Fire Meets Fire: Wretched Soulz MC

Chapter 20

Chaz wants me? I knew he wanted me sexually, no woman could miss the signs. But to think of a permanent relationship? I don’t know how to begin to process that. And making love? Sex has always been a function for me, a transaction between two consenting partners at best, a lack of consent and control at the worst. I haven’t any expectations, just hopeful of just being able to get a pleasurable release. I’ve never known tenderness after doing the deed. Sometimes a perfunctory thank you was all I got. But on my part, I’d never needed anything more. I didn’t need distractions. So focused on my career, nothing was going to divert me from that.

But Chaz? Something drew me to him from the first moment we met. In the beginning it was because I wanted to get something over on the smirking MC prez, but though I fought it, there’s no denying I’d felt the growing attraction between us.

What would a man like Chaz want from a relationship? While I don’t know his exact age, I’d put him in his early forties, half a dozen, maybe ten or so years older than me. If he hasn’t yet found someone to spend his life with, why should he want to change now?

I know my plan for getting information from the Dominators is risky, particularly due to the affliction that affects me. But up to now I hadn’t considered I had very much to live for, even if I could come out of hiding and stop always looking behind me. Those fucking terrorists had destroyed the woman I was. And if my demise results in me taking a den of Dominators along with me, well, personally, I can’t see much wrong with that. When you serve you, however much you might put it out of your mind, there’s always a risk you could die. The odds so great you need to make a will to leave behind you. My desire for life has taken a large hit. Without being able to fly, what the fuck do I do now?

And here’s Chaz, offering me a future, a glimpse of something I’d considered out of my reach. While, before him, I could never imagine allowing a man to touch me again, let alone wanting him to, my body has already started to crave his. It’s still debatable whether my mind will allow things to proceed, but there’s starting to be a part of me that says I don’t want to die without at least giving it a try. Hence my push for Chaz to just take me.

That’s not playing to his plan. He wants to ensure we both survive, holding that tantalising image of sex with him as a bribe.

I don’t want him coming into the Dominator’s club with me. There’s so much that could go wrong. With or without me, Chas has got a life worth living, and a family of sorts behind him.

Since his intense declaration, I’ve stood still as a stone while my thoughts have been racing. Obviously Chaz has come to the conclusion he’s stunned me.

He sends a wary glance my way. “Too much too soon?”

“Too much,” I tell him. But before he can take that as a complete rejection, I carry on, “I’ve never thought about slowing down and simply living, enjoying life. Never had a chance before. First, I had to get out of the fucked-up childhood I had, then I soon learned being a soldier wasn’t enough. As a female, I had to continually fight to wear the uniform, and then that became habit and I never stopped. Before I could even near the pinnacle of what I could achieve, that was taken away. Now, I’m Stateside, with a destroyed career, but I still can’t fucking stop. Not with some bastard trying to kill me.” I pause, collecting my thoughts, wanting to find the right words to put forward what I’m thinking. “I’ve never had the time to take something for myself, or to try what you’re describing as a relationship.”

He offers a wry shrug. “You’ve never been loved. Truth is, I’ve never found that myself. Or not until I met you.”

“You think you love me?”

His eyes close and his brow creases as he thinks for a few seconds. Then his startlingly dark pupils are regarding me again. “I’ve never wanted someone riding behind me. Nor thought that my life would be better for having you in it. I love my club, yet I almost gave that up because of you. Now I value my life much less than yours. Is that love?”

What is love? I answer him honestly. “I’ve never been drawn to someone as much as you. As it’s out of my experience, I can’t say more than I’d like to explore it. And I can’t with that asshole at my back.”

Chaz’s eyes harden, then he pulls me into him. Rather than feeling trapped by his steel embrace, I allow myself to feel cherished. “We’re going to get rid of the fucker and not by you blowing yourself up.”

“Last resort,” I murmur against his chest.

It’s him who initiates the kiss this time. Our lips touch, our tongues explore, our hands caress. My heart rate and breathing speed up, only to be matched by his. His hardness pushing at my groin makes me aware of a throbbing inside me. I’m about one breath away from saying fuck this making love shit, just fuck me now when he pulls away. He rests his forehead against mine.

“Now we’ve both got a good fucking reason to go get your shit squared away.” His eyes hold mine. “And without either of us dying.”

Without giving me a chance to object, he takes a firm hold of my hand and starts leading me back down the track. For the first few steps my thighs make my core ache as they rub together, but seeing as he’s stepping extra wide paces, I know he’s affected the same way.

As we descend though, our breaths even out and our posture gets back to normal as thoughts of a sexy time put in abeyance are replaced by the seriousness of what we do next. I’ll never have a chance to find out what Chaz can offer with a price on my head.

“Do you mind me calling you Queenie?” he asks when we’re about halfway down.

His expression shows me it’s been on his mind. Handles that come by honestly are to be proud of, and I always thought I’d hang on to mine. But he’d put it in a different perspective. Helo is my past. Maybe being Queenie would help me leave that baggage behind. But there are limits.

“Only you, Chaz.”

“Fair.”

We take another couple of steps. “Why haven’t you got a road name?”

He snorts. “I have, babe.”

I stop him. “You’re not Chaz?”

“Until I joined the MC, I was Charlie. I preferred that.” A wide grin appears, and he chuckles. “Made a rookie mistake as a prospect when a full member shortened it to Chaz, and I corrected him.” He pauses at my confusion and shrugs. “You’ve met Shitface? Prospects can’t complain, whatever we call them.”

“So it stuck?” I smile.

“Yeah, it stuck. When I got patched in, the same member pushed for me keeping the road name.”

“Charlie.” I try it on for size, not sure whether it suits the man I’ve become so used to calling Chaz.

But I make a mental note to remember it when he rewards me with a wide smile. “Like my name on your lips.”

“You fucked and got shit sorted?” Slugger roars out, letting me know we’ve neared the cabin once more.

Slugger, along with some of the other men, are out smoking by their bikes. Others not partaking in the same habit are stamping their feet or showing other symptoms of being ready to get on the move.

It seems neither of us are the type to kiss and tell—not that there’s anything to say—as neither Chaz nor I deign to answer his question.

“Thank fuck you don’t last long,” their road captain states as he swaggers out of the cabin, pointedly holding his bike key in his hand.

“Shut it, Weasel,” Chaz growls, then approaches Slugger. “You got a plan?”

“Yeah.” Slugger smirks. “While you two have been coming to your fuckin’ senses, we’ve planned how it will all go down. You,” he points a finger at Chaz, then shoots his thumb sideways at me, “and her will play your parts just as we decided.”

“What fucking parts?”

“Now, now, Chaz. You going to give us reason to think you don’t trust your brothers?”

Chaz shoots a suspicious look around the assembled group who refuse to meet his eye or shrug as if they’ve no clue what anyone’s talking about.

“Prez,” Bull states. “We’re gonna go back to the clubhouse and get things in motion.”

“Yeah, like building a bomb for her for a start,” the man who doesn’t seem to have a clue about body odour states, then laughs.

Chaz swings around but before he can get a word out of his mouth, Slugger shouts out, “Mount up. Now.”

Whatever Chaz had been about to say is lost in the roar of motorcycles. Slugger positions himself at the front, then Weasel gives his prez a pointed look and then jerks his head toward his bike.

“Fuck it,” the man with his arm around me growls, then leads me to the bike I’d ridden here on only the day before. I get on behind but before he starts the engine, he turns his head. “We’ll sort this out back at the clubhouse. There’s no fuckin’ way you’re going to be a human bomb.”

Frowning at his back, I wonder if he had all this planned. I’d steeled myself to have a quick fuck, something to try to get him out of my mind. Been there, done that, move on. But the fact that he’d denied me only seems to make me want him more. Now, damn it, instead of accepting the inevitable, I’m working on how to get out of this alive so I can take him up on all that he promised.

A new life.Sure, I wouldn’t be Helo, Night Stalker anymore. But somehow I know Chaz and his club would be able to give me a life worth living for.

Fuck the man.I grin into his back.