Beyond the Cut (Sinner's Tribe Motorcycle Club #2)(2)
“Stop!” Her scream froze passersby but did nothing to deter her girls, now running hand in hand toward her and into the path of a blue pickup truck racing down the street at twice the school zone speed limit. Dawn’s feet kicked into gear, but even as she threw herself forward, in her heart she knew she wouldn’t make it in time.
A black blur shot in front of the truck. Cade swept her daughters into his strong arms, and out of harm’s way. Moments later her outlaw biker savior deposited the girls on the sidewalk. Seemingly oblivious to their brush with death, Maia and Tia wrapped their skinny arms around her waist and squeezed her so tight she could barely breathe.
“I didn’t know you had kids.”
Dawn looked up at the man who had at once caused the chaos and saved the day, knowing as she did that she would fall headlong into the intoxicating sea of blue she had been trying to forget for the better part of a year.
“Cade.”
“Give it to me, baby. I wanna hear my name on your lips when you come. Scream for me.”
“Oh God. Cade!”
He smiled. She melted. As all women melted at the sight of his chiseled jaw and wide cheekbones, his firm chin and dangerously sexy crooked nose—the only imperfection in a face that could have been sculpted from the finest tawny marble. He wore his cut over a long-sleeved black tee, obscenely stretched to highlight the hard planes and angles of his broad chest. Her hands had traced every ridge of those bulging pecs, fingers clawing at his shoulders countless times during the two nights they’d spent together.
“Been a long time.” His eyes dropped to Maia and Tia. “You never told me about your girls.”
“’Cause they’re not her girls anymore.” The harsh rasp of Shelly-Ann’s voice shattered the moment. “They’re Jimmy’s girls, and he won’t take kindly to a Sinner laying his dirty paws on them or messing with his old lady.”
“I haven’t been his old lady for three years.” Dawn glared at Shelly-Ann, dressed in her uniform of yoga pants and neon-colored sports tank, her red hair swept into a messy haystack on her head to show off her multiple ear piercings. Although Shelly-Ann wasn’t part of Jimmy’s MC, she knew full well that Dawn had ceased to be an old lady—the biker equivalent of a wife in the civilian world—when she ran away from Jimmy. And he’d lost the title of her old man. At least, that’s how it was supposed to work. But of course, outlaw bikers didn’t follow the rules, and because she’d made the mistake of also marrying him in a civil ceremony, she had to file for divorce to try to break his hold. And that’s when Jimmy got really angry.
“Just wait until Jimmy hears about this.” Shelly-Ann smirked. “You’ve shot yourself in the foot big time. We both know what’ll happen if he finds out you saw the girls without asking me first. And if I tell Jimmy you’re with a Sinner…”
“I’m not with him. He’s just someone I know.” But the Sinners were the reason she’d moved to Conundrum with the girls. After a brutal territorial war, Jimmy’s MC, the Devil’s Brethren, had been kicked out of town on penalty of death, which made it a safe haven for anyone wanting to stay out of the Brethren’s reach. At least it was safe until Jimmy found a way around the ban by paying his sister to move to town.
Dawn stepped off the sidewalk, pulling the girls with her, to avoid two women with baby strollers. Her cheeks flushed when their gazes flicked from Cade to her to Shelly-Ann and back to her. After years of trying to put her past behind her, hints of an association with a biker made her feel sick inside. Bikers were bad news. Her little fling with Cade had been an indulgence, a nod to the wild child she kept buried deep inside. Sex and nothing more.
Shelly-Ann waited until the sidewalk was clear again. “Another five hundred a month might keep my mouth shut.”
“I don’t have another five hundred dollars.” Dawn gritted her teeth and handed Shelly-Ann the money she owed her for the week. “I’m already working three jobs. I just sold my car to cover the extras you said you needed last month. You’re getting money from Jimmy, too. How much do you need? You’re not spending it on the girls.”
“Your choice. But you’ve got a history of making bad choices, so you might want to rethink that attitude. You chose to piss Jimmy off, and look where it got you. No kids. I got my own problems to deal with, and looking after your brats is draining me dry. You know where I’ll be on Sunday. And I know where Jimmy will be if you don’t show up with the extra cash.”
Heart aching, Dawn bent down to hug her girls. She assured them Sunday wasn’t too far away, and that one day they would be a family again—a promise she’d been making every week, because she was damn well going to make it happen no matter what it took. No one was going to keep her away from her girls, and especially not Jimmy and his deadbeat sister.
After Shelly-Ann led her sobbing daughters back to the car, Dawn slumped against a streetlamp. Shelly-Ann had been right about one thing. She definitely had made some bad choices in her life, and the worst one was accepting Jimmy’s offer to save her from the streets. In her sixteen-year-old na?veté, she had mistaken his interest for kindness and his possessiveness for love.
“You okay?” Cade gently brushed her hair back from her face, and her skin tingled at his touch. Focused on dealing with Shelly-Ann, she’d totally forgotten about him. And Cade wasn’t an easy man to forget. Not with those faded jeans, tight in all the right places, those washboard abs, a body that moved with easy grace both in and out of bed …