Knight (83 page)
Authors: Lana Grayson
If only for a while.
“Did you watch it?”
I hopped onto the bed without kicking off my heels or slipping out of my new dress—white and frilly, Lyn ordered. To match the Barbie doll pink cast I demanded while hopped up on pain-killers at the hospital.
It was cute at the time, but six weeks of plaster later and I couldn’t wait to get rid of the bubblegum pink.
“Well?” I whined. I checked the phone to make sure the connection hadn’t been lost. I hated the prepaid phones, but Thorne made me swear to talk only on them. They were more secure, he said.
“Yeah, I got it.”
I grinned. “And?”
“And what?”
“What’d you think?”
I picked at the keys of my laptop. The YouTube page still loaded on my browser. Keep did a pretty good job filming the performance, but the cast did nothing to improve my repertoire. At least I only broke my right wrist. Strumming was easy, but I didn’t even want to think of breaking my left hand. I doubted I would have survived the past few weeks.
My stomach dropped.
Not what I wanted to think about.
Not anymore.
“Brew,” I said. “Seriously. What did you think?”
“Christ, Rose. Don’t say my name.”
“No one’s here. Don’t worry.”
He grunted. “Where are you?”
I glanced over the perfect little cottage bedroom. The creamy white walls, lacey curtains, and thick crimson bedspread were more Martha Stewart than Motorcycle Club. But it was bigger than the room at Pixie, much prettier than my apartment, and had a perfect sunroom where I could record songs.
“Thorne’s house.”
“Great. You’re his old lady now.”
“That I am.” I gave him a moment before whining again. “Come on. Stop teasing me.”
“You were good.”
“Just good?”
“Great. What do you want me to say? You always do good. Where were you playing?”
“Sorceress. Lyn had to redo the interior after the—”
I flinched as he swore. “Thorne has you
stripping
?”
“Jesus, no. I was just playing a set while she danced.”
“...And you didn’t think to record that too?”
“Very funny.” I closed the laptop. “So where are you?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
I still tried anyway. Just knowing where he was eased the worry.
Some of it.
“Well, if you were going to buy me a present, what would you get me?”
Brew hesitated. He exhaled. Sharp. His shoulder still must’ve hurt him, especially after riding around the country. He never complained.
“How about a voodoo doll?” He said.
“Sounds exotic.” New Orleans then. I always wanted to go, but I couldn’t visit my brother. It would be a long, long time before I could see him again.
I sighed as Brew went silent. For as much as I loved knowing my brother was alive, the man on the other end of the connection didn’t seem much like my brother anymore. I hated it. Hated even revealing the secret that broke him. I hated even more that he refused to talk about it.
“Brew, is everything okay? With us?”
“Of course.” He cleared his throat. “I should get going. I got some work.”
“Wait, we really need to talk.”
“I can’t, Rose. Not tonight.”
I didn’t care. He had to hear it.
“I don’t blame you.” The words escaped in a rush. “I did. For a long time. But it wasn’t your fault. You didn’t know what was happening.”
“Email me when you play next. Send the link. I’ll try and check it out.”
“Brew, please.”
“I’ll be on the road a lot. Probably won’t be around much.”
“
Brew
—”
“Love you, Bud.”
He hung up before I could respond. Just like always. Just like he didn’t want to hear me say it in return. Like he didn’t deserve it. Like he wouldn’t believe it.
I threw the phone on the bed. Thorne watched me from the hall.
“Who was that?” He leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed. A thin smile teased his lips. Not a grin, I hadn’t fractured the stone just yet. But I was winning. He smirked, and that was all the encouragement I needed.
“No one.”
“Didn’t sound like
no one
.”
He stalked into the room. I fell on the bed as he encroached, looming over me with the ferocity of a champion warrior circling his prey. I welcomed his intensity now just as I did on the stage. Lyn might have danced, teasing with hips that promised more than my song and a chest that bounced more than my vocal range, but Thorne never took his eyes from me.
Then again, it was the first night Lyn allowed him back in the club, and she only permitted it as a favor to me.
“Gotta be careful,” Thorne warned. “You don’t know who might be listening in to your conversations.”
“Oh?”
“Someone might get jealous.”
I giggled. His expression darkened.
“Someone might want information.”
He pushed me on the bed. A dark thrill chased over my body.
“Someone might do whatever he can to get you to talk.”
His hand teased the hem of my dress, pulling the silk up, up, up over my smoothed legs. The bruising faded from the accident, and even the deeper cuts and gashes healed well. I had more scars than Thorne had tattoos, but he never complained.
He called
me
the warrior. I called him delusional.
His hand teased under the dress. I tensed as his fingers brushed between my legs. He read me before I spoke, before I summoned the courage to even remember what triggered me. Thorne dropped the act and lay beside me on the bed. The panic waned. He gathered me in his arms and kissed me.
“You’re safe,” he said.
Though he said it every day, every night, and every time he took me in bed, I never tired of hearing it. I snuggled closer to his body. The darkness passed, but the heat bundling deep inside me hadn’t. I reached for his hand and placed it on my thigh.
“I know,” I whispered.
“You start class tomorrow.” The gun-metal of his eyes hadn’t softened. I didn’t think it ever would. But instead of threatening me, it offered another layer of protection. Security and safety, devotion and absolute adoration. “Want me to give you a ride?”
“God no.” I flicked at the cut on his chest. “I can handle myself. Last thing I need is the entire club going on a run to the university.”
“You sure? Thought all those music majors loved their bikers.”
“Who told you that?”
His fingers swept over me again. This time I was ready. I bit my lip. That only invited his kiss.
“I have my evidence,” he said.
“Pretty solid evidence.”
“You gonna be okay?” He asked. “College is a bit different from Pixie. Might get boring.”
I grinned. “I’ll manage.”
He brushed a curl from my face. I sighed, parting my lips for another kiss.
“What about all this? Can you handle it?”
He didn’t take his eyes from me, but I understood what he meant. His new home, the tracphone, the brother presumed dead and the other still battling his own demons with whatever drug he could find, the new gig at Sorceress, and my new college.
Anathema.
I nodded. “I can handle it.”
“You sure?”
His attention slowed between my legs. I tangled my hands against his cut and kissed him. My hips ground against him.
“Can you handle me?” I whispered. “After everything that happened?”
Now he grinned. “Sweetheart, you are the only thing I want. I fucking love you.”
I pulled him over my body and opened my legs, inviting him even closer.
“I love you too.” I wished I could have removed my dress before he reached for his jeans, but we’d have time later to take it slow. To leisurely explore. To learn. To forget. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Good, cause I’m not letting you go.”
I believed him, but he had no reason to worry.
I knew where I belonged. I held onto his cut as everything that was Anathema, everything I thought was dark and dangerous, deceptive and desecrated, transformed from something to loathe into something to love.
Thorne protected me, sheltered me, and healed me.
I once feared Anathema and Thorne.
But they were the reasons I was alive. The only reasons I even had a life.
They gave me courage, even with exiled brothers and an encroaching parole hearing that threatened everyone’s safety. The scarred demon shadowed everything, but it also protected. It gave me Thorne. It gave me a new life. It gave me hope.
And I never wanted to leave.
The End
Book 2
I betrayed her.
Betrayed my brother. The club.
I betrayed myself.
I raced my guilt, hid my shame, and lived by the undeserved mercy of the road.
Then I met her.
My second chance.
And I fucked it up again.
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Exiled (Anathema Series
)
Copyright © 2015 by Lana Grayson
Published by Lana Grayson
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
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