“Yes. It was a burn phone, and we only spoke a few minutes. Storm will be released in six months. I couldn’t remember the exact date. I had to know for sure.”
“I’m glad to hear he’ll finally make it out.” He left unsaid that he hoped it would actually happen this time.
Twice, time had been added to his sentence due to fighting. She didn’t understand what was going on. Thorn had tried to find out, but all they learned was that he’d knifed a couple of men each time, but thankfully, they’d survived.
It was so hard to think of her little brother being violent, someone to fear. He’d been so sweet and compassionate as a little kid. Then when he became a teenager, everything had changed.
“Janet did say that Mitch is still the Skull. He claims to be holding the place for Storm.” Tension tightened the small of her back. She wanted to help her brother. She understood it was instinct, the same kind she had when it came to Bryan and Thorn. She inhaled and pressed her cheek against Thorn’s bicep. Goodness, the man was strong. She felt safe with him, even with a good dozen outlaw-motorcycle-club members around her.
“I know what he needs.” Thorn’s voice rumbled above her.
“What?” She looked up.
“A good woman. Every man needs one.” He smiled at her, humor twinkling his eyes.
“You’re a smart man, Mr. Savalas.”
Life was good.
To my Dad
Acknowledgments
This last year has been wonderful. Thank you, Sue Grimshaw and Emily Sylvan Kim for helping to make it so. Thanks to Meda White for being my lunch buddy and keeping me sane. Lordy, woman, I would go screaming down I-65 without you. Many appreciative thanks to Betty Bolte for believing in me. Hugs. Special thanks to Candice Moody for being the best beta reader ever! And I have to acknowledge one of the kindest people I know, Heather Leonard. She’s a sweetheart.
BY CARLA SWAFFORD
Brothers of Mayhem:
Hidden Heat
Full Heat (coming soon)
PHOTO: © HOLLY NICHOLS ALLRED WITH THE PHOTOGRAPHERS, INC.
CARLA SWAFFORD loves romance novels, action/adventure movies, and men, and her books reflect that. She’s married to her high school sweetheart and lives in Alabama.
carlaswafford.com
Facebook.com/CarlaSwaffordAuthor
@carlaswafford
The Editor’s Corner
It’s another cold month of winter, but never fear, we have a few special somethings to warm your heart.
USA Today bestselling author Stacey Kennedy launches a new series, Dirty Little Secrets, with Bound Beneath His Pain—ladies, meet Micah, a man who takes what he wants. New York Times bestselling author Missy Johnson introduces a young journalist who goes undercover for a hot lead, and gets seduced by the billionaire bachelor she’s supposed to be chasing, in Resist. New York Times bestselling author Tracy Wolff tells a story about a damaged actress who bares her soul, and falls for the one man who cares enough to listen, in Lovegame. Book two in the Recovered Innocence series from Beth Yarnall, Atone, is guaranteed to tug on your heartstrings, as will Charlotte Stein’s Never Sweeter, where a self-reliant college girl falls for a reformed bully. Then USA Today bestselling author Lauren Layne’s Oxford series heats up in this story of forbidden desire as a brooding jock hoping for a comeback falls for a woman who’s strictly off-limits in I Wish You Were Mine. Jill Sorenson releases a reunited love story with Against the Wall. And a popular song makes for a popular story in Ellie Cahill’s Call Me, Maybe. Then plan to rev it up with Hidden Heat from Carla Swafford, an MC story that’s almost real.
Your history lesson this month includes two new Loveswept releases. First, K. C. Bateman’s Napoleonic love story, To Steal a Heart, and second is Maeve Greyson’s time-traveling phenomena, My Tempting Highlander—where time’s not the only thing changing and there may be a bit of shape-shifting going on, too!
Don’t miss a little bit of sweetness from Flirt: Renita Pizzitola’s Addicted to You, and hockey hotness with Sophia Henry’s Power Play.
And last but not least, seven books in one with Stacey Kennedy’s Club Sin series bundle where you’ll meet all the masters of sin.
Romance yourself this month with Loveswept—you know you want to.
~Happy Romance!
Gina Wachtel
Associate Publisher
Read on for an excerpt from
Full Heat
Brothers of Mayhem
by Carla Swafford
Available from Loveswept
Chapter 1
“I’ll kill you!”
If Storm Ryder had a nickel for every time he’d heard that, the beautiful Fat Bob Harley-Davidson he had a hard on for the last few months would be his.
The redneck’s knuckles came around in a powerhouse swing and knocked Storm’s head to the side. The surrounding crowd groaned. Whether it was out of sympathy for Storm or because of what was about to happen to the stranger was anyone’s guess.
His vision blurred, Storm remained on his feet. He’d learned to take punches in prison. With a shake of his head, he paused and blinked a couple times.
Damn, that’s going to hurt in a few seconds.
Slamming his fist into the redneck’s ribcage, Storm stepped closer as the big guy hunched over. He brought the man a few inches off the floor with a jab into his stomach. The bastard staggered and threw up.
What the hell?
Storm looked down. The sorry piece of shit had fucked up his brand-new motorcycle boots. It was going to be a son of a bitch to clean the crap off the side buckles.
Another hit with his left to the man’s nose knocked the bastard straight back and sprawled out on the floor.
“Hey, boss, want me to take the trash out?” Twofer nodded to the asshole now curled up in a ball.
A second passed before Storm remembered Twofer. Damn that hit scrambled his brain. Even without the hit, it was hard to reconcile the little prospect he knew before he entered Holman Correctional. The skinny little kid was now the six-foot-four monster glaring at the stranger. From what Storm had been told, Twofer had a growth spurt over a year ago and soon after became a full pledge member of the Brothers of Mayhem. He could easily haul the misinformed redneck and dump him outside.
Storm never allowed anyone inside the Skull and Bones who refused to respect the Brothers of Mayhem’s turf. For a stranger to come onto a Brother’s old lady and then call her a slut after she’d said, “Get lost” was batshit crazy. The man was lucky only Storm and Twofer heard him. Usually, Storm would be restraining ten other Brothers, but it was so early in the afternoon that fewer than a handful of the members hung around.
“Yeah, take him out, but no need to drive the point home about leaving. I think he’s got the idea.” Storm pulled a paper towel off the rack behind the bar and swiped at his knuckles, cleaning where his skin split and bled.
Stretching his fingers, he checked for any other damage including fractures. In many ways, it was hell being a lefty, but people rarely expected such a solid punch from that direction. The drawback was the amount of punishment his hand received. Over the last three years, he’d broken his middle finger twice, ring and pinky finger once each. Lately, he’d started wearing fingerless black leather gloves, but he’d taken them off to wash his bike outside the bar and had walked in to grab a rag when he heard the asshole.
He placed one booted foot on a barstool’s lower rung to swipe at the spray, cussing the whole time.
“Is there a Mr. Storm Ryder here?”
Mister?
Storm lifted his head to stare at the woman craning her neck and eyeing the clientele in the dark Skull and Bones barroom.
He tossed the paper toward the trashcan and leaned on the bar.
“Who wants to know?” His gaze leisurely traveled over the girl’s body. Her light brown hair piled in a messy knot on top softened her high cheekbones. With her white buttoned-up shirt and long tight skirt, she looked like what the porn w
orld loved: a repressed librarian. She even wore those little half glasses and glanced through them to a notebook she clutched in her hand. Was someone playing a joke on him? He looked around. Everyone was watching the girl. He wondered how much she got an hour, and if he could afford her for longer.
“Mary Jane Parker.” Her eyebrows almost reached her hairline when she spotted him. He imagined he looked a sight with a cut on his forehead, a swollen lip, a bruised cheekbone, and one eye black and blue with a tinge of yellow. The bruised eye was from a fight yesterday and was a reminder to duck sooner.
“You’re fucking kidding me.” He shook his head. What the hell? Some people had no imagination when it came to their stage names. “Tell me your real name.”
She looked around the room as if she’d never seen a bar before.
“That’s my real name. My parents are nonconformists and indulge in various illegal substances.”
How fucking sexy was that? She talked like a librarian too. He rubbed his bottom lip, taking in the mouthwatering length of her legs. That was what he could see from the knee down. She was nearly his height.
“And what can I do you for?” Oh, yeah. He would like to see her face down and legs spread.
Her attention finally settled on him. “The reason I’m here is that my partner, Jimmy Marcus, heard your gang was hiring out as bodyguards.”
“Well, Mary Jane.” He stepped nearer and leaned down, his nose mere inches from hers. “We’re not a gang. We’re a club,” he said in a threatening tone.
The corners of her lips lifted. Unafraid, she stared straight into his eyes. She was either brave or terribly stupid. Most people lowered their gaze or stepped back.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean any offense. I just wanted a few minutes of your time, Mr. Ryder.”
“Quit calling me that. Call me Storm.”
“Storm.” She said the name as if she could taste it. “May we talk a few minutes in private?”
Hot damn. Someone had a good sense of humor sending her to him. He couldn’t wait to see what was underneath that blouse. Whoever hired her deserved free beer on the house for the next month.
He nodded to the hallway that led to the bar’s office. “Ladies first.”
She smiled big and walked toward the back.
Shiiit. That tight ass of hers swayed just enough to get his cock to twitching.
She was exactly what he needed to make the day better. Taking in the view with a smile, he decided he wanted some of that sweet tail. His fingers tingled with the need to reach out and squeeze that firm little split peach. All women like her should be required to wear form-fitting skirts. He bet she looked mighty fine in tight jeans. What the hell was he thinking? She would be amazing without anything on.
As soon as he stepped into the room behind her, he shut and locked the door.
Those expressive trimmed eyebrows of hers lifted, but her smile didn’t waver.
Oh, hell, yes. Party time!
—
Mary Jane glanced around at the sparse room. The dust on the metal desk made it clear no one really worked in there. The walls had several posters of bikini-clad girls sitting in precarious poses on motorcycles.
The whole building intrigued her, including the few men she’d seen stretched out in chairs or perched on barstools dressed in faded jeans and leather vests, displaying their colors. She believed that was what they called the vest and patches. Jimmy Marcus, family friend and employer, loved reading about motorcycle gangs…no, the blond delicious tall drink of water in front of her said to call it a club.
Danger oozed off Storm Ryder like a heady shot of 110 proof vodka. Even his name warned of risky behavior, and her lips puckered when she said it. With his bruised and cut-up masculine face, his many shades of blond hair brushed back, a couple days’ growth on his chiseled chin, and intelligent silvery eyes that followed her every movement, she understood why he fascinated her the most.
Living the nineteen of her twenty-three years in a commune with her eco-conscious parents, she decided to take up Jimmy’s offer to work for him and see a bit of the world. She’d learned a lot, but Jimmy was nearing seventy and rarely did more than work and watch TV. So when he asked her to track down the Brothers of Mayhem’s president and offer him a job, she jumped on it.
In his deep voice, Storm asked, “So show me what you got, Mary Jane.” Moving around her until he stopped and those light eyes stared into hers.
She probably should have protested his invading her personal space, but she liked the heat radiating off his body, warming her in ways that had nothing to do with temperature. He smelled of soap, sweat, leather, and pure male.
“I have nothing to show you,” she said. Jimmy had warned her that the men were very aggressive.
“You won’t make much money without taking it off.” He crossed his arms and tilted his head.
“You think I’m a stripper?” When his eyebrows rose, she looked down at her clothes and barely there boobs and laughed. “No. I have no idea where you got that. You’re right. If I was, I would be a poor one for sure.”
He dropped his arms to his side, edged closer, and said, “Then why are you here?”
“I need your club’s services.” She felt giddy inside. His smoldering eyes made playing with him so much more interesting. “My boss has been threatened by a gang that calls itself Thirty-Second. I believe it has something to do with the street they first controlled.”
“Yeah.” He chuckled. Such a naughty sound that melted every joint in her body. “The dickheads will never admit what it really stands for.”
She suspected by his tone and the glint in his eyes that he referred to the gang’s sexual stamina. She cleared her throat to hide the giggle she fought against. When had she become so silly? No need to encourage him.
He grinned and asked, “Why would they pick on you and your friend?”
“We own Marcus-Parker Motorcycle Repair shops and sponsor Blaine Flyer’s NASCAR team.”
“Flyer sucks.”
“That’s not what I heard.” Her smile widened. It was well known that Flyer was a womanizer.
He pulled his head back and looked harder at her. As if he wasn’t sure she understood what she was implying about Flyer. A dangerously hot expression crossed his face. He liked her teasing.
“So they threatened to wreck your shops.” Thankful that he moved the conversation back on track, she understood it to be more of a statement than question.
She guessed a lot of people would be wary of his tone, but her mom always told her she had a special knack for reading people. The anger he projected was toward the Thirty-Second gang and not her.
“Why do you think they don’t want to mess with the team?” she asked.
“Thirty-Second loves cars and never screws around with them except for stealing one on occasion. But they hate motorcycles and everyone who has anything to do with them.”
“They may hate bikes, but they love the money they get from us. That’s why we have a problem.” She’d never understand how anyone could dislike an inanimate object.
“Sounds more like your problem.”
“We would like to make it your problem, I guess you could say.” She tilted her head. “As I mentioned, I need to hire you to protect Jimmy.”
“What about you? I take it you’re the Parker in that repair business.” He leaned a shoulder to the wall and rubbed his chin, his gaze once again drifting down her torso.
The speculative look he gave would normally anger her—she wasn’t curvy or big chested, so there wasn’t much to take in—but if she was truthful with herself, she was doing the same to him.
—
Storm had watched her luscious lips move, not hearing one word. He’d never seen lips needing to be kissed, bit, and sucked like hers. Hot damn! Every inch of her begged him to taste her. Usually, he lusted after big tits like so many of the old ladies flaunted. He had a feeling he was about to switch to a handful. Yeah. Small ones with hard little nipples
perfect for tweaking.
His gaze drifted back up to her face.
One trimmed dark brow lifted as he looked into her eyes. Instead of embarrassment or anger, humor twinkled in their mossy depths. Shit! He fucking loved that, a woman who didn’t play hard to get but didn’t throw her body at every available male.
Too bad he had to scratch her being a porn star or a stripper. If she had been, convincing her to remove her clothes would’ve been so much easier.
“Well, sweet cheeks, let’s talk terms.” No matter how much he was interested in what was beneath her clothes, business came first. “How long will you be needing our services?”
His gaze involuntarily slid down her thin buttoned-up blouse.
What could he say? He was pure heterosexual male.
—
She liked how he listened intently to every word she said, even bending his head slightly. With her five-eight height, most men looked her eye-to-eye, but her gaze met his lower lip. The thin scar that cut diagonally from the corner of his mouth across his stubbled chin intrigued her. It gave him a savage look.
Blond men had never interested her, but she liked how his hair fell to nearly his shoulders in strands of light brown, gold, and almost white. The creases above his brow and at the outer edge of his eyes spoke of hours in the sun. She estimated his age in the early thirties, but when he’d briefly grinned at his friend in the barroom, she’d thought mid-twenties. He needed to smile more often.
Those light gray eyes leveled to stare into hers again.
That’s interesting. So he hadn’t been listening. His heavy-lidded look told her he’d been thinking more about recreation than business.
Realizing she hadn’t answered his question and feeling a little guilty of giving him the same treatment, she said, “Jimmy’ll talk to you about that.”
Hidden Heat (Brothers of Mayhem #1) Page 21