Gatling (Blackjacks MC #3)

Chapter 1

Chapter one

Gatling

The fear in Kelsie’s voice over the phone haunted me as I revved my bike and sped through town. She sounded so fucking scared.

Ryker, I think there’s someone in my apartment.

She didn’t call the cops. She didn’t call her overprotective big brother, Noah.

She called me. Her brother’s best friend. The outlaw biker that a sweet, innocent girl like her shouldn’t be associating with, especially this late at night.

Clutching the handlebars of my bike with a white-knuckle grip, I pushed well beyond the speed limit. My headlight blazed a washed-out path of light across the road in the dark.

On my right, Dimitri “Vlad” Volkov kept pace with me on his wine-red bike. As the Enforcer of the Blackjacks MC, he didn’t shy away from getting his hands bloody, breaking up fights, or using his muscles to prove his point.

This whole thing could be a false alarm. There was a chance that I might have dragged him along on a wild goose chase for nothing.

Secretly though, I was grateful for the big brute of a man.

For the most part, I kept to myself and handled my own business.

But when trouble reared its ugly head, I recognized the value of having backup.

During my service in the military, I leaned on my brothers-in-arms during the heat of battle.

As a club member, my biker brothers were the ones I called in for reinforcements when shit hit the fan.

I didn’t know what I was running into here with Kelsie. As soon as I heard she might have an intruder in her apartment, everything after that was a blur of motion, a haze of white static in my brain, with nothing but the urge to protect taking over my instincts.

Turning the corner, Kelsie’s apartment building came into view. The place wasn’t in great shape, with a laundry list of maintenance issues that had been left unresolved ever since she moved in four years ago. But the rent was cheap, so Kelsie could save up a little money every month.

Standing on the scrubby lawn outside, Kelsie hugged her arms around her middle, shifting restlessly. Accompanying her was an elderly woman in a gaudy fuschia bathrobe and curlers—Kelsie’s landlady, Ms. Jalinski.

I barely parked at the curb when Kelsie flew toward me. Flinging her arms around my neck, her body collided with mine. A grunt of surprise escaped me, and I stumbled back a few steps to catch my balance.

Then my breath caught in my throat. Kelsie’s soft curves were pressed against me—plump tits, thick thighs, rounded hips. And for a split second, my brain went totally blank. My fingers itched to grip her flesh until it dimpled beneath my touch.

I swallowed hard, scolding myself for being a creep.

Kelsie was barely twenty-six. Compared to my forty-four years, that age gap was a significant one. Besides, she was my best friend’s little sister. Noah would expect me to look after her. Not fucking feel her up.

Taking Kelsie by the shoulders, I pried her away, putting a safe distance between us. She gazed up at me with misty gray eyes.

“Tell me again,” I said. “What happened?”

She gulped down a shuddering breath, tugging the sleeves of her sweater down over her fidgeting hands.

“When I got into my apartment, I checked all the windows like you and Noah taught me. Everything was locked. No sign of a break-in.”

Crossing my arms, I nodded, listening.

I met Kelsie’s brother, Noah, when we served in the military together. He was charming, warm, and friendly, compared to my prickly, aloof demeanor. I didn’t have a living soul in the world that I could call a friend at that point.

But Noah was determined to change that, for some reason I could never understand.

When he dragged my unconscious body from the rubble of a building after an IED went off, our friendship was locked in for good.

After we left the military, it wasn’t easy adjusting to civilian life again. We didn’t know what to do with ourselves when a drill sergeant wasn't yelling at us day and night.

On top of that, Noah became the unexpected guardian of his baby sister after a car crash killed their parents.

So Kelsie was raised between two ex-soldiers twice her age.

She grew up learning how to defend herself in hand-to-hand combat.

Memorizing strike points on the body for maximum damage with minimal pressure.

When she was old enough, Noah and I showed her the proper care and handling of a firearm, setting up an impromptu shooting range in my backyard for practice.

“What tipped you off that something was wrong?” I asked.

“I found these.”

Kelsie held up a pair of men’s sunglasses with bronze lens. Nothing I would wear. And certainly not a style that her brother would wear either. A prickle of warning spider-walked down my spine.

Ms. Jalinski spoke up.

“I told you before, sweetie. A boyfriend probably forgot them. You brought home that nice young man from the post office a few weeks ago, remember?”

Kelsie’s cheeks turned a mortified shade of pink, avoiding my gaze.

Something nasty and dark curled around my spine, tightening with a possessive grip that I had no right to. She was twenty-six years old, for fuck’s sake. Of course she would bring men back to her apartment.

I still didn’t like it.

“You’re dating a mail boy?” I said in a flat voice.

Kelsie huffed with annoyance.

“He’s a postal worker. Not a mail boy. And no, not anymore.”

“Maybe he left them behind and you didn’t notice until now,” I suggested.

She shook her head.

“They were right next to my sink. I would have seen them when I was washing dishes. Besides, I haven’t had anyone else in my apartment since then.”

Well. That wasn’t true. But I wouldn’t admit it out loud.

Scrubbing a hand over my mouth, I looked away in case something in my expression betrayed me.

Three days ago, I overheard Kelsie mention a leaky faucet in her shower. I didn’t like relying on other people when I could get the job done myself, especially when it came to maintenance techs who were notorious for dragging their feet.

So, while she was at work, I let myself into Kelsie’s apartment…with the spare key she didn’t know I had. Strictly for safety purposes, I reasoned.

It took less than fifteen minutes to fix the faucet. And that should have been the end of it.

But I’m a no-good, rotten bastard.

Bundled at the foot of Kelsie’s mattress was a pile of clean laundry, smelling of fresh, floral detergent. T-shirts and skirts, pajamas and shorts were jumbled up, tossed there to be folded and put away later.

Peeking out from a pair of jeans was a pair of pink, lacy panties.

My gaze locked on that fabric and every drop of blood in my body barrelled south. My cock twitched against the zipper of my fly, damning me to burn in hell for eternity.

Reaching out, I plucked the panties up, twining them around my fingers.

Fuck, they were so soft and silky. I'd clenched my teeth tight enough to snap my jaw, thinking about what that color would look like against Kelsie’s bare skin.

During the course of my lifetime, I had committed many sins that I wasn’t proud of.

Stuffing those panties into my pocket was one of them.

It was wrong on every level.

And I didn’t give a shit.

Taking the sunglasses from Kelsie now, I examined them. No identifying marks to indicate who the owner might be. Probably couldn’t get fingerprints off them at this point either, but I would try anyway. I tucked them into the inner pocket of my cut for safe keeping.

Kelsie cast a worried glance at me, chewing her lower lip. The number one thing that Noah and I had hammered into her brain above everything else we taught her: trust your gut. If something made her uneasy, it was better to act on it than to second guess it.

Hesitation usually caused more harm than good anyway.

Turning to Vlad, I gestured for him to approach. He had waited by our bikes at the curb, hanging back while I assessed the situation. Since this wasn’t club business, he was here by invitation only.

When Vlad rose from his bike, Ms. Jalinski’s eyebrows shot up and she made a noise of surprise.

“Good lord.”

He tended to have that effect on people everywhere he went. Generating shock and intimidation at the sheer size of him. There was a reason he’d been voted into the Enforcer position. With his tatted forearms, broad chest, and thick Russian accent, he didn’t exactly give off cuddly vibes.

“Stay here with Vlad,” I said. “I’ll take a look around.”

Kelsie nodded, but it didn’t seem to soothe her anxiety. Vlad came to stand a respectful distance away from the ladies, bristling with muscle.

If someone wanted to hurt Kelsie, they wouldn’t dare try anything with Vlad hanging around. Unless they had a death wish. Or they were a fucking moron. I’d seen Vlad crush a man’s skull like a grape with his bare hands. It wasn’t a pretty sight.

I headed into the building, taking the stairs two at a time. Stepping into Kelsie’s apartment, I did a general sweep of the area. I canvassed the kitchen twice, where Kelsie found the sunglasses.

No sign of an intruder.

Then I turned and caught the faint scent of…something.

Not Kelsie.

I knew her soap, her perfume. Sweetly fruity and floral. Like peaches and lilies.

This was different. Musky. Salty. Bordering on metallic.

I took another step, edging toward the living room. Could be the lingering scent of an old boyfriend…

The scent vanished.

“Damn it,” I hissed, circling back in an attempt to find it again.

Like a bloodhound, I paced Kelsie’s apartment, sniffing the air in an attempt to capture that smell again.

No luck.

Back home in West Virginia, I grew up in the woods, tracking and hunting wildlife for meat.

Appalachian wilderness was rife with tall tales of monsters that went bump in the night.

And when you spend hours, isolated and alone, deep in the backcountry, you start seeing weird shit that isn’t really there.

Joining the military made things worse in that department. Especially after being medically discharged with PTSD. I lost countless nights of sleep to the phantom battles playing out in my bedroom, right before my eyes.

Until the flashbacks faded, and I was alone again, with nothing but hot adrenaline pumping through my body at a million miles an hour.

Was I imagining this masculine scent? Was jealousy fucking with my head and making me smell something that didn’t exist?

Standing in the middle of Kelsie’s apartment, surrounded with her vibrant colors splashed everywhere…an instinctual tug in my stomach told me that I wasn’t making up anything.

Trust your gut, I always told Kelsie.

Some fucker had been in my girl’s apartment.