Rough Justice (Sinner's Tribe Motorcycle Club #1)(22)
He turned and walked away, knowing he’d been too harsh. Sherry had been with the club for five years, and never once had she given him cause to doubt her loyalty. His anger was directed at himself and not her. And yet, despite all the reasons not to go, nothing could keep him away from Banks Bar tonight. He needed to see Arianne again. He needed to know if he was well and truly f*cked.
SIX
Don’t mess with a brother’s old lady or other patch holders’ chicks
“Hey, baby. You gonna give me a little sugar with that whiskey?”
Arianne groaned when the inebriated trucker leaned across the bar and motioned her forward with a thick finger. Every weekend was the same. As the evening progressed, the happy drunks became lusty drunks, and trapped behind the bar, she was fair game. But she was safer than Dawn. At least she had the counter to keep their hands away.
Dodging to the side, she slammed his whiskey down and gave him a cold smile. “Only sugar on offer is in the little white packets at the end of the counter. Why don’t you head down there and get one?”
He held out his hands, palms up as if to ward off a blow. “Hey, baby. I was just being friendly. No need to get uptight.” He slid off his seat with a huff, no doubt to return to his friends and tell them about the bitch behind the bar.
And “bitch” was the right word. But her prickly shell had helped her survive after her mother died. She fingered the ring she always wore, her mother’s last gift. Not a day went by that she didn’t miss her. Not a day went by that she didn’t long to escape the biker world that had been responsible for her mother’s death. But Viper would never allow it. Especially when there was work to be done and few he trusted to do it. One week she was sent to procure weapons from soldiers at a local military base. Before that, she’d been a midnight drug mule. Last month had been intelligence gathering from city hall to find out who had dared purchase the plot of land beside the Black Jack clubhouse.
The front door opened and her head jerked up as it had a hundred times that night, her heart hammering in dread anticipation of seeing a Black Jack patch. Adrenaline surged through her body until the crowds parted to reveal a couple of middle-aged bikers, balding and wearing patch-free leather jackets. Weekend warriors. She saw them all the time. Business types who wheeled out their bikes only on evenings and sunny weekends. She sagged against the counter in relief.
“You worried about the Jacks?” Dawn hoisted her tray of empties onto the bar. “You’ve been watching that door all night, and since you aren’t interested in dating, I know it isn’t because of a guy.”
Was she that obvious? Turning to hide her disquiet, Arianne said, “I was safe at your place, but I got a bad feeling the minute I pulled into the parking lot outside. I need to be ready to hit the door running because I’m not up for a Viper-style interrogation right now. I still have bruises from being knocked off my bike.”
“Fucking bastard.” Dawn pressed a fist to her mouth. “Wish I still had the kind of contacts I did when I was with Jimmy. I’d so like to kick me some nasty Viper ass, and then I’d…” Her voice trailed off when the front door banged shut again. Arianne followed Dawn’s gaze to the group of bikers walking through the bar, her heart slowing only when she spotted Devil Dogs MC patches on their cuts. Relieved, she turned away, only to look back when Dawn whispered.
“Well … hellooo, baby.”
Arianne looked up and her heart seized in her chest.
Jagger.
What the hell was he doing here?
Her body heated in an instant, a blush burning her cheeks as she cast a surreptitious glance at Jagger from beneath her lashes. Conundrum had more than its fair share of bars, and the Sinners owned Riders and had recently carved out Sixty-Nine Bar on the east side of town as their turf.
Three Sinners followed Jagger as he wove his way through the tables toward the Devil Dogs, who were in the process of clearing everyone out of the back corner. Dawn’s eyes widened when they rushed to seat Jagger at the end of the table, his back to the wall, giving him a clear view of the bar.
“He’s someone important, that’s for sure. I would need to see the patches on his cut—”
“Jagger.”
Dawn startled. “Jagger, the president-of-Sinner’s-Tribe-who-kidnapped-you-then-let-you-go-and-now-you’re-hot-for-him-although-you-shouldn’t-be Jagger?” Her voice rose above Mot?rhead’s “Ace of Spades,” blasting through the speakers. No easy feat.
“Well, look at him. He’s devastatingly gorgeous. I mean, how many bikers look like that? And he was different from the bikers I know. He cleaned up the knife wound on my throat.”
“You do understand how absolutely inane that sounds,” Dawn said. “His friend sliced you with a knife, but he’s a nice biker because he cleaned you up.”
Heart thudding, she looked over at the corner table. Jagger caught her with his gaze, giving her no time to stifle her blush. A thrill of excitement shot through her veins. Oh God. It was like high school all over again, except he had come to her bar and not her locker, and he was the badass president of a rival MC and not the grungy lead singer of a high school metal band she had been panting after for two years.
Still, her body reacted to his unexpected presence exactly the same way—stomach churning, body heating, nipples hardening—although this time with an intensity that stole her breath away.