“That has nothing to do with it. You don’t want to let Meri and Keri become foreign exchange students.”
“I’ll miss them too much.”
Killyama didn’t doubt she would, but she was also sure the other half of the request was causing a problem, too.
“It might not be bad being a host family.” T.A. winked at Train when she saw him watching Killyama. Then T.A. turned her flirtations toward Calder who was avoiding her attempts by giving his back to the room. “What does a girl have to do to get laid?” T.A. scowled, trying unsuccessfully to entice Rock next.
“Quit talking about their dick,” Killyama reminded her for the umpteenth time. Then she went back to her conversation with Sex Piston. “Maybe it won’t be so bad. You get along great with most kids.”
“These aren’t kids. They’re a pain in the ass, hormone-filled, one shady move away from jail. I have my stepdaughters whipped into shape; why should I take someone else’s sixteen-year-old and start all over? With my luck, they’ll end up in juvie or knocked up. I’ll probably end up with another girl like Sissy or T.A.”
“That’s not it. You’re afraid you’ll get attached and won’t see them anymore when they go back home.” Killyama scooted her chair to the side as she saw Jenna practically licking the head off Train’s beer.
“Anyone else want another beer?” T.A. asked, her ass half on and half off the chair as she started to rise.
“I’ll get everyone a round.” Killyama stood up so fast she nearly knocked down the chair she had been sitting on.
She weaved through the tables and around the pool table to elbow her way between Train and Calder.
Jenna straightened when she saw her staring her down.
“Give me four beers, and try to keep your tits out of them.”
The slut was smart enough not to argue, pouring out four beers while Killyama watched her every move. She didn’t trust her not to spit in them.
“You need some help with those?” Train offered.
“No.” Killyama took two mugs in each hand then turned to go back to the table.
“You want to dance after you take them to the table?”
“My beer will go flat.”
“I can sit with you until you finish it.”
Killyama slammed the beers into Calder’s chest, drenching his T-shirt. “Take those to my table and tell T.A. mine better still be full when I get there.”
Leaving Calder juggling the beers, Killyama grabbed Train’s arm while Stud and Cade watched in amusement. She shoved him toward the door, not releasing him until they stood in the gravel parking lot.
“Dude, I’m trying to be as nice to you as I know how! What does it take to get you to learn I’m not interested?”
“You’re interested. You’re just scared.”
She gaped at him. “You think I’m afraid of you?”
“Not me. I think you are afraid of how good we are together.”
Killyama poked his chest. “You”—she pointed at herself—“and I are not together.”
“We will be.” Train gave her a once over. When he started to say something, she covered his mouth with her hand. Train laughingly pulled his head away. “What did you think I was going to say?”
She tucked her curly hair behind her ear. “You were going to say something nice, and I’m not in the mood to hear it.”
Train took a step forward. Unconsciously, she took a step back, trying not to let him get close to her.
“I was going to tell you those boots look as good as those heels did, and I want to rip that top off of you.” Train’s chest brushed up so close to her that she knew she wouldn’t be able to see Stud’s name if she looked down.
She took another step backward, coming into contact with the front wall of the club.
“Go home, Train. There’s no place for you here.”
“Make room for me, then.” He placed one strong arm on the wall next to her head. “I don’t need much room.” He braced his other arm on the other side of her before sinking his body against hers. “I only need this much room.”
When he tried to kiss her, she turned her face away.
Resting her head against his chest, she clutched fistfuls of his T-shirt, trying to decide if she was going to pull him closer or push him away. Train made the decision for her, burrowing his hands in her hair then lifting her mouth until there wasn’t an escape for her. Claiming her lips, he drove his tongue into her mouth, tilting her head so she had to part her lips wider until her jaw started to ache when she didn’t respond.
“Kiss me back.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Don’t lie to me. Kiss me … please.”
It was the plea that did her in. Hating herself, she responded to him the way she had promised herself she wouldn’t. Then, when the hard ridge of his dick rubbed against her waist, she melted into the wall at her back.
“Let’s go inside …” His throaty murmur had her sliding out from under him.
“No.” If she took him inside, Sex Piston and crew would know she had caved.
She started to open the door, but Train’s arm came around her waist, pulling her back into his chest.
“We could get a motel room, or go to my club. I don’t care where we go.”
Killyama wavered, letting him pull her away from the door, while she half-heartedly tried to struggle free.
“I can’t.” This time when she managed to get loose, she turned to face him. Her rampant heartbeat and the throb in her aching pussy were signs it took only a touch from the man before she reconsidered taking a chance with him.
“Why not?”
Killyama had never let herself be vulnerable, and she didn’t plan to start now. How could she tell him that she wanted to have sex with him again so badly that her body was growing wet just thinking about it? That she already had feelings for him, and she was afraid he was going to break her heart? That if he wanted payback for Sasha and left her hurting to get revenge for The Last Riders, he had already succeeded?
Killyama couldn’t tell him, because she wasn’t able to voice her fears, unlike most women were willing to do. It was useless to stay and continue talking to him.
She pivoted on her heels …
“What if we each picked one make-it-or-break-it rule?”
Killyama turned back, staring at his face in the moonlight. “Are you serious? We tried this before.”
His eyes were unwavering, staring back. “I remember. Deep down, I knew you were lying, but I wanted you in my bed bad enough that I took a chance. I’m willing to take another. Shade says I’m terrible at poker, at gambling, but I’m willing to roll the dice and try again.”
“Why?” Her raspy words brought a tenderness to his gaze that had a lump rising in her throat.
“Because I care about you. I like spending time with you.” He reached out to take her hand, pulling her to him. “You make me laugh.”
“I make you laugh?”
“Yes. That’s important to a man.”
Laughter was good. Laughter was a good and open emotion that men usually didn’t talk about wanting from a woman. They weren’t explicit emotions any woman could make him feel. It was how a part of her affected him that he couldn’t get from any other woman, even from those he had ready access to.
“I’m not saying I’ll think about it, but what would be your rule breaker?”
“That you would never lie to me.”
Killyama licked her lips. “You won’t like my rule.”
“Try me.” His sensual lips curled into a smile that had her wanting to say fuck it. Regardless, she was the one who had to live with herself in the morning.
“No other women. That’s my rule breaker.”
“Would you be able to take my word that I’m not fucking around on you when you’re not there, knowing the women in the club will be giving it to the other brothers?”
“If a man is going to cheat, he is going to cheat, regardless of where he’s at. Stud could cheat any
time he walks through the club doors without Sex Piston, but he doesn’t. Or, if he does, none of us would know. Sex Piston trusts him, and I do, too.”
“Then let’s give it a try.”
He lifted their clasped hands to her breasts, rubbing his knuckles across her nipple.
She gave him a quick half-smile. “I’ll think about it.”
Train laughed, letting her hand drop to her side. “You want to spend the day with me tomorrow, thinking it over?”
“I’m busy tomorrow.”
“Doing what?”
“I need to help my mom with a few chores.”
“I’m off tomorrow. I could help.”
“You sure you want to? I can spring for pizza when we’re done,” she magnanimously offered. “I’ll text you the address.”
Hearing the door open, Killyama turned to see Sex Piston blatantly eavesdropping.
“Your beer is getting warm.”
“I’m coming.” Killyama took the silent hint that her friend wasn’t going to leave her alone with Train. She went through the door that Sex Piston held open, telling Train, “I’ll see you in the morning.”
Sex Piston slammed the door on whatever he had said in response.
She almost laughed when she saw Train come back inside the clubhouse seconds later, finding a spot next to Calder.
“Bitch, you need your head examined for even talking to him.” Sex Piston’s hard eyes bore into her.
“I’m not stupid. I took everything he had to say with a grain of salt.” Killyama winced when she took a sip of her beer. It tasted like warm piss. She hated the taste of beer unless it was ice cold and had a shot of tequila to follow it.
“Why give him the opportunity? You’re going to get sucked in—”
“Is that so bad?” Killyama snapped. “Beth and Lily are happy. Willa, Winter, and Rachel seem happy. Why would it be such a stretch of the imagination that Train could make me happy?”
The women seated around her gazed at her in sympathy.
“You think everything he says is bullshit, don’t you?”
T.A. nervously twisted her beer mug by the handle. “Yes, but if you want to go for it, I’m with you.”
Out of all the bitches, T.A. was the most optimistic about men. She would give any man a chance, which was why she had slept with most of the Destructors and the Blue Horsemen. She kept hoping she would find the one man who wouldn’t let her down, in bed and out. So far, her hook-ups had ended in failure.
“I think she should go for it, too. It’s better than her moving away,” Crazy Bitch gave her own two cents, which didn’t make Sex Piston any happier. “You want me to call Fat Louise and see what she thinks?”
“Hell no. I know what Fat Louise would say. She’d tell you to fuck him.” Sex Piston’s lips tightened when boisterous laughter came from the bar. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to know the men were talking about them. “I’m not going to play the bad guy. You’re going to do what you want to do, regardless of what I say. I don’t want you to move, either, but if he’s why you want to move away from us, then I’d rather you do it now. At least you’d come back when you got over him. I’m worried that, if you did get serious with him and it didn’t last, you’d move away anyway, and after being with him, you wouldn’t ever come back.”
To Sex Piston, it wasn’t a decision between if Train would hurt her but when.
“Or maybe I can spend some time with him and find out I don’t want him. That’s what normal people do.”
T.A. shook her head. “We’re not normal.”
“If you fuck him …” Sex Piston started.
“I’m not going to fuck him.”
The women stared at her in shock.
“I’m not,” Killyama stated. “Yet. Or at least not until I’m sure he can keep his dick to himself.”
T.A.’s eyes widened. “How?”
“It’s not like Beth or Lily won’t tell me.” She shrugged. “I just want to find out if the man can stop banging every tail that comes within sniffing distance, or if he will be content to wait until his balls are blue, if that’s what it takes to get me in his bed.”
“What if Beth and Lily don’t know what’s going on in the clubhouse when they’re not there?” T.A. waved Pike away as he started to approach.
“Do you really think that if Train starts cheating on me, I won’t know? There isn’t a man alive who can pull that wool over my eyes. A man acts differently when he has blue balls than he does when he has a happy dick. If he lies to me about cheating with those hos, you won’t have to worry about me moving to Knoxville; you’ll be visiting me in Danville.” Killyama wasn’t joking, and they knew it.
Danville was where the state penitentiary was.
If Train did manage to pull the wool over her eyes, she would kill the fucker. She might beat the living hell out of the woman, but she would kill Train. The only one who would be doing a happy dance was her when the coroner wheeled his cold dead body out of the clubhouse.
“I’d be sitting in jail with you, and then my kids would be motherless,” Sex Piston said glumly.
“No, they won’t. I’d take care of them for you,” T.A. happily offered without hesitation.
“I bet she’d take care of Stud, too.” Crazy Bitch’s snide aside had Killyama drinking the nasty beer to keep from laughing at Sex Piston’s menacing expression.
“You’d do Stud if I were in prison?”
“It’s not like you’d still be married to him. Stud would divorce you.”
“Bitch, you wanna help me out, then go get Jenna and tell the slut to come here.”
“Why?” T.A. asked innocently, preparing to get out of her chair.
“I want to tell her that you’re out of my crew, and she’s in.”
T.A. sank back down in her chair. “That’s kind of hurtful.”
“And you telling me to my face that you would fuck my man isn’t?” Sex Piston scoffed at T.A.’s hurt expression.
“At least I’d take good care of your kids. You see Jenna doing that?”
“I’ll tell you what. You can have Stud when I’m dead. Okay?”
“All right. You work with all those chemicals; I’ll outlive you.”
“Killyama?”
“Yes?”
“When you move to Knoxville”— Sex Piston stood up angrily, her beer sloshing over the side of the mug as she picked it up—“and you will be moving … take T.A. with you.”
21
Train turned the blinker on, signaling the turn onto the street where Killyama’s mother lived. He had expected other houses on the road, not familiar with Jamestown as he was with Treepoint, but it was further out of town than what he had expected. No man’s land.
The house was a mile down from the turnoff, the road turning into gravel. He almost lost his struts on the first pothole.
“Son of a fucking bitch.”
Train had taken the back road to the Porters’ house many times to purchase pot from the brothers, but the one Killyama had directed him to made theirs look like the yellow brick road.
The next rut almost buried the truck in the mud. He had to saw the truck back and forth before he could find enough traction to free his tires.
Becoming aggravated, thinking Killyama had sent him to the boonies to make a fool out of him again, he was ready to turn around when he went over another rut that had his truck dipping so low he expected to see his bumper in his rearview mirror.
Turning a corner, he was searching for a place to turn around in the knee-length grass when he saw a trailer sitting on the side of the gravel road. He knew he was in the right place when he recognized the Escalade Killyama had been in when she had taken Sasha.
Train parked Cash’s borrowed truck beside the Escalade at the back of the house. Getting out, he saw Hammer and Jonas, shirtless and on the roof, nailing shingles down. Killyama moved into view from behind the house, wearing blue jeans tucked into work boots and a tank top with a bright red bandana tied aro
und her throat. Her curly hair had been swept up on top of her head into a careless knot.
“I was beginning to think you chickened out of meeting my mother.”
“Nothing could have kept me away, not even what you called a road.” Train brushed a smudge of dirt off her cheek, letting his fingers linger before dropping his hand. Then he looked up at the two men on the roof. “Hey, Hammer, Jonas.”
The men didn’t stop hammering to greet him.
“That’s one of the chores we have to work on today. Come on inside and meet my mama.”
Train’s nerves went on high alert. He still had to get past Sex Piston and the rest of her friends. Plus, Hammer and Jonas were giving him the cold shoulder. The last thing he needed was another person keeping him from making headway with her.
Killyama casually held the screen door of the trailer open for him. He caught a glimpse of her anxious expression as he stepped inside.
“Mama, this is Train. He’s a friend of mine. He offered to come and help with the roof.”
“Hi, Train.” Killyama’s mother removed her hands from the sink, drying them on a dishtowel.
The woman who came over to hold his hand was so delicate he was afraid she would disappear like a whisper of smoke. He knew her age from Crash’s report, but she looked more like Killyama’s sister than her mother.
The only characteristic of her mother’s he could see they had in common was their hair color. Her nose and cheeks had a sprinkle of freckles, while Killyama’s complexion was flawless. Her eyes were brown, and she was so small Train thought she might need a stepladder just to shake his hand.
“Train, this is my mother … Peyton.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” Peyton said. “We’ve already eaten, but I could fix you some breakfast if you’re hungry?”
“I already ate, but thank you.”
“I appreciate you offering to help Hammer and Jonas fix my roof. That last storm decided to take a chunk out of it.”
“I’m glad to help out,” Train said, releasing her hand.
“I’ll be mowing the yard, Mama. If you need us, just yell out.”
“I’m going to vacuum and get started on white washing the front porch before I make lunch.”