King Cobra (Diamondbacks Motorcycle Club Book 3) (3 page)

CHAPTER FOUR

Lind’s head was still reeling as he sped through the congested L.A. traffic on his beloved Harley. He had left the car at the Diamondbacks’ headquarters; the bike was faster, and after what he had just learned, he needed to get to Eve’s as fast as possible.

***

“There’s reason to believe that the attack at the Cobra, while aimed at Alec, was meant to hurt someone else.”

The Diamondbacks had all looked at Lucas, the youngest and most promising member of their club, in confusion.

“What are you talking about?” Phil, one of the oldest members, had asked.

“And how would you know?” echoed Freddie.

Lucas hesitated. His hazel eyes settled briefly on Lind before he nervously looked away, but even that short stare was enough to make the hairs on Lind’s arms stand up.

“This came in the mail today,” Lucas said, pulling an envelope out of the inside pocket of his leather vest. “There was no name on it, so I opened it.”

It was a brown, plain envelope with nothing written on it, just the MC’s address. Lucas slid it across the table towards Lind, who took it with a sense of foreboding growing in the pit of his stomach. He looked briefly at the kid before he, too, took the single piece of paper out. Unsurprisingly, the note addressed him directly.

‘Viper,

This isn’t over. You may have eliminated the menace of the cobra, but I have many more serpents in my basket. I will destroy you and all you love. I will destroy the club. I will destroy your love. Once everything you’ve ever known and loved has been burned down, I will kill you.

This isn’t over. You can’t sleep easy yet.

Love,

D.’

Lind had to re-read the words quite a few times, in order to make sense of it all. In order to accept that this was real. And once the reality of it finally sank in, he experience a red-hot wave of rage as he had not experienced in a while. It almost blinded him.

“What is it?” Alec asked.

His friend’s voice brought him back to the here and now. Wordlessly, Lind handed the note over to him. He watched as Alec’s gray eyes flashed in anger and his jaw twitched. Equally silent, the President of the Diamondbacks handed the note over to the man sitting next to him. It was passed around the table until everyone had read it, and once everyone was up to speed a stunned silence fell onto the room.

“Are we sure it’s him?” Victor ventured weakly. “Maybe it’s a prank.”

Lind silenced him with one glare. This was no prank. This was far too real.

“What do we do now?” Freddie asked.

“We find that son of a bitch,” Alec said. “And we kill him, like we should have done a long time ago.”

“
I’ll
kill him,” Lind corrected, his voice low and growly and dripping with hot fury. “No one else lays a hand on the bastard but me.”

Alec nodded gravely. “Understood.”

***

Lind feared that Eve would not understand. After all, he could hardly wrap his mind around it himself. He just couldn’t believe this was happening. Then again, he should have known. He should have known this was going to come back and bite him in the ass one day. He had known that this day would come eventually, but he always supposed Doug’s revenge would harm him and him alone. And he certainly never imagined he would have a woman to protect when the time came.

Lind clenched his jaw in anger and self-deprecation as he rode on, and he curled his fists a little tighter around the bike’s handles. He had been stupid. He had let down his guard. Before Eve, he would have been looking out for something like this. Eve was a blessing, but he realized now that she also made him slip.

Never again
, he promised himself.

From now on, he was going to be as sharp as he had ever been. His life—and more importantly, Eve’s—depended on it.

Lind parked his Harley in the street in front of Eve’s fancy apartment building. All thoughts about the canceled dinner and her suppressed anger towards the club were forgotten as he all but rushed inside.

Henry, the doorman, greeted him cheerfully. Lind barely responded and made a beeline for the elevator. Horrible scenarios of finding Eve in a puddle of her own blood flashed through his head, so much so that he had to take a few deep breaths once the elevator doors closed behind him and hid him from the doorman’s sight. He tried to convince himself that she would be fine. He told himself that the threat had just come in, and there was no way Doug was going to act so fast; he would let Lind marinate in his fear first.

The elevator ride was the longest Lind could remember, and once he finally reached the right floor he was out of the door like a bullet before the doors could even open completely.

He knocked—or, if he were honest, pounded—on the door and waited impatiently, and when Eve wasn’t at the door two seconds later, he knocked again. And again.

“I’m coming!” he finally heard her scream from inside. “Hold your horses!”

He wondered if she knew it was him or if she would just yell out at a stranger. If he knew anything about women’s anger—and unfortunately he did—it was probably a little of both.

The door finally opened, and Eve stood there wearing sweatpants and a tank top, glaring murderously at him.

“Were you trying to kick down my door?”

“Are you okay?” Lind blurted out before he could stop himself. It was a stupid question, of course, but one he felt entitled to ask given the circumstances.

“If you must know, I’m pissed off,” Eve said.

Lind almost laughed in relief, but he was pretty sure she wouldn’t take that well. “We can talk about that later,” he said, the fleeting moment of alleviated tension already gone and forgotten. “We have more pressing matters to discuss now.”

Eve arched a blonde eyebrow. “Such as?”

“Just let me in,” he almost growled, shoving her aside and striding inside. “Close the door,” he ordered, turning around to face her.

Eve was so taken aback by his behavior that she did as he asked without protesting. “What’s going on?” she asked, as she walked them both to the living room.

She sat on the white faux-leather couch, but Lind was too agitated to sit down next to her.

“I can’t go into details,” he said, “but I need you to come with me to the club’s headquarters. You’ll stay there for a while, it’s a lot safer than here.”

Eve groaned. “Please, Lind, not again. What is it this time?”

Lind hesitated. “I can’t tell you.”

Her brown eyes flashed in anger. “So, I’m just supposed to follow you without knowing anything about what’s happening?”

“You’re supposed to trust me,” he corrected.

Eve sighed. “I trust you,” she said, but she didn’t look very convinced herself. “But I can’t just uproot myself every time you think I may be in danger—”

“I don’t think you may be in danger,” Lind cut her off forcefully, “I
know
you are.”

“Fine,” Eve said after a moment. “But until you tell me what the danger is, I’m not going anywhere.”

Lind suppressed the wave of anger that came over him. She was driving him nuts. Could she not see the urgency written all over his face?

“I’m not going to involve you—”

“Sounds to me like I’m involved enough,” Eve cut him off.

“It’s not about you.”

“Then, why are you asking me to leave my house?”

Lind exhaled in frustration. “Someone’s after me,” he said, finally conceding to revealing some part of the truth.

“Who?”

“
That
really doesn’t concern you,” Lind dismissed. “They have reached out to let me know they’ll be going after the people I care about, so I need you to
please
come with me where I can protect you.”

Eve was silent for a few moments. She seemed to be letting the words sink in and weighing her options. When she finally spoke again, it was nothing Lind would have expected.

“No,” she said.

Lind blinked. “Excuse me?”

“I said, no,” Eve repeated, more forcefully. “I’m not going back to your club’s headquarters so that you and your friends can guard me like I’m in some sort of witness program. No.”

Lind took a steadying breath. “Eve,” he said, with a calmness he did not feel, “I have to hunt this bastard down and get rid of him before he gets rid of me. That means I can’t be here watching you 24/7. I need you to be in a place where there are people who can keep an eye on you.”

Eve looked unimpressed. “I’ll be fine on my own, thank you.”

“No, you won’t—”

“Listen, this is not negotiable,” she interrupted, anger creeping back in her voice. “I’m not the one who chose to be in a gang, and I’ll be damned if I’ll alter my lifestyle because of
your
choices.” She stood, her whole frame taut with tension. “I’m not leaving my house.”

Lind stared at her. He forced himself to dismiss the impact her words had on him; now was not the time to be sensitive. “Then I’ll send someone to be with you at all times.”

Eve snorted. “No, thanks.”

“
That
’s not negotiable.”

They stood unmoving in Eve’s living room, staring at each other with defiance in their eyes. It was a battle of wills, and neither of them was going to back down.

“Fine,” Eve finally said, giving in to at least this one request. “Send whoever. Also, get me a gun.”

Lind stared at her in surprise. “What?”

“You heard me,” Eve said. “I want to be able to protect myself.”

“From the one who’s after you or from the one I’m sending to protect you?” Lind didn’t know what prompted him to ask that question, but as he uttered the words he knew it was a legitimate doubt to have. Eve had begun to show her feelings towards the MC, and they didn’t seem to be amicable ones.

“Both,” Eve admitted readily.

Lind did his best to hide his shock. It was one thing to suspect something; it was another matter entirely to have those suspicions confirmed.

“Do you really think I would send you someone untrustworthy?”

“No,” Eve said. “But they’re worthy of
your
trust, not mine. I don’t know these people.”

“Isn’t it enough that I know them?”

Eve stared at him straight in the eye. “No.”

Lind shook his head, but he decided not to argue the point any further. If a gun was going to make her agree to have a bodyguard, so be it. “Fine,” he said. “I’ll get you a gun. Do you even know how to use it?”

“I’ll learn.”

Lind stared at her. “You’re a maddening, maddening woman, you know that?”

For the first time that evening, Eve smiled. “Honey, you have no idea.”

CHAPTER FIVE

Eve slept fitfully that night. She kept tossing and turning, and whatever sleep came her way was a very light kind of sleep, the kind that brings about no rest and many nightmares. Her head was filled with visions of everything that she had been through since she had come in contact with the Diamondbacks—from being held in an abandoned warehouse, to watching Jessica die, to almost losing her legs to a baseball bat swung by a crazy man. She didn’t normally allow herself to think about any of that during the day, but the nighttime was a different matter, one that she had no control over.

Finally, after waking up from yet another confused nightmare, she gave up. It was 5:17 in the morning, and she figured it was a good enough hour to get up and get herself a much-needed cup of coffee.

She padded quietly to the kitchen, stopping briefly in the living room on her way. Lind was asleep on the white couch, and Eve took a few moments to look at him. He seemed so unguarded when he slept…it was hard to imagine that he was the same man who had ordered her around a few hours ago. Well, he had
tried
to order her around, but Eve was not going to have any of that.

Feeling the anger from the evening resurfacing, Eve left the living room and completed her brief journey to the kitchen. She closed the door behind her so as not to wake Lind—more out of a lack of want to talk to him rather than out of consideration for his sleep. Eventually, she opted for black tea rather than coffee—she figured she was irritable enough—and she sat down at the table to nurse the steaming mug.

She went over everything one more time in her head. The evening surely had not worked out like she had planned. She had been looking forward to a quiet dinner with Lind, followed by one of their binge movie watching nights, and maybe (why not?) a reprise of the breathtaking sex they had in the morning. Instead, she had ended up eating her delicious roast alone while he ran to his precious MC.

Eve wasn’t sure when she had begun to resent the Diamondbacks exactly. She wasn’t sure about the process that had led her to blame them for pretty much anything that went wrong between her and Lind. The more time passed, the more she came to realize that no matter how involved Lind would become in their relationship, the club would always come first. No matter what, Eve would always come second. No matter what, if it ever had to choose between her and the club, Eve had no doubt that he would choose the club.

She had not minded his devotion to them—at first. It was clear that they were the only family Lind knew, and she figured there was nothing wrong with being devoted to one’s family. But lately, she had begun to notice that his devotion to the club actually bordered on the obsessive. He was always ready to go to them at a moment’s notice, and Alec just had to snap his fingers and Lind would come running. It drove Eve mad.

One thing she was painfully aware of was that Lind regularly went out of his way to keep her out of anything even remotely connected with the club’s business. There had been a few operations over the five months that they had been together, but Eve had never known what those were. She didn’t know what Lind did when he rode off on the back of his Harley and kissed her goodbye in a way that let her know she might not see him again.

He didn’t seem to realize that not knowing was worse. Not knowing had Eve’s imagination work overtime, and she had come up with the worst possible kinds of scenarios. Not knowing had Eve imagining that Lind was doing unspeakable things, things that she didn’t even want to take into consideration. Just knowing for a fact that he had killed people was enough to not make her sleep at night if she only allowed herself to stop and think about it.

This
particular not knowing was worse than any that she had experienced before.
This
particular not knowing involved her personally, and it made her furious that Lind couldn’t be bothered to share any information with her. Who was after them? Why?

Eve curled her fingers a little tighter around the steaming mug and let the warmth seep into her. She wasn’t stupid. She knew that a personal revenge was ten times worse than any club rivalry. Personal revenge meant that the person would not stop in front of anything or anyone. It meant they would pursue it ruthlessly and relentlessly, and that unless Lind really got to them before they got to him, Eve was as good as dead, no matter how many men Lind put outside her door and inside her apartment.

Try as she might, she couldn’t bring herself to be as terrified as she felt she should be. She was oddly lucid about the whole thing, and what was really killing her about the whole affair was that she didn’t have the information she felt she needed to protect herself. Lind was treating her like some helpless girl who wasn’t smart enough to be involved in her own protecting. It made Eve’s blood boil.

One thing was certain, however: she was
not
going to go back to the Diamondbacks’ headquarters. She was
not
going to live like a recluse until this—whatever
this
was—was taken care of.

The kitchen’s door opened then, and Lind walked in. He looked fully alert, like he had not been sleeping soundly only a couple of minutes ago.

“I hope that’s coffee,” he said, giving her a weak smile that told her he was testing the waters.

Eve was in no mood for tests. “It’s tea,” she said curtly. “You can make coffee for yourself if you’d like, you know where everything is.”

Lind nodded and set about to do just that. They remained silent while the coffee brewed, and that silence stretched on until Lind was seated across from her at the kitchen table, nursing a steaming mug.

He took a hearty sip and sighed in contentment. “Did you get any sleep?” he asked her after a few more silent minutes had trickled by.

Eve shrugged. “Some.”

“I know it’s scary—”

“I’m not scared.”

“Oh?”

He seemed surprise, and that fact alone sent a new wave of anger down Eve’s spine.

“I can’t be scared if I don’t know what’s going on,” she said.

Lind sighed. “Isn’t knowing that someone’s after you enough?”

“No,” Eve said. “It’s not.”

Lind set down his mug and captured her gaze, holding it in place with his impossibly blue eyes. “I told you, Eve,” he said, quietly but firmly, “you need to trust me.”

“I do,” she said, and she meant it. “And
you
need to trust
me
.”

He seemed genuinely confused. “I trust you.”

“It doesn’t feel like it.”

Lind frowned. “What do you mean?”

Eve stared at him. He wasn’t faking it. He really didn’t get it. How could he not? How did he not realize that his constant keeping her in the dark was most certainly
not
a sign of trust, no matter his reasons?

“Whatever you’ve done to prompt this person to come after you and everyone around you
is
your business, I guess,” she conceded. “But whatever he might do to put his revenge into action is
my
business. I’m the one who’s being threatened. I deserve to know how, and by whom.”

Lind stared at her. He was clearly considering what she had just said, but when he spoke again, he didn’t give her any satisfaction. “I guess that makes sense,” he said. “But I still think it’s best if you know less about it.”

“Why?” Eve exploded in frustration. “Why is that best?”

“Because you may leave me if you knew!” Lind finally snapped. “And you just can’t leave until I know you’re safe!”

Eve blinked, taken aback by his outburst. “Do you really think I didn’t know what I was signing up for when I started this thing with you?” she said. “I know you’re no saint, Lind. But guess what, saints don’t interest me.”

Lind shook his head. It was like he hadn’t even heard her. “There’s a big difference between having a general knowledge that my hands aren’t exactly clean and getting the details.”

“I still wouldn’t leave,” Eve insisted.

“Maybe,” Lind conceded. “But maybe you would. And I just can’t let you go anywhere until this threat is taken care of.”

Eve felt her cheeks flush with rage. There he went again. “Do you even care if I stay or go? Or is it just that you don’t want me on your conscience?”

Lind stared at her in shock. “How can you even ask me that? Of course I care!”

“Then prove it!” Eve snapped back. “Involve me, goddamn it! Explain! Let me be part of what’s happening!”

Lind was shaking his head even before she had finished her sentence. “I can’t do that.”

Eve exhaled in frustration. “I can take it.”

“It’s not just about that.”

Eve frowned. Now, she was the confused one. “What is it about, then?”

“The club’s business is our own.” Lind’s features hardened, and Eve knew then that she wasn’t looking at her boyfriend; she was looking at the Viper.

She felt her own expression turn to stone. “Fine,” she said. “Whatever.”

“I’m just trying to do what’s best for you.” Just like that, Lind was Lind again. The quickness of the transition was disconcerting.

“Whatever,” Eve said again, unwilling to let him in. “When are you sending your guys?”

Lind stared at her, taken aback by the change of subject. He adjusted quickly, however. “First thing. I’ll make sure they’re here by eight a.m. After that, they’ll take turns. I want someone with you 24/7.”

“Will you ever be one of those someone’s?”

“Sometimes,” Lind said, giving her a smile. “I want to see you, too, you know?”

Eve didn’t know. She felt like she didn’t know anything anymore when it came to their relationship. “I have stuff to do in the morning,” she said after a moment. “I have errands to run, and I want to go to the gym. I’m not going to be cooped up for weeks on end; I want that to be very clear.”

Lind nodded. “Ok,” he conceded. “As long as you always take one of the guys with you and give me a full schedule of your day every day.”

Eve stared at him. Surely she’d heard him wrong? “Excuse me?”

“I want to know where you are at all times.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“I’ve never been more serious, sweetheart.”

“Don’t patronize me,” Eve snapped. “Listen, it’s bad enough that I’ll have a fucking bodyguard wherever I go, I am
not
sending you reports of my whereabouts.”

“I’m not trying to be a stalker here,” Lind said in exasperation. “I’m doing this to keep you safe.”

“I don’t care. I’ve been in a controlling relationship before, and I’m
not
doing it again. You hear me?”

“This is different!” Lind snapped. “I’m not being a jealous boyfriend; I’m trying to protect you!”

“This isn’t the protection I want!”

“What do you want from me? Should I just let you take a bullet in that thick skull of yours?”

“Yes, goddamn you! Either involve me or back the fuck off!”

They stared at each other, panting with rage and fear. Next thing Eve knew, he was scooping her up in a passionate embrace and moving them both to the bedroom.

It wasn’t a solution, she knew that. It was only a balm, one that she wasn’t even sure was doing much to soothe the wound. But it was better than fighting. It was better than feeling on the sidelines of Lind’s life. Because no matter how devoted he was to the Diamondbacks, in the bedroom
she
was his only focus.

Eve kissed him deeply and hungrily, fisting the dark hair at the base of his neck. She was going to claim him tonight, mark him as hers. When they were finished, he would know that no motorcycle brotherhood in the world would ever be able to give him this.