Chapter 4
Don’t nobody get on my nerves like everybody.
— Cutter’s secret thoughts
CUTTER
The sound of bikes pulling up outside my place had me grabbing my helmet, my cut, and slipping out the door.
I jerked my chin up toward the four bikers waiting for me and stopped at the side of my bike, shrugging into the Truth Tellers MC cut before sliding the helmet over my head.
There were quite a few people that didn’t wear helmets, but the Truth Tellers weren’t one of them. We were all former military.
Every last one of us knew the significance of protecting your noggin.
Plus , all of us had people we cared about, and we didn’t want them to find out we were dead because our heads met pavement and exploded like a cantaloupe.
“ Boys ,” I drawled as I threw my leg over my Fat Boy and leaned far enough to the side to swing the kickstand free.
“ Coastguard ,” Detroit , whose real name was Audric , greeted me. “ Ready to ride?”
Coastguard was the name given to me by the old president of the Truth Tellers . He’d been a Navy man himself and knew how to insult a fellow Navy man.
“ Sure am,” I breathed. “ It’s been a long ass day.”
I started my bike up, and we went to the next house, which just so happened to be where Apollo had been spending his evening. Apollo’s real name was actually Finnian .
Apollo was running out of the house without his boots on.
He didn’t have his belt, shirt or cut on, either.
He did, however, have his helmet strapped to his head.
“ Bruh ,” Bodie , whose road name is Knight , drawled. “ What the fuck are you doing here?”
Apollo flipped the visor up on his helmet, and his blazing white grin shone through. “ Getting caught up on all the gossip.”
“ Hopefully you don’t get caught up on the clap,” Posy , better known as Doc , grumbled. “ Seriously , she’s been sleeping with everyone at the hospital.”
Doc , being a paramedic, would know. He spent a lot of time there.
“ I know, I know.” Apollo groaned. “ But she gives really good head.”
I had to laugh as we started off, this time heading to Hagrid’s place.
Hagrid met us at the road before his house came into view, and I raised a brow at him.
He shrugged, but knew it was likely due to the way his girlfriend would yell at him about leaving as soon as he’d gotten home.
Once we’d caught up with him, Piers , whose road name was Webber , our de facto president, signaled for us to ride.
We did, going from I75 to I30 , which would eventually take us to the road around the lake, which was where we preferred to ride since it was more scenic, and wasn’t fuckin’ wall to wall traffic.
The sound of a bike whizzing past us going the opposite direction had me shaking my head.
Going that fast was exhilarating, but it was stupid.
If you wrecked going that speed, there was no saving you.
You were dead on impact.
The sound of the bike faded, and the sound of my pipes replaced it, allowing me to forget the stupidity of some people and just enjoy the night.
As much as I could, anyway, with all the fuckin’ traffic.
But once we got past the goddamn Costco , things would get a little less busy.
It was a nice night for a ride.
It was mid- March , and it was the first night that it was above seventy in months.
So , of course, the club decided tonight was a perfect night for a ride.
That , and we usually tried to get together on a Wednesday to catch up.
All of us were busy people, and the times where we could get all of us into one place were few and far between.
Today , we only had about half of our group, but that was okay.
Spending time with my brothers from the club was great.
Even better was that Chevy , my actual brother, was in the Truth Tellers MC with me. Though , he was spending his time with Keely tonight.
The sound of the crotch rocket slowly started to creep toward us again, and I sighed, knowing that he was about to be on us any second.
All of us moved out of the fast lane almost as one, knowing the dumb fuck was about to come up on our right whether we were in that lane or not.
Which , we were right.
We moved over just in time for a red flashy, likely brand new off the showroom floor, crotch rocket came up to the side of us.
I looked over in time to see black hair flying.
My gaze went from the black hair—all long, lovely inches of it attached to a head that was buried so deep in the man’s back that she looked like she was trying to disappear—to the shapely body.
The very shapely body.
She had a fantastic set of arms that were clutching onto the man guiding the bike so hard that her fingers were bloodless. Her tan hands were the only thing that I could see of her skin.
She had long legs with shapely thighs and the cutest Timberlands on her feet that looked like they were kids’.
Then her face turned, and her eyes—goddamn, they were indigo and full of terror—met mine.
“ Please ,” she mouthed, and I couldn’t stop myself.
I moved my bike closer to the crotch rocket holding the terrorized woman and reached out for her.
After entwining our forearms, she let go of the man, and seconds later, she went from his bike to mine.
She clutched me like her life depended on it, and she turned her face to rest against my back.
And something shifted inside of me.
I didn’t know what it was.
What I did know was that the protectiveness that overtook me at having her wrapped around me was leaving me breathless.
The man’s outraged face turned to me, and I moved, forcing my way between Apollo and Webber , who moved to block the angry man’s attempt to follow me.
It took ten minutes, but eventually I’d maneuvered us to a place that was safe to pull off—a picnic area that would lead to the lake—and pulled the bike over.
When we came to a stop, I fully expected the woman to jump off and rid herself of my closeness, but she stayed where she was, which was when I realized that she was shaking.
And not just a little bit shaky. Full on bone rattling, teeth clacking, scared out of her goddamn mind shaking.
“ Darlin ’,” I said, trying to pry off her hand that was fisted in my leather cut. “ You’re okay.”
Bikes pulled to a stop all around me, and I got quite a few looks that clearly said “fuck” from my brothers.
It was Webber who came up and handed me a phone before saying, “ It’s hers. Was in her back pocket.”
“ That’s my goddamn girlfriend, motherfucker!” I heard an angry voice say behind me.
I tapped the phone’s screen and saw a photo of a tiny little baby on the screen.
I idly wondered if it was hers as I said, “ Honey , what’s your lock code?”
She didn’t answer.
She did squeeze me tighter, and it was then that I noticed that her arms couldn’t fit fully around my chest.
Covering her hands with one of my own, I hit the emergency number on the side screen and hit go.
“ Milena ,” a man’s smooth voice said. “ Are you awake enough for visitors? We just pulled onto I30 .”
I wondered who it was that I’d just called. “ Not Milena . This is Cutter Clayborne . I just pulled your woman off a bike, and she’s fuckin’ terrified. Can you come get her? I don’t think any more riding is going to be a good thing for her right now.”
There was a long moment of silence before the man said, very carefully, “ I’ll be there in five minutes.”
The shaking woman continued to chatter her teeth behind me, and the rest of my brothers talked softly all around me, casting sidelong glances at the girl that had yet to loosen her grip.
“ Seriously , if you don’t move your fuckin’ ass right now and let me get to her, I’ll …”
“ You’ll what, tit bag?” Hagrid asked. “ You’re not getting through all of us. So , unless you really are stupid enough to try, go back to your bike and ride away.”
Hagrid had just finished the last of his taunting words when an armored black Mercedes rolled to a stop directly behind us.
I didn’t bother to ask how the man knew where we were.
Likely , he had a tracker on the woman’s phone.
“ Honey ,” I said. “ The man who is in your emergency contact is here.”
Still no movement—well, besides the shaking.
The man arrived like an avenging angel.
He pushed through the bikers like he had not a single care in the world and walked right up to the woman in my arms.
I tried to release her, but she wasn’t going without any coaxing.
“ Go Go , darlin’,” I said. “ You gotta let go.”
“ No ,” she moaned.
“ Milena .”
The man looked ready to rip her from my body.
I held my hands up to let him know I wasn’t holding her there.
He looked at me, studying my face, before saying, “ Milena , sister. I have my car here…”
“ Of fuckin’ course you’d show up,” the punk from the crotch rocket said. “ She always calls her big brother to protect her from thin air.”
The “big brother” turned only his head and pinned the prick with a stare. “ If you ever show your face in front of me again, I’ll peel your skin off your face and shove it up your ass.”
As threats went, that one was pretty damn good.
If I were a lesser man, like the punk behind me, I would’ve been definitely rethinking my words.
But he snorted. “ You don’t scare me, Semyonov .”
That name had my mind screeching to a halt.
There was only one Semyonov in the area that would’ve scared anyone, and if this was him, I’d definitely be thinking better of my words.
From what I’d been able to garner based solely on word of mouth, Shasha Semyonov was one scary son of a bitch.
“ If I get my sister in this car and you’re still here, I’m running you over with it,” Semyonov growled.
Seconds later, she was being pried from my body.
“ No , no, no.” She reached for me again, and I wouldn’t admit to how that made me feel.
Warm .
Wanted .
Definitely delusional.
She was shaking so hard that he could barely hold onto her.
“ Put her in your car, I’ll tell you what happened,” I suggested.
“ What the fuck?”
Before the man could move with whom I assumed was his sister, the prick from earlier chose violence.
He pulled his crotch rocket right up in the middle of our club, got off, and barreled toward the man still holding the woman.
I stepped around the man and placed my body in front of his before saying, “ I need you to think long and hard for a moment. Ask yourself is this really how you want to die.”
I wasn’t joking either.
I knew several different ways to kill the dumbass without breaking a sweat.
“ Like the crime lord of Dallas really needs your fuckin’ help.” The dumbass snorted. “ Give me my girl back.”
“ She’s not your girl anymore,” I supplied. “ You likely lost that privilege when you started driving a hundred and fifty miles an hour with her in the middle of rush hour traffic.”
“ What ?” the man behind me asked quietly.
“ Car , man,” I said over my shoulder. “ I’ll explain everything.”
The man behind me did just that.
When the one in front of me went to make a grab for her, I caught his wrist with my hand and twisted it quickly behind his back.
He went down to his knees screeching. “ Do you know who I am?”
I didn’t care who the fuck he was.
I waited until he was damn near kissing the pavement before I told Semyonov exactly what happened.
He listened calmly, and didn’t interrupt until I was finished.
With one look from me to the dude still lying on the ground, his face full of sweat, he said, “ You have two seconds to get out of my sight. If you decide to linger, we’ll be accidentally shoving you out into traffic.”
“ There’s no…”
A car revved its engine, and I looked back to see a woman at the wheel of the car, looking pissed as hell.
“ As I was saying,” he said. “ Leave .”
The man finally found the head on his shoulders and left, but not without a last parting shot. “ This isn’t over, Semyonov .”
Semyonov smiled and watched as the man left on his bike.
It was only when he was so far in the distance that we couldn’t see him that Semyonov turned to me and said, “ I owe you a debt.”
I studied the man for a long second before saying, “ You owe me nothing.”
I left after that, getting back on my bike.
The ride through the lake was beautiful, and by the time I arrived home, I felt like I could breathe again.
Only , my mind kept straying back to her, and who the hell she was.
Milena .
Milena Semyonov ?
The sad fact was, I’d probably never find out.