Never Love An Outlaw (Deadly Pistols MC #1)(107)

Fuck it. Everybody who still had a soul in this club needed to hear the bitter truth, and I hoped I'd lodged it so deep in Rabid's brain tonight he wouldn't be able to go back to his carefree f*cking.

Finally, I looked at her, reaching up over her head to tap the button for the gate clipped to the visor. It opened up and then we took off.

I mouthed a few directions to give her some idea. No blindfold this time, obviously.

I was so tired of fighting, playing this f*cking game with her and the club. It hadn't gone down like I wanted, but I was done. So goddamned finished.

If the girl sitting in the driver's seat was gonna screw me over, then there wasn't shit I could do about it. I wasn't gonna drive myself nuts over her knowing where the clubhouse was or pissing off my brothers.

If they came for her again – Serial or anybody else – I wouldn't hesitate to swing my fists 'til I couldn't anymore. I'd die fighting for something. Right now, protecting her was a helluva lot more attractive than fighting for my own club, even if she never gave me a shred of thanks.

She had a good reason for despising everything I'd done. The club was behind all this shit. Stress and siege weren't gonna cut it as excuses neither.

Truth is, my band of brothers turned into a pack of wolves a long time ago. Fuck, they'd been like that since I showed up in Redding, and I was too f*cked up to admit it. I couldn't see it 'til now, but when I finally did, it was blinding.

They were gonna kill her. Serial was gonna force her, sure as he would've blown her little sis' head off in the basement that night. Whatever f*cked up sins her daddy did for the cartel against my MC, they shouldn't have been paid for this way.

My guts churned, rougher than any other time tonight. Raw, hot bile spasmed in my intestines, rage incarnate, vile as whiskey mixed battery acid.

I reached for her hand on the wheel, gently covering it. “Pull over, babe. Right f*cking now.”





V: Broken Heartbeat (Missy)


What a night.

Listening to him in the ditch dry heaving was just the cherry on top of my crap sundae. I shook my head, wondering when he'd finally be done. I wondered even more why I didn't just take off, fleeing into the forest that flanked the little strip where we'd pulled over, and not stopping until I touched Mount Shasta looming in the distance.

My brain was still trying to process the evening. Too many bombs exploded in my head too close together.

I was cleaning, trying not to dwell on all the rough brutes all around me enjoying themselves. Then I had to stumble in on him with that blonde bitch's tongue down his throat.

Jealously shouldn't have thundered through my veins. And I definitely shouldn't have taken off running, crazed to get away from him while he pursued me.

Of course, it did, and no reason or wishing was going to make me feel any different.

I didn't want to hear his crap – especially when he didn't owe me any apologies whatsoever.

I couldn't want this man. He was a means to an end, a way to navigate this sector of hell and find my way out of the deep, deep pit daddy dug for Jackie and I.

I was hiding behind the bar, just waiting for him to come out of his stupor on the floor, when Serial attacked. He was so insistent, so fast, his eyes like a guard dog's before it lunges.

I tried to fight. I wanted to believe I could get him off me, get to safety by myself, but the man who threw me against the counter and pressed his nasty hand between my legs was too strong.

That was when I broke. I begged for Brass to wake up and help me. Prayed for it.

The problem with wishes and prayers is that sometimes you actually get what you want.

He fought for me like nobody ever had. When they piled onto him and forced him off the creep, I thought he'd break out like a bull and keep going, even if it meant his own destruction.

More than anything else, he'd put me above his own club, and after I'd treated him like total shit too.

Sure, I could try to ignore these raging uncertainties tearing through me. I'd tried to do that plenty when the liquid heat flowed through me every time I looked at him too long, studying the fierce dark ink scrawled on his hard skin.

But I couldn't ignore the fact that he'd done me right. He'd truly protected me, and not just for his own selfish reasons.

A man fighting for himself wouldn't fight like Brass did. He fought for me, and only me, putting himself against blades and blows without a care for himself.

Didn't that count for something? I shook my head, unwilling to accept the obvious answer in my screwed up brain.

I was still staring at the ground when he rounded the truck, banging on its metal side with one fist. “I'm done. Let's hit the road.”

“Are you sure about that?” I reached into the driver's side and grabbed the water he'd left behind, holding it out to him. “Here. Something to rinse away the taste.”

He popped the cap and chugged it. Stray water sprayed out the corners of his lips, rolling down his cut, saturating the t-shirt he had on underneath it. The droplets drew my eyes to his body, the muscles I owed a debt to that I tried so hard to forget.

Jesus, he was strong. It was one thing just to see it on him, but to know what those fists could do...

His knuckles were scratched, but his hands were still big, strong, and masculine. Untouched. Unbeaten. My thoughts went rampant, imagining what they'd feel like wrapped around my waist, or hooked around my back, sliding to my ass.