Blow Out (Steel Veins Book 1)

by Jackson Kane

  Remy was sitting on the floor on the far side of our one-room apartment smoking when I came home. I hadn’t dwelled on Molly or what I’d done at all since leaving the restaurant. Actually, I was in a great mood. I felt lighter than I had in a long, long time.

  Remy, on the other hand, appeared to be the opposite.

  I put my bag down cautiously, trying to assess the situation. He’d occasionally get lost in thought as he tried to work something out. This time, though, he seemed more focused in his distant concentration than I had seen him in a long time.

  It had me worried.

  “Everything all right?” I tested the waters.

  No answer.

  “Remy?” I asked again.

  He ignored me and took a pull from his cigarette. The cherry tip danced in his eyes, and smoke streamed from his nose. Still nothing but that fiery gaze as it bore directly through the opposite wall. I half expected the wallpaper to start smoldering any second.

  “Rem—”

  His searing gaze snapped at me.

  I immediately felt uncomfortably warmer. I swallowed and continued. “Are you okay? Did something happen?”

  At some point while I was speaking, he went from staring at me to staring through me. I felt translucent.

  “Goddammit! Talk to me!” Burn me, scream at me, anything to let me know you’re still in there! I could deal with damn near anything at this point but not a rift between us. I needed him to be able to talk to me because I needed to be able to talk to him.

  All we had in this life was each other.

  “I can’t do it.” His voice was a guttural whisper.

  “What? Can’t do what?” I had no idea what he was talking about.

  Remy shot up and whipped the ashtray at the far wall, shattering it. Then he kicked the nightstand and lamp across the room. The lamp was still plugged in and smashed with an electric flare and fizzle.

  I recoiled, but only at the sound. Remy still frightened me, but I didn’t think he’d ever hurt me on purpose.

  “All of it!” he screamed. “This playing house bullshit. I’m not cut out for the nine-to-five grind. ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘No, sir.’ All these toilsome, fucking parasitic jobs are eating me inch by inch! I’ve never had more homicidal rage than working fucking retail! How the fuck do people do this and not kill everyone?”

  He saw that his outburst had startled me and walked outside, slamming the door behind him.

  I was hesitant to follow him. What happened today?

  My heart was beating as fast as it had when we walked into the Lobos clubhouse, and then I was dressed as a stripper. Remy was a frightening man when he wanted to be. Just because a tiger was docile at times didn’t make the animal less of a fucking tiger.

  After a few deep breaths to steady myself, I started thinking about what he said. I thought back on all the jobs I had and all the shit I had to put up with over the years. Between managers and customers, I had been trained to be an obedient little worker bee who made just enough to continue working.

  It was a form of economic slavery.

  I guess that was why I was going to college to escape the cycle. Then I thought about all my insane school loans and the unemployment rate. I understood Remy’s frustration. The normal world sucked. I wasn’t timid enough for it any longer. I wasn’t obedient enough to just fall in line anymore.

  I went outside to find him sitting in the station wagon the priest gave us. I opened the passenger door and sat next to him. I waited until he was ready to speak.

  “I didn’t mean to scare you,” he finally muttered.

  “What happened?”

  “I lost my job today.”

  My creeping smile couldn’t stem the laugh that escaped me.

  Remy was taken aback and eyed me suspiciously. Of all my possible responses, that wasn’t one that he’d expected.

  “I’m sorry.” I finally got myself under control. “You too? We’re one hell of a pair, huh?”

  “You got fired today?” Remy’s demeanor lightened.

  I told him about all the events of the last two weeks with Molly that culminated in me pulling a knife on her in the parking lot and threatening her.

  “You told her you were going to tear her heart out through her pussy?” Remy cracked a smile and put a hand on my knee.

  “Something like that, yeah.” I covered my face with my hands in embarrassment.

  Remy pulled my hands away and kissed me.

  His face was coarse, but I didn’t mind the sting from his beard. Those sweet, warm lips were all I cared about.

  Regardless of the day I had, I could always lose myself in them.

  “You’re too good for that place anyway,” he said when we eventually came up for air.

  “I take it you had a shitty day too, huh?” I asked.

  Remy told me about the robbery and how he thought it was a Lobos hang-around initiation. He told me what he’d done to the robber and what his boss had said to him.

  While he was talking, I lit a small joint I had bought off one of the dishwashers. It wasn’t particularly good weed, but it was better than nothing.

  “What bothers me the most is just how willing the Lobos were to pull this shit in their own backyard,” Remy spoke, reaching over and snagging the joint from me. After he took a few hits, he gave it back and picked up where he left off. “No one talks to the cops here because they know the Lobos will come knocking if they do, and there isn’t shit the cops can do about it. I can only imagine what they’d do in territories that the Veins had been pushed out of.” Remy shook his head, and I could tell he was thinking about Leslie.

  “There’s something else I need to tell you.” It was no longer a difficult decision to make. Remy deserved the full truth, no matter what path it would lead us down. “Nachomama’s is a money laundering front for the Lobos. The owner is related to one of the Lobos cabinet members, Spyder.”

  Remy didn’t look all that surprised. We were in Lobos country, after all.

  “I found out today,” I continued, pulling out a pair of tweezers and pinching the end of the joint so I wouldn’t burn my fingers. “I overheard a conversation between the owner and Spyder. They were talking about expanding Nachomama’s due to a lot more money coming in soon. Spyder said there was something big coming up next week that would let them know for sure when and if it was going to happen. They’re planning on putting a Nachomama’s restaurant in Leslie.”

  “They’re going after something big enough to cripple the club.” Remy’s face went stiff.

  “What is it? What could they be talking about?” I asked, coughing as the last of the weed was spent.

  “I don’t know. I’ll have to at least warn them.”

  “Are you going to call T— your brother?” I couldn’t say his name without my stomach turning at what he tried to do to me. Thinking about him made my skin crawl.

  “No. He’s already buried both his brothers. I should stay buried, at least for now.” Remy’s face pulled hard to the side. I could feel the burning sorrow in his heart. “Tee. I’ll call him instead. Give him the heads-up.”

  Remy desperately wanted to reconnect with his brother and his biker family. He was torn between wanting to help them and wanting to honor his vow to keep us safe and start a life together. It killed me to see that turmoil in him. I didn’t want to be the burden he was sworn to carry because eventually, he would resent me for it.

  If I let things continue on like this with him knowing he could’ve done more to help but turning his back on them because of me, it would poison everything we ever tried to build together. If I cared about him above all else, then I would let him be the man he needed to be. I had to believe in Remy and give him the support he needed to spread his blackened wings and do whatever was necessary

  “Remy…” I took his hands in mine. “I want you to know this. No matter what it is or what the consequences are, whatever you decide needs to happen next, I’m with you till the end of the road.”

>   “Thank you.” Remy’s brow furrowed upward. Hard-earned gratitude was heavy in his beautiful, dark eyes. He wasn’t one for spoken, soft pleasantries, preferring instead to show me how much he cared with subtle actions and meaningful gestures. So whenever I heard it out loud, it really mattered.

  It made my heart flutter.

  Remy started the car and drove us to our door. “Grab the bag and lock up.”

  “Where are we headed?” I asked, stepping out of the car.

  “To find a payphone, if they still exist.”

  “And the bag?” We didn’t have that much money left in there, so it was mostly just the guns. And for this kind of a shitty area, we didn’t have any problem with people trying to break in.

  “You’ll see.” Remy smiled. It was a smile thick with more fun than trouble... well, maybe a little trouble.

  After a few hours of searching and asking around, we’d given up on the phone booth hunt. We had pay-by-the-minute burner phones, but he didn’t want to use them for fear of having our location traced. Remy had decided we needed the remainder of the light for whatever he had planned, so we picked up a case of soda and drove deep into the desert. When we stopped in the middle of nowhere, he finally told me what was going on.

  “Pick out a gun you feel comfortable with. You’re going to learn how to use it.” Remy opened the bag. He held them up and explained them to me—what each was called, the various parts, how to load them and unload them with extra care given to show me how to turn the safety on and off.

  Fucker.

  “Is this because of that whole safety thing?” I asked him. The incident made me a little wet just thinking about it. God, it was hot. Crazy, dangerous, and stupid, but hot.

  “No.” Remy stripped down a Beretta nine millimeter, breaking it into five parts, then reassembling it in seconds. Afterward, he looked up at me through a small gap he made between his extended thumb and index finger, a gesture that meant “a little” and mouthed the word, “Maybe.”

  I shoved him.

  “You’re pretty when you pout,” he said mockingly.

  I slid the magazine into the Beretta with a click and pointed it at him.

  “See, you’re already learning.” He put his hands up like I had told him to freeze. Then I thumbed off the safety. “We’re off to a great start.”

  His hands and legs were a flash of motion as he stepped out of the path of the gun and stripped it from my hands.

  “Hey!” I protested.

  “Now you just need to learn how to hold on to it.” He winked at me, thumbing the safety back on and tossing the gun to me. “C’mon.”

  He’d set up cans of soda all along an eroding stone wall. I lined up the shot as best I could and pulled the trigger. Miss. I winced from the noise. He motioned for me to continue. I stepped forward and tried again. As I pulled the trigger, my eyes narrowed like I was expecting a blow.

  Miss! I dug my feet into the sand and pulled the trigger again.

  Another miss.

  Growling in frustration, I emptied the rest of the magazine toward one can of soda, and I swore the last shot nicked it, but the damn thing didn’t have the decency to fall over. I was terrible at this.

  “This is impossible!” I’d decided, handing the gun back to Remy.

  Without a word, he reloaded it and fired off six quick shots, each hitting their marks and clearing the fence of soda cans.

  “Show-off,” I huffed.

  “Here.” He loaded the gun and put it in my hand. “Hold it like this.” Remy swung around, wrapping his body over mine from behind. I felt every part of him press into me. “Now turn your head to the right a little. Just... like that. Look down the barrel. You want to line up the front and rear sights. Should look like a capital E laying on its back. You see it?”

  “Yeah.” I was trying my hardest to concentrate, but Remy was so close that I found myself just taking him in all over. My mind drifted to each part of him that touched me, the vibration in his voice as he explained the basics, the heat of his breath, his scent—

  Blam!

  “Fuck!” I startled from the noise.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  “Shit! Yeah, sorry. It just kinda went off. I’m sorry.” I was blushing, but I don’t think he saw, or at least I hoped not. Focus, Star!

  “Don’t jerk the trigger. Squeeze it. Line up your shot and fire at the bottom of your exhale.”

  His voice was warm-honey calm. So soothing and smooth, I could drink it.

  I followed his directions, relaxed, and fired. A can of soda exploded; the carbonated liquid spiraled off the fence. I’d done it!

  “Good. Now the rest. Each time you hit, move back a step.” Remy released me to fire by myself. He walked behind me to lean against the car and watched.

  I relaxed, taking my time and drilling his instructions into my mind. It was slow going, but each shot that spiraled a can moved me a little closer to Remy. Several rounds of reloads and additional targets later, I started feeling much more comfortable with the gun. I turned the death-dealing piece of metal and plastic over in my hands, wondering how I could’ve ever been so timid.

  I would never close my eyes when I fired again.

  By my final set of targets, I was boiling. The late summer sun had been beating down on us mercilessly, wavy clear lines of heat radiated off the red dirt ocean that surrounded us. I had to stop to remove the flannel button-down I had on for fear that I might combust. I finished the clip and turned to Remy.

  He was in the process of peeling off his shirt. Thin beads of sweat rolled down through his matted chest hair and between his glistening abs and were absorbed into the band of his boxers. He used his shirt to wipe the dust and sweat from his face. The light caught the bullet scars on his chest and stomach from Bones, turning them a lighter shade of olive tan than the rest of him.

  The longer I spent with him, the more certain I was that only Remy could’ve survived something like that. No one else would’ve ever been tough enough.

  I’d never gotten the chance to see so much of his skin outside in the sun. Pale motel lights didn’t do his physique any justice. He was all scars and ink over a battlefield of hard, ripped muscles. While obscured a little by his chest hair, the words “Steel Veins” were tattooed like a top rocker on his chest. Running up his arms were scratches, burns, and tattooed gray lines made out to look like his actual veins were made of metal.

  Remy was the personification of everything my mother warned me about when bikers thundered by.

  “Looks like you’re a natural, after all,” he said, sounding impressed.

  “No help from you. You’re the worst teacher ever. So distracting.” I stuffed the gun into the back of my jeans and walked over to him.

  When I got close enough, he pulled me into him and turned me around so that we were both facing the destroyed targets. “Yeah? And what do you call that?” he whispered, biting the top of my ear.

  “That… mmm... was all me. I am a natural.” I smiled mischievously, feeling Remy’s tongue tickle as it set fire to all the ridges in my ear. “You just stood around looking pretty.”

  The gun slid out of my pants and landed with a metallic thud on the hood of the car before sliding off to crash against the packed ground. His hands glided over my stomach and up my tank top, then down to pop the button on my jeans. He wasted no time in parting the metal teeth of my zipper and dropping both my jeans and panties to midthigh. It was all so rough and quick as he moved me to wherever he saw fit.

  God, his hands were strong.

  Bitter wind kicked up and dusted across my exposed flesh. I yearned for his touch, but he left me there, waiting. His hardening cock, pressed sideways along the top of my ass, it fought for freedom against the denim prison. My pussy quivered in the sunlight.

  Touch me! I wanted to scream out.

  We could fuck for days like our lives depended on it, and still I would beg him for more.

  Three strong fingers peeled back my
bottom lip and dragged past my teeth. I all but swallowed them until they were cruelly ripped away to push against my clit. My pussy strained against the weight of his fingers as they massaged me up and down. The pressure was devilish. It built upon itself harder and faster as his fingers traveled between my lower lips and my clit.

  My back arched, my eyes closed. It felt like all the sensation was drained from my limbs to hum on that one golden spot between my legs. I shifted relentlessly. My hips bucked. My inhales were sharp. My exhales ragged.

  He wouldn’t stop until I came.

  A shiver flashed through me. Everything was electric. I grabbed his probing hand, and together we got me off. I let out a long, choppy moan. Any soreness and stiffness I had from firing the gun dissolved instantly.

  He wasn’t done with me. Not by a long shot. Remy spun me around and jerked me into him, the bulge in his pants stabbing into me. The pressure whet my appetite. I was famished. Ravenous. Carnal impulses took me over to the point I couldn’t think straight.

  Then he switched gears completely and fucked me all up.

  He kissed me.

  The sweetness of it took me completely by surprise. It was a fairy-tale kiss, one that could’ve revived a sleeping princess. With a man like Remy, it was easy to forget just how tender and light he could be. Jesus, he made me feel like I was floating sometimes.

  His lips, closed at first, were cracked but moist. Inviting. They wandered across mine, parting slightly more with each supple impact. A hundred little explosions of warmth reverberated through me. And with a parting smack of our lips, that tender moment was over.

  He pulled away and looked at me. There were flecks of deep red hidden in those dark eyes that I’d never noticed before. It was stunning.

  Those beautiful eyes narrowed. Everything behind those long lashes burned away. Heavy, bloody lust was all that remained. Remy Daniels was a series of heights and depths. Riding high on one of his peaks, I swallowed hard, embracing the plunge. I was turned back around, gently at first. I knew that wouldn’t last long. In a heartbeat, I found myself bent over the hood of the car.

  More like thrown onto it, really.

  The car had been off long enough for the engine to cool, so it wasn’t scorching, but it was still damn hot from baking in the desert sun. My tits pressed into the top of the sun-soaked metal, the bra took most of the heat, but my hands and hips weren’t spared.