Protection (Death Knights MC Series Book 1)

by Michelle Betham

  And I’m one hell of a great liar…

  Vanni

  “You OK? With Logan being here?”

  I keep a close eye on her as she turns to look at me, her beautiful face all flushed from the sex we’ve just had.

  “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “I dunno, baby girl. I just want you to feel safe here, is all. And if he isn’t making you…”

  “I feel safe. He’s a good man.”

  I laugh, and her expression changes to one of confusion. “None of us are good men, darlin’. Thought you’d have realized that by now.”

  I go over to her, cupping her cheek and kissing her hard. I’m still not done with her yet, I want some more of her hot, wet sex before I go kick some serious ass, maybe take a life or two, that all depends on how co-operative those Devil Hounds are feeling tonight.

  “You’re a good man, Vanni. To me, you’re a good man, underneath all that shit you project to everyone else.”

  I laugh again, because she sometimes likes to see our world through rose-tinted glasses, but I know she only chooses to do that when she’s scared.

  “You saved me, didn’t you? That makes you a good man.”

  “I haven’t saved you yet, baby girl. But I’m gonna. And that’s a promise.”

  She smiles, I like it when she smiles. She’s already beautiful to me but when she smiles it only emphasizes how beautiful she really is. And she don’t deserve to die. But others do.

  She keeps her eyes on me as she backs up against the countertop, pulling her dress off over her head, and she’s naked in front of me, again. Naked and wet and I am gonna take her one more time, use her body as some kinda fuel to get me through tonight.

  “Turn around,” I instruct, and she does as she’s told, clutching the edge of the countertop, pushing her beautiful, tight ass back at me until I can hold on no longer.

  I grab her hips and she widens her stance as I press my thumb against her asshole, opening her up, her tiny groans of pain and pleasure turning me the hell on, she makes me so fucking crazy!

  Slipping my fingers inside her ass I close my eyes as her muscles contract around them, sucking them in deeper, and she’s warm and tight and my cock is in real pain here, desperate to feel what I’m feeling right now. So I pull my fingers out, keeping her open as I sink into her, man, she gets off on this shit as much as I do. And as I’m fucking her ass she’s touching herself, but I reach around and pull her hand away, shoving my fingers inside her pussy, I got her all ways now and I am fucking flying! And all it takes is a couple more thrusts and I’m coming like there ain’t no tomorrow, and she’s crying out and bucking back against me, every muscle she got gripping my cock and my fingers so tight, it’s freakin’ incredible!

  But I’m not done, and neither is she, she hasn’t come and I want her to. I want to taste her, want her to come all over me so I pull out, quickly swing her around and drop to my haunches, diving into her soaking wet pussy as she cries out again, a beautiful sound I never tire of hearing.

  She buries her fingers in my hair as I lick her, pulling her apart so I can taste her, all of her, inside and out, her knees almost buckling beneath her as I ram my tongue inside her. And that’s what tips her over the edge, what finally gets her there, and I keep my tongue inside her, let her juices slide down my throat and, man, she tastes like nothing I’ve ever tasted before. I can’t get enough of this shit, she’s ruining me.

  Grabbing her ass I slowly pull out of her, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand, the sound of her breathing all heavy and ragged the only thing I can hear right now, and I close my eyes, just for a second. And then I feel her cup my jaw, pull me up until I’m facing her, and she smiles. And we’re good, we’re fucking amazing.

  Frankie Cabbetto wants her dead, huh?

  Game fucking on, asshole.

  Nine

  Piper

  “Everything OK? With you and Vanni?”

  “If you mean, does he suspect that the man he’s asked to keep me safe slept with his wife then, no. He doesn’t. And yes, everything’s fine.”

  Logan goes over to the fridge and helps himself to a beer. “Want one?”

  I shake my head and sit down on the couch, drawing my knees to my chest, hugging them to me as I watch him move around the kitchen. “What about you? Are you OK?”

  He looks at me, a slight smirk on his way-too-handsome face. He’s everything Vanni isn’t, and for some reason that only makes me want him more. Because I do, want him. I want him so much I’m terrified, because I don’t know why I’m suddenly feeling this shit, why it’s happening now.

  “I’m good, sweetheart. I’m real good.”

  My eyes follow him as he comes out from the kitchen and into the living area, stopping out front of the counter that separates the two spaces, leaning back against it as he downs a mouthful of beer.

  “What did you hear, Piper? What was so bad that your daddy needs you dead?”

  I drop my gaze and start picking at the hem of my dress. “If I tell you, that puts you in danger, too.”

  His laugh causes my head to shoot up. “You don’t think I’m already in enough danger, huh? I fucked you, Piper. And if Vanni finds out you know as well as I do that sorry just isn’t gonna cut it. So, y’know…” He shrugs as he downs another mouthful of beer. “I’m already up to my neck in danger.”

  I drop my gaze again and I stay silent, I’m not sure this is a conversation I want to get into.

  “What did you hear, Piper?”

  I get up and walk outside, onto the terrace, but he’s beside me before I can take a breath and I swing around to face him. “What do you want from me, Logan?”

  “I want you, Piper. I want you, in my bed, all the fucking time, at least, that’s the kind of shit my head’s filled with right now.”

  “You can’t have me.”

  “Do you want me?”

  “You can’t have me.”

  “Answer the question, Piper. Do you want me?”

  I turn and head back inside, this isn’t fair, what he’s doing here. It isn’t fair.

  “I love my husband.”

  “Answer the fucking question, Piper.”

  “You really want to do this? On top of everything else…?”

  “Answer the question.”

  I shake my head, and I know that only agitates him more, I can see it in his eyes, he’s angry. But so am I, because nobody needs this. Nobody.

  “I need to know if you’re worth fighting for, Piper; if you’re worth me betraying my club for, worth putting my life on the fucking line for so, come on, darlin’, just answer the question.”

  “I want you.”

  The words fall from my mouth before I even realize I’ve said them.

  “And that’s all I need to hear.”

  He starts to walk away, and I panic, my chest’s so tight I can barely breathe. I don’t even know what I’ve done here.

  “No, Logan, wait!”

  He turns around and looks at me and now I don’t know what I’m feeling. If I’m feeling anything. It’s like a strange, almost comforting numbness has taken over, and all of a sudden that Pink Floyd song fills my head – Comfortably Numb. The words are dancing around my brain, making me slightly confused.

  “This doesn’t change anything, Logan, it can’t, change anything.”

  He frowns, and then he takes a step toward me, but the second he reaches out to touch me I recoil. It’s not that I don’t want him to touch me, I do. I want him to kiss me, to fuck me until I forget the twisted reality we’re mixed up in here, but what I want and what I have are two very different things.

  “He’ll kill you, Logan. Even if we never touch each other again he will kill you, if he finds out what we did.”

  “Tell me something I don’t know, Piper.”

  “He’d kill me, too.”

  My voice won’t rise above a whisper, the words are sticking in my constricted throat because I’m terrified. I’d been scared before, but
that’s nothing compared to the fear I feel now. And he should go, but I can’t tell him to leave because that would only raise suspicion, cause Vanni to ask questions, and I can’t risk that.

  “I don’t know about that, Piper. I think Vanni – he really does love you, yeah… that crazy asshole might actually have feelings…”

  He trails off, and I back up against the wall, taking what feels like a hundred deep breaths, one after the other, as I try to lose that well of fear that’s bubbling away inside of me. But it isn’t going anywhere, and I don’t know what to do now.

  “You’ve gotta get tough, Piper. You know that, right? You can’t go back to being that pampered princess…”

  “You think I was pampered?”

  “You telling me you weren’t a daddy’s girl?”

  “I had a nice life, OK, but that was… that was before I found out the truth. Before all those slightly blurred pieces of my father’s fucked up world suddenly came together. That’s what changed me. That’s when I knew I had to turn into someone else, be someone else. I’m not going back there, Logan.”

  He takes a step toward me and this time I stay where I am, I can’t go anywhere anyway, I’m up against the wall.

  “We’ve started something we can’t take back now, Piper.” He places his hand against my cheek, his thumb lightly grazing my jaw. “So what’s the point in stopping?”

  I wrap my fingers around his wrist and gently pull his hand away, and he looks at me, right into my eyes, and I try to find that numbness again, I try to claw it back because I need to feel that now. I need to feel nothing. I don’t need to feel this.

  I let go of his hand and his arm drops to his side, he lets me walk away, but where the hell can I go? I’m still trapped, in this world I became a part of because I thought I’d be safe here. I’m anything but, it’s just that, the threat within these walls isn’t my father. It’s my own weakness, my own inability to say no to a man who is – what is he, exactly? A distraction? Someone to take my mind off everything that’s happening? I can’t afford that luxury.

  “You ever been in love, Piper?”

  I look at him, and I frown. “I love Vanni.”

  “Have you ever been in love, there’s a difference.”

  I’m not sure why he’s asking me this, and again, I don’t know what he wants from me. “I love my husband.”

  “Sure you do, sweetheart. Because of what he can give you? Huh? Is that it? You love him in return for his protection?”

  “It’s not like that…”

  “It’s exactly like that, Piper. You telling me that if your daddy weren’t coming for you you’d still be with a man like Vanni Colletti?”

  His words are like a punch to the solar plexus, each one hitting harder. Because he’s right? Is he? And I still can’t tell him to go, he can’t leave, I can’t escape what he’s telling me.

  “My life changed, the second my father put a hit out on me. It changed, I changed, I just told you that. I did what I had to do.” I sit down on the arm of the couch and pick up the bottle of whiskey that’s on the table beside me. “And what could you offer me, anyway? A more stable, comfortable life?”

  He raises an eyebrow as I down a mouthful of whiskey straight from the bottle. “I never said I could offer you anything. I’m not offering you anything, I’m just trying to work out…”

  “Then what the hell is this, huh?” I stand up and walk over to him, still clutching the whiskey bottle by the neck. “What me and Vanni have is none of your goddamn business, so just do what he put you here to do, and quit with the amateur physcology.”

  I turn away from him but he grabs my wrist, swinging me back around to face him.

  “You really are one cold bitch, aren’t you? Princess.”

  He barely gets the words out before my palm connects with his cheek, so hard it twists his head to one side and I step back from him, but he isn’t giving up.

  “Like I said, one cold, crazy bitch.”

  “Fuck you.”

  He takes the whiskey from my hand and places the bottle down on the counter behind him. “You ever speak to your daddy like that, huh?”

  I shake my head and make to go again, but once more he grabs my wrist, pulling me around with so much force I almost feel the breath physically leave my body as it crashes against his.

  “But I kinda like a dirty mouth.”

  “Fuck. You.”

  He smirks, a low chuckle escaping before his mouth lowers down, moving closer to mine and I try to push him away but it’s like I’m fighting an immovable object, he isn’t going anywhere.

  “You said you wanted me, Piper.”

  “Sometimes I lie.”

  Sometimes I do. But that wasn’t a lie, that was true. Do I still want him? Now? After this? I don’t know. I don’t think I know what I want now, except – I want to stay safe. I want to live, I don’t want to die, and this situation I’m in here, I can only do that, stay safe, if I stay here, with this man who’s confusing and complicated and so insanely hot my skin’s already broken out in a barrage of goose bumps.

  “I can’t offer you anything, Piper.”

  “Then why are you risking so much?”

  He can’t answer that, and I don’t blame him. We’ve created an unnecessary mess that needn’t have happened, it wouldn’t have happened, if we’d both been stronger people.

  “I won’t let anything happen to you, Piper.”

  “Vanni’s already made me that promise.”

  He lets go of me, and whatever we’d been about to do just then, the moment’s gone. I step back from him and reach behind him for the whiskey, taking another mouthful as I walk outside, onto the terrace, watching as day slowly blends into night; as darkness takes over the light, and l know exactly what I’m feeling now…

  Logan

  I can’t offer her anything, that’s true. I can’t offer her shit, we can never happen, I don’t know why I thought we ever could. That was the old me, that other person I thought I’d left behind – that was him talking. And I don’t think like him anymore, he’s gone. I didn’t go through all that crap just to go straight back to everything that had almost destroyed me before.

  I watch her as she stands outside, swigging whiskey from the bottle as she watches the sun go down, and I try to forget that we did what we did but I can’t. I don’t want to. But I can’t give her anything more than Vanni can, it’s just a mess. All of it. All I can do is my job – keep her safe, and when all this is over and she’s back in Nevada, with Vanni, I’ll move on. Again.

  She turns around and walks back inside, leaving the French doors open, I’m guessing that makes it feel less like a prison in here.

  “What happened to you, huh?”

  She hands me the whiskey, and I frown slightly. “Nothing happened to me.”

  She throws me a look and I take the whiskey, helping myself to a long draft, the warm hit of alcohol welcome and necessary as it settles in my stomach.

  “You weren’t born into this life. Right?” she asks as she heads into the kitchen, opening the fridge and taking out a plate of cold meat and a bowl of salad.

  “No. I wasn’t.”

  She places the food on the counter that separates the kitchen from the living area and looks straight at me, her blue eyes boring so deep into mine it’s like she’s staring into my soul, shit! I need this crap like I need a gun to my forehead.

  “Then that’s something we have in common. Isn’t it?”

  It’s about the only thing we have in common.

  “You hungry?”

  I’m not, not really, but at the same time my stomach’s telling me something different. And I can’t actually remember the last time I ate, so I nod and slide up onto a stool, taking the beer she’s just slid toward me, watching as she dishes up two plates of cold cuts, salad and bread. And I wonder how we’ve suddenly arrived here, at this picture of calm domesticity when five minutes ago we were this close to fucking.

  “Here. Eat someth
ing. You can’t protect me on an empty stomach.”

  I look at her and smile slightly, she had her tongue in her cheek when she’d said that.

  “There’s something about you that tells me you can look after yourself, Piper.”

  She sits down opposite me and bites into a chunk of buttered bread, her eyes fixed on mine. “You might think I grew up a pampered princess, but my father also made sure that me and my cousins knew how to defend ourselves. He taught us how to use a gun, how to bring a man down with one swift kick to the right place. He taught us how to fight.”

  “You know how to use a gun, huh?”

  She raises her eyebrows as though I’ve just asked her the most ridiculous question ever. “Why’s that surprise you? I was born into one of the biggest gangland families on the east coast, Logan. We were all in some kind of danger, all of the time, ‘cause of my father’s business. He just wanted us to be able to take things into our own hands, if we ever needed to.”

  “You needed to, he saw to that. And you couldn’t do anything.”

  She drops her gaze and starts picking at her salad with her fork. “That was different.”

  The silence between us hangs heavy in the air for a few loaded seconds, punctuated only by the sound of the waves outside and the muffled noise of traffic and people somewhere in the distance.

  “Have you ever been in love?”

  Her question throws me slightly, even though it shouldn’t.

  “We’ve moved past that conversation now, Piper.” I’m not getting into this, not with her. Not with anyone.

  “So, you can ask me that question but you’re not up for answering it yourself?”

  “It’s got nothing to do with you.”

  “But, somehow, my life’s got everything to do with you?”

  Her eyes are back on me, refusing to break the stare this time, she’s not letting go of this one.

  “What was it your daddy and his men specialized in, huh?”

  “You’re changing the subject.”

  “I know what I’m doing, Piper.”