I watch my hand leading the fabric down, enraptured when she uses her hand to turn my face back to look at her. “Come home, Raif,” she says, widening her legs and lifting her hips to welcome me inside. I rub my dick up and down her center to make sure she’s good and wet. And when I finally sink inside her, I relive every moment of our lives together, from the first time we met when I saved her from that trucker to that glorious night she gave me her virginity through our wedding night and every moment she touched my soul in between.
I close my eyes, just feeling her surround me, and force myself to breathe. This is Hannah. My Hannah. She presses her hand to my cheek and when I open my eyes she’s smiling up at me, her hair spread like an aura around her body. I press a firm kiss to those luscious, smiling lips, and I finally remember to move. Together, we scale mountains, lifting each other higher and higher. Slow and steady, we ascend until there’s nowhere else to go and we come crashing down, she having reached the summit first, wrapping her legs tighter around my hips, clinging on so she wouldn’t fall alone.
She never has to fall alone.
21.
Blood
Twenty years later…
“Boy, quit your staring,” I say. Gun jumps and spins, sloshing his beer over the side of his red Solo cup, and I laugh. The boy’s the spitting image of his old man. Sandy hair, brown eyes and built like a MAC truck. You wouldn’t think a guy who looks like him would be shy around a woman. Getting pussy runs in his family, and he’s no stranger to the pieces who hang around.
“Jesus, goddamn.” He swipes the amber liquid from his hand, flicking it to the ground. “I wasn’t starin’,” he argues. “Just watchin’.”
“Looks like staring from where I’m standing.” I reach up to fake swipe at his whiskers. “You might want to wipe the drool from your chin.”
“Fuck you, Blood.”
“Nah, thanks for the offer, but I’m happy with my wife,” I tease. “The girl you’re looking at, however, is Sneak’s only daughter.” I point over to Briar Rose. Sneak and Trish’s daughter is all grown up. I love her like a niece, and to me, she’ll always be that little girl who sat on my lap and called me “Unkie Blood.” But I can see why these young bucks might want to go wading in her watering hole. She’s a beauty. Tall and lean, big blue eyes, all that blonde hair—plus, she’s smart and quick as a whip.
She and the terror twins—boy, that’s another story; those girls are going to run Scotch into an early grave—pretty much run the show now that Gun patched in as a full-fledged brother. They come up with most of the trouble. Even my baby girl, Harley, who has my strawberry blonde locks, but otherwise looks so much like her mama, and whose been Daddy’s Little Girl since the doctor set her in my arms for the very first time almost thirteen years ago, got grounded for the first time ever because of shit the older girls talked her into. My older boys, Nash and Colt, didn’t have the heart to stop her. Harley has the Baxter men wrapped around her pinkie, just like their mom.
“But you might want to think twice before making that offer to her,” I say, still chuckling.
Though Bri could do worse than Gun for an old man and everybody knows it. Because he’s just like his dad, he can take care of any woman he chooses to call his own. And with how his parents are, he’s only ever seen love in his home. Boss treats his wife like she’s the Queen of fucking Sheba. Even after all these years of being married and adding two more sons, Ride and Bastian, to their home. Gun’s smart, quick-witted, and loyal as fuck. I’m proud to call him a brother.
Diesel, Duke’s son and Gun’s best friend and partner in crime, saunters up to stand next to Gun along with my nephew Jack, Hero and Brinley’s oldest. Diesel’s a real even split between his dad and his mom. Duke’s dark hair. Caity’s green eyes. He’s tall and lean, but solid and strong. A good man to have at your back. Jack, they named him after Hero’s father, is a chip off the old block. Hollywood, pretty boy just like his pop. He’s a prospect with the club. Poor kid, I remember those days. Hero thought he got off lucky after Jack came along. Boy, was he wrong. Brin gave him three daughters after that, Rocket, Rebel and Raven, every bit as beautiful as their mother. They’ve had the boys sniffing around since those young bucks discovered girls. It’s been a struggle. Diesel points over at Bri. “Heard she went off with some quarterback from Cumberlands at a party last weekend,” he says. “Don’t know what happened, but I heard some people talkin’ shit about him spreadin’ shit—if you know what I mean.”
“Goddammit,” Gun grumbles.
“Never seen you shy around women before, Gun,” Diesel goads him. “Seen you talk a woman out of her panties with a corny joke, a wink, and a smile. What’s the deal with Bri?”
“She’s not just any woman… and she’s Sneak’s daughter,” he answers.
I lay my hand on his shoulder. “Listen, your role in the club is different now. Sneak’s your brother, so you need to pay him the respect he’s due before you take it too far with her. Does she even know how you feel?”
“Mostly,” he replies.
“Mostly? Mostly isn’t gonna get you that pretty, little thing in your bed, if that’s where you want her. And hear this.” I give that hand on his shoulder a squeeze. “Don’t go there if all you want is to put her in your bed.”
He glares at me. It’s a combination of duh and fuck you and I can’t help but chuckle. Seven years I was in love with my wife—seven fucking years—before she finally let me claim her. Women have a way of messing with a man’s mind like nothing else ever has in probably the entire history of the world.
“What’re you gonna do about it?” I ask, egging him on.
He shoves his cup at Diesel, who takes it quickly, and marches through the field of brothers, old ladies, friends, siblings, and cousins who’ve all shown up today to celebrate Jade following in her mama’s footsteps. The picture of her mama in every way, her occupation following suit. Jade’s now a full-fledged doctor. Jade Ellis, M.D.
Bri’s deep in conversation with Mollie and Macie, she and those auburn-haired beauties are probably planning their world domination, which means she doesn’t see Gun barreling down on her. Macie’s eyes grow huge and Mollie only has time to gasp before Gun reaches Bri, flips her around to hold her face in both his hands, and plants the mother of all kisses on that shocked girl’s lips. The forecourt goes silent. Bri looks too stunned for words. We’re all too stunned for words when Gun hefts Bri over his shoulder like a sack of oats and begins stomping toward the door to the clubhouse.
Harley, my niece Clover—Chaos and Liv’s oldest daughter, and Emerald, Duke and Caity’s youngest, stand in a circle giggling like the twelve-year-old school girls they are. The Doyle clan, The Duncan clan and Blue, Carmen and the kids haven’t shown up yet. It’ll be an even madder mad house when they do.
Sneak’s delayed reaction finally comes. “The fuck you doin’ with my daughter?”
Gun doesn’t miss a beat, pointing at Sneak. “You and me gotta talk.”
And as the door slams shut behind him and Bri, Boss yells out, “That’s my boy!”
The End?
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thank you to Kyleigh Poultney of Free to Be Creative Co, my brilliant cover designer. As always, your talent blows me away. Finally thank you boys (mine specifically), family (I claim them too), friends (they’re support is important), and baristas (Hello, coffee.).
It takes a village to raise a novel, and you all are my villagers. The people who helped turn a project I was proud to have completed into a project I’m proud to present to the world.
About the Author
Sarah spends her days embracing the weirdly wonderful parts of life with her two kooky sons while pretending to be a responsible adult. And there is plenty of the weird and wonderful to go around with her older son being autistic and the younger being a plain ol' wisecracker. She resides in Michigan, where the winters bring cold, and the summers bring construction. The roads might have potholes, but the beaches
are amazing. And above all else, she lives by these rules. Call them Sarah’s life edicts: In Sarah's world all books have kissing and end in some form of HEA. Because really, what more do you need in life?
Read More from Sarah Zolton Arthur
www.sarahzoltonarthur.com
Blood Revealed (Brimstone Lords MC Book 6) Page 26