Own the Wind (Chaos, #1) by Kristen Ashley
Acknowledgements
I wish to start my shout outs with Emily Sylvan Kim, my superagent but also a woman who makes the grand feat of diplomacy seem like tying her shoelaces. I’m not sure you knew what you were tackling when you signed me on, honey. What I am sure of is that I’m delighted you’re on my team.
Going my own way for so long in the self-publishing world, I was worrying myself silly about forging new relationship with folks who would dig their hands into my stories. I care about my work more than is probably healthy, and I strive to provide stories to my readers that are far from disappointing.
More proof that the star of fortune has finally decided to shine its light on me as it led me to Amy Pierpont and Lauren Plude at Grand Central Publishing. Amy took pains to preserve my voice, listen to and hear my meanderings about everything under the sun that meant something to me to share about Tabby and Shy, and put up with my crap along the way. And she sent me a bottle of tequila. So you know that’s gonna be good stuff. Thank you guys and here’s to good things to come.
Own the Wind will be my first book with a bona fide publisher, another in a mess of dreams come true. This beauty would not have befallen me if not for my loyal, dedicated, kickass readers who pimp my books, blog like crazy, and shout my name from rooftops. I wish I had the time and space to name you all, but that would take a decade. I hope you know… down to my bones, mamas.
Finally, as my life preferences are writing and communing with my readers, not logging sales spreadsheets, updating websites, and dealing with bank managers, so last but oh so not least…
Erika, I love you.
Chas, no way… no way… I would be here without you.
Prologue
You Don’t Know Me
His cell rang and Parker “Shy” Cage opened his eyes.
He was on his back in his bed in his room at the Chaos Motorcycle Club’s compound. The lights were still on and he was buried under a small pile of women. One was tucked up against his side, her leg thrown over his thighs, her arm over his ribs. The other was upside down, tucked to his other side, her knee in his stomach, her arm over his calves.
Both were naked.
“Shit,” he muttered, as he lifted and twisted himself out from under his fence of limbs. He reached out to his phone.
He checked the display and touched his thumb to the screen to take the call.
“Yo, brother,” he muttered to Hop, one of his brethren in the Chaos MC.
“Where are you?” Hop asked.
“Compound,” Shy answered.
“You busy?”
Shy lifted up to an elbow and looked at the two women passed out in his bed.
“Not anymore,” he replied.
Knowing Shy and his reputation, there was humor in Hop’s tone when he stated, “Tabby Callout.”
At this news, fire hit his gut, as it always did when he got that particular callout. He didn’t know why, it made no sense, he barely knew the girl, but always when he heard it, it pissed him way the hell off.
“You are shittin’ me,” Shy bit out.
“No, brother. Got a call from Tug who got a call from Speck. She’s out on the prowl, as usual. She’s closer to you than me, so if you can disentangle yourself from the * you got passed out in your room, it’d be good you go get her.”
There it was. Hop knew Shy and his reputation.
“I’m on my bike. Text me the address,” Shy mumbled, shifting from under the bodies to put his feet on the floor at the side of the bed.
“Right. Under radar, yeah?” Hop returned, telling him something he knew, and Shy clenched his teeth.
Three years they’d been doing this shit with Tabby. Three f*cking years. It was lasting so damned long, he knew, unless she got a serious f*cking wakeup call, that girl would never learn.
But no one was willing to do it. The Club didn’t normally have any problems with laying it out no matter who it needed to be laid out for, but Tab was different. She was the nineteen-year-old daughter of the President of the Club, Kane “Tack” Allen.
That meant she was handled with care. That also meant when they got word she was out carousing and needed someone to nab her ass and get her home before she bought trouble, they did it under radar. In other words, they didn’t tell Tack. And they didn’t tell Tack because the first time it happened he lost his shit, but worse, his old lady took off to extricate Tabby from a bad situation and nearly got her head caved in with a baseball bat.
No one wanted a repeat of that kind of mess, so the brothers kept an eye on her and took care of business without getting Tack involved.
“Under radar,” Shy muttered then finished, “Later,” and touched the screen with his thumb.
He rooted around on the floor to find jeans, tee, underwear, and socks. The women in his bed didn’t twitch when he sat down next to them to pull on his boots.
Dressed, he turned off the light to his room and headed down the hall and into the common room of the Club’s compound. The brothers’ rooms were at the back, doors opening off a long hall that ran the length of the building. A doorway in the middle of the hall led to the common area, which had a long, curved bar and a mess of couches, chairs, tables, and pool tables. Off to the side through another door was their meeting room, a kitchen, and a set of locked, reinforced storage rooms.