Noah pushed himself toward the front of the crowd. Shayna emerged right behind him, chandelier earrings swinging wildly. They looked like they’d just come back from a romantic dinner. “What the hell is going on?”
“They were just heading out,” Liam said firmly.
Ryan eyed the gun being brandished in his direction. He wiped his mouth. “Let’s go, fellas. The girls here aren’t that hot, anyway.”
The Scorpions scowled as they followed their leader toward the exit. Alex scanned the room as he trailed off after them.
“Well, it’s been real,” he said. “See you later, Aspen.”
Several faces turned to me as the Scorpions left.
Noah, on the other hand, ignored me “How did those scumbags get in?”
“Logan was taking a smoke break,” a man piped up. Logan nodded sheepishly.
“Then, where were you?” Noah rounded on Liam. Liam stuffed his hands into his pockets and stared at the floor. That was when Noah finally noticed me.
I avoided his gaze. Bonnie was clear on the other side of the club. She shook her head wildly and ducked out of sight. I exhaled loudly. I was on my own for this one.
“Maybe you should leave,” Noah said.
“I’ll walk her out,” Liam offered.
“Both of you, I mean.” Noah set his jaw and crossed his arms.
I opened my mouth to say something, anything. But when Noah turned his laser beam eyes back on me, I snapped my mouth shut. “I’ll just...show myself out, then,” I finally said.
As I crossed Noah’s path, I couldn’t help but meet Shayna’s eyes. She studied me with her heavy-lidded gaze, shaking her head back and forth in disapproval. My heart withered and died. I couldn’t get out of the club fast enough.
Liam stormed past me through the exit. I chased after him.
“Wait up!” I called. “I’m sorry!”
Liam turned around so quickly I almost ran into him. He breathed heavily through his nose, like a raging bull. His eyes kept flickering between me and the middle distance. “You know that guy.”
My shoulders fell. “Yeah.”
“Is he—” Liam made an odd swallowing noise. “Is he that ex you were talking about?”
I closed my eyes. I nodded.
Liam punched his hands together. “Look, I gotta—I can’t do this right now.”
“Liam!”
“Don’t.” He held his hand up to my face. I felt it like a blow to the stomach. “Just don’t.”
I stood aside helplessly as he fastened his helmet to his head and straddled his bike. The engine gave a roar as he kicked off into the street. In the deepest pit of my heart, I hoped that he would take one last look at me before he left.
He didn’t.
Bonnie squealed as the ducks swarmed her feet. She took off up the hill, throwing breadcrumbs in her wake. I watched her from my seat in the grass, tearing a hot dog bun into a million little pieces. The pond glittered under the sun, like a shining eye.
“I should’ve told him that Alex was in town,” I said.
Bonnie dusted off her hands and dropped to the grass beside me. She picked up a handful of crumbs from my pile and tossed it to the ducks. “It was your business, not his. You can’t help how he found out.”
I nodded just to have something to do, but I wasn’t sure if I agreed. The guilt ate away at my insides, leaving nothing but an empty shell. I hadn’t seen Liam for a couple days, hadn’t heard his voice. It was killing me.
“But maybe it happened for a reason, you know?” Bonnie said. She draped a comforting hand over my arm. “Maybe you and that guy have some unresolved issues or something.”
I snorted. “Like what?”
“I don’t know. He did have a tattoo of your name. Not every guy does that for his lady. Noah doesn’t even have one for Shayna, and they’re like the king and queen of Canyon City.”
I knocked down my pyramid of breadcrumbs. “What’s up with Shayna, anyway? She’s been nothing but a bitch to me, and for no good reason other than the fact that she doesn’t know me.”
“She’s got a stick up her ass,” Bonnie said. “Ever heard the saying, ‘Happy wife, happy life’? Well, Shayna is that times ten. If Shayna ain’t happy, ain’t nobody in three counties going to be happy.”
I laughed. The ducks were beginning to waddle away toward the shore, losing interest. I tossed out a few crumbs to call them back. “Well, thanks for bringing me here. I feel better. Kind of.”
“No prob.” Bonnie leaned back on her elbows and tilted her face up to the sun. “Don’t forget about what I said, though. Talk to the guy. Maybe there’s a reason he came back.”
“Yeah,” I said faintly. “Maybe.” I did have a couple of people I needed to talk to, actually, but Bonnie was wrong. Alex was going to be last on my list.
The reigning queen of Canyon City was first.
* * *
For once, Shayna wasn’t glowering at me when I showed up on her doorstep. She looked surprised as she peered at me through the screen door.
“Can I come in?”
“Yeah,” she said, waving me through. “I still have some of those Buddy’s wings left if you’re hungry.”
I ignored the dig and marched straight to her living room. I picked the seat on the couch closest to her favorite armchair. Shayna pulled her rose-printed silk robe tight around herself before she sat down. “What’s up, sweetie?”
I steeled myself. “I want to know what I did to make you hate me so much.”
Shayna reared back, shocked.
I continued on, “Whatever it was, I want to make it right. Let’s just call a truce and move on, because rumor has it that I won’t last long in this town if I’m on your shit list.”
Shayna’s eyebrow twitched. Then, she put her elbow on the armrest and held her chin, regarding me with a bemused expression. She sat still and silent for so long that I was beginning to get a little scared. Finally, she spoke.
“I don’t have a problem with you.”
It was my turn to be shocked. “You don’t?”
Shayna shook her head. “Nope. But that don’t mean I gotta coddle you like a little princess. You’re new, that’s a fact, and we give new people shit. It’s the circle of life.”
“Well. Okay, then.”
Shayna laughed. “Okay,” she echoed. “So, now that we’re being open and all, let me just say that you really suck at scaring ex-boyfriends out of town.”
“I know. It’s just that—”
Shayna stopped me with a raised palm. “You don’t have to explain yourself to me. Your business, not mine. But if you really want things to work out with Liam, that Scorpion-wannabe has got to go. If you want, I’ll round up the girls and we can hatch up a little plan.”
“You’d do that for me?”
Shayna shrugged. “Sure. You see, Aspen, the Skull Kings are brothers for life, but the same thing goes for us girls. We ride together, we die together. That’s what’s great about being a Skull Princess.”
I nodded. Skull Princess. So Shayna hadn’t exactly welcomed me into her den of old ladies, but this was close enough. “I think I’d like that.”
“Great. So I’ll call Heather, Farrah, Yasmin,” Shayna said, ticking them off on her fingers.
“And Bonnie.”
Shayna snorted dismissively. “Bonnie’s not comin’. No way in hell.”
“Why not?”
Shayna planted her hand on her hip. “First of all, she annoys the hell out of me,” she began, waving her finger. “Always tagging along, latching onto this guy and that guy. She wants to be an old lady, anybody’s old lady. It’s pathetic. And second of all, bitch tried to steal my man when he hired her at the club. She would’ve been out of a job a long time ago, but bartenders either keep quitting or want to dance, and Noah has no choice but to keep her. I’ve been keeping an eye on her ever since, and she’s as shady as shady gets.”
I frowned. But she’s helped me so much, I wanted to say. But
I kept my mouth shut. It was Shayna’s house and Shayna’s girls. She could invite whoever she wanted to. I just made a mental note to fill Bonnie in on the details later.
“And Liam.”
I shook myself out of my thoughts. “What?”
“Get Liam to come, but don’t let him ask any questions about why. We don’t want any of the other brothers involved in this, or it’ll just turn into an all-out war.” Shayna closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. “And I’m too old for that shit.”
“Why does Liam have to come?”
“Because you’re his girl, Aspen. If anybody should know about what’s going on in your life, it’s him.”
* * *
When I didn’t see Liam’s bike at his apartment, there was only one other place he could be. The tangled, indistinguishable roads at the edge of town would’ve confused me a month ago, but by now I navigated them with ease and got to the MC clubhouse in ten minutes. And just as I’d predicted, there was Liam’s bike, hitched in the otherwise empty parking lot.
I let myself in without knocking.
“Hey,” I said.
“Hey.” Liam got up from the leather couch. He’d been lying down, but he was wide awake. I could see a million thoughts swirling around in his eyes.
“I have to tell you something,” we said in unison. We registered the words at the same time. I couldn’t help but smile.
“You first,” I said.
Unlike me, Liam wasn’t smiling. He scooted over and patted the couch. “Maybe you should sit down for this.”
I felt strange as I lowered myself beside him. We’d seen each other naked, and he’d been inside me multiple times, yet the simple act of being close to him now made me uncomfortable. “What is it?” I asked tentatively.
“That girl Bonnie, she’s been hanging around me a lot,” he said. “I told her I had somebody, but she wouldn’t take no for an answer. She came by my place earlier and tried to...tried to...” He trailed off.
“When?” I said sharply.
“Like an hour ago, maybe more.”
I calculated in my head. That bitch. That was around the time I went to Shayna’s, so Bonnie must’ve headed straight for Liam’s after our talk at the duck pond. Her words filtered thinly through my mind like radio static.
“Talk to the guy. Maybe there’s a reason he came back.”
Yeah, right, and that reason was to distract me so she could swoop in on my man. Shayna had been right about her, right down to the shady, man-stealing part. I began shaking with rage.
“Aspen?” Liam touched my shoulder.
I shook him off. “I’m going to kill that bitch.”
“Hey, now.”
I stood up and kicked around the room, seeing red. I knocked over a barstool. “Fucking Bonnie!”
“Whoa, calm down!”
Liam caught my wrists and crossed them over my chest. I let him hold me, taking deep breaths. The world shifted back into focus, and I was surprised to see Liam smiling.
“What’s so funny?”
There was a familiar glint in his eye, but I couldn’t place it. He looked at me in a way that jolted me awake. “It kind of turns me on, seeing you get all riled up like that.”
“Come on, Liam. I’m being serious here,” I said, pulling away.
“So am I.”
Liam pulled me back with a growl. I landed against him, bumping hips. He was already excited. I gasped as he pushed his hardness into the seam between my thighs, moaning softly.
It had only been a day since our last failed encounter at the strip club, but it seemed like ages ago. My skin bloomed with heat under his fingers, waking up to his touch. Alex was still at the back of my mind, but somehow I knew that the time was right. Liam was my man now, and he deserved all my attention.
I tore off my shirt. Liam blinked at me a few times, dazed momentarily. Then, his hands covered my sides, roamed up my ribs, and reached for the clasp of my bra. His mouth descended on my naked breasts. I grabbed his hair when I felt the pull of teeth grazing along my nipples.
Liam forced me backward, chasing me up onto the bar. I lifted myself, giving him the space to take my pants off. I reached down the front of his jeans for his cock and gave it a squeeze, making him jump.
“Naughty,” Liam said, though he was smiling. He unzipped his pants and pulled out his cock. Without wasting another second, he pulled me forward by my hips and penetrated my wet pussy.
“Ah!”
I threw my head back and wrapped my legs around Liam’s waist. His pants fell to his ankles as he began thrusting, quickly making up for every minute we’d spent without touching each other. My ass kept knocking into the bar, but I was only barely annoyed. I just wanted to open myself wider, deeper, and take all of Liam into me.
“Yeah, yeah, just like that,” I whispered. I licked the edge of his ear.
Liam received my encouragement like a horse getting kicked in the side and took off, making me scream. I leaned back against the bar, pointing my breasts at the ceiling, and Liam curled forward to take my nipples in his mouth. He traced his tongue over my hard nubs as his cock stroked up my clamped pussy. I could barely see, but I felt absolutely every hard inch of him.
“Fuck me, Liam! Fuck me!”
Liam growled. I felt his abs tensing up against me, burning with effort. I reached into his shirt and pinched his nipples. He howled and bit me, and he wrapped his right hand around my neck.
“Come on, Liam. Come for me,” I said.
Liam’s eyes rose to meet mine. They were dark with lust, almost possessed. I winced as the force of his thrusts grew stronger and clenched my teeth.
“Liam...”
Liam’s gaze grew foggy. His mouth fell open. I shifted to feed him my nipple, and he sucked it between his teeth gratefully.
My pussy began burning and itching with want. I moved my hips up and down, rubbing my clit against the soft tuft of hair on Liam’s pelvic bone. His mouth moved onto my other nipple, leaving the first one wet, cold, and peaked in the open air. I rolled it between my fingers as I worked myself on Liam’s cock, screwing and unscrewing myself. I could feel my pussy dripping on him, matting the fur on the insides of his thighs, making me sticky. My eyes were glued to Liam’s lips, soft and plump as they were pressed against the underside of my breast.
“Oh,” I murmured. My eyelids felt heavy. “Liam. Oh, Liam!”
I shuddered from head to toe. Liam gave his cock one final push. Something inside of me broke loose, and I came suddenly. My pussy spasmed all around Liam’s rock-hard cock. Liam’s voice cracked when he yelped, and he pulled himself out just in time to spray his cum on my bare stomach.
“Fuck!” he screamed. He grabbed his wet cock and began jerking himself, spilling more and more of his fluids on my skin. I felt it drape over me in sticky ropes of pearly milk and thought I was about to come again. I felt like Liam was marking me, claiming me for his own, and there was nothing sexier than that.
Liam fell on top of me, panting. He didn’t even care that he was getting his own spunk all over his shirt. I held him close, matching my breath to his. I brushed my lips against the racing pulse in his temple. It felt so right. The last couple of days couldn’t even have happened.
“So,” Liam said in my ear, “what was it that you wanted to talk about?”
Oh, that’s right. “Shayna,” I blurted out.
Liam pulled away. “Huh?”
I could only laugh at his confused look.
The parking lot of the grocery store was empty, just as Shayna had promised. The moonless night sky cast its black eye over the town. Anything outside the reach of the street lamps were completely ensconced in shadow.
I parked the car under a lamp and waited. The blue Mustang pulled up beside me right on time. I stepped out.
“I heard you want to talk to me?” Alex said. He smirked, exposing his small, seed-like teeth. “You decided you missed your man after all, huh?”
I squared my shoulders. “No
t exactly.”
The back door of my car popped open, and Liam sprang out. He pulled Alex’s arms behind his back and held him in place.
“What the fuck?” Alex uttered.
“Remember me?” Liam said. “I’m Aspen’s man, now.”
Footsteps echoed from the distance. Shayna and the other old ladies emerged from the darkness, stomping across the asphalt with their platform heels.
“Who are these people?” Alex said.
“They’re my friends,” I said. “I have a life here, now. You can’t control me anymore.”
Alex snorted. “You think these people are better than me?” He spat on the ground and threw his face at the old ladies. “You don’t know what I can do. I’m a dangerous man.”
“That’s real convincing,” Shayna said. “But you’ve never seen me in action, sweetie.”
Alex groaned loudly as Liam slammed him into the hood of his blue Mustang. Shayna reached for one of his arms and pinned it down beside his head. I could read my name on his skin clear as day.
Heather, Eddie’s old lady, passed me two plastic bottles. One held powder, and the other held a clear liquid. “You do the honors,” she said with a smile.
I approached Alex, wedged between Liam and Shayna. “This is just a warning,” I said. I splashed his tattoo with the liquid.
Alex barely flinched. “You stupid bitch!”
“If I ever see you in this town again,” I continued, “if I ever see your old, shitty car, and if I ever even dream about you coming back, your dick’s next.”
Alex’s brow knitted together in confusion until I dusted his tattoo with the powder. His scream barely pierced the air before Heather stuffed his mouth with a bandana. Shayna and Liam held him down as he squirmed and kicked. I watched the skin under his tattoo pinken, shrivel, blister, and pop, like it had been set on fire. A sick smile twisted over my lips.
“You don’t own me anymore,” I said.
The tattoo curled in on itself and melted into the white, peachy under-layers of Alex’s flesh as his top layer of skin burned away. If I strained my ears, I could still hear the fizz and hiss of the chemicals working their magic. I hoped they burned him down to the bone.
Skull Kings MC: the collection Page 6