The Broken Pieces of Us (The Devil's Dust #2.1)

“You got it, babe,” Bull comforts, grabbing my hand and helping me in. I pull myself into the swaying contraption and quickly sit down, gripping the side. It smells of lemon and dirty feet. Bull sits next to me, resting his arm along the back of me.

“Enjoy,” the carnie mutters, slamming the door to the cart. The ride begins, making us move upward. My stomach fluttering with nerves, I squeal and close my eyes.

“You going to close your eyes the whole time?” Bull laughs.

I nod. “That’s the plan,” I whisper, scared to death.

I feel the cart stop, making my heart stop briefly.

“Why have we stopped?” I question, my eyes closed so tightly I see white spots.

“Open your eyes,” Bull requests, his voice smooth and softly.

“No,” I reply, shaking my head stubbornly.

I feel his rough fingers gently grab both sides of my face. “Open those eyes, Babs,” Bull says sweetly. I slowly open my eyes and see his emerald ones staring back at me. His thumb brushes over my bottom lip gently, causing it to tingle. He leans his face down and stops a breath away. His eyes look from my lips to my eyes, silently asking me if it’s okay. I lean forward, closing the gap between us, and press my lips to his. His lips part mine as he slightly sucks my bottom lip into his mouth, kissing me. He rubs his thumb across my lip as he pulls away, looking over my shoulder. I pull my gaze from his mouth and look at the scene below. My stomach feels dizzy and my heart is thudding against my chest. I just kissed Bull, the president of the Devil’s Dust. It’s wrong on so many levels, yet it felt amazing.

After the Ferris wheel, Bull holds up to his promise and gets me a funnel cake. The sugary goodness is so good and gooey; we both devour it quickly, laughing at what we think some angry couple is saying to each other.

“Let’s get you back before someone starts wondering where you are, darlin’,” Bull states, throwing our empty plate in the trash. If Locks knew where we were and who I was with, he would have a heart attack. Is that such a bad thing?



I walk into the club after having a cigarette, giving Babs enough time to go ahead of me, not wanting anyone to come to any assumptions about Babs and me. I can’t believe I fucking kissed her. I don’t know what was going through my damn head when I did that. But seeing her all scared and shit, it was cute as hell. I can’t help but want to touch her. I want her more than I have wanted anything in a long time. Babs is different when she is not under Locks’ eye. I don’t get why he won’t cut her loose. She told me what he said, told me he won’t let her go. Sadly, club law is, she is his till he says so. I’ve never followed those rules myself. If a woman doesn’t want to be around my ass, I don’t want to be around her, surely.

My phone buzzes from my pocket.

“What?” I answer.

“Need a favor.”

“And this is?” I ask, I hate how they all assume I know who the hell is calling.

“Trigger,” he announces. The Ghost motorcycle club. Their club and ours have an ‘I’ll scratch your back, you scratch mine’ clause. Seems we are always bargaining with each other.

“I need a favor,” he pauses.

“Okay,” I answer, waiting for him to continue.

“Seems I’ve been bent. Someone came into one of my locations, clipped my candy man, and took my candy,” Trigger continues, speaking in code. If I’m understanding him right, someone stole from him, killed one of his men, and took his shit. I hate trying to interpret code, but you never know who is listening.

“I see. Give me the location and I’ll check out the sweets,” I answer.

After he gives me the address, I go and bang on all the doors down the hall, waking everyone up. I walk back up to the front where Babs is wiping down the counter, back to working as Shadow and Bobby sit on a couple stools, trying to wake up.

“Take the day off, Babs,” I demand. Her body stiffens from my tone, my friendliness gone now that I’m in president mode. I furrow my brows I hate talking to her like that, but I would talk like that to any other female in the wind of club business. Besides, she needs to take some time off, relax.

She nods and heads to the kitchen.

“What’s up?” Shadow asks, shrugging on his cut.

“Trigger needs us to deal with someone who stole his shit. We need to go to this place and see if it’s being held there,” I answer, handing him the slip of paper that I wrote the address on. Bobby peeks over Shadow’s shoulder and eyes the paper.

“I know where that is,” Bobby adds, snatching the paper from Shadow.

“Good, let’s go,” I say.

I let Bobby lead the way, Shadow behind me, Locks and Old Guy beside me. Old Guy is a patched in brother, has been for a while now. He’s a brute, and can be too much for the ladies to handle at times, but he’s loyal. Bobby leads us to some abandoned docks and stops just short of them when we see a few bikes parked outside of what looks like a large shed.

“This is it,” Bobby informs, looking at the shitty place.