by Lexie Davis
Almost immediately, she felt stupid for even caring that she looked the least bit unattractive to him. It shouldn’t have mattered. Fatigue filled her blue eyes and she wondered how long Ryker planned to stay. Her energy level plummeted and she knew that doing even simple things would take a bit of effort. Sagging against the vanity, she depended on it to hold her up. The cool basin of the sink felt good against her feverish skin as she gripped it. It would be so embarrassing if she had to ask him to help her.
After using the facilities successfully on her own, she went back to the living area and stared at him. “How do you feel today?” he asked before she could say or do anything.
“I’m still freezing.” She rubbed her arms. “I haven’t been sick in so long. I forgot how horrible it is. My throat is burning like the pits of hell.”
He patted the sofa next to him. “Have a seat. You don’t look like you feel that great.”
She walked over to him and sat down. He pulled the afghan off the back of the couch and tucked it around her. She caught a whiff of his scent and it made her stomach do a flop. Afterward, she watched as he stood, leaving her for the kitchen. He got her some crushed ice and water before grabbing a bottle of pills to help reduce her fever.
“You didn’t have to stay with me. I can take care of myself.”
“Maybe.” Ryker dished out the pills and handed them to her along with the water. After she took them, he settled beside her and pulled her against his body, rubbing her chilled arms. “But I did it anyway.”
She closed her eyes, letting him comfort her. “Who stabbed you?”
“It doesn’t matter.” He kissed her forehead, feeling too good to push away.
The thought scared her. He was a kind and considerate person outside the club. He was a completely different person when he was with her. She tried to convince herself that her father was right, that they were all the same, but Ryker kept proving that theory wrong. She seriously doubted anyone in the club would have treated her as well as Ryker had. She wasn’t even sure why Ryker was treating her so kindly.
Ella pulled away from him and laid her head on his thigh. She curled up in the blanket and closed her eyes. It took a long time, but the moment her fever broke they both knew it. She sweat through her shirt. Her clammy skin felt like she’d been in a sauna for an hour. She pushed away from him, deciding to change.
“Don’t look.” She pulled out a tank top from her dresser. “I don’t have enough energy to walk to the bathroom and I’m not wearing a bra.”
He looked toward the kitchen. “You say that like I haven’t been inside you before.”
“Yeah, well, that was in the past.” She changed her shirt and turned to find him staring back at her. “Are you still using?”
“No.” Ryker ran a hand over his face. “Do you want some breakfast? I’m kind of hungry.”
Despite having been stabbed, he looked good. She watched while he grabbed his phone and dialed someone, placing an order of food from a local fast food restaurant. She doubted that he’d give her any answers about the club, but she wanted to know what had happened. When he was through he set the phone on the coffee table and went back to watching the TV show he had on.
“Aren’t you going to get in trouble by being with me?”
He snorted. “I’ll do whatever the hell I want.” He glanced over at her. “Unless you don’t want me here.”
Did she? It was a stupid question. They both knew it too. She would have kicked him out last night if she didn’t want him around. She enjoyed him taking care of her too much.
“I think your friends thought I was dying or something. I probably looked horrible to them.” She smoothed her hair from her face.
“You look beautiful.” He stared at her. “Do you feel better?”
“Yeah. Some.” She glanced over to the bathroom. “I probably need a shower.”
“You’ve got time if you want to clean up before breakfast arrives.”
“I honestly don’t have the energy to walk to the bathroom, much less shower.”
Ryker stood and bent to pick her up.
“What are you doing?” She clutched his arms as he carried her. “You’re going to pop your stitches.”
“Then you can sew me back up.” He set her down in the bathroom and turned the shower on, adjusting the temperature of the water for her. He made sure she had everything she needed before saying, “I’m a few feet away if you need me.”
He left her, closing the door behind him. Ella blinked a few times. If she had asked him to help her, he probably would have. She never would have thought that about him. Before, when they’d been together, he’d been caring and kind, but this was different. This was protective. Possessive. The only thing that would make him leave was her. And for some reason, she couldn’t say those words. She got in the shower and stood beneath the spray, enjoying the heat and the comfort the water provided. She’d never felt so drained from a stupid infection in all her life. She simply had no energy.
Ella sat on the small bench inside her shower. The very act of washing her body was a chore. She smoothed some body wash on her skin and splashed the water onto her to wash it away. Her hair was another story. She leaned against the shower stall, resting her head against the tile. She’d never felt so fatigued.
Ryker knocked on the door. “You okay? The food’s here.”
She swallowed, cringing as it hurt. “No. Can you help me?”
He opened the door and came in. She probably should have felt embarrassed, but she didn’t. At the moment, she simply didn’t care.
“What’s wrong?”
“I just don’t have the energy to wash my hair. My body was a struggle.”
He nodded. “Okay. Is this normal with strep?”
“No.” She closed her eyes. “I think I’ve been working too much and pulling crazy shifts in the hospital that it weakened my immune system. I’m tired and being sick doesn’t help either.”
Ryker undid his pants. “After you eat, you can go back to bed and rest.”
He got in the shower with her, wearing his boxer briefs. He turned her around to face him, glancing down at her body.
“Your stitches are going to get wet and cause an infection.”
“I’ll risk it.” He kissed her forehead before reaching for the shampoo.
His fingers massaged her scalp as he worked the product into her hair. The soft rubbing motion against her head had her relaxing to the point she nearly fell asleep on him. He held her head as she leaned back into the spray, letting the warm water wash away the suds. Ella gripped his arms to keep herself from falling, though she was fairly sure he wouldn’t let her.
“Did you wash your body?” Ryker asked once her hair was clean. He squeezed the excess water from it before meeting her gaze.
“Yeah.” She wasn’t sure she could handle his hands all over her.
He turned the water off and shifted her to the bench in the stall while he got out to grab a towel. He’d kept mostly dry, she noticed. She laid her head against the tile, waiting for him to come back.
He lifted her so that she stood and wrapped a soft towel around her body. She felt like a child while she let him dry her off. She didn’t have any clothes picked out and wasn’t even sure she could find something to wear.
“I’m surprised you’re willing to take care of me.”
“Why?” He tucked the towel at her breasts and met her eyes.
“Most guys aren’t.”
He snorted. “What do you know about most guys? I’m the only one you’ve ever been with.”
She pursed her lips as he lifted her into his arms again to carry her back to the bed. “How do you know? I could have had a thousand lovers between then and now. I haven’t seen you in a month.”
He laid her on the bed and arched an eyebrow. “A thousand? When would you have time to work yourself to death?”
She closed her eyes and smiled. “Okay. You’ve got me there.”
“Plus, I may
not have seen you, but I keep tabs on you. No lover but me.” He moved away to sort through the food that had been delivered.
“You keep tabs on me?”
“I’ve always kept tabs on you. Ever since the biker rally when the dickwad came on a little too strong.” He handed her a biscuit. “If you want more, there’s plenty.”
She propped herself up and opened the paper surrounding the biscuit. “Would you be mad if I had another lover?”
He didn’t look at her. “You can do what you want.”
“Somehow, I doubt that.” She bit into the food, taking small bites so it didn’t scrape her throat when she swallowed. “Are you ever going to tell me what happened?”
“About what?” He sat on the couch with his own food.
“I don’t know. You could start with the drugs and finish up with how you got stabbed.”
He didn’t say anything for a while, choosing instead to eat. She noticed something in him had changed. But he didn’t like talking about the club with her. In some ways she understood why, but at the same time, she knew virtually nothing about him.
“Okay, can you at least tell me you won the fight?”
He smiled at her. “Yeah. I won.”
She ate a few more bites. “I was scared that they were going to find you OD somewhere in a dark alley.”
He didn’t say anything and it pissed her off. She shook her head and lay back against the pillows, deciding she didn’t have enough energy to keep up the conversation. He was elusive and she was tired.
To her surprise, he packed up his breakfast and walked around the bed, climbing onto the other side of the mattress. She stared at him as he laid everything out before him.
“You don’t have to worry about me.”
“But I do.” She shook her head. “It doesn’t just go away if you’re not in the picture either. It gets worse.”
“I can take care of myself.”
She snorted and sat up. “With a needle in your vein?” She tucked the towel tighter. “You cried. You broke down in my arms. They shoved that shit in your body and filmed you. You didn’t want to be part of that. We both know it.”
“Leaving the club isn’t an option.”
“I know.” She stared at him. “You have to see the man your father is. He would rather you suffer than be happy. That’s fucked up.”
He took a deep breath. “Would you be with me if things were different?”
“Different?” She shook her head. She was contemplating being with him now, with things the way they were. It was completely stupid on her part. But she felt it deep inside her that something about him was different. Something about the way he looked at her. The way he acted around her. He couldn’t fake his emotions and during that night, when he’d been high, she’d really understood him better than any conversation they’d had prior to that.
“Yeah. If I wasn’t part of the club.”
“The club isn’t the problem.” She stared at him. “I don’t give a fuck about the club. You’re not happy. When you were with me, you smiled and laughed. You joked around. And anytime I brought up the club, you didn’t want to talk about it. Not much has changed except your happiness. You’re mad at the world, and I completely understand why. But you have to know that that isn’t the way someone should live their life. You can have the club, but you should also have happiness too.”
He nodded. “Yeah.”
“What makes you happy, Ryker?”
He gave a small smile. “Do you really have to ask me that?”
“Why is the club so against you being with me?”
“Because you’re a distraction.” He swallowed. “To be a leader, you have to be focused on the club. Everything you do is for the club. When other people outside the club start getting in the way, my grandfather said it clouded judgment.”
“How does it cloud judgment?”
He took a deep breath. “If Young Blood kidnapped you instead of your father and the result was the same, there would be one fucking massive war going on in this town. I’d risk everything to protect you and defend you. That’s what my grandfather meant.”
“So I’m a liability.”
“Not to me. To the club, though, yes.” He wadded his food wrapper and stood to throw it away. “If there isn’t anyone outside the club that means something to us, then virtually, it’s impossible to gain leverage.”
“So none of you have relationships outside one-night stands?”
He grabbed them something to drink and came back to the bed. “That’s the idea of it. Disposable women. We only have sex with club women, too, so that’s another reason you’re a problem. For a woman to make it to a higher rank, she needs to have fucked at least the top three members of the chapter. That way she’s not necessarily favorited by only one person.”
“Do you know how ridiculous that sounds?”
“Yeah. But I didn’t make the rules.”
“No, you just live by them.” She sipped her ice water. “Would you ever ask me to do that?”
He glared at her. “No.”
She smiled. “Jealousy getting the best of you?”
He shook his head. “You fucking the top three members is not an option. Never was. Never will be.”
She was glad for that. She stared at him. “Why’d you stay with me?”
“Because you needed me.” He leaned back on the bed, favoring his side. “And maybe I needed you too.”
“I could have taken care of myself.”
“You couldn’t even wash your own hair.” He tilted his head to the side and kissed her shin. “It’s okay. I like you needing me.”
“I could have gotten someone else to help me.”
He made a noise. “Who? Your father? That’s not awkward.”
She chuckled. “No. Not my father. I have friends, believe it or not.” She stuck her tongue out at him. “I don’t get why you’re helping me even though you’re getting absolutely nothing from it.”
“Who says I’m getting nothing from it?”
Ella snorted. “I’m not having sex with you.”
He almost looked offended. “Is that all you think about?”
“Around you? Yes.”
Ryker clutched her ankles in each hand and pulled her closer. The towel slid up to reveal her ass to him and he smacked it.
“You’re supposed to be sick.” He squeezed the fleshy mound before he smacked it again. “You’re hardly capable of having sex right now.”
She yelped and tried to tug the towel down, but he got the upper hand, yanking it away. He pulled Ella back against him so her ass was firmly resting against his crotch. Stroking her side, he let his fingers drift along her soft skin.
“I am sick.” She closed her eyes, enjoying his touch too much. “I need some clothes.”
“In a minute.”
Ryker leaned down so that he could take her breast into his mouth. Ella turned slightly, giving him better access. Eyes drifting shut, she ran her fingers through his hair, loving how the scrape of his stubble scratched her skin. His hand drifted along her stomach, trailing lower until he brushed his fingers along her thigh.
“Ryker, I really am sick.” She swallowed, her throat still feeling raw. “I can’t do this.”
He let her breast go and blew on her wet nipple. “Do what?”
Lifting her leg so that it rested on his, he smoothed his fingers along the inside of her thigh. She sucked in a breath, anticipating his touch, but he didn’t give her what she wanted. Her eyes popped open and she stared up into his.
“What can’t you do?” His fingers slipped along her slit and brushed against her clit.
She chewed on her lower lip. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to give you an orgasm.” He pushed up slightly so he could suck her other nipple into his mouth. “And when I’m through, you’re going to sleep.”
Her eyes drifted closed as he stroked her pussy. He had her temperature rising as he teased. Two fingers slipped insid
e her while his thumb worked her clit, rubbing in soft circles that were damn near going to kill her. He let her breast go with a pop and pressed his face against her chest, kissing the valley between her breasts.
She tried to push him away and found herself clutching at his hair, keeping him in place. Dragging his tongue along the soft swell of her breast, he kissed the underside. A shudder raked over her as her legs fell open. She gave herself to him, desperately needing his touch and loving every second of it.
When he made her come, her back arched up as she ground her pussy against his hand, forcing his fingers deeper into her. Her labored breaths filled the silent room. Ryker kissed her flat stomach and pushed off her.
“You’re the best thing that has ever happened to me.” He pulled her comforter back and lifted her so she could tuck her legs beneath it. “That’s what I get out of this. That’s why I can’t seem to leave. I know I’m not good for you, but dammit, baby, you’re good for me. I want you.” He kissed her forehead. “I swear I’m going to find a way to make it work.”
Ella curled up on her side, staring at him. Ryker smoothed his hand along her back. He couldn’t stop touching her. He couldn’t move away.
“You’re probably not tired, but you can lay here with me? We’ve spent most of the morning in bed. It’d be nice to spend the rest of the day like this.”
He smiled. “I really need to go.” He grabbed a pen and wrote a number on her arm. “Call me if you need anything.”
She stared at the scribbled number. “Really?”
“Yep.” He smoothed her wet hair from her cheek. “I’ll be riding around most of the day. I can stop by anytime or go out and get you something if you need it.”
“What if I just need you?”
He smiled and pulled away. “You’re too sick for sex. Plus, you’re conserving your energy, not spending it.”
She watched as he went to the bathroom and pulled his pants on. His shirt was ripped, but apparently when his friends had delivered breakfast they’d brought him another. He pulled it on and collected his stuff from her coffee table before sitting down to put his black boots on.
“Here.” He handed her the phone. “Call your mom and tell her you’re okay. I saw the soup and cake. I know she made that for you. She used to send it with you every time you came back to school from being sick.”