Long Ride: A Motorcycle Club Romance (Black Sparks MC) (Whiskey Bad Boys Book 1)

by Kathryn Thomas

  “Jesus Christ, this looks awful, Nick. Has this even been cleaned? You’re lucky you’re not dead of an infection,” she said, trying to force the authority in her voice she didn’t feel. “I can’t believe you thought you could get away with leaving this untreated.” She sounded like a nagging scold, but she figured it was better than nothing. Maybe she could succeed in keeping this interaction strictly friendly.

  “Why did you come back?” he asked as she reached for a wad of gauze. Startled, she watched helplessly as it rolled out of her hand, leaving a trail along the none-too-clean garage floor. She was probably breaking every rule in the first aid book, but Nick needed help. Only an ogre could walk away from him in the state he was in. She glanced over at him, hoping she’d heard wrong. But he was looking at her expectantly. He did not drop his gaze.

  She dropped her head. “It was time.” She hoped he was getting the unspoken message: Please, please don’t ask more. “This is going to have to be changed tomorrow,” she said as she wrapped the wound tighter, wondering how she was going to cut off the excess. She finally ripped it with her teeth, hoping Nick wouldn’t laugh. “You really shouldn’t go anywhere until then.”

  “It’s not the first time I’ve slept off a bullet wound in here.” He shrugged.

  “You—you live here?” She asked in surprise, glancing around the decidedly un-homey environment of the garage.

  “Upstairs.” He pointed.

  “Kirrily didn’t mention that.”

  “Probably because she heard what happened the last time you and I got under the same roof.”

  Liana froze; all sensual thoughts involving the man reclined in front of her flew out of her head. They were pointless. Nicholas no longer wanted her; that was clear. He didn’t even want to be around her, and she was sure he would have avoided it if he could have; it was pure bad luck that he happened to live above her uncle’s garage. That cockiness, that shameless flirtation, that supreme knowledge that she found him irresistible, that had thrilled her so much back then—she’d killed all of that. She’d broken it, and had nearly broken him. He didn’t smirk at her now; his golden-green eyes that had once blinked curiously up at her, that only desired to know her, to puzzle her out, to unwrap her, were now only hard steel. Her one action had destroyed it, ensured she could never have it again. She deserved that consequence. In fact, she didn’t deserve to ever see him again; when she’d left Prudence, she hadn’t expected she would. Now, only some twisted facet of fate had brought him back into her life.

  “And you’d be surprised how many guys had shivs in Circleville.”

  She froze, before turning and rushing out of the room.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  She sat on the porch, staring out at the darkness of the orchard. She had not sent anything to him during his time in Circleville—the Ohio state juvenile prison, the place first her kiss, then her lies, had sent him. Hers, and nobody else’s. She had not written him, and though, at first, she told herself he was so angry with her he’d barely notice, or that he wouldn’t even read anything she wrote, with time the guilt started to poke at her, first with needles, then with hot knives. She was already tiptoeing around Noel, trying not to set him off, like a fish trying to clean a shark’s teeth and get out before being ripped to pieces. She’d already been through enough with him; she knew what he was capable of when someone defied him. She couldn’t risk Noel getting the wrong impression of what had happened; that would have risked everything she’d lied for in the first place. And she was just as ashamed of that—of not writing to him, of not apologizing—as she had been for the lie that had put him there to begin with, of the idea that he’d had to face it utterly alone, thinking she’d given up on him, that she didn’t care – that, perhaps, she’d never cared.

  Noel had brought home several other boys before Nick, and he only had one rule for his stepdaughter as concerned them: Don’t touch.

  She obeyed. She feared the consequences more than she wanted to experiment with them. But with Nick, that was impossible. She had craved him more than she craved straight As, the lead role in the play, or the title of homecoming queen. She craved him more than the image she’d built around herself like a fortress. He’d been everything good that awaited her at childhood’s end. She had asked Noel to let her have him. He’d laughed in her face. And so it was that forbidden touch that had ruined everything, that had sent her lies spinning out of control, that had sent her to New York determined to brush off the stench of shame and heartbreak that she’d left behind in Prudence, to forget the boy that had started it all. He was a man, now, she reminded herself. And he had moved on. He deserved to move on after the hell she had put him through.

  But that didn’t mean that, deep down, she didn’t wonder what kind of man he’d become.

  ***

  “I thought I’d find you here,” said Tryg, standing in the doorway of the darkened bar. Even Hot Dog, the skinny blond long-necked prospect who usually tended bar, had left for the night, after Nick had assured the kid he was capable of drinking himself into oblivion without any help.

  Nick pulled the strings of his hoodie tighter around his neck underneath his jacket, hoping the bandages Liana had applied wouldn’t be visible. It was bad enough they’d lost the shipment. Nick couldn’t afford to show vulnerability or that he was injured in front of Tryg. The only thing he could afford to show was steely resolve, because that was the only thing Tryg responded to.

  “Cigarette?” asked Tryg, pulling out a pack of Camels. Nick had quit smoking regularly in high school, but Tryg always seemed to know when an emergency struck.

  “God, yes,” said Nick, leaning in so the older man could light it for him. He exhaled instantly, watching the smoke drift over the liquor bottles behind the bar, almost hypnotizing. “I thought Kirrily made you quit.”

  “I don’t see her around here, do you? Look at me, kid,” said Tryg.

  Nick tore his eyes from his glass to obey, blinking into Tryg’s coal-colored eyes. It had been a couple of years before Nick had gotten comfortable looking at the Black Sparks president in the eyes. And it wasn’t as if Nick had ever had any problem defying people. But most of these people had been teachers and foster parents, who demanded respect simply because of who they were, and threatened him if he didn’t give it. Nick, of course, knew that was bullshit, that respect had to be earned no matter who you were. And, yet, he had learned how to jump through the hoops when he felt like it, throwing out a “yes, sir” here and there, keeping his head down, obediently doing his homework and chores to keep them happy and off his back, while undermining them in secret. The consequences of that were that he’d never really learned how to genuinely respect anybody. But Tryg was different; he made you want to respect him.

  “I’ll get it back,” Nick said before Tryg could say anything else.

  “You will,” said Tryg. “Because you have to. I believe in you. Don’t let me down.”

  Nick nodded, hoping Tryg wouldn’t ask for details just yet, because he didn’t have any. Getting shot made planning that much harder. “By the way,” said Tryg, and the older man’s tone instantly sent a jolt of tension back through Nick. It wasn’t a tone he often used. It was a tone he used to talk about women. “Don’t you think it’s a coincidence that the day she arrives in town is the day the Vipers hijack our truck?” He didn’t even have to use her name. Tryg was testing him, he knew, to see how he’d react. If he’d defend her. To see how deep he was still in. Nick decided to dodge.

  “We don’t even know it was them. It could have been an inside job.”

  “It was them,” said Tryg. “It may not have been them in the truck, but they were the ones pulling the strings. They were trying to make a statement. We can’t let them think they have anything on us, Nick. If we don’t get that shipment back, it’s as good as waving a white flag at the Russians. Saying we’re too weak to protect our own territory. They’ll go to the Vipers. I’m pretty sure the Vipers have already gotten to some of
them.”

  “What did the Russians tell you?”

  “They want us to prove ourselves,” said Tryg, grabbing the bottle by the neck. “They think we don’t have what we once did. Without Trace. Without Noel.”

  “Noel wouldn’t even be seen in public with us,” Nick practically spat.

  “But he put his money where it counted.”

  “Only when it got him something in return.”

  “Noel never did anything that didn’t get him something in return. He’d run over his own mother if the insurance payout was big enough.”

  “Noel’s dead, Nick.” Nick nodded and took a deep breath. “And so is Trace. What’s left is Liana. She may not look it, but the Black Sparks are in her blood. She can’t be overlooked. And right now, she’s not being honest with me.”

  Nick thought back to the garage, of the way Liana had started and looked away when he’d asked her why she’d come back. If she wasn’t hiding anything, she was playing somebody who was.

  “She had a rough time in New York, but she’s not involved with the Vipers.”

  “I don’t like to guess,” said Tryg. “I like to know. And since I can’t be around every second of the day, I want you to keep an eye on her.”

  “You mean spy on her?”

  “You don’t have to spy. She’s my niece. She’s staying with me and Kirrily and Kizzy. She’ll be around whether we like it or not. And you two were close once. All I’m asking is for you to pay her a little extra attention.”

  “A little extra attention is what got me in trouble with her to begin with.”

  “I know,” he cut him off severely. “But this isn’t personal, Nick. It’s business. You won’t make it far in this M.C. if you can’t understand that difference. Besides, she’s lived in New York for two years. That’s where the Vipers’ original chapter is based. That’s too big a coincidence.”

  “Come on, this is Liana Ryan we’re talking about,” said Nick, and he hoped he was disguising the emotion in his voice as he recalled what she’d once been. What she’d once been to him. “Homecoming queen, choir girl. She played Sandy in Grease, for God’s sake.”

  Tryg chuckled. “Was she any good?”

  “I heard she was, but I didn’t see the play.”

  “Why not? I mean, I know the legitimate theater probably wasn’t your thing, but I would have thought you’d at least be curious.”

  “I wanted to, but I was pissed off at Mr. Howe, the gym teacher, for making me run laps.”

  “Yeah? So?”

  “Well, I got suspended for stealing his sneakers, tossing them into the dumpster, and lighting them on fire.”

  “You and she led very different lives, didn’t you?” said Tryg with a smile.

  Nick bent his head, laughing into his glass. But when he looked up again, Tryg’s face was grave. He suspected what was coming.

  “I need to know what happened between you two, kid.”

  Nick sighed. “I thought the whole town knew.”

  “They know what Noel Richardson wanted them to know—that his foster son tried to sexually assault his stepdaughter. I want to know what really happened.”

  Nick knew he must have noted the tension in the younger man’s body, and rubbed his back.

  “I had just turned seventeen when they sent me to live with Noel and Larissa and Liana. Noel had a reputation for taking in and turning around foster kids, and my social worker told me how lucky I was that he’d chosen me, like it was some special privilege to be taken in by the guy who everybody thought was God’s gift to Prudence. But I wasn’t buying it, and I bought it even less the first time he took off his belt and I found out it was all an act. He was a huge fucking hypocrite, just like every other adult I ever knew,” Nick added bitterly. Tryg followed along, something almost like sympathy in his dark eyes. “Thing is, that alone wouldn’t have been that bad. It wasn’t like I couldn’t handle it. But what I couldn’t deal with was the idea that he might do to Liana what he did to me. I lied for her when she sneaked out to see her friends one night. I don’t know why I did it. I had never once stuck my neck out for anybody, especially not some spoiled little brat. But she was such a caring person, genuinely caring, and funny and real,” he paused, reddened a little.

  “Anyway, none of it was put on. The idea of him hurting her made me almost literally sick. I couldn’t sleep at night, agonizing over what I could do to keep her safe from him. But we got close after that, started spending time together,” he added, blushing a little. “One thing led to another. What can I say? We were seventeen and curious. He caught us together in the attic. Not entirely clothed.I should have been able to see it coming. She was terrified of him—more than I was. She’d seen it up close for years, what a twisted bastard the guy was. Plus, she had a reputation to uphold—not only her own, but her entire family’s. She was going to go to college. She had a future. And I was just some punk. I should have known that when it came to saving herself or saving me, which one she would choose. I should have known she’d lie and say I forced her. It didn’t mean it didn’t hurt.”

  Tryg placed a hand on the younger man’s shoulder, and Nick felt himself relax a little at the kind of fatherly gesture he’d so rarely experienced in his life. “Were you in love with her?”

  Nick stiffened, closing his eyes briefly. “Tryg, don’t do this. Not like it matters now, anyway.”

  “You don’t have to say it. You’re making excuses for her.”

  “I’m not making excuses for her. Why would I? She just stood there while they slapped the cuffs on me. She never apologized. Never wrote me a letter. I spent my eighteenth birthday in prison because of her. I still have scars from where my crazy cellmate stabbed me with a filed-down toothbrush because, for the past week, he’d only been pretending to swallow the schizophrenia medication they were giving him.”

  “Nick, I know I may not seem like it, it’s not a sin to admit you still have feelings for someone, even after they fucked you over. It doesn’t make you weak. It makes you human.”

  “Well, I didn’t get where I am by acting human. Not in this life. And you didn’t either.”

  Tryg gave a rueful smile. “I’m more human than you think.”

  “Anyway, it doesn’t matter, because if I know one thing, it’s that you’ve got nothing to worry about with Liana. She’s not involved with the Vipers.”

  “Nick, she’s practically the heiress to this M.C. Her grandpa started it; her dad made it what it is. She may be a princess, but she’s a princess who knows her way around outlaws. She has to.”

  “But the Vipers? We know what they’re mixed up in. Their president’s been fingered for about a half-dozen murders, not to mention the ones they suspected but couldn’t prove. Liana’s not stupid.”

  “No, she’s smart. She’ll do what she has to do to survive. You, more than anybody, should know the dangers of underestimating what she’s capable of.”

  Nick watched his grip tighten on his glass of whiskey. He grabbed the bottle and poured himself another two fingers, slamming it down. Tryg watched him, the younger man knew the club president could read him, could see the memories clouding his face.

  “Besides, even if she’s not involved directly, that doesn’t mean she can’t be useful to us,” he said.

  Nick didn’t like the sound of that at all; Tryg was honorable; Nick wouldn’t have joined the Black Sparks if he didn’t trust him. However, he was also a master manipulator; he used people before they even caught onto the fact that they were being used. He made them think they were getting something out of the arrangement when, really, they were eating right out of his hand. And Liana didn’t deserve to be used even if she’d destroyed his trust and proved herself unreliable. On the other hand, Nick owed everything to Tryg; he was the one who’d taken him in after he’d been released after a year in Circleville, keeping him off the streets, giving him a place to live, making him a prospect and patching him in under a year, letting him move up into the ranks as his
unofficial protégé. He’d been the first person to recognize promise in a throwaway kid, one everybody else had given up on – including Liana.

  The hard line of his jaw softened. “Look at this way, kid. We both know you’ve moved on. You don’t need her anymore. If there’s one thing I know, it’s that shitty things happen all the time. And you can’t dwell on them. You admit they were shitty, then you move on. You use them. And, right now, you need to use them to help us. That’s how you got to where you were. Because you’re smart, and you can be trusted. Think of Liana being here as an opportunity for you to put it behind you once and for all.”

  He took a last swig from his glass and thought back to what he’d said in the garage that had so upset Liana she’d run out on him. He shouldn’t have brought up Circleville. He should have been better than that. After all, she’d tried to help him and, in return, he’d made her feel like shit for something that happened six years ago, for something she couldn’t change, even if she wanted to. He knew she would. In fact, he’d known the second he saw Liana in the garage, eyes widely gaping at his bloody wound, that she’d insist on helping patch him up, and it killed him that, after all this time, he still knew her so well.

  That was one of the things that had drawn him to her, the fact that underneath her haughty façade, she had a genuinely kind and giving nature. She did art projects with her nieces and helped them put on plays; she volunteered to teach Sunday school. She was afraid of spiders, but he still remembered how she would shriek when she one, then trap them it in a paper towel and toss it out the window rather than killing it. That was why her betrayal had hurt, like acid in a wound that had not yet begun to heal. He thought of the bullet that had grazed him, aching.