Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 102335 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 512(@200wpm)___ 409(@250wpm)___ 341(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102335 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 512(@200wpm)___ 409(@250wpm)___ 341(@300wpm)
“Nowhere safe!”
She widens her eyes at me, the corner of her mouth twitching. “Actually, yes! But I’ll stay with you for a few days before I head back.”
“Back where?” I ask, pushing open the driver’s door. I slam it closed as she rounds the back of the car.
“Chicago!”
I bare my teeth. “Of course you would live there.” I ignore her jokes as we make our way up to the clubhouse. Music plays loudly and bikes rumble into the space behind us. Tonight’s going to be a big fucking party. We all know it, and we all know Jade and Royce deserve it. This is a win for them, which makes it a win for us all.
Since the explosion a couple weeks ago, there have been some renovations around the place. For one, this oversized glass sliding door where a wall used to be. It works. So people can walk between the clubhouse and onto the patio, or down to the octagon below that’s opposite the parking shed.
“I’ll go help Jade.” Poppy leans up on her tippy toes, kissing me on the cheek. “I’ll be fine.”
I watch painfully as she disappears through the front door, smiling when she sees Jade. My control wavers and I don’t take my eyes off her until she’s gone.
“Church in the morning.” Royce hooks his arm around my shoulder, handing me a beer. Lion stares at me from behind a smirk, and I lower myself down onto the stool.
“I’m gonna need something stronger than this.” I swirl the beer around in the bottle, just as Khaos climbs the stairs and squeezes my shoulder on passing. Khaos is the youngest one of us all, and the most fucking mischievous. Seems to never keep his dick in his pants and unfortunately, that has extended to Fury’s daughter, Silver. Fury is the one who walks around the clubhouse and absolutely no one wants a problem with. He served time. Hard time behind bars for murders he most definitely committed. We don’t ask how he got out.
“Your sister is fucking hot. There, I said it.”
I follow Khaos’ eyes as he looks back inside, the smirk on my mouth testing. “Yeah? Maybe you should try? Go on.”
He stares back at me with a blank look on his face. “You think I won’t?”
I shake my head, taking a sip of the beer. “No, I think you can’t.” I don’t bother telling him that Poppy has only ever been interested in girls since she was little. I’d rather watch his ego be crushed.
“So look, Royce here tells me that the Kyle shit didn’t even touch the surface of what you’ve done and been through. That there’s someone else?”
I lean back in my chair, exhaling a deep breath. Two years I’ve spent not thinking about all of the dark shit in my past. Pretending your demons don’t exist doesn’t make them stop chasing you…it only slows the race. “That’s right, but since K Diamond is dead now, I’ll never know shit about Skully.”
“This Skully chap…” Lion asks. “He a big threat?”
I think over his words, watching as the girls laugh inside the house while preparing bread rolls and salad. I haven’t seen Jade this happy since she’s been here. “Nah, I don’t think so. If that motherfucker wanted me dead, I’d be dead.”
“Good.” Lion shifts back. “Then tomorrow at church, I have a proposition for you.”
Weed and pussy are the general smells of the clubhouse, but with Jade and now Olivia spending more time around the place, they make sure the club girls are kicked out well before anything else.
I move to the back, behind the kitchen and through the space we hold church. I don’t bother to say Royce said we were doing this tomorrow. Obviously, this proposition needs to be told now.
I take the spot beside Royce. This chapter isn’t large. Lion, Khaos, Royce, Roo, Fury, and a couple of prospects. It’s manageable to Lion and gives Royce and Jade that easy-going life they both want.
Lion blazes a joint, blowing out smoke and passing it around the table. I shake my head as Khaos takes it from Royce. “We have an issue. In-house. And I hate to bring this to the table so soon after what happened, but since Royce’s and my girls are safe, figured we hit this one straight away. We have a chapter that needs doing over. The president there is weak, can’t take fucking shit, and needs to be stripped of his patch. He’s being doing dodgy fucking dealings with the cartel for years now—shit we never pulled him up on.” Lion’s eyes come straight to mine. “It’s the Illinois chapter. Or, Chicago, to be precise.”
I keep my eyes level on his. “Illinois? Didn’t know we had one there.” Even though he hasn’t said it, I already know what he wants from me.