Frustration and happiness mingled in his eyes. I recognized the look, praying it would all be over as quickly as he hinted. It needed to be.
Tonight was going to be sheer hell keeping my hands off him while Jackie slept in the other bed.
VIII: Deals With Devils (Brass)
Sleep didn't come easy. It wasn't just club politics weighing heavy on my brain – it was having her pressed up against me in too damned small a room to do anything about it. No fucking way was I gonna make a move and subject the kid sister to hearing us fuck.
But god damn my dick ached. Bad. Felt like somebody reached in and filled my balls with lead, heavy and hot, anchoring me to the sheets. Anxious lust hissed through my veins all night. I don't think my hard-on relaxed a second, pressed snug against her ass, taunting me every time Missy twitched in her sleep.
She was obviously having some bullshit nightmares. At one point, I leaned over, kissed her brow, tender as I could without making my cock rage harder.
“It's gonna be okay, baby,” I whispered. “All this shit. I'll kill them all myself for dragging you girls into this. Then I'm gonna fuck your brains out, wipe away all the nasty memories with red hot sex. I'm no doctor, but I've got a cure, and I know how to deliver it too.”
She stirred, wriggling against me in her sleep. I had to shift my hips. Having my dick on her all night was bound to drive me absolutely nuts by dawn, if I didn't wake up balls deep inside her first.
Truth was, Missy ignited a lunatic inferno in my skull, my blood, and especially below my waist. I'd never told a woman I loved her before the drive up.
Before her, that was the sappiest, most alien shit I ever could've imagined. But having her around let cupid sneak up behind me and drive his arrow deep in my back, and I wasn't gonna pull it out for anything.
It was finally all as clear as a California day.
My life had two stages: before Missy Thomas and after her. The before was complete shit, betrayal and stupidity, my family going to pieces while I was too blasted outta my skull to do anything about it. Shit, I'd helped it along, hadn't I?
What was this after, this new run just waiting for me to follow its jagged path? Remained to be seen. But I swore I'd give it everything to make it the beginning of the rest of my life; a smooth, sweet ride that meshed seamlessly with the future I'd give the babe curled up next to me and her little sis.
I had to. Fucking up again was not an option.
The ride was long and hard the next day. Woke up with a nasty bruise on one cheek, plus a few kinks in my shoulders and ribs from all the places those fuck faces hit me at the warehouse.
We all ate a quick breakfast in the hotel, checked out, and then we were on our way, second leg of the two day trip to Missoula. It all hinged on time, getting our ducks in a row back in Redding before Fang had too many of his own to snuff us out. The rest hinged on those Devil assholes cooperating.
Thinking about that shit made me want to rip everything apart. Having Shelly as his wife – or Saffron as he called her, my sis' old stripper name – was the only fucking reason Blaze agreed to talk to me at all. And I still didn't know how I was really gonna sit down with those assholes without punching their teeth out.
I'd barely kept it together during their wedding in Reno. Two Prairie Pussies, Stinger and Tank, nearly beat me to a bloody pulp the minute they saw me. Thank fuck their old ladies were there to talk sense to 'em.
We spent the next night in Coeur d'Alene. I got us all some grub at a sit down restaurant. It was strange to eat in public without my cut on over the tight gray shirt, but the Idaho panhandle was Grizzlies MC territory, and I damned well had to keep a low profile. There was no telling what the charters would do as news about the power struggle in Redding spread.
More than a few Prezes out there had axes to grind with Fang, and there was never a better opportunity. But the bastard also put plenty of loyal thugs in place over the years, far and wide, including * fuckers who'd stay with him 'til the bitter end while the cartel had them scared shitless.
Dinner was good. The girls both seemed happier. They chatted and smiled, a welcome thaw in the tension I'd seen between them yesterday. Missy told me about her accounting shit while little Jackie rolled her eyes in boredom. Promised right then she'd be going back to school – shit, both of them – as soon as we were clear and free.
“Brass? This is it?” Jackie wrinkled her nose when we pulled up to the only hotel with vacancies.