Craving Absolution

  Deuce’s boys.

  Deuce, the president of our town’s local motorcycle club, was one of the most frightening yet intriguing men I’d ever met. And I used the term “met” very loosely; I’d had very little contact with the leader of the Hell’s Horsemen, only minor encounters here and there around town. Deuce was a very private person, but as far as I knew, he was a decent enough man.

  Unlike his father, Reaper, the former club president, Deuce took take care of Miles City. He’d taken control of several failing businesses around town and brought them back from near bankruptcy, he constantly donated money to the public schools and library, and a few years back, when my parents’ neighbor had lost his wife to cancer and was about to lose his farm due to her exorbitant medical bills, it was Deuce who had picked up the tab.

  Even so, there were rumors that Deuce was involved with business that danced around the law, but Deuce and his boys were good to us, so other than the rumors and the idle chitchat between the gossipmongers, usually no one gave it a second thought.

  “Sell smokes here?”

  Jason Brady emerged from the bathroom no longer looking like an American hero. Dressed in leather boots, leather pants, a tight black T-shirt, and his leather Hell’s Horsemen cut, he now looked like one of Deuce’s boys. Except he was hands down the most clean-cut biker I’d ever seen. And he appeared to smell good too.

  But that was pure assumption on my part. Or maybe wishful thinking. Because for some reason, I really wanted to get close enough to give him a sniff.

  “Name’s Brady,” he said, smiling over my head in Joey’s direction. “Jase Brady.”

  “Joe Weaver.” Pointing at me, Joey said, “And this here’s little Dorothy Kelley Matthews, resident ginger midget.”

  Jase’s friendly gaze dropped down to where I stood and he looked me over, an embarrassingly slow and thorough perusal of all five foot nothing of me, from my head to my toes and back up again.

  I felt my face heat. Not only were my holey jeans and plain tee covered in the remnants from a full morning of cleaning, but my hair was piled on top of my head in a messy bun, and I was sweating from the midday heat.

  “Nice meetin’ you, baby,” he said, his lips curving. The tip of his tongue appeared and he very deliberately ran it across his full bottom lip.

  Then it wasn’t just my face overheating but my entire body. Feeling suddenly drugged and my thoughts muddled, I pressed my hand over my stomach and swallowed hard.

  “You . . . too,” I whispered.

  “You got a nickname, little Dorothy Kelley Matthews?” he asked. “’Cause that’s a fuckin’ mouthful right there.”

  My breath shuddered from my lungs in small spurts of air. What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I speak? Or move?

  Jase’s lips split into a grin. “Not that I mind a mouthful of pretty girl . . .”

  Oh dear God. How did one respond to that?

  From behind me, Joey let out a loud and amused-sounding cough, startling me back to reality. Back to Jase and his knowing grin, fully aware of the effect he had on me.

  “Excuse me,” I muttered. Snatching my purchases off the counter, I hurried quickly toward the door and pushed blindly through it.

  What was wrong with me? I’d been flirting! And with a total stranger!

  And worse, I was married. It might not be a love match between Pete and me, and he might be on the road more than he was home, but we had a daughter together and he took care of us financially. I should respect that, and yet here I was acting like a teenager with a crush, entertaining thoughts that I had no business thinking. I shook my head in dismay and let out a large pent-up breath that did nothing to calm my rapidly beating heart.

  Reaching my truck, I tossed my purchases inside the open window, and was about to open the door when I felt a touch on my left shoulder. Startled, I spun around and came face-to-face with . . . Jason Brady.

  “You forgot your change,” he said.

  When I tore my gaze from his grin and looked down to his outstretched hand, I found three wrinkled dollar bills. But my focus wasn’t on my change, it was on the man standing in front of me. He was so close to me, too close, and watching me too intently for me to feel at all comfortable.

  And yes, dammit. He did smell good. An understated, yet softly spicy bouquet wafted off his skin, and along with it, the faint odor of sweat and the crisp scent of leather.

  Swallowing hard and with a slightly trembling hand, I reached for my money and when I did, his free hand came down on top, his hands caging mine, his touch freezing me in place.

  “You should stop by the club and see me sometime,” he said, his eyes lazy, his smile filled with less-than-honorable intent. A smile that had my stomach flip-flopping.

  I cleared my throat and managed to choke out, “I . . . I’m married.”

  Jase’s smile never wavered. “Baby, I ain’t tryin’ to marry you.”

  Releasing me, he held up his left hand and wiggled his ring finger back and forth. His wedding band, a thin band of platinum, glinted menacingly in the sunlight. “Got the battle scars to prove it too.”

  I stared up at him as foreign thoughts infiltrated my brain, thoughts of him and me naked, sweaty, our bodies colliding. I saw heated kisses and furious groping and—

  Instantly disgusted, more so with myself than at his audacity, I had spun back around and quickly jerked open the driver’s side door. Yanking it closed behind me, I’d thrust the key into the engine, slammed the truck into reverse, and hit the gas. As I had burned rubber out of the parking lot, I could see him in my rearview mirror, still standing where I’d left him.

  Laughing.

  What an absolute scumbag.

  What an absolutely, perfectly sculpted, beautifully smelling . . . scumbag.

  • • •

  Since I was young and unhappy in my marriage, it had only taken Jase a few months of pursuing me before I’d succumbed, and an even shorter period of time before I’d fallen head over heels in love with him. A love I’d chosen above all else—my marriage had ended and my family was lost to me, viewing me as an adulterer; the utmost disgrace.

  And my dignity, I’d sacrificed that as well.

  And for what? To be a club whore?

  I might be off-limits to the other boys, belonging only to Jase, but the painful truth was that he’d never be mine. All these years later he was still married, still armed with a litany of excuses as to why he couldn’t yet leave his wife, and still promising that he someday would.

  It was a promise I’d recently given up on.

  I could either accept my fate and status in Jase’s life—always a club whore, never an old lady, forever waiting for what little crumbs he would toss my way—or I could leave him.

  But how could I leave him? After all I’d given up, all I’d sacrificed for him, the sheer lengths I’d gone to ensure that someday I would be his one and only, how could I simply walk away?

  The truth was that I couldn’t.

  Leaving him meant losing the security he provided me. I’d lose the apartment he paid for in town, and my only source of income: my position at the clubhouse.

  So as I made nice at a barbeque I had no interest in attending, I matched his happy expression, hoping from this distance that it would appear genuine, and that unlike Eva, he wouldn’t see through my facade.

  I shouldn’t have been worried. As usual, Jase was oblivious to my wants and needs, only ever focused on his own. So much so that he was unaware of my biggest secret yet.

  The secret I carried inside my belly.

  Unbeknownst to Jase or to anyone other than myself, the life growing inside me was not a product of my relationship with Jase. It was the result of an affair with another member of the Hell’s Horsemen. It had begun as a drunken slipup, a night of much-needed comfort spent in the arms of another, but over time had become something else entirely. Even years later, it was still something I’d never quite known how to process, could never truly comprehend, but a
t the same time . . . I’d eventually begun to depend on it. Need it, even.

  The other man provided me with an outlet nothing else in my life allowed me. When I was with him, I was never consumed with feelings of inadequacy, fearing that every move I made was being compared to another woman. With him, I felt almost free.

  Turning away from Jase, I squeezed my eyes shut, easily envisioning him, a beer in one hand, a cigarette in the other, as stoic and as silent as ever.

  The dark to Jase’s light, James “Hawk” Young’s skin held a duskier undertone, his features were more striking, almost otherworldly. Even without the additional height of his Mohawk, he was taller than Jase, larger with bulky muscles and an overall stature that could very easily be construed as intimidating.

  At first, I too had been intimidated by Hawk. After our first night together he’d come to me again, wanting more. When I’d refused him, he’d threatened to tell Jase what we’d done. Terrified of losing the only man I’d ever loved, I’d agreed.

  And in the end, I’d been the furthest thing from intimidated.

  In the end . . . I’d been in love with two men.

  It was yet another mistake I’d made.

  But even as I thought those very words, I could hear Hawk, his voice uncommonly deep, his expression forever firm as he stared down at me and said, “There ain’t no such thing as mistakes, Dorothy. There’s only shit that happens and shit that don’t.”

  I swallowed back a threatening sob, furiously blinking back my quickly gathering tears. No matter what Hawk thought, I knew in my heart what we had done was wrong. Hawk had betrayed the bonds of the brotherhood, and I had betrayed Jase by allowing another man into my bed. Even worse, I had allowed Jase to believe that the baby inside me was his.

  But what choice did I have? If I admitted my sins, I would lose everything. As it was, I’d already lost Hawk.

  I could still see him, the joyous expression on his face when I’d told him I was pregnant. And then the pain that had shattered his joy when I’d told him the baby wasn’t his.

  Hawk had known the admission for what it truly was, a bald-faced lie stoked by fear in the addled mind of a confused woman. But even knowing this, he hadn’t put up a fight. Instead, he’d left.

  I didn’t blame him for leaving, for choosing life as a nomad over continuing to live a life full of lies and secrets. I just hadn’t realized how drastically my life would change with his absence. I hadn’t realized how much I had come to depend on him, and in turn, how much I would miss him.

  Good God, what was wrong with me? Almost thirty-seven years old with a grown child and pregnant with another, yet in many ways I was still a child myself. I was without purpose, always unsure of myself and my feelings, giving love away as easily as breathing, all while flitting and flailing aimlessly through my life . . . if you could even call this delusional sham I’d created around myself a life.

  The light touch of a hand on my stomach brought me reeling back from depressing musings, to the young woman who’d stepped up beside me. Blonde, beautiful, and dimpled as all Deuce’s children were, Danielle “Danny” West smiled kindly at me.

  Blowing out a breath to ensure my voice wouldn’t quiver, I then covered her hand with my own and gave her fingers a light squeeze. “Only a few more weeks,” I said. “I can’t wait for this baby to come. I’m too old to be pregnant.”

  Danny’s smile turned sympathetic, but anything she might have said in response was stopped short by the man who walked up behind her. ZZ, her boyfriend, slid his arm around her middle and pulled her tightly up against him.

  “Hey, baby,” he murmured.

  Danny turned in his arms, returning his embrace, and placed a kiss upon his chest.

  It was refreshing to see her happy again. Not too long ago, she’d been depressed, constantly brooding, and engaging in destructive behavior that had belied her usually outgoing and upbeat personality.

  It was ZZ who’d pulled her out of her funk and brought her back to the land of the living. At first Deuce hadn’t been thrilled with the match, but not even Deuce could deny the significant change in his daughter, nor could he refute how good of a man ZZ was. Smart, sweet, and loyal, ZZ was the perfect match for his president’s daughter.

  But even as thrilled as I was for Danny, I couldn’t help but be reminded of my own daughter, Tegen.

  Not much younger than Danny, Tegen was away at college in San Francisco. Her phone calls were minimal and her visits home practically nonexistent. Although she’d never much cared much for Miles City, always wishing for something bigger, something better, I couldn’t help but think it had been her disappointment in me and my life choices that precipitated her hasty departure and reluctance to visit.

  “Oh my God!” Kami shrieked. “Oh my fucking God, he’s proposing!”

  Startled from my reflections, I glanced up, seeking the cause of Kami’s outburst. I’d been so lost inside my own thoughts I hadn’t even realized the yard had gone quiet, or that the couple who’d been standing right beside me only minutes before were now in the center of the yard, all attention on them.

  Down on one knee, ZZ was holding up a small black box in offering to Danny. She stood before him, staring down at him, her pretty features twisted with shock.

  My throat convulsed, suddenly dry and scratchy, and I swallowed repeatedly, trying to wet it, trying to keep my composure.

  That would never be me. That would never be me.

  “I’m going to cry,” Adriana whispered, and covered her mouth with her hand. Rolling his eyes, yet smiling, Mick wrapped his arm around her shoulders and drew her close to him.

  Even Kami, a born cynic, forever bickering with her own husband, looked misty eyed.

  “Baby girl!”

  My gaze traveled to where Deuce and Eva had come together. Standing side by side, both of them were smiling happily in Danny’s direction.

  “You say the fuckin’ word,” Deuce yelled, “and I will throw that asshole into next fuckin’ week! Fact is, whether you say yes or no, I’m still gonna beat the fuckin’ shit outta him!”

  Eva shoved playfully at Deuce’s abdomen and in response he captured her neck, pulling her against his body and into a loving embrace.

  Good God, I was surrounded by it. So much love and affection. So many happy couples, both mature relationships and ones that were just beginning. Love was everywhere, literally all around me except for where I wanted it, needed it, most of all.

  I couldn’t stop myself from crying, not this time. I was too pregnant, the welling emotion was too great. So often while at the clubhouse, during birthday parties or barbeques, when I’d been forced to watch Jase interact with his wife and children—and dying inside a little each time—from across the room or the yard, I would find Hawk. Our eyes would meet, and then I was no longer falling apart but instead was centered by Hawk’s desire for me, warmed by it, strengthened by it. Again and again, with just one look, he would save me from myself.

  I needed that now, his strength, him.

  As my tears began to fall, I hurriedly turned away from my friends, searching out the most expedient way back to the solitude and emotional safety of the clubhouse.

  That was when I saw her.

  Standing at the far edge of the lawn, just outside the circle of gathered people, was Jase’s wife, Chrissy.

  My tears dried instantly as my breath hitched and my stomach sank. She wasn’t here to attend the party.

  It wasn’t the tears streaming down her pretty face that gave it away, or her disheveled hair and wrinkled clothing. It wasn’t even the wild look in her eyes. It was the simple act of her gaze meeting mine, really and truly seeing me for the very first time. She’d never looked at me before, only in passing glances, and always dismissing me.

  She knew. She knew everything.

  All these years of being thrust together, living in the same town, attending the same parties, both in love with the same man, yet strangers still.

  Not anymore. br />
  Her gaze dropped to my swollen belly. In a mindless instinctive reaction, I raised my hands to cover it. To somehow protect the life inside me from what I knew was about to transpire, to shield its innocence from the ugly secrets that were about to be ripped from the darkness and sent, screaming and bleeding, into the light.

  Tentatively, I took a step backward and was about to take another when movement at her side caught my attention.

  A flash of light.

  A glint of metal.

  Shrieking, I turned to run, but above my cry heard a booming crack. As if I’d been punched, my head snapped backward, knocking me off my feet.

  Then I was falling and people were screaming. There was so much screaming, it was all I could hear, and yet it sounded far away, off in the distance.

  “Dorothy!”

  Voices echoed all around me.

  Hands grabbed at me.

  A face hovered directly over mine.

  I knew that face, I knew her, she was my . . . she was . . .

  Tears streamed down her cheeks and her mouth was moving, but I couldn’t hear what she was saying. I couldn’t hear anything. Why couldn’t I hear anything?

  I tried to ask her why I couldn’t hear, but my mouth wouldn’t work.

  Another face, a man with pretty blue eyes, appeared beside the woman, wildly shaking his head back and forth. I knew him. I couldn’t remember who he was or how I knew him, only that I knew him.

  Like the woman, he too was crying and his lips were moving, but still there was no sound. I tried to lift my arm, to reach out to him, to . . .

  My vision began to blur, distorting and warping the faces around me. I blinked furiously, trying to see, trying to understand.

  Something awful was happening, I knew that much, something horrible. And these people, whoever they were, I wanted to help them.

  But I couldn’t move, I couldn’t hear, and black spots floated over me, quickly growing larger, taking over my vision.

  I was tired. So, so tired.

  I just had to . . . close my eyes . . . for just a second . . .

  Darkness enveloped me.