“You can do better. Seriously.”
I flushed as soon as the words were out of my mouth. Being rattled so many times in a couple hours killed the brain-to-mouth-filter.
Brass looked me up and down. Then he laughed, filling the truck with his deep baritone. I couldn't help but smile.
“I'm laughing because it's fucking true. Not just with chicks, I mean. Trying to do better's the story of my fucking life since I left Montana. Better's all I got.” He paused, as if considering his words. “Thing I hate most about change is how it warps your vision. Some of the shit I see with a clear head, I'd strike down in a heartbeat if I really had a choice.”
“The stuff going on with your club?” I asked.
He nodded. “Just when I think we've reached our limit, some new asshole has to make a ruckus, painting everything darker. More bitter. I don't know what's gonna come outta fucking around with the cartel, but I don't want any part of it. Not if it means my own brothers are gonna keep acting like fucking jackals.”
My hands tightened on the wheel. He wouldn't take his eyes off me, tracing my curves. That heat was back, shades of nervous excitement I couldn't quite define, let alone handle.
He was so hard, so intense. No, handling him didn't come natural, but damn if I didn't want to try. This man might be the death of me, a fatal attraction I was destined to follow into the fire. Whether I'd meet heaven or hell there was anyone's guess, and for the first time since all this went down, I was ready to start taking bets.
“You...you never should've been swept up in this shit. I don't care what your father did,” he said. “We should've taken the money and let you go. If it wasn't so fucking hard convincing guys to do the right thing anymore, we wouldn't be stuck playing pretend. Fuck, babe, if there was a way I could've saved you and your sis without ever using the words 'old lady...'”
He closed his eyes and didn't finish. I had to keep my eyes fixed on the road, refusing to look over. Hearing him regret claiming me as his hurt.
It defied common sense, but it did, and it shook me to the core too. I leaned in my seat and pushed on, following the narrow streets through Redding toward our apartment. There was nothing left to say. Breathing another word would've only upset somebody, and we'd had enough heartache for one night.
I pulled into a parking space and got out, waiting for him to follow. The whole way upstairs and down the hall, I hoped like hell Jackie would be asleep. When I got inside, one more prayer was answered, and I was left alone to pad off to my room, alone with my fears and forbidden desires.
I woke up sometime before dawn and ran to the bathroom. It was still dark. The water I'd downed before I went to sleep helped kill the hunger pangs nipping at my stomach. I was too upset to eat earlier, worried I'd wake up with my stomach twisted in knots as I slid through my nightmares.
Brass was snoring lightly on the couch, a thin blanket thrown across him, his cut and jeans hanging on the chair next to him. I looked at the coffee table and saw his wallet. There was something else too, thick and shiny, even in the pre-dawn darkness...
I crept up, quiet as a cat, reaching out when I was close. It was the skinny switchblade he'd wrestled away from Serial. My thumb brushed the handle, running over the small bear claw pressed into the handle, one more cruel mark left by the Grizzlies MC.
My finger gently moved along the edge and pushed a small button. The sharp blade jumped out, dangerous as ever in the darkness.
I looked up, studying him in the shadows. He was huge, and right now...completely at my mercy.
The old, frightened, vengeful Missy Thomas inside me stomped her feet, begging me to end this right now. If I killed him here, nobody would ever know. Jackie and I could take off with his vehicle, find our way to Mexico or something.
But the way he'd gotten underneath my skin – God!
Killing him was the last thing I wanted. How could I spill his blood when he'd already given his for me? For Jackie?
He'd sliced into my soul, sure, but he'd ripped his own open and bled ten times more. I wanted to take the easy way. I wanted to be free. But I also wanted him, alive and well, and so much more. Primal greed grabbed me by the throat and forced me to look at him, a rugged manly mirror for all my feverish desires.
I wanted him on top of me, hot and throbbing, slamming me into the floor while he worked between my legs. I wanted to smell our sweat mingle when he was deep inside me, claiming me for real, shattering the game of pretend we'd been playing with insatiable lust and twitching flesh.