Smoke and Steel (Wild West MC #2)(34)

Both her friends were staring out the windows at them as Eight drove away.

The new girl looked terrified.

Marcy gave them a finger wave.

Okay, that almost made him smile.

“Fucking Marcy,” Hellen muttered irately.

Core looked back to see she was pulling her phone out of her purse.

He swiped it out of her hand.

Her head snapped back. “Core!”

“Get in the truck.”

“I’m not getting in your fucking truck.”

She went for her phone, he pulled it out of her reach.

“Fine!” she shouted, started to stomp around him toward the drugstore, but he caught her by the back of her neck, curled her into him, then tangled his fingers in her hair.

Thick. Soft.

Goddamn.

She was tits crushed to his chest, belly to his cock, soft breaths coming from her lips whispering against his lips.

And yeah, the perfume did a number on him, but all the rest, it was practically impossible not to get hard.

He could kiss her, and she’d kiss him back. He knew it. She knew it.

And with them both this ticked, it’d be hot as fuck.

He knew it.

She knew it too.

“You gonna get in my truck?” he asked softly.

“Yes,” she whispered.

His dick stirred.

He let her go to take her hand and lead her to the passenger seat.

Nanook read the situation and jumped in the back.

He opened her door and stood behind her as she climbed up. He slammed the door, rounded the hood and folded in.

He started the truck and pulled out.

Nanook shoved his head between them and panted at the windshield.

Core gave himself a minute to calm down, giving her one too.

After that minute, he said, “My boy’s name is Nanook.”

She didn’t reply.

He glanced at her.

She was looking out the side window.

He drew in a deep breath and let it out as a heavy sigh.

“You know I like you,” he said.

She didn’t speak.

“Seeing as I like you, not big on the idea of something happening to you.”

She remained silent.

He gave it another minute, then two, and tried again.

“You eaten?”

She made no reply.

“I haven’t eaten.”

She still said nothing.

Right then.

At the next light, Core changed directions.

She lived east of Colorado Boulevard.

He lived south, close to Englewood.

Instead of going to her place, he headed home.

She was so busy pouting, she didn’t notice.

He knew when she did because she straightened in her seat.

Nanook took that opportunity to sniff her then try to lick her.

Core opened his mouth to command his dog to stop, but Hellen didn’t rear away.

She buried her pink-tipped fingers in his fur and scratched.

Nanook licked her again.

Core decided he needed to keep his eyes on the road.

She said nothing, even when he pulled into his garage.

He got out.

Nanook, not dumb by any stretch of the imagination, hopped down behind Hellen.

Core walked toward the door to the house, hit the garage door button, it started trundling down, and he opened the way to the house, sweeping his arm to invite her inside.

She went in.

She strutted through his laundry room and stopped in his kitchen.

She glanced at the steak, but otherwise didn’t look around.

Nanook’s head swung between the two of them as they went into a stare off. Then, with a groan, he hedged his bets and sank down to his belly between them.

She finally spoke.

Lifting her hand in front of her, palm up, she asked, “May I have my phone now?”

“How pissed at me are you?”

“There is no quantity yet invented to measure the intensity of how pissed I am at you.”

“Say they were onto you.”

She shook her head. “It doesn’t excuse—”

“You in a skirt and high heels. Maybe five of them in that house. You and Marcy nabbed first, your friend comes over the back fence thinking she’s good, they get her next. What do fucks like that do to women who are not toeing their line?”

He saw her jaw bulge as she ground her teeth.

But she stopped doing that to say, “Christos wasn’t there, obviously. We knew that. He knows Marcy and me.”

“So four on three. Four men, three women. They still got you and you know it.”

She glared at him.

She knew it.

He kept at her.

“To answer my question, they teach them how to toe the line, and sweetheart, they do it in a way you never forget. Eight called me, that was all that was in my head. I have spent five years cleaning up the trail of misery left behind from women who have been used by men like that. If they realized what you women were up to, you become someone else. The you standing here, pissed at me, is gone. That was why I was so fucking furious.”

“I can cogitate, Core. I figured that out when you shouted in my face.”

“It was an honest reaction.”

She nodded sarcastically, and yeah, she could do that because he didn’t miss the sarcasm.