by Krane, Kasey
I stared at her for a moment, confused. “How does the waiter guy know what I ordered?” At her nod, I said, “Because that’s all they make here. This isn’t a Mexican restaurant. This is a fish taco restaurant. Or, shack. But yeah, this is all they make. You can have anything you want, as long as you want a fish taco.” I grinned at her and she laughed.
“Good thing you ordered fish tacos then. I’d hate to see you disappointed.” I glanced down at her lips, imagining sucking on them, kissing them, and all the places I wanted them on my body. “Yeah, me too,” I said, my voice husky with lust. With any luck, I’d get exactly what I wanted that night.
In bed.
And there damn well weren’t going to be any fish tacos there.
The waiter delivered the tacos and then disappeared again without saying a word. We dug in and as soon as Jules took her first bite, her eyes popped open in surprise. “Oh, hell yeah!” she exclaimed and then took another large bite. “I didn’t realize…damn, all this time.” She chewed and swallowed so she could continue, “There’s a fish taco stand down the street from Blush. It always smelled good, but I just thought that food from a taco stand couldn’t be all that great. I’ll have to try it when I go back to New York and see if their fish tacos are as good as these.”
I felt my stomach tighten at her comment. When she goes back…
Because she was going back. I was being a goddamned fool to forget that fact for even a second. But the problem was, with Jules around, I had a hard time making myself care.
12
Jules
I saw his eyes drop and his shoulders tighten as soon as the words left my mouth and I wanted to grab them out of the air. Take them back. Erase them.
Why would I be so stupid as to bring up my return trip to New York? This fantasy I was living at the moment, I was quite enjoying it.
Fine, I was fucking loving it.
Leaving wasn’t something I wanted to think about. Going back to New York to my small, stupidly expensive apartment and the job I didn’t want.
I stopped that train of thought right there. This wasn’t a debate. No one decides after visiting a town for 24 hours that they ought to move there. That kind of shit just didn’t happen. No one fell in love, no one moved, no one did stupid shit like that, in just 24 hours.
No one.
“So I didn’t realize you’d eat meat,” he said, snapping me back to the present. “Last night, you had steak, this morning you had ham, and now you’re eating fish. I guess I just assumed everyone that worked for a fashion magazine ate tofu and sprouts three times a day.”
I giggled, the tension easing out of my shoulders, the laughter spilling out of me unconsciously. “Do you really think that I’d be built like this —” I said, gesturing to my body, “if I ate tofu and sprouts three times a day?”
“Thank God you eat meat, then,” he said. His words were teasing, sweet, but his tone was serious. I blushed, my eyes dropping to my hands. How could he find me beautiful? Every Blush magazine I’d ever read told me his words weren’t true. No one built like me ever made the cover. Or a glossy full-page spread. Or even a mention in passing, unless it was, “I used to be fat, but now I’m not - follow this diet and you too can just let the fat melt away!”
He was sweet, he was kind…but he was wrong.
“If you guys get a monsoon every afternoon in July and August,” I said, “then why schedule your dad’s charity fundraiser for July? Why not hold it later, in like December or something? It has to be cooler then, too.”
My attempt to change the subject was not so subtle, but I didn’t care. The more obvious the attempt, the more likely he would leave the topic of my weight alone in the future.
“Because he died on July 26th. It was the fourth Thursday of the month. So, every year, we start our ride out on Thursday and loop back on Friday. We start early in the morning before it gets hellishly hot and we have a place to stop in the afternoon so we know we’ll be under cover if a monsoon hits. A monsoon doesn’t hit every afternoon for two months straight - I may or may not have been exaggerating when I said that - but it can be every day for a week straight, then a day or two off, and then more rain again. You just never know what’ll happen. But monsoons only hit in the afternoon, so we know we’re safe to ride in the morning.”
“Hold on, I just realized - how do you have time to babysit me?” I asked. “I thought you were in charge of the long-haul trucking business. Doesn’t, you know, shit need to be hauled somewhere?”
“Well, Ghost dumps shit off onto me, so I dump shit off onto Judge. This is the way of the clan…or at least the Dead Legion.” He grinned at me.
“Who’s Judge? Was he there this morning at the clubhouse?”
“Judge is the guy you want standing next to you when you have bullets raining down. You mighta noticed him next to the windows - tall, brown hair?”
I shrugged. To be honest, all I noticed was beer guts, leather cuts, and Bishop. The rest of the members were a blur. Well, except for Ghost, but he was a guy I didn’t want to think about.
“Anyway, my best friend growing up,” Bishop continued. “His parents are definitely not bikers, so they haven’t exactly appreciated me, or the club. We’re his family now. He’s my second-in-command in the trucking business and whenever I’m gone for something, he takes over. So I have plenty of time to babysit you,” he said with a flirtatious grin.
“I’ll keep that mind,” I said, grinning back. I flicked my tongue out and wetted my lips. Dammit, Bishop made it hard to breathe.
Finally, my mind caught up with our discussion - one of the downfalls of staring at Bishop’s mouth and drooling incessantly was that other things took longer to process. Like words.
“Just a second,” I said, “did you say his name was Judge? Who names their kid Judge??”
“Uh…” Bishop paused with the last of the fish tacos halfway to his mouth. “Well, that’s not his real name but that’s what everyone calls him.” He suddenly got cagey and I just knew that he did not, under any circumstances, want to tell me what Judge’s real name was.
Which meant, of course, that this is all I wanted to find out.
“So,” I said, biting my lower lip and looking up at him seductively, “what is Judge’s real name?” I always wanted to know if my flirtation skills were up to par. Here was the perfect chance to test them.
Bishop shoved the last bite of the fish taco into his mouth and made a big production out of chewing it. And swallowing it. And when he finally couldn’t put it off any longer, he said, “Listen, darlin’, I…I’d love to tell you. Really I would. But Judge…no way. He’d kill me. Nice and slow.”
“So my big, strong biker guy is afraid to tell little ol’ me someone’s name?” I ran my fingers lightly up his forearm, tickling the hairs on his arm, staring up into his eyes as I did so. He was so close to breaking, I could tell. A light sheen of sweat broke out on his upper lip.
He shoved his chair back. “You—” he cleared his throat, “you ready to go?”
I wanted to smile in triumph. I may not have wheedled the information out of Bishop, but I did manage to get under his skin, which was almost as fun.
Bishop paid the bill and we waddled back out the door. I felt stuffed to the brim. Bishop seemed to be a man who wasn’t afraid of food, and who seemed to like the fact that I wasn’t either.
I pushed the thought away. Flirting, teasing, kissing, fucking…fine. Nothing more than that, though.
“You ready to go back to the clubhouse?” Bishop asked as we mounted the bike.
“Yeah, I should probably go ask somebody a question or two, and earn this all-expenses-paid vacation to hell,” I said, teasing.
“Hell? You shoulda been here last month. No one ever believes me, but June is actually the hottest month of the year. Plus there’s no monsoons to cool things down.”
I swallowed hard at the thought. Hotter than this just wasn’t possible.
The ride back to the clubh
ouse was fun, if short. With a town as small as Deming, it seemed like everything was close to something.
What a difference from New York City…
We walked back into the clubhouse and I immediately felt it - the air was tense. There were no neon flashing signs, but there might as well be - You’re Not Welcome was a brick wall I just slammed into. I looked over at the members and flashed a confident smile, but only got one in return from Ghost. A smarmy smile. He was back out with the group again, dammit.
Bishop headed for the bar again, abandoning me - bastard - so I headed towards the group. I sat next to Knight and smiled brightly at him. He stared back at me.
I turned towards the other biker at the table and focused my 1000-watt smile on him. My eyes flicked down to his leather vest. Tats?? I instantly looked him over, and saw why. Every inch of available skin, with the exception of his face was covered in tattoos .
“So…Tats —” was it rude to call a stranger by what was obviously a nickname, and not necessarily a nice nickname at that? Somehow I doubted the advice given by Miss Manners covered this situation — “How long have you been a Dead Legion member?”
His eyes flicked towards Ghost and then back to me. “A while,” he said.
Fuck. So far, I could write an article extolling Bishop’s stomach muscles, Blaze’s ability to eat hot food, and how amazing authentic Mexican food could be. This so wasn’t going to fly with Evan. Or the Huffington Post. I doubted they wanted an exposé on the inner workings of a fish taco stand.
The room was dead silent.
Gathering up my courage, I started again. I couldn’t give up yet. I decided to turn my attention towards Ghost. After all, the man agreed to have me come out here, right? Surely I could expect him to say something more interesting than, “A while.”
“Ghost,” I said, giant smile plastered on my face, “how did you become the president of the Dead Legion?”
“Well now, that’s a real interesting question,” he said, leaning back in his chair. His eyes flicked over to Bishop’s for a moment and then back to me again. “My daddy died of lung cancer. He’d taken over after Bishop’s dad died. When my daddy died, I became president.”
And that’s where he left it. The implication was crystal clear - I asked a question that I obviously wasn’t supposed to be asking. I wanted to scream. What the hell did this man want out of me??
Ghost stood up and ambled over to a long-legged brown haired guy by the windows, and I strained my eyes to see. The patch on his shoulder looked like it could be “Judge,” although I couldn’t be sure at this distance. I stood up and walked over to the row of windows, pretending to look out into the completely uninspiring parking lot, hoping to overhear something.
Ghost talked quietly for a moment, and all I could get out of it was Sangre, which threw me for a loop. Sangre was a Spanish for blood. What the hell were they discussing blood?? Ghost looked over at Bishop one last time, and then ambled out.
Bishop had been given his marching orders to get me out, and he wasted no time following them.
“Hey Jules, why don’t we head back to your motel room?” he asked, walking towards me, smiling nonchalantly.
Simultaneously pissed at Bishop for letting Ghost order him around with only a look, and intrigued by the Sangre lead, I did the only logical thing I could do: I acquiesced to Bishop’s plan. I wasn’t nice about it though. These dumbasses agreed to have me fly across the country to interview them, and then no one would say a goddamn word.
No, I didn’t have to be nice to Bishop at all.
We rode back to the motel in silence, each lost in our own thoughts. I hopped out of the truck and went to slam the door when he called out, “See you at ten tomorrow?”
“Yeah, fine,” and then slammed the door with a pleasing thud. It felt good to slam something. He waited until I unlocked my motel room door and walked inside before he drove away.
Attempting to put his gorgeous eyes and sexy abs out of my mind for a moment, I pulled out my laptop. At least the wifi was good, even if the AC was…lacking. I pulled the only chair in the tiny room over in front of the AC unit and began researching Sangre. I didn’t find much until I tacked “New Mexico” onto the end of the search. Suddenly, I wasn’t seeing pages of blood and gore, but instead, info about another MC.
I read further, holding my breath.
Oh.
My.
Fucking.
God.
The Sangre were not just an MC; they weren’t just an outlaw MC. They were evil bastards. Whether the Dead Legion were in cahoots with them or fighting them, it wasn’t going to end well. Last year, they had gotten off on kidnapping and extortion charges on a technicality and were all currently out of prison. The president and VP had been charged with human trafficking, and the pictures were…horrifying. Young girls, hands tied, bruises, gags, matted hair, cuts. The pictures turned my stomach, but the stories were worse. The Sangre were abducting and selling young girls into the sex trade, or at least that’s what they’d been charged with last year.
One of the cops had gotten overeager and had searched an apartment without a warrant, where he found the address where the girls were being held. The cops were able to rescue the girls and get them to safety, but since the search was illegal and the girls all refused to testify, the Ghost had thrown the case out. Because the Sangre were all from Mexico, they’d been sent back after the trial had been dismissed.
I sat back and stared off into space. What did I actually know? I grabbed a piece of paper and made a list:
One - Ghost wanted me here before but doesn’t now.
Two - He’s told all of the members to shut the hell up around me.
Three - Something was happening with the Sangre. Or Ghost was worried about them. Or something…
I doodled around the edge of the paper, thinking.
In the end, I closed my laptop and shoved my notes into my laptop bag. I had to give up for the evening. It could be any of a million crazy ideas, and without any more evidence, I’d just be spinning my wheels. I changed into my PJs and crawled into bed, curling up with No Angel: My Harrowing Undercover Journey to the Inner Circle of the Hells Angels.
I sure knew how to pick a nice vacation read.
13
Bishop
I drove back to my apartment, cursing under my breath as I went. Inviting Jules out to Deming was just about the most dumbass idea Ghost had ever come up with. Jules wasn’t stupid. Jules saw that every person in that clubhouse was glancing back at Ghost before telling her what time of day it was. She knew the club was hiding something from her - I could see it in her eyes. It was just a question of how much she’d figure out before heading back to New York City.
And then, to have her ask Ghost about becoming president…she couldn’t have known what an awful question that was. No doubt Ghost thought I had put her up to it, just to be a jackass.
Fuuucccckkkkk…
The club had been divided after Ghost’s dad died, with many of the members wanting me to become president. Ghost had always been a little more willing to break the law and run roughshod over the rules than either of our fathers or the other members had been comfortable with.
But I also knew that if it came down to it, Ghost wouldn’t back down from what he saw as rightfully his. The club would be split in two, and I just couldn’t let it happen. So I had approached him with a compromise - Ghost could be president and I would be his vice-president. Ghost agreed but I knew it’d always rankled Ghost that members of the club had wanted me more, and had been willing to fight for me.
Jules had no way of knowing that Ghost’s pride had been hurt, and even now, years later, he was touchy about it. Based on his dickish response, she’d figured out that something was wrong but how could she know any more than that? And me…I wasn’t sure I wanted to tell her. Ghost would flip the fuck out if I told her anything more than two-word answers when it came to club business.
For all of Ghost’s stree
t smarts, he’d never been able to read people well or figure out what made them tick. It would require too much empathy and willingness to see things from other people’s viewpoint. He seemed to honestly think that telling Jules absolutely nothing would keep her in the dark, she would go home, and everything would be fine. How Ghost could cling to this idea, even after meeting Jules, was beyond me.
Yup, Ghost was being a real dumbass.
I pulled into the parking lot and headed into my apartment. Night was falling and so everything was finally starting to cool off a bit, but a nice stint in front of the AC would be a great way to end the day.
Before I settled in for the night, I hopped in the shower to rinse off. As I scrubbed down, I closed my eyes, leaning against the shower wall as I ran the soap over my body.
And almost by magic, there she was. Smiling. Green eyes crinkling in the corner. Biting her lower lip in concentration. Long eyelashes sweeping closed, cutting off my view into her world, until she opened her eyes again, looking into mine.
And God, her curves…my hand ran down to my cock and I began running a soapy hand over it as I remembered every detail of her amazing body. She had these tits that I couldn’t decide what I wanted to do with them first - bury my face between them or suck on their pink tips. Her stomach would be soft and welcoming. And damn, did I want to fuck her hard.
This was ridiculous. Why was I letting a New York bitch wreak havoc on my sex life like this??
Because she’s not a bitch. She’s not some chick hanging out at our bar. She’s not going to fuck Ghost or you or anyone else for a hit of crack. She’s fucking smart and funny and too fucking sexy for her own fucking good.
It was steamy in the shower as I ran my hands over my cock, stroking, imagining her mouth on me, sucking, soft pink tongue on me, taking me all the way into her throat.
I spurted load after load over my hand and down the drain. I leaned against the shower wall, letting the hot water rinse my seed and my stress away.