ASA: BLACK SKULLS MC

by Walker, Kylie

  She shoved those anxious notions down, this time by pressing her lips against Asa’s in a hard kiss. He took her firm ass in his hands and her pussy grew wetter by the second. Maybe there really was a way, she thought, a way to make everyone happy—Harry Walsh, the Boone brothers, herself, even Asa. It was as though Harry and Rodney were tugging at her from the same side, and Asa had her by the opposite arm. She needed to make a decision before she was ripped in half. Find out the truth once and for all. But what if she didn’t want the truth anymore? What if she didn’t want to write a groundbreaking article? What if Asa had somehow become more important than that? Was she crazy to feel this way? Was feeling this way merely the result of having his rough hands all over her?

  Maybe finding out the identity of the real killer would be the best thing. She would be the hero of the Las Vegas Post and clear Asa’s name and the name of the MC club all at the same time. The more she analyzed and strategized, the worse the dread in her stomach became. She was only getting more and more confused, and it didn’t help that she was currently running on next to no sleep. Asa had been massaging her ass, grazing the tip of his finger between the cheeks, and stimulating her slippery pussy whenever his reach got that far.

  “Hey,” he whispered, taking her face into his warm hands. “Where are you? You disappeared.”

  “I’m here,” she said in a faraway voice. He moved his face so that they could make direct eye contact, and said, “We’re going to be fine.”

  “You promise?” she asked, fighting the tears that wanted to spring up in her eyes.

  “I promise,” he whispered. “It might be rough going for a while, but in the end, we will be okay.”

  She gave him a little smile and asked, “Do you trust me…I mean, are you sure you can trust me not to give them the information they’re looking for?”

  “I trust you,” he said. “I read your article after you left this morning and I wasn’t even mad at you.”

  She chuckled. “I forgot about the laptop. I suck as a fucking journalist.”

  “I don’t think so,” he said. “I thought it was good.”

  A warm flush ran through her veins. “Really?” She couldn’t believe how much his compliment meant to her, how good it felt. It almost felt as good as his hands that were still squeezing the cheeks of her ass.

  “It wasn’t really an article,” she said. “It was what we call a teaser. I haven’t written the full article yet. I’m just sending in little updates so that the Post has something to print every day and my editor stays off my back and in Vegas.” The look in his eyes was affectionate and understanding, and Samantha couldn’t reconcile how he had suddenly and without warning begun trusting her. She trusted him though too, with her life. Telling him what she told him today was taking a big risk. He could have chosen to hand her over to the club…use her as some kind of bargaining chip, but she hadn’t even been afraid that he would. Samantha had never before seen him as anything but a strong, invulnerable man who couldn’t be hurt. But she realized now that his trust in his MC had been his biggest vulnerability.

  “You know how Fox received a call that night?” she asked, gently easing into her overall question. When he indicated that he knew what she was referring to, she went on, “I know it was your number, Asa.”

  “Are you going to put that in your article?” he asked. His hands were still running up and down her back slowly.

  “No, but I’d really like to know, did you call him? What did you talk about?”

  “How did you find out it was my number?”

  “Your club knows Asa. Your father knows. The police aren’t going to be far behind. I’m worried about you.”

  She felt his body tense and then he let go of her and she suddenly felt cold all over. “Fuck the police,” he yelled, spitting each word through his teeth. He plowed all ten fingers through his hair and Samantha knew that the MC concerned him more than the police did. They were his whole life. They were all that he knew. That life was all he knew. If they let him live what kind of life would he have?

  “What was said on that call, Asa?”

  “I never should have let you stay in town. You should never have been involved in any of this.” She moved toward him and he stepped back. She saw his eyes scan the trees across the dirt road from the house before he turned back to her and said, “You need to go Sam. You need to leave, now. Go back to Vegas. Let me deal with the club. As long as you drop all of this they won’t go after you.”

  “No Asa. I won’t leave you…” She tried to touch him and he brushed her away.

  “I don’t want you here. You’ll just be in my way. Go home Samantha. Leave. Now.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Night settled over Death Falls. The stifling heat cooled off into a warm breeze that rolled through the flat desert. Asa had spent the greater part of the day struggling with a wealth of emotions that he could neither control nor reconcile. His life had been turned upside down ever since Johnny Fox’s body had surfaced.

  Samantha Wilde had been the silver lining amidst the chaos—the best sort of distraction—and Asa had even thought he would be able to manage her nosy nature, keeping an eye on her journalistic habits while containing her efforts in the realm of non-threatening inquiries. But she didn’t know when to quit and she dug too close to home. She discovered that Fox had spoken with someone the night of his death, and the second she shoved her questions into Luke Olson’s face, Asa knew it was the beginning of the end. Everyone knew now that he’d spoken to Johnny that night. Everyone would know soon enough what happened after. That meant that his entire world, life as he knew it, was about to unravel.

  He became mentally exhausted wrestling with his options and when Jared texted him at midnight, Asa welcomed the chance to get out of his house and out of his darkening thoughts. Even as hurt and disappointed as he was that Kyle was following Samantha around and he hadn’t come to Asa and told him what was going on he didn’t even hesitate to trust Jared. He knew Jared was loyal to a fault…to death. Jared was four years his senior and he was still fighting his way into the inner circle and doing everything he could to be promoted to sergeant-at-arms, a position currently held only by Asa and Kyle Flanagan, both of whom were younger than Jared. Despite the divide in rank among them, Asa had been close with Jared since childhood. They were both passionate and opinionated in the same ways and when issues arose within the MC, Asa found that Jared was in frequent agreement with him, even when Rodney, Carl, and the other higher ups strongly disagreed.

  They had a tight bond, one that at times even rivaled Asa’s alliance with his self-proclaimed best friend, Kyle, and because of it, they had made a pact to go off on their own pursuits in secret when one or both of them felt deeply compelled to do so.

  Asa and Jared had each other’s backs, which was why Asa pulled his Harley into the vacant parking lot in front of Happy’s Diner where they had agreed to meet at half past midnight.

  After downshifting his Hog into an idling purr, Asa lit a cigarette and challenged himself not to think about the sexy curves of Samantha Wilde’s body. He wanted her, but he wanted her to be safe even more. He couldn’t sleep at night if he was worried that someone would hurt her. It was better for her to go back to her life. She wasn’t ever going to fit into this one. If he lived through all of this shit his life would not only never be the same, it would likely never be one that a woman like Sam would want to be a part of. Luckily, he was jarred from those depressing thoughts when Jared eased his Harley off the long stretch of dirt road he had traveled, and turned into the parking lot and pulled up beside Asa.

  Asa looked at his friend in the dim lights of the parking lot. With his crew cut and rugged good looks, his chest as firm as a brick wall, Jared could easily have any woman he wanted. Unfortunately, there was no explaining love and attraction. Jared didn’t want just any woman. The woman Jared wanted happened to be tied up in the worst kind of cesspool relationship. Her name was Mol
ly Posner and she had been getting battered by her abusive boyfriend. Jared had enough of standing by and doing nothing about it and Asa agreed that a man who would beat a woman was one of the lowest on the totem pole with child molesters being the only ones lower than that.

  Shooting his friend a wry smile, Asa said, “So, after all of these years you want to cash in that favor, huh?”

  Jared smiled tightly and said, “Ten years might seem like a long time, but an elephant never forgets,” He throttled his Harley into a loud growl and said, “Follow me and kill your headlights when I do.” Jared reversed out then and kicked his Hog into high gear, peeling out through the dusty parking lot with Asa driving directly behind him.

  In less than five minutes they came to a trailer park where mobile homes were spaciously lined in the one tree-shaded stretch of Death Falls. Asa followed his friend’s lead, flipping his headlights off and slowing his Hog to a crawl as they rolled into the quiet and dimly lit trailer park where the majority of residents were fast asleep.

  When they came to the very last home, Asa saw that the lights were on inside. They were illuminating the object of Jared’s obsession, Molly Posner and her dirtbag boyfriend, Andy Simmons. Their argument was loud and based on their shifting silhouettes on the other side of the curtained windows, Asa knew that things would quickly escalate between them like they did every time Andy stumbled home drunk and violently angry.

  The two friends studied the silhouetted scene together in silence for a long moment—Jared clenching his jaw in disgust and Asa fearing that they could easily take things as far with Andy as they had in a similar instance ten years ago.

  Asa turned to his friend and asked in a low tone, “She gets how this is going to go down?”

  “She called me,” he assured him. “She can’t live like this anymore.”

  “Look, man,” Asa said, gripping Jared’s shoulder and locking eyes with him. “If you want to make this right, if that’s what you’re after, then I’ll make this right with you. But if you’re doing this because you think Molly’s going to fall into your arms-”

  “I just want her to be safe,” he interrupted before pointing at the escalating argument inside the trailer. “She’ll never be safe with him.” Asa got that at least. He’d let Samantha go earlier for the same reason. All he wanted was for her to be safe. Maybe that’s what real love was like. Asa wasn’t sure because he’d never felt anything like it before. No one had ever made him question his loyalty to his father or his club. But with Sam, there really wasn’t any question. He knew that given the choice, he would choose her.

  Asa looked back at the house and at Jared again. “She’ll never leave him,” he stated. He hated being the voice of logic and reason, but in all of this time, Molly hadn’t left Andy, which meant that some part of her felt like she deserved what he was giving her as far as Asa was concerned.

  “She can’t leave him,” Jared argued hotly. “He won’t let her. Bottom line,” he asserted, “she called me and I’m going to fix it and you’re going to help me just like I helped you when we were barely old enough to drink.”

  “Yeah, man,” Asa agreed, fully with his friend now. “I’ve got your back.”

  Climbing off their Harleys, Asa pulled a pair of leather gloves from the back pocket of his jeans. They stalked as quietly as they could with their boots crunching over dry dirt, towards the trailer door. They reached it just as the sound of a vase shattering against a wall sliced through the volatile couple’s argument and Molly screamed in response.

  Urgently, Jared kicked the door in, much to Andy’s drunken surprise and that’s when all hell broke loose—Andy took a swing at Jared and Jared ducked in counter-measure and delivered blow after blow to the guy’s stomach, ribs and face. Asa used what little time he had to draw a handgun from his waistband at the small of his back and screw a silencer on it. Molly was fretting and pacing all the while as if she were only now realizing the precise manner in which the Black Skulls were about to answer her prayers.

  Once Jared had the guy in a secure headlock, he wrestled him through the trailer and out the door. Asa followed and once Jared had Andy on the ground, Asa advanced on him fast and pressed the barrel of his weapon against the back of the son of a bitch’s head.

  Molly filled the open doorway with tears spilling down her cheeks as she watched what was happening with wide eyes. “Do it, man,” Jared hissed as he struggled to keep his hold on Andy “Kill him! He’s the same kind of piece of shit that Johnny was.”

  Andy was a piece of shit, but not on the same level as Johnny. Johnny Fox had intentionally seduced a woman who was too drunk and on drugs to take notice of her own daughter’s whereabouts. That was how Johnny had taken advantage, how he’d abused that girl in the night, how he’d convinced her to keep her mouth shut unless she wanted her mother to live on the street and starve. Johnny had provided for them and it had come at the cost of a fifteen-year-olds innocence. And the Black Skulls hadn’t done one Goddamn thing about it when they found out. They continued to let that son of a bitch sit as V.P. and pretended like they didn’t know he was a fucking pedophile. But Asa hadn’t been able to stand for that. Johnny needed to pay for what he did to that girl and probably other girls before her. Asa did what he had to do to protect that girl…but Andy wasn’t the same.

  “Kill him for fuck’s sake!” Jared hissed, jerking Asa out of his time warp.

  Andy wasn’t the same by a long shot, but Asa had an obligation to Jared. Without Jared’s help ten years ago, he would have never been able to drive Johnny’s dead body out into the desert and bury him. He would have never gotten away with putting that rabid dog down.

  So Asa pulled the trigger.

  Pop!

  The silencer at the end of the barrel had muffled all noise. Asa immediately paced off, shoving the gun down the back of his jeans and doing what he could to get some air in his lungs, as Jared wasted no time dealing with the body they now had on their hands. That’s when he saw her—the unmistakable wild mane of strawberry blonde hair, long legs, something in her hand... a cell phone? Samantha was lurking by the edge of the neighboring trailer, staring at the scene with wide eyes, the cell phone in her raised hand facing them... recording them? If Samantha was here then so was Kyle…fuck!

  “Hey!” he called out, breaking out into a jog towards her.

  Samantha turned and sprinted toward her Prius that was idling with its headlights off, and the driver’s side door open. She jumped in and peeled out of the trailer park. Asa heard the unmistakable sound of a Harley taking off after her. Fuck! Asa knew that things had just gone from bad to much, much fucking worse.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Jumpy and terrified, Samantha had locked the door and all the windows of her motel room and checked that each was secure several times. She didn’t feel safe, not with the paper-thin walls and flimsy-looking front door. She had never scrutinized it before, but now she was fairly certain she could kick it in if she tried. She needed to focus, she told herself, as she made a beeline to the bed where her laptop was resting, warm and in sleep mode. She set her cell phone on the comforter beside it and ran her finger over the cursor pad to bring it to life.

  At long last, she not only knew who had killed Johnny Fox, but she had hard evidence on video—Asa Boone had pulled the trigger, Jared Hurst had helped get rid of the body, the two MC bikers had stated both easily and straightforwardly as they ended the life of yet another man. “Oh, My Fucking God,” she groaned out loud, holding her head in her hands, her elbows planted on her knees. She thought she might be sick. She suspected that Asa killed Johnny. Hell, the truth was she knew in her heart that he had done it after their conversation earlier…but tonight she had actually witnessed him killing another man. She had seen Asa Boone do what he does on a regular basis and she wished that she had left town when he told her to.

  She should have left a week ago. She might not have fully realized it at the time, but hindsight wa
s always 20/20. She had willfully ignored Asa’s comments, his warnings, all the red flags he had waved right in front of her face that should have told her he was capable of such brutality. But yet she didn’t want to really know it was true. Since when did she blindly buy what she was being told even when it contradicted the person’s reputation? Since she stopped being a journalist and deferred all rational thinking to her lady-parts, that’s when. Shit! He saw her tonight. Would he give her another chance to get away, or had she blown it by not leaving?

  She ran all ten fingers through her matted hair and challenged herself to breathe and focus. But part of her mind was on high alert and hyper-vigilantly focused on the front door. Why hadn’t Asa charged after her when she ran? Why hadn’t he jumped on his Harley and chased her when she had driven off into the night?

  Was it because Jared Hurst hadn’t seen her?

  Had Asa tried once again to keep her safe?

  “No!” she answered out loud. “What a fucking mess!”

  Suddenly Kyle Flanagan jumped into her troubled thoughts—his promise to tail her that had been an unmistakable threat. Would he come pounding on her motel door? Had he tailed her? Had he seen what she saw? Would he confiscate her cell phone video in order to use it against Asa Boone in the Black Skulls’ perverted court of justice?

  As Samantha mentally wrestled with the moral and ethical shit storm that was the mess of her personal life having mixed with her professional one, she began drafting the five thousand word article that she had begged Harry to let her write back at the Las Vegas Post for no other reason than to release some of the anxiety that filled her head and her heart. Her hands were shaking so hard that it was difficult to type at first, but soon the steady rhythm of her fingers and the quiet, clacking sounds soothed her into at least a temporary sense of calm.