Rage bubbles up inside me, but I keep my voice as even as possible. “Is that your answer to everything? Dump your kid somewhere?”
“How are you ever going to find another husband? No man wants to take on some dead guy’s kid—”
A band of blind fury tightens around my head. I reach up and rub my temples before speaking. “Then that’s not the kind of man I want in my life or my daughter’s life.” What was I thinking? This woman doesn’t give a shit about me. Never has. Never will. “Let me guess, you need money. Is that why you’re suddenly interested in my life?”
I try sipping my coffee to calm myself, but my hands continue to shake with anger.
“Well, Nick owes these people—”
“Nope.” I slam my mug on the table. “I’m out. Have a nice life, Helga. Lose my number.”
I push out of my chair, grab my purse, and power-walk the fuck away from that crazy bitch.
Ugh, how could I let that woman fool me? Again. But as I shut myself inside my car, my rage subsides, giving way to the familiar ache of abandonment. Vividly, I picture myself as a broken little girl running to look out the window every time she heard a car, hoping it was her mom.
All the ugly memories and feelings threaten to drown me.
I’m better than this. I’m over it.
I’m a mother now. Not a broken, abandoned little girl. Not anymore. I love Alexa, and I’d do anything for her. Die before I abandoned her.
Drying my tears, I’m overwhelmed with the need to see Blake. I’m torn between not wanting to bother him at work and needing to see him.
“We’re in this together. I’m always here for you.”
Choosing to trust his words, I point my car in the direction of Furious Fitness.
“Heidi, what are you doing here?”
Right away, I know something’s off. My girl’s eyes are red and puffy.
“Jake, can you take over for me?”
“Yeah, man.”
Since Wrath isn’t here, I usher Heidi into his office and close the door behind us. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry. I know you’re working. I needed to see you, though.”
“It’s okay. Tell me what happened? Is Alexa okay?”
She gives me half a smile. “Yes. She’s with Marcel. But I did something really stupid.”
I lean against Wrath’s desk and pull her into my arms, kissing her cheek. “I doubt that, beautiful. You’re the smartest girl I know,” I murmur against her ear.
“My mother called.” My jaw tightens. This won’t be good. Heidi gives me the rundown of lunch with her mother and I’m ready to find the woman and choke the life out of her selfish ass.
“I don’t know why I thought she’d be different. All she wanted to do was find out if I had any money to give her.”
“Fuck that.”
“That’s pretty much what I said.”
“Good.”
“I made it out of there without crying, but I lost it once I got to my car.”
“And you came here to see me?” I ask, so damn happy that she finally understands she can come to me when she’s hurting instead of bottling it up.
She sniffles and nods. My arms wrap tighter around her, and I press more kisses to her cheek. “I love you, Heidi.”
“I love you, too.”
After Heidi calms down, I talk her into sticking around. I need to have her close and I don’t want her driving home alone when she’s upset. She calls her brother to let him know where she is, and he’s more than happy to have extra time with the baby.
“I have to tell him about seeing Mom. Warn him. Don’t you think?”
“We’ll do it tomorrow.” Teller will probably hunt the woman down and kill her for upsetting his sister.
“We?”
“Yes, we.”
She grins and kisses my cheek before grabbing a bottle of Windex and a rag and cleaning the mirrors that line the gym walls.
“You don’t have to do that,” I say, placing my hand on her arm.
“If I’m hanging out here, I might as well be useful.”
How can I not kiss her again? “Thank you.”
“She okay?” Jake asks when I return to the front counter. I know he’s got a reputation as the panty-whisperer or some shit, but he seems to be genuinely worried about Heidi.
“Yeah, just family stuff.”
“She’s a sweet girl. If someone needs an ass kicking, let me know.”
My mouth quirks up. “Will do. Thanks, bro.”
He finishes up his work and leaves, locking the door behind him.
Heidi’s cleaning the last mirror when I walk up behind her and grab her by the hips. “Hey, pretty girl. All done?”
She leans back against me. “Mmhmm.”
Gently taking the cleaning supplies out of her hands, I set them on the weight bench next to us. “You know what I spend a lot of time thinking about in here?” I whisper against her ear, pulling her against my body.
She shivers and stares at my reflection. “No, what?”
I keep one arm wrapped around her waist and slip the other one under her breasts. “Bending you over something.”
Her breath hitches. “And?”
“Fucking you.” I take her earlobe between my teeth, grazing it enough to make her shiver.
“What?”
“Anything. Desk, front counter, this weight bench we’re standing next to. Actually, I can lie on it and you can straddle me—” My hand skims down her body, stopping to rub right between her legs. Even through the soft, thin sweatpants she’s wearing, her heat sears my fingers.
“Ah. Oh…Blake, every light in the place is on.” As she says it, though, she reaches back, curling her fingers around my dick, softly stroking me through my shorts.
“Good point.” My other hand slides up her ribcage, gently kneading her breasts until her head falls back. “You’re all mine.”
She makes a soft humming noise in the back of her throat.
“We should shut the lights off,” she says, with a soft, husky laugh that fires me up even more.
“I don’t want to take my hands off you.”
“Do it,” she whispers.
I can’t believe I let Blake talk me into this.
Who am I kidding? I didn’t need a lot of convincing. The minute he put his hands on me, I was ready to rip my clothes off.
I turn as he flicks the light switch. The overhead safety lights come on, throwing off enough illumination to see him clearly. “Maybe we should—”
My blood freezes as a red dot bounces up and down on the wall, next to Blake’s head.
“Down!” I scream, as I dive toward him. He drops to the ground, as I crash into him. A second later, a bullet slams into the plaster above us.
“Holy fuck! Baby, are you hurt?” he asks, placing his hands on either side of my face.
I whisper, “No.” As another bullet punches through the wall.
Lower than the first one.
My heart’s pounding so hard, I hardly hear him urging me, “Move. Stay low. Wrath’s office.” He points down the hall, and I crouch-run my way there, stopping once to make sure he’s behind me. We close the door behind us as quietly as we can. “Wrath has a Glock Forty-Three and a Sig in the bottom left drawer. Both 9mm. There should be ammo in there, too. There’s a vest in the closet, put it on.”
“What about you?”
He lifts his head and glares at me.
“Okay, okay.”
I have to shuffle through a few books and papers before I find the small metal box at the bottom of the drawer that I assume holds the guns.
Wrath’s trained me on the Glock before, so I load that one and hold on to it. Murphy will have to handle the Sig.
I scurry over to the closet and find not one, but two Kevlar vests. Jackpot. I throw the larger one at Blake and slip into the other one.
“Wrath’s on his way,” Blake says, when I crouch down next to him.
“Do you see an
yone?”
“No, they could have been shooting from the other side of the road.” He glances down at the gun in my hand. “You okay?”
“Yeah, Wrath’s had me shoot this one before.”
“Thank fuck.” He glances at me again. “You did good, babe. If you hadn’t warned me—” I let out a sob and he squeezes my hand.
“Do you think the cops are coming?”
“Don’t know. Notice we didn’t hear much? Had to be using a silencer. A rifle with a silencer isn’t easy to come by.”
I don’t for a second think this is anything other than club business, and I’m scared about what Wrath might be driving into.
Murphy gives me a tired smile when I voice my fears. “He knows what he’s doing.”
It feels like hours before we hear someone at the back door. “Stay down,” Murphy orders as he runs over and peeks out the side window. “It’s Wrath and Rock.”
They push into the office and the four of us huddle behind Wrath’s desk. Murphy explains what happened and the guys all tell me what a good job I did. I don’t even realize I’m still gripping the Glock, until Wrath pries it out of my hands.
He pushes his keys at Murphy. “We’re parked down behind the bakery. Get her home.”
“No,” I whisper in a frantic hush. “Don’t stay, please. Come with us.”
“Heidi-girl, someone shot at my gym.” His gaze darts between Blake and me. “They could’ve hurt you. I want to find the fuckers.”
“Please. I don’t want anything to happen to you,” I plead, close to tears.
Murphy shakes his head. “I’m pretty sure the shot came from across the road. They could be long gone.”
Wrath grits his teeth. His gaze strays to the front window and back to us. “Your truck’s in back, Murphy?”
“Yeah.”
“Take Heidi out that way.” He points to the side. “Just in case, I want you to drive through the parking lots until you get to route fifty-five. None of them have dividers more than a couple inches. Your truck can handle them.”
“Okay.”
“We’ll be right behind you.”
I finally let out a breath.
“In the morning, we need to check that spot out,” Wrath says to Rock.
“Yeah, you might want to call Whisper in on this, too.”
Murphy leads me out the way Wrath told him to, and we drive home in silence.
There will be an emergency meeting as soon as everyone’s at the clubhouse. Right now, I need to get Heidi home safe. I want her far away from bullets and crazy-ass mothers.
Everyone’s buzzing with news of the shooting when we walk into the clubhouse. Marcel freaks out when he sees Heidi and hugs her to him until she can’t get a breath.
“I’m okay, Marcel, I swear.” She grabs Alexa and immediately buries her face against her, running her hand over Alexa’s curly brown hair.
“I’m going to walk them home and I’ll be back.”
Marcel shakes his head. “Hope’s upstairs. Might as well stay here. The guys moved Alexa’s other crib into your old room, Heidi.”
“Thanks.”
Z points to the war room. “Church as soon as Rock and Wrath get here.”
I walk Heidi to the staircase. But before she takes the baby upstairs, I give her a kiss. “You did great tonight. Fuckin’ proud of you.”
“We’re finally together. There is no way I’m losing you.”
I touch my forehead to hers, and she runs her hand over my cheek. “Try to get some sleep. I’ll be up as soon as I can.”
Rock and Wrath come in a few minutes later. Dex and Bricks right behind them.
The entire club’s seated at the table within minutes.
Rock points to me to start the meeting. “Tell us what happened.”
Leaving out the part about how I was about to molest the fuck out of Heidi over one of Wrath’s gym benches, I explain how we were closing up and she saw the red dot and yelled for me to get down. It’s then that it comes rushing back how she dove for me, too. Shit.
I wrap up my story with, “Two shots. I hustled her in the office and sent Wrath my 911.”
“Christ, Murphy. They were aiming for your fuckin’ head. Who’d you piss off lately?” Z asks.
I glance to my right. “You mad about me and Heidi, bro?” I ask Marcel. A small joke to lighten everyone up.
He barely cracks a smile. “Ain’t funny, fuckface. She could’ve been hurt.”
“Sounds like she kicked ass to me,” Bricks says.
“What do we know?” Rock asks.
Wrath shakes his head. “Nothing. We’re good with the Wolf Knights. Whisper’s too greedy to fire at the gym he owns a piece of. I’ve been in talks with the owners of the salon next door to buy that piece of property, but no one else should know about it.”
Z lifts his chin in Wrath’s direction. “Could it have something to do with Dylan?”
“I doubt it.” Wrath shakes his head. “He’s not involved with his dad’s club. Seems pointless to target him.”
Dex raises his hand. “Loco came by Crystal Ball earlier. Said there was a Ransom sighting and he had one of his guys running it down.”
“Christ,” Rock grumbles.
Wrath nods. “Makes sense. Ransom’s the only Viper we haven’t exterminated yet. Bold fuckin’ move for him to be up in our territory, taking shots at our businesses, though. Never mind us. That could have brought Empire heat. Stupid risk. Even for a Viper.”
Dex signals Rock and gets the nod to speak. “We shut Crystal Ball down and sent everyone home as soon as we got the call.”
“Thank you.” Rock sits back and runs his hand over his chin. “What about the trouble we’ve had taking over Ironworks? Do we think it could be one of the crews pushing in from Vermont?”
“Anything’s possible. Loco swore he had it covered,” Z says.
I meet Wrath’s eyes across the table. He forces a quick smile. “We’ll find ‘em.”
Feeling like somehow I let him down, I drop my gaze.
The guys keep discussing scenarios, but Wrath’s low voice snaps my head up. “Murphy?”
“Yeah?”
“It’s just a building, bro. I’m more pissed you two coulda been hurt.”
“Yeah,” Teller slaps my arm. “Why was she there, anyway?”
Glancing around the table, I decide it’s not time to bring the reappearance of Heidi’s mother to the club yet. “I’ll tell you later.”
“Aww! Someone was gonna get some nookie at work,” Ravage shouts, making everyone except Teller laugh.
“Knock it off, cocksucker. That’s my sister.”
I’m laughing too hard to confirm or deny.
“Just stay off my desk,” Wrath warns.
“All right. Get some sleep. We’ll meet again in the morning.” Rock dismisses everyone and I head straight upstairs to Heidi.
Except she’s not in my room.
I find her in her room with Alexa.
I hate to wake her up, but there’s only a twin bed in here. “Baby, come on. Let’s go to my room,” I say, pushing her hair off her face.
“I’m not comfortable in there.”
I think I understand why. And since she’s pretty much forgiven and forgotten my former manwhorin’ ways, I crawl into bed behind her and pull her to me.
Of course, that means we’re pressed up tight against each other. My hand strays to her legs. Bare. She’s wearing tiny cotton shorts and, from the feel of it, a tank top.
Five seconds after that, she has my very hard dick poking her in the ass. I shift backward, but she moans and turns over, grabbing the back of my head, pulling me to her for a kiss.
“Heidi? You awake?”
She reaches down and squeezes me through my shorts. “I am now.”
Fuck, the entire night slams into me and I surge upwards, pinning her under me, taking her mouth, yanking the straps of her top down, kissing my way down her neck.
“Blake, please—”
“No condoms in here, baby.”
“I…I don’t care.”
My brain and my dick have completely different reactions. I still her movements and take her chin between my fingers. “You think we’re ready for another kid? Or you saying that because you’re rattled from earlier?”
“What?”
My dick’s not amused. But, one of us needs to have a clear head.
“Come on, get her monitor, and let’s go down to my room.” I tug her out of bed, give her enough time to check on Alexa and grab the baby monitor, then I take her hand and we race down the hall to my room.
As soon as we’re inside, I pin her to the door and strip her shorts off, flinging them over my shoulder. Our kisses are quick and desperate. Desire for her pulses through my veins.
We part long enough for me to drag her to the bed. I fumble with a giant box of condoms in my nightstand drawer.
“What’d you do, buy them in bulk?” she asks. There’s more annoyance than amusement in her voice.
“Yeah. I bought this box thinking of the many, many positions and places I plan to fuck you in, brat.”
I finally get the fucker open and spill a bunch of them on the nightstand, grab one, and dive for her. Her loud giggles echo through the room as I wrap my arms around her. “Shhh…your brother’s right next door.”
“Oh. Sorry.” She laughs even harder.
I want to turn those laughs into moans. I kiss her from mouth to neck. “I lose my mind around you.” She tastes so sweet, my tongue traces a path to her breast, rolling her nipple with my tongue.
Her back arches.
“Like that?”
“God, yes. Would you fuck me already?”
“Wow. I’m thinking I should gag you when we’re in here,” I barely get the words out as I squeeze into the rubber and clutch her hips.
I love teasing her. Making her moan. But I really need to be inside her. I thrust in slow, and she gasps.
“Good?”
“So good.”
I keep moving slow at first, but that only lasts for so long. I let loose and she wraps her legs around me, grabs my hair, and tries not to make too much noise. Just the sight of her fighting to be quiet while she tips over the edge is enough to make me come.
Later—after Marcel threw a number of things at the wall and told us to knock it off—I wrap my arms around her tight. “You scared me tonight.”
More Than Miles (A Lost Kings MC Novel) Page 40