I hadn't forgotten all the business I had with this girl, or the promise I'd made to her. She'd pay up and go home. We'd find a way to deal with the Deads and keep our club safe. But damn if I'd let that sick motherfucker slink away into the night, only to set up shop and do this to some other girl who never asked to be pulled into violence and slavery.
I'd end him one day. I'd do it with pleasure. I'd let Meg know when I did too, if only to give her closure so she could live the rest of her days without worrying about seeing his evil ass ever again.
“Take the bed tonight,” I told her. “I'll crash on the floor.”
She sat up and watched me flop down with a pillow and a thin sheet. Shit was hard as concrete, really, but I didn't give a shit.
There wasn't much to my bed. Still better than the crappy cot she'd slept on forever in that whorehouse.
I closed my eyes for about a full minute before I heard her voice. I looked up, and she was staring over the bed at me, straight down with her gem blue eyes.
“There's enough room for both of us, Skin, if you'll behave yourself. I'm okay with us sharing. It's a cold night.”
I grunted, mulling it over for a second. The raw need roaring through my cock threatened to strangle the gentleman inside me. Fine, whatever. I popped up and rolled into bed next to her, promising myself I'd keep my hands to myself.
She switched out the lamp a second later and pulled the sheets tight. I laid awake for a long time, thinking about how this whole twisted situation would blow over. We'd get the reward for the club, the day all this shit would finally be wrapped up by dropping her off at her parents' door.
I thought about the hundred ways I'd like to slaughter Ricky the pimp again. I thought about how I'd fight to keep this club intact and protect every last brother wearing my patch, how we'd butcher the Deads or anybody else who fucked with us.
I thought about anything and everything that didn't involve me throwing the covers off Meg, tearing her panties off, and sinking my cock deep inside the hot, warm hole I wanted to fill with every fiber of my being.
All the dirty, bloody thoughts in the dark ended when she rolled toward me. I felt her heat, her sweet young body, pressed into me as naturally as a kitten curling up to its mother. The soft whimper leaving her lips told me she was asleep, doing it unconsciously.
Fuck it. I couldn't lay there a second longer without feeling her.
I threw an arm around her waist and pulled her tight, silencing the lust in my blood. She craved comfort, and I'd give it to her, if only for tonight.
There was something strangely peaceful about having this chick huddled in my arms. Didn't change the fact it was confusing as shit. I hadn't even fucked her, and we were spooning like lovers – something I never did with the whores I bedded.
What the fuck?
I was still thinking about how ironic life could be when the sandman finally caught up to me and dropped the five ton hammer on my head.
The next day, everyone was frustrated. Both the prospects ran into trouble with their bikes in the morning, and half our crew spent the entire day fixing them up.
When I came in to clean up, streaked in grease and oil, I found her in my room, a notepad and pen in her hand. She'd barely opened her eyes and muttered a few words this morning. I'd left her the paper and told her to start working on a plan that would get her parents' attention, without getting our club busted by any boys with badges.
“Didn't know you were into mud running,” she said with a smirk, as soon as our eyes locked.
I gave her a stare. “You've still got your sense of humor. That's good. What else have you got?”
I walked over and ripped the notepad outta her hands. She yelped protest, but I ignored her as I flipped the pages, staring at a few lines of neat cursive scrawled several pages in.
It looked like the start of an outline, a bunch of question marks – never a good sign.
“Skin, give it back! I promise I'll read you everything. I'm having a hard time...”
“Yeah, no shit,” I said, my eyes scanning what she'd written. “Letter to the press...anonymous call from a truck stop...dropping you at the Knoxville police in nothing but a sheet and a note stuck to your back.”
I looked up as she grinned uncertainly. “Come on, baby. You're a smart girl. I know you can do better than this. What else have you got?”
“That's it,” she said, blushing.
Bullshit. The way she jumped up from the bed and started tearing at my hands when I flipped a few more pages said otherwise. I pushed her away easily and turned my back, only stopping when I flipped another page and saw my own face staring back in dark ink.
Shit. It was good for an amateur. She'd done me realistic, capturing my intense eyes and all the little details on my mug in all its glory. She'd even gotten the scar going down my cheek, the long gray line I'd taken in a knife fight several years ago with another drunken punk one fine night.
“Fuck me. What the hell is this?” I spun around, confronting her.