a month at the farmer’s market for them.

  Putting together my salad, I roll my lemon to get the juices moving. Slicing it in half, I feel the nick of my knife hit the edge of my thumb before I see the red of my blood.

  “Shit,” I mutter to myself. “See, this is why I have to make things right with Coal. He may be letting me off the hook in his mind, but his spirit is still calling to me. We have to get the balance back,” I tell the room around me, wishing I knew how to explain why I have to do something for the stranger. My bumping into him has linked us, and I need to sort it out.

  Sucking on my thumb, I try to slow the bleeding. Releasing it with a pop, I then absentmindedly squeeze the lemon halves over my salad, feeling the acid burn on my open wound and bringing tears to my eyes.

  Dropping the lemon, I suck on my thumb again, trying to get the juice off as I move to the sink where I wash my hands. I eye the salad as if it’s suddenly my enemy.

  Using a lemon zester, I grate some of the peel before I sit down to eat my meal. And with each crunch of my salad, my mind continues to think of a way to make things right with Coal.

  I don’t know his actual name, and I don’t know what he does, but I will find out. He may not want dinner, but I will find some way to serve him and make up for my misjudgment today.

  Watch out, Coal, your days of being in the dark are gone. I’m going to be your sunshine, even if only for a day.