Unattainable

by Madeline Sheehan

  I took it.

  I grabbed hold of him and took as much of him into my mouth as I could. Both his hands were in my hair, gripping tightly, pulling painfully hard, and jerking his hips forward, gagging me, forcing me to take more, but I didn’t care.

  I didn’t care because I wanted more. I wanted all of him. I always had; I’d never stopped.

  My hands flew to his hips in an attempt to hold on to him. My nails dug down deep and deeper still until he was grunting in pain yet thrusting faster, and I couldn’t breathe and his grip on my hair had reached scalding levels and…

  “Tegen,” he said, groaning, breathing in and out in hard, erratic bursts. “It’s never been like this for me, babe, never. Nobody’s ever been this good…felt this good.”

  Oh God, I knew; I had always known. How fucking long had I prayed for this moment? For as long as I could remember, forever even.

  It had always been him. It would only ever be him.

  My tears spilled over. My longtime broken heart was breaking again, shattering, falling to pieces and disintegrating. And in its place was a brand new heart. Like a phoenix rising from the ashes.

  When it was over—after Cage had taken everything, every part of me he could take, making me take him inside my body everywhere I could take him, after falling away from one another—we lay side by side on the floor of his room, sharing a cigarette.

  “Now what?” I whispered.

  Cage’s head lolled to his right and his half-lidded eyes found mine. “Now, nothin’,” he said.

  “Nothing?” Panic flooded me. Had he just fucked me over? Again?

  “It’s me and you, Teacup,” he said, rolling to his side and sliding his hand over my bare stomach. “And nothin’. ’Cause nothin’ else fuckin’ matters right now.”

  • • •

  Cage lifted Tegen off the floor and set her down on his bed. He stared at her for a while, running his gaze up and down her naked body, just watching her sleep.

  He’d lied. When he’d said he’d never loved a single woman he’d fucked. He’d lied.

  He’d loved before. He’d loved exactly one of them. He just hadn’t realized it until right now.

  He loved Tegen. He’d loved her most of her life, actually, but just hadn’t known the feeling for what it truly was until now.

  Love wasn’t something he’d measured by how many days you spent around a person, or how long you’d known someone, and it sure as fuck wasn’t measured by whether you fucked them or not or how many times.

  Cage only measured love by what he would do for someone, the lengths he was willing to go. How much he cared about their well-being and their survival. And he’d always cared about Tegen; he’d never stopped. She was family, she was his best friend, and just like he’d take a bullet for his sisters, for his brothers, even for his old man, he knew, in that moment, staring down at her, he’d take one for Tegen too.

  No way was she going back to California. Not a chance in hell.

  He’d tie her to the fucking bed if he had to.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Dressed more comfortably now in a pair of black leggings and an oversized, slouchy pink tee that hung off one shoulder and had a pair of silver angel’s wings printed on the back, Ellie followed Danny out of her room.

  The club looked exactly as it always had. The back hall of bedrooms had the brothers’ names on the doors, pictures of the boys with their families or on their bikes lined the walls, and it smelled of cigarette smoke, spilled booze, and men who preferred smoking and drinking over bathing on a regular basis.

  Every visit to the club before she’d left for college had been barely tolerable and had always left her with a bad taste in her mouth. But instead of feeling any sort of negativity, she felt more at home than ever before. Safe, too.

  The telltale sounds of sex, from both a male and female, flooded the hallway and Ellie flushed with embarrassment as she recognized Cage’s deep voice, and heard Tegen crying out in response to his quite frankly mouth-watering sexual demands of her.

  Thinking back to high school, to her own experience with Cage, she smiled to herself. If there was anything Cage excelled at, it was women. Or rather, sex with women. And from the sounds of it, Tegen was being thoroughly excelled.

  Danny, with Harley in her arms, shook her head in disgust and picked up her pace.

  “Guess crazy #1 and crazy #2 made up,” she muttered. “Give them five minutes and they’ll be at each other’s throats again. I swear, it’s like Kami and Cox all over again.”

  Ellie gave her a sideways glance. “Have they finally calmed down?”

  Danny snorted. “Actually, yes. But I think it has more to do with the fact that Kami wants more kids and he doesn’t, so she’s taken to ignoring him entirely.”

  “And you?” Ellie asked. “And Ripper? Things are good?”

  Danny stopped walking and looked into Ellie’s eyes. “They’re better than good,” she said softly. “I-I’m so happy Ellie. I really, really am.”

  Ellie stared at her old friend, feeling the sharp, unwelcome pang of jealousy rear its ugly head. What was wrong with her? First she was having baby envy and now this? Being beaten and nearly raped had seemingly stirred up doubts about her priorities in life, making her wish she’d maybe taken a different path.

  No, she would never regret putting school and a career first. But maybe she sort of regretted not going on any dates in college, not really doing much of anything except studying. Her only boyfriend to date, a millionaire with a kink fetish who favored cream-colored cable knit sweaters…and existed only in the pages of a book.

  Not that she was into kinky sex…or anything.

  “Talkin’ ’bout me, beautiful girl?”

  Ripper turned the corner, smiling at his wife and daughter, Dirty and Tap close behind him. But Ellie was only focused on Ripper. The last time she’d seen him, he’d been carting around his usual bottle of tequila and looking miserable. That was definitely not the case anymore. This was an entirely different man standing in front of her; a man whose entire world consisted of two heads of blonde hair, two sets of blue eyes, and dimples as far as the eye could see.

  “Maybe,” Danny replied, smiling coyly. “If you’ve stopped being stupid about ZZ.”

  Ripper’s smile melted into a soft, yet serious expression. “Yeah, baby,” he said quietly. “I’m good.”

  “So fuckin’ glad you’re both good,” Tap said, pushing past Ripper. “I for one ain’t fuckin’ good. We’re locked the fuck up for four more days and all the pussy inside this motherfuckin’ club is all taken.”

  “Shoulda stayed true to your old lady, brother,” Ripper said as he took Harley out of Danny’s arms and swung the little girl up over his head, setting her down on his shoulders. “Then she’d be locked up with ya instead of married to some fuckin’ asshat down south.”

  Opening his mouth, about to respond, Tap’s eyes landed on Ellie and his mouth abruptly closed. The grin that followed made her skin crawl. It wasn’t that he was a bad-looking man, maybe a little shorter than Ellie liked, but he was fit, clean, his long black hair was well taken care of, but the fact remained that he was old enough to be her father. If not older.

  “Forgot about you,” Tap said, stepping forward. Ellie took a quick step back.

  “Like big black asses and chocolate pussy,” Tap continued. “Don’t get enough of it ’round here.”

  “Oh my God, Tap!” Danny shouted. “Little ears!”

  Tap glanced over just as Dirty stepped forward, immediately dropping his head into Tap’s personal space. “Back the fuck off her,” Dirty said darkly. “Or the only pussy you’ll ever be seein’ again is gonna be you cryin’ on the fuckin’ floor after I drop your ass on it.”

  Tap’s eyebrows shot up at the exact moment Ellie’s jaw dropped. She hadn’t grown up around the club life like Danny had, but she’d seen enough, knew enough to know that Deuce’s boys loved one another fiercely, that unless it was their women or t
heir kids in question, they banded together. Them against the world.

  Ellie wasn’t anyone’s woman; she wasn’t a biker brat, she wasn’t even friends with Danny anymore, not really, yet Dirty had just threatened Tap. For her.

  “Come on, Ellie,” Danny said, sounding irritated. “I’ll find you a room. One of the boys can crash on a couch.”

  Ellie yanked her arm back, a knee-jerk reaction out of fear, partially because she was more than jumpy lately and Danny had caught her off guard, but mostly because of Tap’s behavior.

  “No,” she said. “Thank you, but I’ll, uh, stay with Dirty.”

  “What?” Danny asked, gaping at her. In fact, everyone was gaping at her. Even Dirty.

  Why was everyone staring at her as if she’d suddenly lost her mind? She felt safe with Dirty; he’d saved her life, for God’s sake. So what if he had issues? She had plenty of issues herself lately and Dirty, of all people, understood. Whatever had happened to him as a child, he knew exactly how she was feeling, maybe even better than she did.

  “You can have the room,” Dirty said as he backed away from Tap. “I’ll sleep up front.”

  Ellie didn’t like that idea either. With men like Tap crawling all over the club, she didn’t want to be alone in the middle of the night. In fact, the more she thought about it, she never wanted to be alone anywhere ever again.

  God, she felt pathetic. Helpless, powerless. She couldn’t even save her own life.

  “You don’t have to,” Ellie said quietly, her eyes focused solely on Dirty. “I would feel…better…if you stayed with me.”

  • • •

  Dirty tried his best to ignore the three shocked sets of eyes burning holes into him as he stared back at Ellie, but there was no ignoring the thundering rattle of his heart trying to pound its way out of his chest.

  What was wrong with this bitch? First, she came back to comfort him after he’d attacked her. Next, she saved him from having to explain to Danny why he’d cleaned himself up. Not that he could have. He honestly didn’t know why he’d done half the shit he’d done lately.

  And now, she felt safe with him; so much so that she wanted to bunk with him. Out of everyone here, Ellie felt safe with him.

  Jesus fucking Christ. He was the one man in this club no woman should ever feel safe around.

  What was going on? Up until now, his world had made sense. It wasn’t pretty, or sugar-coated. He damn sure wasn’t envied.

  But to him, it was all he knew, it was how he lived to see another day. To him, it worked.

  Until now. Until her. And suddenly, nothing was working and none of it made any fucking sense.

  He knew that if he tried to speak, his voice was going to crack and give away how fucked-up he truly was to everyone standing in this hallway. So, instead of speaking, he pulled his pack of smokes from his cut, lit one up, and as he was putting the pack away, glanced back at Ellie and jerked his chin toward the other end of the hallway. Then he took off down the hall, feeling something akin to masculine satisfaction when he heard Ellie’s bare feet slapping the concrete floor behind him.

  Not that he’d ever wanted the attention of a female, but Ellie choosing him over his brothers, him over sleeping alone in a room, following him down the hallway, fucking shit, he liked it. It felt like power and not at all like the sort of power he was used to exerting over women. This was different, softer, it flowed smooth and hot through his veins, improving his posture and twisting his lips.

  Was this what it felt like to have a woman of your own? A woman that actually welcomed a man’s physical strength, wanted his protection, would be submissive to only him.

  Stopping in front of his room, Dirty pulled out his keys and unlocked the door. As he held the door for her, Ellie slipped past him and into his room. His eyes moved over her bare shoulders, down the curvy lines of her hourglass figure, stopping at her ass. It was a juicy-as-fuck ass; it looked soft and jiggled when she walked, much like her breasts did.

  And none of it was off-putting. In fact, the more he watched her, the more he liked her imperfect body, her darker skin, and jet-black hair. She looked nothing like the club whores, those fake blondes with fake tits, their bodies covered with tattoos and leather.

  More importantly, she looked nothing like his foster mother. She was nothing like his foster mother. She would never hurt a child. She was kind even when she didn’t have to be.

  “Dirty?”

  Dirty’s eyes traveled up the front of Ellie’s body, raking over her generous breasts before landing on her beautiful face.

  “Yeah?”

  “What’s your real name?” she asked. “I feel so strange calling you Dirty.”

  His stomach flipped. No one but Deuce knew his real name, and no one had called him by his real name since her.

  Agitated excitement rose from his gut to his throat. He wanted to tell her, he wanted her to know, but he wasn’t sure why he wanted her to know, or what the repercussions of her knowing would be.

  “Michael,” he said quickly before he could talk himself out of it.

  Ellie’s eyes widened in surprise and then just as quickly, her lips split into a smile.

  “Michael,” she murmured. “A great prince of Heaven and the protector against the forces of evil.”

  Dirty stared at her. Did she just liken him to a motherfucking angel? A protector? Him? She really was insane. Or maybe that beat-down she’d taken had left her with some fucking brain damage?

  “Thank you, Michael,” she continued softly. “For protecting me.”

  He swallowed hard. She had no idea who she was thanking, that the monster she thought he was protecting her from in fact lived inside of him.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  “Get the fuck off me,” I whispered, shoving at Cage’s wandering hands. “Everybody is staring at us.”

  Actually, staring probably wasn’t the right word. Everyone who was currently in the main room was gaping at us. Or snickering. Bikers, their old ladies, and kids had all piled in for lockdown and the ones who hadn’t been here when Deuce and I had gotten into it, had quickly been informed. To make matters worse, Cage was groping me 24/7.

  It was everything I’d always wanted growing up.

  But now, it was embarrassing as all hell. The only people who didn’t seem to think our sudden coupling was the best comedy show of the season were Deuce and Eva. Deuce was ignoring us entirely and Eva was sending warm smiles in our direction. Smiles that were nearly as embarrassing as all the laughter.

  And then there was Danny. She hadn’t said one word to me, hadn’t even so much as looked my way.

  ZZ.

  She’d heard everything and probably then some.

  Strangely enough, I actually felt guilty. As much as I couldn’t stand Little Miss Perfect, I’d grown up with her and the thought of her hating me, really hating me instead of just being irritated with my usual shitty attitude, wasn’t sitting well with me.

  Although Dirty’s initial appearance at the club, looking eerily like a Calvin Klein underwear model, and Ellie—of all people—staying with him, had taken the attention off Cage and me, Dirty was only making brief visits out of his room, mostly to the kitchen, so all attention was back on us again.

  Stupid fucking lockdown. Stupid motherfucking lockdown. Not only was I trapped here but I was trapped here without my own clothing, forced to wear Kami’s, the only other woman here who was as thin as I was. The skinny jeans weren’t so bad, despite them being tighter than I liked, but the nearly sheer camisole, a silly and shimmering purple, was repulsive. I was literally counting down the minutes until the washing machine was freed up and I could put my own clothing back on.

  And it was only Monday. I had two more days to endure. Maybe longer if whatever Deuce had going down on Wednesday didn’t go according to plan.

  To make matters worse, my mother refused to leave Deuce and Eva’s room and Jase was practically camped out in the hall, hoping that she’d eventually come out. Hawk, th
ankfully, was keeping his distance, staying quiet and keeping Christopher busy. I had to give him credit for that; my poor mother wouldn’t stand an emotional chance if both of them came at her at once.

  Speaking of emotional chances, I was still trying to figure out how to bring up the matter of her memory without upsetting her further.

  As usual, the Hell’s Horsemen Montana Chapter was one big fat hot mess.

  “I don’t give a fuck,” Cage growled, slapping my hands down as he used his body to push me backward. My back hit the bar counter and Cage’s arms came down around me, locking me in place.

  “I’m hungry,” he said, his voice low as his face dipped into the crook of my neck.

  “I’m not a kitchen,” I hissed, even as my eyelids fluttered from whatever his tongue was doing behind my ear.

  “No?” he asked, laughing softly as his teeth grazed my neck. “So, all that pussy I been eatin’? That wasn’t you grindin’ my face like you were diggin’ for gold?”

  Loud laughter erupted to my left and my cheeks heated with mortification. Cage, however, was completely oblivious or just didn’t care one way or the other.

  “Please, Cage,” I begged, shoving at him again. “Please, not in front of everyone.”

  Cage lifted his head and pulled himself to his full height, towering over me. “I want ’em all to know,” he whispered. “That you ain’t with Z. That you’re fuckin’ mine.”

  Mine. His.

  God, he was killing me. Slowly. I was a mere bystander to my own death, unable to move, only able to watch all the time knowing exactly what was coming.

  “Gimme those lips, Teacup,” he whispered, bowing his head, pressing his mouth to mine. His tongue slid past my lips, his hand came up, and his fingers slid through my hair. Before I knew what I was doing, I was up on my tiptoes, wrapping my arms around his neck, kissing him back with equal eagerness, forgetting where we were, forgetting that we were far from alone.

  Out of all the men I’d been with, not one of my sexual experiences had been quite like this. Where I just couldn’t seem to stop myself, to say no—no matter what Cage was demanding of me, I still wanted more and more and more.