2 Years Later...
Bash I was going to kill someone tonight.
Frowning at the men sitting around me, I clenched my teeth and tried to concentrate on anything other than the fact that Raven was walking around with shorts on up to her a.s.s and a hot pink bra on under her white Hannigans" shirt. Didn"t she realize that I had trouble not looking at her when she was wearing her normal work outfit, so it was ten times as hard when she was showing off what only I was allowed to see?
Muttering a curse under my breath, I chugged the half full beer in front of me and practically slammed the bottle down on the tabletop. The secrecy thing was getting to me. Bad. For three months now I"d been sneaking around with Raven and I was tired of it. Tired of not getting to claim what was mine. Tired of having to keep my feelings hidden when all I wanted to do was watch her. Tired of not getting to touch her when every second she wasn"t in my arms I ached for her skin on mine.
I knew she was struggling just as hard as I was, but she refused to let me go to her brothers. My Raven, who was scared of nothing and no one, was terrified for me. Afraid that they would kill me. I didn"t relish the beating that would follow, but I could take it. There was nothing they could do to me that would keep me from my female.
"Eyes to yourself, brother."
I didn"t glance to my left at the sound of Spider"s voice. My eyes were on Raven as she bent over a table in the back near the pool tables. A few of the ol" ladies were sitting there with a pitcher of frozen margaritas. They said something that made her laugh and that sound was like an electrical shock to my d.i.c.k, which was already at half-mast in readiness for her.
Two tables over from the ol" ladies sat a group of newcomers. They"d ridden in an hour or so ago, stopping on their way through to who-the-h.e.l.l-knew-where. Posers, in their leather jackets and expensive boots. Their bikes had bada.s.s artwork on them, but that was about the only thing going for the young punks playing at being a gang.
That was what they had called themselves. A gang. They didn"t have a clue what it meant to be part of an MC. Were clueless as to the rules. Especially the Angel"s Halo rule.
No one touches Raven Hannigan.
They hadn"t attempted to touch her, but I could see them building up the courage. It was Sat.u.r.day and like usual the sheep were in attendance. Girls were all over the single club members sitting around drinking or playing pool. None of them attempted to approach the newcomers though and I could tell that was p.i.s.sing them off. It was just a matter of time before one of them laid a finger on Raven.
I wasn"t the only one watching them watch Raven. Jet was standing behind the bar mixing drinks while Colt stocked the fridge with more bottled beer. Even as he was pouring shots his eyes never left the five newcomers who were talking loudly over the bar"s usual noise of rock music and high-pitched female giggles. It grated down my spine-all of it. I popped my knuckles, ready for them to make a move.
"Am I going to have to go over and rip their heads off to get you to calm the f.u.c.k down?" Spider demanded in a low voice so that Hawk, who was sitting at a table nearby with Raider and two other members of the club, wouldn"t be able to hear him. They had a poker game going, but like Jet, the other two Hannigan brothers were watching the newcomers watching their baby sister.
"I"m cool," I a.s.sured my friend with a lie that tasted bad on my tongue. I wasn"t cool. I was boiling with rage. If only I could stake my claim, those f.u.c.kers wouldn"t be sitting there eyeing my female.
"Hey baby, how about another round of beers?"
I jerked as the one who appeared to be the leader of the five posers called Raven "baby". When she didn"t automatically turn around, the loser reached out and tugged on her arm. Every muscle in my body tensed, ready and willing to kick a.s.s. Behind me I heard two chairs scoot across the wood floor. Hawk and Raider. I didn"t have to glance at the bar to know that Jet and Colt were about to jump over the bar top. But they didn"t take a step forward, waiting to see what happened next.
Raven turned her head slowly, glancing down at the hand still tugging on her arm. When she lifted her eyes they were ice cold as she glared at the man. "I"m not your baby. Get your own beer."
"Come on, sweetb.u.t.t." The poser gave her a grin that I a.s.sumed was supposed to be charming, but just served to p.i.s.s me off. "Go get daddy a beer."
Spider snorted beer out his nose. He coughed, laughing so hard he was choking. I couldn"t help but grin myself. That wasn"t going to end well for the newcomer. Some of my tension eased as Raven turned to face the biker and his friends. Her olive-jade green eyes were bright with anger. Stepping closer she bent her head and whispered something in the man"s ear that had his Adams apple bobbing.
The man stood and reached a hand out as if to grab her a.s.s. She didn"t give him the chance as she elbowed him in the sternum and then lifted her knee quick and hard to his groin. "Call me a sweetb.u.t.t again!" she screamed. "Now go get your own f.u.c.king beer, daddy."
Behind Raven, the ol" ladies were cracking up while the biker fell to his knees, wheezing as he struggled to stay conscious after the debilitating hit his d.i.c.k and b.a.l.l.s had just taken. As hard as she had kneed him, I was sure that the guy was going to need retrieval surgery to remove his b.a.l.l.s from his throat. She turned back toward the table but before she could take a step one of the other newcomers reached out for her, his face set in angry lines.
As if in slow motion I saw his hand rise and I was across the room a second before he made contact with her arm. His hold on her was hard, bruising and I saw red. Jet and his brothers didn"t have time to move before I had the man on his back, his nose broken and his left eye already swelling shut. I didn"t even remember punching him the first time, let alone the second.
No one touched Raven Hannigan. No one touched my female.
Three sets of arms were suddenly around me, punching me. I elbowed the man on my right in the face, and grinned when I heard his nose break. The one behind me didn"t last long as I head-b.u.t.ted him twice, but he had a tight hold on me and I went down with him. The third man was the biggest and a little slow in the head by the look on his face. That didn"t mean he couldn"t fight though and I suspected that he was only kept around as a kind of bodyguard for the other four idiots.
I felt a kick to my ribs and growled at the sudden sharp pain. Working my way free of the man who still had a death grip on me and my shirt, I stood, only to have to duck when the ox of a man swung his meat clever fists at my head. The next punch landed on my jaw and I was unable to control the instinct to dismember as I hit the man over and over with my fists. Head. Stomach. Elbow to the ribs. Kidney. Kidney. The ox stumbled back, but not before he reached out to try and catch himself.
What he caught was my shirt that I wore when I worked at Uncle Jack"s on the older cars that he sometimes got in. The ox went down, ripping my shirt open on the way.
I stood there, shirt hanging wide open, sucking in air to calm the boiling in my veins that had started long before that f.u.c.ker had grabbed hold of Raven. Around me the bar was quiet. Someone had even turned the music off so all I heard was the sound of the men on the ground around me groaning and my own heavy breathing.
When I turned around I expected all eyes to be on the b.l.o.o.d.y men behind me, but they weren"t. Instead their eyes were on me. Or rather the new ink Spider had slapped on me that morning.
"Raven" was in bold, gothic style writing across the left side of my chest.
I heard Raven gasp as she took in the brand that told the world that I was hers just as much as she was mine. She stepped forward, her fingers trembling as they slid over her name on my skin. When she lifted her eyes to mine they were full of a mixture of wonder and pure terror. Terror for me as I suddenly felt the breath of five raging Irish bikers behind me.
She pulled my shirt closed and stepped closer. "I love you," she whispered before putting herself between me and her brothers. "Jet... Don"t."
"Move, Rave." Jet"s tone was colder than I had ever heard it. He was the one who had taken over as a father figure when Mad Max Hannigan had died. He was the one who had always been the most protective and possessive of Raven. She had been his baby from the day she was born. Of course he was going to be my executioner.
"Please." Were those tears in Raven"s voice? She wouldn"t let me turn her around to see if there were. She was glued in front of me, my last wall of defense before my death-or my wish for death. "Don"t hurt him. I love him."
The look on Jet"s face only turned colder. "How long?" His eyes were on Raven but the question was directed entirely at me.
I stroked my hand over Raven"s blonde hair, knowing I wouldn"t get to touch it or her for at least a few weeks. Which was probably how long I was going to be in traction once the Hannigan brothers were done with me. "Since her birthday," I told my MC president honestly.
My answer had Jet"s eyes finally meeting mine. "That long?" His head turned to the side as if he found me curious. He most likely did. I could have lied and told him that I hadn"t touched Raven yet. That I was waiting until I had his and his brother"s permission. Maybe I should have gone that route, but I hadn"t. I"d taken what I wanted and said f.u.c.k the consequences.
Consequences that I was going to have to face like a man now.
I nodded. "Yes. That long."
"I never would have suspected it of you, Bash. The ever loyal enforcer breaking the one rule that would automatically sign your death certificate." He turned his neck left and right, cracking it. It was a scare tactic.
But I wasn"t scared. As soon as I could walk after the beating I was about to receive, I would get to call Raven mine once and for all.
Willa I was sound asleep when the phone rang.
I jerked awake and sat straight up in bed. The last time I had gotten a call in the middle of the night was when my mother had died. She"d hung on for eight months before the cancer had finally taken her from me. Those eight months hadn"t been pretty. I"d tried to take care of her on my own, but one day my mother had asked her doctor to admit her to a local nursing home. She had died three days later. I knew she had done it so that I wouldn"t have to live with the memory of her dying in our house.
Now I wasn"t sure what to expect. My heart was pounding as I reached for the phone. "h.e.l.lo?"
I felt the blood leaving my face as I listened to the federal agent. There had been a raid on my father"s compound last night and most of his MC were dead. Including my father and sister. Tears burned my eyes as I nodded my head while the special agent continued on and on. I couldn"t have cared less that Tasha was dead, but my father...
"... I was hoping you would be able to a.s.sist me in getting ahold of your niece"s father."
I was snapped out of my grief stupor by the special agent"s request. I knew that Bash Reid was Lexa"s father. Other than that I hadn"t kept up with my sister"s baby daddy issues. The only reason I even knew my niece"s name and that Bash was her father was because I"d overheard Duke telling Clara shortly before my mother had died.
"Is Lexa okay?" Lexa lived at the compound with Tasha and my dad. If that place had been shot up then there was a chance Lexa had gotten hurt as well.
"Your niece is fine, Miss Blackstone. But if I don"t reach her legal guardian in the next few hours I will have no choice but to turn her over to child services."
Heart pounding for an entirely different reason, I a.s.sured the special agent that I would get ahold of Bash as quickly as possible. A glance at the bedside clock told me that it was earlier than I had originally thought. Just after one. I wondered what Bash was doing right now as I punched in his number. I had changed my number when I had gotten back from Vegas two years ago, but I had kept Raider, Bash, and even Spider"s numbers in my phone. Every now and then I would pull up Spider"s number, type out the anger I wanted to throw at him, but never sending the text message.
The phone rang six times before it went to voice mail. I hung up and immediately dialed again. It rang over and over again and I was about to try again when his voice filled my ear. "What?" He practically snarled at me.
"Bash?" I cleared my throat, which was still clogged with tears from finding out my father was gone. "Bash, it"s Willa Blackstone."
There was a hesitation before he finally answered me. "What"s up, Willa?"
"Lexa needs you. The Red Dragons" compound was raided last night. Duke and Tasha...are gone." I heard his shuddery inhale. "Your daughter is going to be put in foster care if you don"t get her."
He was so quiet for so long that I thought at first he had hung up on me. Then I heard his groan as if he were in pain. A moment later he cursed and told me he was heading to Vegas now. "I don"t know how to take care of a kid though."
I don"t know why I offered. Maybe it was because Lexa was all the family I had left now. Perhaps it was because I had been lonely for years now, long before my mother had died. "I"ll get the first flight out to Vegas and meet you there. I"ll help you as much as you need, Bash."
It took a while to get a flight out to Vegas. By the time I got there Bash was already there. Honestly I didn"t know how he was able to stand. His arm was in a cast, his body black and blue. It was obvious someone had beaten the h.e.l.l out of him, which only confused me. The man was a beast. A whole army had to have jumped him to have beaten him so badly. He wouldn"t talk to me about it though. Just told me to take Lexa back with me on the next flight back to Seattle and he would meet me there.
Bash Reid became my best friend. We talked about everything but Spider and Vegas. Two subjects that were completely off limits. I never did find out who had beaten him so badly, but I could guess it had something to do with Raven Hannigan.
In the beginning Bash sucked as a dad, but he found his footing and became pretty kicka.s.s. We lived in my mother"s old house and he went to work at a local garage during the day. On the weekends he was a bouncer at some club in Seattle and we lived pretty comfortably.
He a.s.sured me that he was done with the MC lifestyle but I could tell in his heart he wasn"t. So when he got the call from San Quintin I wasn"t surprised when Bash took the offer of being Angel"s Halo"s new president.
Chapter 8.
Willa Present Day...
I hated Sat.u.r.day nights at Hannigans".
I had only been working at the bar for two weeks now, but in the two Sat.u.r.days that I had worked I decided that they were the worst days of the week. When I had to work them, they were the worst days of my life.
I carried a tray of brown beer bottles to the back of the bar where seven bikers were standing around playing pool, while seven sheep rubbed themselves all over the men to the beat of the s.l.u.tty rhythm of the rock music pounding through the bar. I tried to keep a neutral expression on my face as I handed out beers to the bikers.
They knew I was under Bash"s protection, but there was no rule that it was hands off. So while the bikers would keep their hands to themselves, the looks I"d been getting from the sheep was not a good sign. They didn"t like me for a mixture of reasons. One being that the Angel"s Halo MC"s sheep were loyal to Raven Hannigan and considered me a home wrecker in some way. I would admit that while Raven and I weren"t BFFs we weren"t enemies either.
I liked to think we had come a long way in the month since I"d moved into the Hannigan house with Lexa. Raven and I got along well enough even though I knew she still had misgivings about the time Bash and I had lived under the same roof. Now that I was working as a waitress at her family"s bar we got along a little better. I did it to have something to do, but also to try and relieve some of the mounting stress that was pushing down on Raven more and more with each pa.s.sing day.
It had been two weeks since Flick had run away. Raven wasn"t taking it well. She blamed herself and she was beating herself up over it. The entire Hannigan clan was taking it pretty bad though. Including Jet who was in San Quintin and was the most powerless of them all.
Once everyone had their beers I walked away without saying a word. That was how I got through my nights the easiest. Keeping my mouth shut. I didn"t have to ask people what they wanted to drink, they normally just yelled it out or went to the bar to order and I would take it to them. On my way back to the bar I picked up as many empty bottles as I could so I could dump them once I got back to the bar where Colt and Raider Hannigan were busy mixing drinks and taking care of the customers seated on stools in front of the bar top.
There were ol" ladies and a few sheep sitting at the bar, having just sat down because they hadn"t been there when I had gone to the back just a few minutes ago. I paid them no attention as I stepped behind the bar with Colt and Raider and started hand washing dirty gla.s.ses that were in the sink. Keeping busy made the nights go by faster and kept my mind from wandering.
As I dried the shot gla.s.ses and placed them in their designated spots, I saw that Raider was already chatting up a new conquest even though he had already taken some chick into the bathroom not forty minutes ago. I rolled my eyes at him when he glanced my way and he smirked. It only made me roll my eyes again, causing him to laugh.
Colt accidently b.u.mped into my shoulder and I turned to apologize to him but he just grabbed my arm and guided me to the side, winking as he reached for a bottle of whisky. I had heard that Colt was the most like Jet in personality and looks, and I could honestly understand what Felicity must have felt when she fell for Jet if Colt was anything to go by. Charming, bad a.s.s when he needed to be, and a mixture of sweet and arrogant all at the same time. I was immune to his charm just as I was immune to nearly all things male, but I could still get what all the fuss was about.
It was nearly midnight, two hours before closing, when Bash walked in. He didn"t normally come in on Sat.u.r.days unless Raven was working. Mostly he stayed glued to her side, watching her as if she would break at any second. It was kind of cute.
Bash wasn"t alone though and I had to grit my teeth to keep from cursing when I saw Spider walk in behind his best friend. I really couldn"t understand those two and their f.u.c.ked up friendship. One day they were fighting, hating each other"s guts. The next they were best friends again. It was a wonder neither had whiplash the way they went back and forth so quickly.
Colt sat an unopened bottle of Patron down on my empty tray along with two shot gla.s.ses and a salt shaker. Placing a bowl of sliced limes on it he picked up the tray and handed it over to me. "It"s their usual," he said when I just raised a brow at him. "Spider"s favorite, actually. Beware. He has a p.i.s.sed off look on his face. Normally Raven is the only one who will deal with him like that. Be careful."
It really was a night for rolling my eyes. "I"m not scared of James Masterson."
Colt raised a brow at that and turned his head to study me curiously. "I don"t think there is a person with b.a.l.l.s big enough to call him James to his face. Good luck with that."
Shaking my head I stepped around Colt and headed toward the back booth that everyone seemed to call the Original"s booth. Very few of the Originals came in on Sat.u.r.day nights whereas they all came in on Fridays. I"d learned quickly that they didn"t like having ol" ladies and sheep in the bar on Friday nights. They only let Raven serve them or one of the other Hannigans. I could understand why, since it looked like Hannigans" was their chapel and Friday nights were when they held their official church meetings. Even if Angel"s Halo had their own warehouse that I a.s.sumed was much like The Red Dragons" compound had been before it had been shot all to h.e.l.l.
I had to weave my way through the ma.s.ses of people to get to the back booth. The bar was fairly big and the layout was s.p.a.cious. The pool tables in the back, the bar in the front, with about five booths and thirty or more tables with at least five chairs to each table in between. This was the only real bar for miles. Sometimes locals that weren"t a.s.sociated with the MC came in, but I had noticed that they were the ones that looked a lot scarier and much braver than your usual Creswell Springs resident. Also a few college students came in from time to time, mostly females looking for a walk on the wild side.
When I reached the Original"s booth, Bash and Spider stopped talking abruptly making me wonder what they had been talking about. I felt like I was a mindless teenager with the amount of times I was rolling my eyes tonight. Placing the Patron and everything else on the table in front of them I picked up the tray. Instead of turning to leave as I was sure they thought I was going to do I just stood there, putting a hand on one hip and frowning down at them. "So, what ya talking about?"
I saw Bash"s lips twitch with amus.e.m.e.nt. Having lived in the same house with me for fifteen months he had grown to know me fairly well. We were friends-h.e.l.l, he had been my only real friend. Ever. "Club business."
"Oh yeah? So shouldn"t you be talking to the club about it too? Or is this a president-enforcer-only chitchat?"
Spider grabbed the bottle of Patron and poured two shots. He tossed them both back without so much as a flinch and I found my eyes locked on the sight of his throat as it moved up and down with each swallow. A knee nudged my leg and I shook my head, clearing it of the stupid desire-filled fog before anyone other than Bash noticed. No way did I want Spider to know he still affected me so completely.
It wasn"t smart to let the big man know that I"d been fighting with myself for the last month. From the day I had set eyes on him again I"d been one ma.s.s of aching female flesh. My body didn"t seem to comprehend what my mind constantly screamed at me on a daily basis. Spider had cheated on me, shredded my heart into a million pieces. And I wasn"t going to be one of those stupid girls who took her man cheating with a grain of salt and no more than a bat of an eyelash. It had been one of the things that had ended my parents" marriage. Duke had cheated with club wh.o.r.es over and over again on top of a s.h.i.tload of other things club related until Clara had had enough.
I was just happy to have learned early what Spider was really like-which I a.s.sumed was how all bikers were.
"It"s just a small matter." Bash making light of whatever they had been talking about only made me more curious but I let it go. For now. I"d caught a few words of their conversation: Raven, Hannigans", Hawk and frat boy had been the only things I had made sense of.
The frat boy I could only a.s.sume was the guy who had tried to a.s.sault Gracie Morgan at a party a month ago. Hawk was out for blood when it came to the guy as it was obvious to any and every one that he and Gracie cared about each other. I had no idea what the two had to do with Raven or even Hannigans" but I wasn"t likely to get anything out of Bash anytime soon.
I sat down at the booth with them. My feet were starting to hurt and I hadn"t really taken much of a break all night. When neither man spoke I reached for the dish of pretzels I had set out earlier. The ones at the Original"s booth were the only ones I would eat because they hadn"t been touched by a hundred hands tonight. Gross.
Spider tossed back another shot, not bothering with the salt and limes. After a moment Bash poured himself a shot then offered me one. I shook my head. I wasn"t a big fan of drinking and I had no tolerance for it. One shot was all it was going to take for me to start acting stupid.
"Go away, Willa. It"s what you do best."
My eyes narrowed as I turned my gaze on Spider. He was glaring at me as he tossed back another shot. "Go f.u.c.k one of the sheep, Spider. It"s what you do best."
"Coward."
"CHEATER."
He flinched as if I had slapped him, but just swallowed another shot. It felt like the hundredth time tonight-maybe even in the two hundred range-but I rolled my eyes again. d.a.m.n it, he was turning me into a juvenile. This whole bar was. It felt like I was twelve instead of almost twenty-two.
"Should I leave?" Bash asked, taking a second shot of the Patron. "I mean, if you two are going to have angry s.e.x-which is really hot, by the way-then I don"t wanna be around for that s.h.i.t. You"re like my sister, Willa. Seeing you naked is just wrong."