Angel's Halo: Entangled

Angel"s Halo.

Entangled.

by Terri Anne Browning.

Chapter 1.

Willa.

Four Years Earlier....

I frowned up at the warehouse, wondering if I should get out of the taxi or tell the driver to take me back to the airport. The problem was that I had asked for this, had pleaded actually. I was seventeen years old, nearly eighteen, and I barely knew the man who was my father. As for my sister? She was a vague memory I had from when we were both kids, playing tea party with our dolls. I wanted to get to know those two-well, at least my dad-and the only way to do that was to come to them.

Here. In Vegas. At an MC compound where my dad lived with the rest of his charter. Duke Blackstone was The Red Dragons" MC President and ate, slept, breathed nothing but his club. My sister, Tasha, had run away to live with our father when she was sixteen and I hadn"t seen her since. That had been four years ago.

The driver cleared his throat but I ignored him for the moment. I wasn"t sure if I was ready. The motorcycles parked in the parking lot in front of the warehouse that served as The Red Dragons" compound both terrified me and made something stir inside of me that I wasn"t used to. My mother"s warning that the thrill of the MC could become addictive echoed in my mind and I swallowed around the nervous lump in my throat. There wasn"t anything more terrifying to me than addiction. Of any kind.

A door to the compound opened and out walked a big, burly-looking man. My heart twisted because I would have recognized him anywhere, even if I hadn"t seen him in more than a year. Duke stopped when he saw the taxi sitting at the back of the parking lot, his eyes narrowing and I gathered my courage before opening the door.

As soon as he saw me he let out a yell and started toward the taxi. "Willa girl!"

I grinned as he drew closer. I might not have seen Duke in over a year but he hadn"t changed all that much. Even when I was a little girl he had looked the same: tall, wide shoulders, thick muscled arms, a slight beer gut, and s.h.a.ggy salt-and-pepper hair with just a hint of red to it. Dressed in old, grease-stained jeans, a white T-shirt with his leather cut over it, he was the same as when I had looked up at him when I was five years old-the last time he had lived in the same house with me. And then my parents had divorced and my mother had moved my sister and me to Seattle. Since then I had seen him once a year, if that. My mother both loved and hated this man. She didn"t want him around me in case he rubbed off on me. Like he had rubbed off on Tasha.

As soon as he was within reach, he pulled me into his arms for a tight bear hug. I sucked in a deep breath that was full of the scents of smoke, stale alcohol, and sweat. Another thing that hadn"t changed since my childhood. It was both gross and comforting. I hugged Duke back, burying my face in his chest so he wouldn"t see my happy tears.

By the time he pulled back I had my emotions under control and offered him a smile as his eyes skimmed over me from head to toe. "s.h.i.t." His smile disappeared. "As beautiful as your d.a.m.n momma. I"m going to have to beat the f.u.c.kers away with a two-by-four."

I couldn"t tell if that was a compliment or an actual worry. I knew I was pretty in a girl-next-door kind of way, but he had to be exaggerating. Laughing it off, I pulled my one case out of the trunk and he took it from me. "Thanks for letting me come visit for the summer, Daddy."

"Don"t go thanking me, darlin"." He shook his head, leading me toward the compound with his free hand at the small of my back. "I wanted you here with me... Although I"m probably going to regret that in a few days. s.h.i.t, I"m going to have to bust some skulls over you."

I snorted. "Seriously, are you complimenting me or should I be worried?"

Duke stopped at the door but didn"t immediately open it. Instead he just stood there staring down at me. Finally he blew out a breath and shook his head again. "If anyone gives you trouble, Willa, you come tell me right away. Okay? I mean it. Anyone."

Before I could so much as nod he opened the door and pushed me through. I had to blink a few times as my eyes adjusted to the dim lighting of the compound. When it finally came into focus I nearly gasped. This place, while looking run down on the outside, was a completely different world on the inside.

The first thing I saw was the three pool tables in the middle of what had to be the living room. Five huge sofas sat around the area and there was a seventy-two inch big screen hanging on the wall. There were four men standing near the pool tables, drinking brown bottles of beer and smoking as they laughed. The television was turned on to a local news channel, but no one seemed to be watching it.

Further beyond the living area was a huge industrial-sized kitchen with stainless steel appliances. Two women who were slimmer than I was were fixing some lunch while they giggled over something a man in a different cut was saying. A bar sat off to the side with a skinny old man sitting behind it. He had a mug of coffee in front of him while he smoked a cigar.

It took me less than ten seconds to take all of this in. As soon as someone noticed me standing there with Duke, everyone stopped what they were doing and grew quiet. The only sound I could hear for a full minute was the voice of the anchorwoman who was doing the noon news. I felt everyone"s eyes raking over me and wondered if they thought I was as beautiful as my sister or plain like I was sure I was.

Finally it was the man in the different cut that stepped forward first, breaking the silence that I found uncomfortable. He walked slowly, but his steps ate up the distance quickly with his long legs. I let myself check him out. His hair was on the longish side and dirty blond. His eyes, I noticed once he was closer, were a startling jade green and full of amus.e.m.e.nt. His features were neither strong nor pretty-boy beautiful, but he was hot in his own right. The cut he wore told me he belonged to the Angel"s Halo MC.

"Raider." Duke stepped forward, stopping the other man just a few feet away. "I"d like for you to meet my daughter. This is Willa. She"s visiting for the summer."

I watched as Raider grimaced but his smile quickly returned. "Gottcha, man." He held out his hand toward me. "Nice to meet ya, Willa. Name"s Raider Hannigan."

Shaking his hand, I gave him a small smile. "You too, Raider."

"Why don"t you show her up to her room? The one beside Tasha"s. I need to talk to the men... And be sure to introduce Willa to Bash and Spider. Make sure they remember what I said last night." Duke pressed a kiss to my temple and handed my case over to Raider.

My father walked off toward the men still standing quietly by the pool tables while Raider stepped forward and nodded toward the stairs that led up to the second floor. It was all pretty open and I could see a dozen closed doors on each side. As I climbed the stairs behind Raider I looked down over the first floor and watched as my dad said something in hushed tones to the men standing around before they followed him past the kitchen to a closed door. The door had a huge sign on the front that simply said CHAPEL.

When the door shut behind the last man, I turned my attention to the man in front of me. The angel wings inside of the diamond with a flaming halo over top shouldn"t have looked so manly, but somehow it did. Maybe it was because the diamond represented the one percent of bikers who were outlaws. The Red Dragons had the same diamond on their cuts but with a scaly red dragon bursting through it breathing fire at whoever was behind them.

"Here ya go, Willa." Raider stopped in front of a metal door at the end of the right side of the second floor. Beside my room there was another door with TASHA"S ENTER AT OWN RISK roughly engraved into the metal. It looked like someone had simply taken a knife and scratched the words into the door. Remembering how crazy my sister had been the last time I had seen her four years ago, it wouldn"t have surprised me if she had been the one to do the scratching. "If you need anything let your dad know, okay?" His gaze went to Tasha"s door and his eyes narrowed. "And if either of my guys gives you trouble let me know, okay?"

"Thanks, Raider," I murmured as he opened the door and placed my case on the floor. I gave him another small smile. "I"ll see you later, I guess."

"Sure thing, kid." With a tip of his head he turned and went back the way he had just come.

I shut my door before finally glancing around the room that was supposed to be mine. Since I had a corner room, I had two windows. One that faced the back of the compound where the trash was, and one that faced the side street that led between the compound and some kind of old, abandoned building. The room wasn"t very big. The queen-sized bed with gray pillowcases and sheets wasn"t very old-looking but the quilt on top was and it made me smile as soon as I touched the slightly frayed corners. My grandmother had made this for me when I was a little girl. I used to sleep under it when I would go visit her for the Thanksgiving holiday break from school.

The walls were white and smelled freshly painted while the floor was covered in a brown carpet that looked well used. I had my own bathroom, as I was sure most of the other bedrooms did. Taking a peek inside, I saw that it was simple and efficient. A tub/shower combo with a black, red, and silver shower curtain. The sink was small but there was a large medicine cabinet that had a mirror on the door hanging over it. The walls were a baby blue while the floors were a stone-colored tile. Clean towels were folded in the little utility closet that also had a few cleaning supplies.

All in all my room was nice and kind of homey. Not something I was expecting. When I had imagined my room in an MC compound I thought it would have an old bed that had been slept in by fifty different sweaty bikers and a bathroom that was little more than a hole in the wall. I felt bad for thinking that and I almost wanted to apologize to my dad.

Deciding to unpack and then to take a shower, I placed my case on the end of the bed and started hanging my clothes in the small closet. I had mostly packed shorts and tank tops, but I"d also slipped in some nicer clothes. Who knew, maybe I would hit it off with Tasha and we could go out or something. When I had told my mother that she had just given me a worried look but hadn"t said anything. I knew that she had reservations about my visit, but she also knew that I had to do this. Honestly I think she was hoping I would hate it here and get to say "I told you so".

I was just stepping out of the shower when I heard the first knock on my bedroom wall. At first I thought it was someone knocking on the door to my room so I tossed on a robe and wrapped my hair in the towel as I hurried to answer it. But when I got into my room I heard the knock come again and it definitely wasn"t from the door.

The third knock was so loud and forceful that it made me jump. A curse followed the knock and then a steady rhythm started up. My eyes widened and I suddenly felt sick to my stomach. Gross. Gross. Gross. Tasha was having s.e.x with some guy. In the middle of the day. While our dad was in the same building.

Did Duke know? Did he care?

My gut told me he probably did and no, he probably didn"t give a s.h.i.t. Mom had told me that Duke pretty much let Tasha do whatever she wanted. Always had. Always would. She wasn"t daddy"s little girl or anything like that. Actually Mom was sure that Duke and Tasha didn"t even like each other very much-too much alike, she had said. Tasha was just wild and Duke didn"t care enough to rein her in.

I rushed to get dressed, trying to block out the sounds coming from the room next door. The rhythm increased and I was actually gagging by the time I pulled my still wet, unbrushed hair into a messy ponytail and picked up my running shoes. I didn"t care if I was without makeup or that my top didn"t match my shorts. I just wanted out of that room and away from the erotic noises coming through the wall.

Shoes still in hand I rushed downstairs and then paused at the bottom step before putting them on. Muttering to myself, I went in search of my father. The men I had seen follow my father into the back room were playing pool once more. Seeing me they paused and nodded their heads in greeting, but otherwise didn"t give me another look. The two women were still in the kitchen cooking and I had to admit whatever they were fixing smelled amazing.

When I heard Duke"s voice I headed toward the back room where the door was now wide open. "He knows that he"s here to solve my problem, right? Not to just lie in bed s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g her brains out."

I stopped at the entrance and glanced inside. My dad sat at his desk, a cigar in his mouth and a gla.s.s of rich-looking whisky sitting on the desk in front of him. Two men sat in front of the desk. Raider was in the first chair leaning forward, blocking my view of the second man"s face. He was huge though, that much I could tell. Wide shoulders, long legs stretched out in front of him. I got a glimpse of long, curly, dark brown hair.

Raider shrugged his shoulders. "I"m sure he just needs to work it out of his system. Besides, we"re going to be here for a few weeks, Duke. Not like he has to rush this."

"The sooner we start cleaning up this mess the happier I"ll be, boys. I..." He broke off when he saw me standing in the doorway. Putting the cigar in a gla.s.s ashtray he waved me in. "Hey there, girl. Get settled in?"

I took a step forward. "So far."

"I"m almost done here, Willa. You can go help the ladies finish up lunch... Or I can have someone give you a tour of the place. Though there isn"t much left to see." He nodded his head at the men sitting in front of his desk. "You know Raider already, but that"s Spider."

The man stood and I turned my head to get my first look at his face...

d.a.m.n! I sucked in a breath as I took all of the big man in. His hair was longer than I had first thought and I was a sucker for long hair, but on this man it was like a shot of pure l.u.s.t went straight between my legs. He had a strong jaw, with no facial hair marring the ever so slightly tanned flesh. The bullring in his nose drew my eyes and I noticed he must have broken it at least once because it was crooked. A dimple in his chin caught my attention and I had the sudden urge to lick it-what the f.u.c.k?

I had never had a thought like that in my life. Sure I"d had crushes on the random hot guy at school and a few musicians that could make my panties wet with just the sound of their voice. This though? This was full-on l.u.s.t in the blink of an eye and my mouth fell open as I let my eyes roam over his chest-d.a.m.n, really? How can one man be that wide? His shirt was tight underneath his cut and let me know that he worked out regularly. Faded, battered old jeans hung low on his hips and I saw just a fraction of skin between the hem of his gray T-shirt and jeans. Smooth skin. Skin I wanted to caress and lick...

"Willa..?"

I blinked at the sound of my name and heat instantly filled my cheeks. He was standing there with his hand out, but there was a grin on his s.e.xy-as-sin face and a dark heat in his black eyes. Black. Eyes. They reminded me of licorice, which instantly made me wish for a Jagerbomb, the only alcohol I actually liked.

Biting my lip, I finally put my hand in his. Electricity fired up my arm as if I were being electrocuted. His hand was hot and huge, his fingers wrapping around mine, completely swallowing my hand. My heart jumped and took off racing as if it were in the lead for an Olympic gold medal. A gasp escaped me before I could think to stop it and I lifted my eyes from our hands to find those black eyes watching me closely.

"Is Spider your real name?" The question left my mouth without permission from my brain and I immediately snapped my mouth shut. Smooth, Willa. Real smooth.

He laughed, but not in a way that made me think he was making fun of me. "It"s James, actually." Tossing back his hair I was presented with something that I had only seen on the National Geographic channel and in my nightmares. The black spider with the red spot on its back climbed up his neck and if he hadn"t still been holding on to my hand I might have taken a few steps back. Instead I just stood there, feeling safe with his warmth seeping into me, and I decided that while that tattoo was scary as h.e.l.l, it was also beautiful. "I used to keep tarantulas as a kid and so my Uncle Razor was always calling me spider boy. Eventually the boy was dropped and I became just Spider."

"Oh..." I didn"t know what else to say and my cheeks darkened even more with embarra.s.sment. d.a.m.n, I had never been so tongue-tied in my life. Normally I was the outspoken girl, the one who didn"t care to make an a.s.s out of herself or to sound like a b.i.t.c.h. It made me popular in school for some strange reason that I was still trying to figure out. Who wanted to be around a b.i.t.c.h like me that often?

"Spider." Raider only said his name but there was something in the other man"s tone that had Spider dropping my hand and taking a few steps back. But the dark heat remained and I nearly bit my lip in half as I contemplated that.

"Why don"t you go help the other women and make me some of that lemonade of yours? No one makes it as good as you, girl." Duke stood and grabbed my hand, giving it a gentle squeeze before practically pulling me out of the room. Out in the hall he stopped and practically shoved me in the direction of the kitchen. "He"s not for you, Willa."

"Wh-why not?" I whispered, trying to look around him into the office. My heart was begging for just one more glimpse of the scary yet beautiful beast inside. Less than ten minutes. That was all it took and I was infatuated.

"He"s older than you," Duke began and I snorted. I knew for a fact that Tasha had been s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g around with men in their thirties when she was just fifteen. No one but our mother had had a problem with that. I was just a few months away from my eighteenth birthday and still a freaking virgin. And Spider didn"t look all that older than me. Maybe early twenties, definitely younger than Raider. "He belongs to a different MC. Not even in our charter..."

"It"s your charter, Daddy. I don"t have anything to do with this MC," I reminded me.

Duke let out a frustrated sigh. "Just take my word on it, girl. Stay clear of the Angel"s Halo boys, and especially Spider."

If only I had heeded his warning...

Chapter 2.

Willa I knew there was a reason I hadn"t spoken to my sister in years. It had just slipped my mind in my excitement to see her and my father. Now, as I stood at the kitchen sink, I was remembering with disgusted clarity.

Tasha was a psychotic b.i.t.c.h.

I hadn"t seen her at all the day before. She had been locked up in her room with the other Angel"s Halo guy and hadn"t even come out to eat dinner last night. Really, all I had been worried about was having to listen to her and s.e.xy maniac still going at it like rabbits. Thankfully there hadn"t been any banging on the walls all night long.

As I waited on the coffee to brew I let my eyes skim over my sister. We didn"t look alike, not even a little. I took after our mother, from the color of my long, dark hair to the gray of my eyes. At just five-foot-one, I was equal in height to my mom as well as just as curvy. Tasha on the other hand looked like the female version of our father. That wasn"t bad, because my sister was beautiful. But she had wider than normal shoulders, small b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and little to no a.s.s. Her hair was a long ma.s.s of red curls that I knew she had enhanced with some over the counter product. I don"t care how good our genes were, there was no way her glossy hair was that red naturally. Her face was gorgeous. Big brown eyes, pouty mouth, and small slightly upturned nose. Her jaw was soft, very feminine.

It was the hate glaring back at me through those brown eyes that reminded me that my sister wasn"t exactly stable when it came to our relationship as sisters. I knew what it was, what had made her hate me so much. Our mother. Clara Blackstone had made no secret of how she felt about her oldest daughter. Mom had always said that she sensed something dark in her child and couldn"t bring herself to truly love her. I had always thought that was sad... And yeah, really creepy.

Yet even as she was distancing herself from one daughter, she had been pulling the other-me-as close as possible. I was the light to Tasha"s dark, or so our mother would always say. I"d hated to be compared to my sister in such a way. Honestly I wasn"t an angel. I"d had my share of sin. Smoking before school with friends-something I had hated and had only done once. Drinking with friends at parties-getting so drunk I was scared to go home until I was completely over my hangover. Making out with boys and letting them get further than I should. The guys at school all thought I was a teasing s.l.u.t because I hadn"t let any of them take my v-card even though I"d let them get pretty far. Of course they hadn"t because I hadn"t felt anything other than a mild fascination with the whole thing. If they could have made me mindless with pa.s.sion I would have spread my legs for them without even blinking.

From the time I could remember, Clara was comparing me to my sister. Tasha could do nothing right. I could do no wrong. That was how it had been with our father too, only he hadn"t rubbed it in Tasha"s face like our mother had. I loved my mother, but she had always seemed so heartless when it came to Tasha and that just wasn"t normal. How do you hate your own child?

"How is the old bag?"

I sighed. I couldn"t blame Tasha for calling our mom names, but that didn"t mean it didn"t bother me. I loved Clara, and I wanted to love Tasha too. "Mom has been having some health issues." It was possibly the only reason she had let me come to Vegas. She didn"t want me around to see her going through the chemotherapy that the doctors insisted that she needed. "Stage two breast cancer. But she won"t let the doctors operate."

Tasha didn"t even flinch when I told her that our mother had cancer, while I had cried for two solid days when Clara had finally broken the news to me. "I don"t think I would want some quack hacking on my t.i.ts either," she said, taking a long swallow of her screwdriver, the only thing she was having for breakfast.

"The cancer could come back if she doesn"t have the surgery," I told her. "The doctors all said that even though it"s only stage two, even with the chemo this cancer is so aggressive that it"s likely to spread unless they do the double mastectomy."

She shrugged. "Oh well. Let me know when she finally kicks the bucket. I"ll open the champagne and toast to that."

I turned around, unable to look at her a moment longer. Maybe our mother had been hard on Tasha, but Clara was still her mother-the woman who had brought her into the world. Didn"t she feel even a little compa.s.sion?

Thankfully the coffee was done and I poured myself a huge mug before adding just a little sugar. Picking it up along with the slice of toast I"d made earlier, I walked away without another word to Tasha, who was now on her second screwdriver of the morning.

I dropped down onto one of the long sofas in the living area. Two other women were already sitting on another sofa, looking a little hung over. They weren"t the ones from the day before who I had helped make dinner with, and these two looked even less welcoming than the two from yesterday had. So I kept my eyes on the television that was turned to some local news channel and finished my small breakfast.

It was more than half an hour before the guys started coming downstairs. My father"s crew were all grumpy this early in the morning-eleven thirty. When someone spoke to someone else all they got were grumbled answers that were unintelligible to me. I tried not to get excited every time someone"s door would open on the second floor, but my heart wouldn"t listen to me. All I wanted was just a glimpse of him, or so I kept telling myself. A small glimpse and I would be happy for the rest of the day.

Raider appeared to be blurry eyed as he came downstairs. He didn"t go immediately to the kitchen like the other men did. Instead he just flopped down on the closest sofa and closed his eyes again. I laughed because it had been my sofa he had landed on. "Rough night?" I teased.

"s.h.i.t. I"m never drinking moonshine with your father ever again," he mumbled. "Gonna be feeling this for a few days."

"Sounds like a good plan," I said with a grin.

"It"s too early to be awake."

"It"s nearly noon." I"d been up since seven, gone for a run and then showered before coming back down for something to eat.

"See? Early." He yawned. "I own a bar, sweetheart. I"m usually not even crawling into bed until dawn. Noon is not a time of the day I see often."

"A bar?" That made sense to me. It probably worked out great for him. In the little time that I had known him I had realized fast that Raider was a man-wh.o.r.e in the worst way. The two women from the day before had been all over him after dinner last night. I"d seen him leave with one and half an hour later he"d come back for the other one. Gross.

"Hannigans"." He yawned again, slumping a little lower on the sofa. "My brothers and I own and run it. When my sister is old enough she will too."

Raider looked like he wanted to sit there and go back to sleep. The nice thing to do would have been to let him. But he was the only person that seemed willing to talk to me and I was starving for conversation. "How old is she?"

"Raven?" He cracked an eye open and yawned again. "She just turned sixteen a few weeks ago. How old are you?"

I shrugged. "I"ll be eighteen soon."

That had his eyes opening wide and he sat up straighter. "Seventeen?" I nodded, because he seemed like he needed the confirmation. He groaned and rubbed his hands over his face. "d.a.m.n it."