Claiming Crusher: Savage Brothers MC (17 page)

“Fair enough,” he says and the phone goes dead. Guess Dragon ain’t one for goodbyes.

I hang up and take a deep breath. I’m feeling at loose ends. Paul had work tonight. He’s a bartender at a local club. Ray is working there too, as he does every night. He’s the bouncer. He’s also convinced I should go there tonight. I’m not. He’ll probably win though, because I have no desire to sit home alone.

“You about ready, Kitten?”

I look up to find Ray standing in the door way. He’s literally gorgeous. He’s got eyes so blue you’d swear the sun was behind them making them shine. This perfect angular face that shows off his five o’clock shadow perfectly. His body shows that there is a reason he is a fitness trainer. His arms are muscles galore, abs that make women and men drool, and finally there’s his laid back, don’t fuck with me, but I’m the guy next door attitude. Ray has it all, including a heart that is so giving I think he must be from another planet, because they just don’t make people like that here on Earth.

“I really don’t think this is a good idea.”

“That’s your problem, you think too much,” Ray says looking like a giant kid.

I shake my head and pull myself off the bed. I’m ready as I’ll ever be. When I make it to my bedroom door, Paul pulls me into his arms and holds me close and kisses the top of my head. I’m not exactly short, but Paul towers over me. It doesn’t intimidate me though, I feel…safe. The only other time I’ve felt that way in my life has been with Zander, and doesn’t that just suck.

An hour later I’m standing by an old cement column in the corner of a busy bar, listening to music and watching the dancers. It’s not my cup of tea. Some man is whaling on a juke box about a woman’s sundress and how he’s going through withdrawals over her. I refuse to think of Zander. This is probably why I never listen to country music. It’s damn depressing. I’m still nursing the same rum and coke that Paul sent over when we got here an hour ago. I don’t really drink a lot these days. I’ve learned that drinking might numb me, but in the long run it makes the nightmares worse.

“Seems like I’m always chasing you, Hell Cat. One of these days, I may just get tired of that.”

My body freezes. My heart races. It’s been a month, why now? More importantly, how? I don’t ask. I still my reaction, as best I can. I don’t need to show him any weakness.

“No one asked you to, Crusher. I think you just can’t take a hint.”

“I can baby, I absolutely can.”

“Then why are you here?”

“I missed you,” he says and it’s said in a quiet voice, but there’s…feeling in it.

“I doubt that. I’m sure you and Gun found a new play toy before I even crossed the state line,” I say bitterly, because I am bitter.

“I was a fucking ass.”

I still haven’t turned around to talk to him. I’m afraid. I kind of hate him for that too.

“You won’t hear an argument from me,” I respond, taking a drink. Zander’s arm comes around and takes the glass away from me. I still can’t turn around to see what he’s doing.

I think I’m frozen, afraid to move. If I do, will he really be there? If I do, will I see the truth in his eyes, that I was just a lay and I was right…I meant nothing to him?

“Hellcat, we need to fix this, I’ve missed you and I think you’ve missed me too.”

“We barely had any time together, and we were just fuck-buddies.”

“I think it was more than that.”

“No, it really wasn’t, Cowboy. I’m not even sure why you made the trip.” Or how you found out where I am.

“Because your lips might be saying no, but your body is saying something completely different.”

“I think you’re delusional, Zander.”

My heart is beating hard against my chest. It should freak me out that Zander is here—that he found me. I know Nic would have never told him. We agreed a long time ago to never tell anyone where Ray lived. So, I should be worried about being tracked here, instead I feel this small ball of hope inside because Zander came to find me. He moves closer to me and I feel like I don’t have any control of my body when he gets this close. I do my best to calm my heart. I don’t want to betray what his closeness really does to me. It’s not easy. Especially when his body pushes against my ass and I can feel his hard erection brush against me. A minute later the heat of his breath fans my bare shoulders.

His hands loosely hold my hips, while I try to look out over the crowd in the bar and find Paul or Ray. Someone to save me, because I know if Zander is involved I can’t save myself. I feel the tips of his thumbs at the top of my blue jeans, brushing the skin exposed between it and where my tank top begins. My brain is screaming danger, because that’s what Zander is. He is danger with a capital ‘D.’

“That right there is what I mean. When those thick, beautiful, fucking lips of yours say my name, all I can think about is you whispering it against my cock, right before I grab your hair, plunge inside and fuck your mouth like it’s meant to be fucked.”

His words flow down my spine and they lodge deep. If I close my eyes, I can see him doing that same thing and me…the woman who has hated sex…suddenly craves being weak with a man. What the fuck is he doing to me? Can he hear how my breath catches and becomes ragged? Shit is he looking over my shoulder and noticing how hard my nipples are right now?

“You have a strange fascination with my mouth,” I tried to make that sound bored. I failed.

My body feels like it’s on the edge of a cliff and I’m scared to death of what will happen if I jump. Zander is not safe. I can’t control Zander. No longer than we were together, when he said those things at the club…he hurt me. He hurt me deeper than anyone had—not physically, but emotionally and with my past that’s an accomplishment. I’ve made so many bad decisions, what happens if he’s just another one? I’m leaving to go back to Kentucky soon. Would it be stupid to give in? Wouldn’t it be wiser to keep my distance? I’ve never wanted a man before Zander. Never. What happens if I pretend just once like I’m a normal woman without a fucked up head, without a past that is going to get me killed someday? What happens if I give in and pretend?

“Hellcat, you have no idea, but I could show you, baby. I could show you a hundred different ways and I’d make damn sure you enjoy every…fucking…one,” he says drawing my attention back to our conversation.

His last three words are paused and hoarse sounding. They are timed and in tune to the way his hand comes around and nudges my chin, so I look over my shoulder at him. He finishes his reply against my mouth and I open for his kiss without thought.

I drink in his taste. God, I’ve missed him.

Crusher

I
t has taken
a month of scoping out Nicole’s cell phone, and following leads from the greyhound station to find Dani. The bitch knows how to hide her tracks. The surveillance videos at the bus stop don’t even look like her. She hides her hair under a hat, she wears big, loose clothing and she never, not once, looks at a security camera. It’s like she instinctively knows where they are. That says a lot and what it says doesn’t make me happy. My woman has some deep, dark shit to tell me about and we’ll get there. Right now, I’m too overwhelmed with finally having her in my arms. I had almost given up hope it would happen. I thought it was over when I didn’t hear from her after that first week she left. The silence was deafening. Still, I couldn’t fully give up and now I’m here with her.

It’s been so long since I’ve had her in my arms, so long since I could take in her scent, touch her, breathe her in and just hold her. I can’t let her get away from me again. She turns completely in my arms, our lips never fully breaking apart. Then, my arms are full of her, my mouth is full of her tongue, my hands are full of her ass, and I use that to pull her hard against me—so tight even air can’t get between us. God, I’ve missed her.

Eventually, we’re forced to break apart to give our lungs oxygen. We pull away from each other’s lips slowly. That’s when I get it. Those eyes. The eyes that have haunted me the last few weeks, look up at me. They’re dark, intense and liquid with emotion. I need this woman. I need that look on her face every fucking day.

“I’ve missed you, Hellcat,” I tell her before I can stop myself. Her forehead crinkles and I know she’s thinking about what she should say or do to stop this. It won’t work. There’s no stopping this and no matter what she says, I can tell she wants this as much as I do. I press my lips against the crease on her brow and just continue holding her.

“What you did was wrong.”

I don’t argue…I can’t argue.

“I am not a Twinkie! I won’t be shared with your crew, Zander. I won’t be talked about with your crew.”

“I was a drunken, fucked-up, fool, Hellcat. I didn’t mean the shit my mouth was spewing. It won’t happen again.”

“I don’t think we should happen, I mean it was only supposed to be for sex anyway and…”

I imprison her chin in my hands and pull enough until she looks up at me.

“I. Was. A. Fool. Gunner said something that pissed my whiskey-soaked brain off and I said shit without even meaning it. I don’t think of you like that, Dani. I told you, you are mine. Mine, Hellcat and I sure as fuck ain’t sharing you with no-fucking body.” I lay it bare. I owe her this. I just hope I get through to her. When she doesn’t respond I say again, “You’re mine, Hellcat.”

“And who are you exactly?” A man asks from behind Dani. I look up at him and take him in. Overgrown muscles, a too pretty face and much too cocky. He needs to step back from my woman immediately. I move my hand up to Dani’s side and pull her into my side and facing the asshole. He’s not getting near her.

“What’s it to you?” I ask, ready to take him down.

“Zander…”

“I asked you a question, pretty boy. Is there some reason you’re interrupting me and my girl?”

“Your girl?”

“Ra…” I squeeze Dani, before she can say anything. I got this. The sooner I take care of him the sooner I get her and hell I need to get her, and soon.

“That’s right. My girl.”

“Weird she hasn’t mentioned you in the month she’s been living with me.”

Heat hits me and anger fills my body. What the fuck? What the ever-loving fuck? She left me and moved in with some Arnold Schwarzenegger wanna-be, with a pretty face. I look at Dani and she’s staring at the other guy and she looks like she could spit fire at him, so I relax, marginally.

“You’re not helping, Ray,” she says, and I sneer. Ray, pussy-ass sounding name.

“Not trying to help Kitten, just wondering why you’re making out with some man in the middle of the bar.”

Kitten? Fuck that shit, right there.

“Who the hell is this Ray, Hellcat and explain fast before I end his ass right here.”

‘Ray’ looks away from Dani and back to me. He takes me in and that’s fine. I want him to, because I’m about to beat his ass down. He needs to see the motherfucker that is about to make him bloody.

“Jesus, you said Nicole got mixed up and attached herself to a biker Kitten, you didn’t say you had done the same thing.”

Hand to God, if this motherfucker doesn’t stop calling my woman Kitten I’m going to make sure he doesn’t have a voice to use. That way he won’t be able to say anything ever again. That’s probably the thing to do really because his voice is annoying as hell.

“I’m not mixed up with a biker, Zander and I are…”

“Fucking like rabbits,” I interject before she can say anything that might piss me off even a tenth more than I already am.

She lands a hard elbow into my side and I grunt, pulling away to rub the spot her blow landed.

“What the fuck is that for?”

“Because you’re pissing me off!” She says.

“Well join the fucking crowd. It doesn’t quite fill me with rainbows and little pink ponies to find out my woman has been living with another man.”

“I haven’t been…little pink ponies?” She stops mid-sentence to ask, looking exasperated, and sexy as hell.

“Yeah those damn…”

“I know what they are, I’m just…I have no words.”

“So this is the guy you’ve been mooning over for the last month?” I look up to see yet another pretty boy standing in front of us, although this one has way-less muscles and is shorter—more Dani’s size than me or the terminator-wanna-be.

“Jesus, Nic told me you were living with two men, I guess I should have listened,” I grumble taking my hand away from her and raking it over my face and then massaging the tension in my neck. How the fuck do I handle this? I need to take her ass back home and tan her hide. Hell, maybe I should lock her in my room until the only cock she can ever think about is mine. That idea definitely has merit. I look up when I hear a table being scooted beside us. Hellcat has another bottle in her hand and she’s aiming it at my head. Arnold has his arms around her and is pulling her away from me. Now, I should be grateful, but I kind of want to rip his arms off his body and beat him to death with them.

“What the hell you coming after me for? You’re the one sleeping with two men! After you yanked my cock out in the middle my club, woke Junior up to play and then poured an expensive bottle of Jack on it and leaving my heart broken.” Okay, by this time I’m poking her like she was an angry bear more than anything else. It’s fucking fun to watch her and I’m a sadistic S.O.B.

The twins, and I mean that in the form of the bad Arnold and Danny Devito movie from way back when, freeze and look at me like I have three heads and then back at Dani (who tries to fly at me again), and then they do the strangest thing. The tall dude kisses Dani on top of the head and whispers something in her ear. The smaller one, hugs her and then they look at me. I expected shit to be thrown so I could finally beat them down. Instead I get an invitation.

“Come on up to the bar and we’ll get you a drink on the house,” the smaller one says.

I turn to look at Dani, trying to figure out what her mood is, and where her head is at when she just shrugs and walks towards the bar. I look at her buddies and they basically do the same, except Arnold slaps me hard, a little too hard, on the back and we follow her. At least I’m not the only one chasing after her, but I am going to make sure I’m the only son of a bitch who catches her. Ever.