A rumble of a motorcycle and I stand. Razor pulls in front of my house, and when his gaze meets mine, I know the answer to his silent question.
Clara steps toward me. “No, Bre.”
Unfortunately for her... “This isn’t your decision to make.”
RAZOR
BREANNA GLANCES AROUND my house. It’s the first time I’ve brought a girl home. This moment’s huge, and I’d share how much this means to me, but we don’t have time for my emotions. We have problems.
“You have a nice home.” By her slight grin, I can tell she means it.
“It’s small.” But pride leaks out. I could never be ashamed of the place Mom loved.
“Bigger isn’t better.” It’s a reference to her family, and I hate the sadness in her eyes.
I snag her hand and draw her forward. “Want to see my room?”
Breanna blushes as she threads her fingers with mine. I flip on the light, and Breanna takes in the narrow room with the Reign of Terror banner, the dresser and the mirror hanging over it. She touches the pictures taped on the wall. Most of them are of me, Chevy, Oz and Violet in various stages of life. There’s two of me and Dad and at the top is one of me and Mom.
“She didn’t commit suicide,” she says.
It’s a mixture of relief and anger. “No.” I’m grateful that Breanna doesn’t press for more, because she already knows more than she should.
“The code helped?” she asks.
“Yeah.” A sickening sensation crawls along my insides. “It helped.” And I haven’t helped her. “This stuff with Kyle—we’re going to figure it out.”
Breanna’s pursing her lips like she’s about to disagree when the sound of a motorcycle gains our attention. She twists her fingers in her hair and her eyes shoot to the closet as if she’s searching for a hiding place. “Am I allowed to be here? Holy crap, you’re cutting school. Your dad is going to freak. I did not mean to get you in trouble.”
I slip into her personal space, circle an arm around her waist and kiss the next string of worries from her lips. It startles her, and when I lick my tongue across her lips, she sucks in a breath and molds completely into me. Her sweet scent overwhelms me, and when she eases her soft curves into my body, I become very aware of the bed less than a foot from us.
A knock on the front door and I begrudgingly release her. “I’m not in trouble, you’re fine in my house and stay here. I need to talk to Pigpen alone.”
“How do you know it’s him?”
Because I asked to see him and I don’t ask anyone for anything. “I just do.”
Breanna lowers herself to my bed, and I pause. Damn, she looks good there and leaving is the last thing I want to do, but in order to help her, I need Pigpen. He knocks again and I cross the room, open the door and step out onto the porch.
Pigpen leans against the railing and nails me with his stare. “This is the second time you’ve gone AWOL on the club. Let me tell you, that shit got old the first time. Next time I fucking text you to see if you’re alive, you text back.”
Hell, I’m so caught up in Breanna’s problems I forgot about Friday night. After the board laid it out for me in regards to Mom’s death, I split as I needed time to digest.
“Do you hear me?” he demands.
“Loud and clear.”
“Good. So what’s this 911 Oz sent out on your behalf?”
“I’m against the ropes on a problem.” Quick and to the point. Hopefully less painful.
“Knock and the door shall open...”
...ask and you shall receive. How many times has he said this to me? Breanna might consider this a betrayal, but it’s one person, not the whole club. “Breanna’s being blackmailed by some guys at school with a picture they took of me and her. I thought I could nail them and erase the picture by using the backdoor program, but they found it.”
“Thought I taught you to move fast when you work with hacks like that.”
He did. “I couldn’t figure out one of the guys. I was waiting for them to slip his name in an email. If I moved before I had the last of the group, I would have tipped my hand.”
Pigpen crosses his arms over his chest, clearly pissed that I’m not following his set rules for hacking. “You should have come to me when you hit that snag.”
“I fucked up.”
“You did, but now you’re playing straight. What was your endgame?”
“Figure out who was involved. Go through their phones and computers, then wipe the picture clean in one swipe.”
“It’s a hell of a risk to take that they haven’t stored the picture someplace else. I taught you to never underestimate.”
Until they found my hack, I was convinced they were minor-league players. I crack my neck as I do something I hate—repeat myself. “I fucked up and Breanna’s suffering for it. If you can’t figure it out, I’m asking for help.” And doing so is like offering a pound of my flesh.
“Give me what you know and we’ll get it taken care of.”
“I promised Breanna this would stay out of the club. I’m asking this as a personal favor.”
Pigpen shoves off the railing and studies me like I got caught knocking over a liquor store. “I told you, no more personal favors. You have a problem, then you lean on your brothers. That’s the point of the whole fucking club.”
“I promised her—”
“You made a promise to us first,” he cuts me off. “Here’s the thing, I know the past couple of months have been tough. Fuck, I’m not going to even pretend what the past couple of years have been like, but you have a family willing to take the same type of bullet that you did for us. You expect us to trust you, but it’s a shitty position to be in when we’re the one giving all the blind faith. It’s a two-way street with us. You either start trusting us or you need to give up your patch, because without trust, those colors on you don’t mean shit.”
“That how it is?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says like it’s simple addition. “That’s how it is.”
We glare at each other as it crawls under my skin that he won’t look away.
“And another thing...you say you love her, then you better figure out quick if you can trust us, because if you want to get her out of this mess, you’re going to need the club. Just so you know, brother, you think it’s impossible to trust us with you, it’ll probably kill you to trust us with what you love the most.”
A muscle in my jaw twitches. “If you help her, I want in.”
Pigpen shakes his head. “We offered that help the night you brought her to the club. We saw you weren’t budging. This is it, kid. End of the road. The stakes are high everywhere and it’s time for you to go all in or to fucking fold. Which one is it going to be?”
Breanna
I’VE BEEN DRAWN to Razor—like a possessed moth to an inferno. So many reasons explain why: his beauty, his understanding, the way he protects, but it’s not until my chat with Clara that I understood what attracted me to him emotionally...at least initially. He understood what it was like to feel as if you had possibly driven someone to take their own life.
The guilt.
The self-hate.
The feeling that your existence is absolutely worthless.
I saw it in his face the night outside of Shamrock’s and I hurt for him because I still hurt for me. Clara pulled the knife away from her skin. She sank to the floor, tears streaming down her cheeks, telling me that she would do it if I ever told anyone what I saw.
I never betrayed her secret. Instead, I’ve let it eat me from the inside out.
A rush of air escapes my lips. His mother didn’t commit suicide. I’m utterly relieved for him and still devastated for me. Year after year, Razor grew up tortured by the gossip of everyone in town, grew up believing that
his mother chose to take her own life rather than to be with him. The entire time, the people who think they know everything knew nothing, but the emotional damage has already been done. The same damage that’s already been done to me.
I stare at his mother’s picture. She was beautiful. Blond hair. Sky-blue eyes. She has a fantastic smile. Mom says she was smart and full of life and Rebecca said that being a club girl isn’t for everyone. Is it for me?
My eyes dip to a picture of Razor, Chevy and Oz crouched near a motorcycle. They’re flipping off the camera and they grin as if they were laughing like children.
“I like it when you smile.” Razor strides into the room and I jump. I hadn’t realized I had been smiling, but I got lost in the pictures. As weird as his world is to me, I do strangely find myself gravitating toward it. As if I do belong.
An undertow of sadness yanks me down. I finally find a place I belong and I’m being ripped away. I’ll have to tell him and doing so is going to break my heart.
I gesture to the picture. “This reminds me of the night of orientation. You were working on your motorcycle then, too.”
Razor gathers me so that his front warms my back. He props his chin on my shoulder and his breath tickles the sensitive spot behind my ear. A wave of pleasure races through me.
“So you were checking me out that night.” The smugness radiating from him is so sickening that I mock elbow him and he fake flinches as if I hurt him. I drank Razor in that evening, and I lean back into him now, reveling in the fact that, at least in this moment, he’s mine.
“We need to talk.” Razor loses his lightness, and I’m not ready for us to confront reality—the logic of our situation.
“We do.” I pivot in his arms so we’re face-to-face. “But you made a promise to me about you healing and then us being alone, and I know how you are about your promises.”
Razor goes completely still, and as he blinks back to life, he tunnels his fingers into my hair. “Breanna, those are words I fantasize about hearing you say, but we have time.”
I shift my weight because we don’t have time.
His fingers ease farther into my hair until he cups my head. “I know Kyle sent the picture to your parents. Addison told me they’re sending you away. I know you’re scared this is—”
“The end,” I finish for him. “I need us to make memories.”
Razor’s eyes shut like my words cause him pain and it’s not what I want. He lowers his forehead to mine. “We’re going to figure this out.”
We won’t, and a lump in the back of my throat confirms this. “Their decision is made. There’s nothing I can do or say to make any of this go away.”
“No, Breanna.” His voice cracks and it causes a flash of agony in my chest. “Let’s take a few steps back, talk this out, solve the puzzle—”
I kiss him. My mouth on his. Without fear. Without thought. All of my emotions, my love, my trust wrapped up in this embrace. Our lips move in time. Too fast, almost desperate.
There’s an ache within me—a curling of warmth in my stomach. It’s like an indescribable, beautiful need, a desire even, and it’s calling for Razor to touch me, to ravish me, to bring me to this glorious high only he has brought me to before.
His fingers gently pull on my hair, creating pleasing tingles that zap to my toes, and my hands find his chest. Through the fabric of his shirt, I explore his muscles, but this isn’t enough. I crave the warmth of his skin, and for there to be absolutely nothing between us.
As I reach the hem of his shirt, my wrist bumps his cut and my eyes snap open. I draw in a breath and Razor is looking down at me with the deepest blue eyes.
“You can take it off,” he says, and the thought of doing so terrifies me and causes a spark of joy. He doesn’t allow anyone to handle his cut, and when someone does touch it, they’re careful to avoid his patches.
I reach under the leather, up to his strong shoulders, and keeping my hands safely inside the cut, I slowly edge it off his arms. It’s like a countdown. The moment this is off, everything will become discarded. My shirt and his. His jeans and possibly mine. We’ll be tangled and touching and everything I need this moment to be.
I lick my bottom lip and heat rushes through me as Razor’s eyes track the movement. That provocative feral glint appears in his eyes again. It’s like we’re becoming victims of pure, unadulterated instinct.
My fingertips graze along his arms, over his biceps, along the inside of his wrist, and with each second that passes, my heart rate increases. Faster and faster and faster.
His cut skims over his hands, and when he grips it, my heart stutters with the switch in pace. Razor takes over. Easing his cut off, he folds it, then reverently places it on his dresser.
Razor circles an arm around me, and a smile bursts from me when he lifts me off the floor and carries me to his bed. He’s gentle as he lays me down. My head settles into the huge pillow and my body is cradled by the blanket beneath me.
Razor yanks his shirt over his head to reveal all his beauty and he kneels. One knee against my outer thigh. The other tucked between my legs. His fingers pace the inner seam of my jeans—the area above my knee. A heightened sense of awareness causes my cells to awaken.
He leans down, situates his hands on either side of me, but hovers his body wickedly away from mine. “I’m in love with you. This isn’t a memory, but a promise, do you hear me?”
I hear him and his words cause a pain in my chest. One of my hands slides along his spine and another touches his cheek. His jaw is smooth and his blond hair falls so that it almost covers his eyes. I’m in love with him and I’ll take whatever I can get from Razor—his love, his memory, a promise. “I love you, too.”
He drops his head and kisses my neck. It’s a long kiss, an enduring one. It causes goose bumps along my arms and my blood to hum. His hands are magic, creating a tingling sensation wherever they roam. Down my arms, along my sides, up again as he tugs at my shirt.
His lips meet mine and we’re both leaning up, my hands over my head. We briefly separate as the material is eased off my body and tossed to the floor. My back arches as he begins this slow, seductive trail of kisses.
Soon, there’s no material between our chests and he touches and kisses and nips and his hands move lower. My body and Razor’s rock in the same rhythm that’s being synchronized by our pulses. I suck in an audible breath that partly describes the intense pleasure.
Razor moans and the sound drives me close to the brink of insanity.
His body glides against mine as he drags himself toward me for more kisses. These are on fire and intense and it’s like we can’t satisfy this building hunger.
The world spins, several times, and I’m touching and he’s touching and we’re kissing and there’s whispers. Lots of whispers of love and of God and there’s this warmth. Oh, this warmth. It’s hot and it’s consuming and it’s spreading and then my muscles tense and an explosion.
Colors and sounds and a rush and then I’m gasping for air.
Lots of air. Razor’s breathing hard beside me, cradling my head, kissing my lips, my cheeks, and whispering that this was right, and he utters those magical words again. “I love you.”
RAZOR
CLOSE TO NAKED and tangled with me in my bed, Breanna’s head is on my chest and she tells me everything. From Kyle, to her parents, to her siblings’ reaction and the bad news I had hoped was wrong—that Breanna is being sent to private school—that she’s being sent away from me. I’m not Chevy and I don’t have any more tricks up my sleeve. Her parents are packing her up and Kyle still holds all the cards.
As she talks, I stare at the ceiling, graze my fingers up and down her bare back and search for a solution, but I keep circling back to the same place—with a solution she won’t easily accept.
Breanna falls silent, a
nd I give her a few seconds in case she remembers something else or I can create some brilliant plan. Neither happens.
“Can I tell you something?” she asks.
I fist her long raven hair and kiss her forehead. “Anything.”
Breanna lightly brushes her fingernails over my chest and her apprehension is palpable.
“Tell me,” I say.
“The night I met you, going to that private school was my dream. I would have given anything for my parents to say yes.”
I swallow the fear nagging at me. “And now?”
She lifts her head and the pain in her eyes is her answer. “I don’t want to go, not like this. Not because of this. Not because I’m in love with you and they won’t give you a chance.”
I trace her cheekbone and weigh her words. There’s a part of her that wants to go, and why wouldn’t she? This is a place that can challenge that perfect brain of hers, a place where she’ll meet other people like her, a place where, as she said, she’ll fit in and meet her tribe.
Just like how I have a tribe—my club. A group of men who understand there are days I want to talk and days I don’t. A group of men who I have proudly taken a bullet for and who would take the same bullet for me again and again. A group of men who are begging me to love and trust them the way they crave to love and trust me. A group that I’ve hurt because I can’t get past my own demons.
“I fucked up with Kyle and I’m sorry it’s costing you.”
She offers a sad smile that breaks my heart. “You tried, and that means everything to me. It’s okay. I’ll write the papers. At least being a hundred miles away will keep Kyle from tormenting me on a daily basis.”
But he’ll still torture her, possibly worse because he’ll hate the loss of control that comes with not being able to confront her in person. Fuck that. Trying isn’t good enough. “There’s a way to fix it with Kyle. The path I should have taken and I was too stupid and prideful to do it.”