Chapter 16 #2
A cold beer appears in Cece’s hand, delivered by a topless waitress who gives me a wink before sauntering off. I watch Cece closely as she takes a long pull from the bottle, her throat working as she swallows, doing her best to hide whatever discomfort she’s feeling.
There’s fire in her expression—determination, laced with something else. Maybe curiosity. Maybe rebellion. Either way, she’s holding her own better than I expected, which both impresses and terrifies me.
“Who do we have here?” a female voice cuts through the noise, and I turn to see Tasha, Domino's girlfriend, pushing her way toward us.
Unlike the half-naked women circling the room, she's fully dressed in jeans and a tight tank top, her dark hair pulled into a severe ponytail.
She turns to me, one perfectly shaped eyebrow raised.
“You couldn't have brought her on a regular night, Bray? Had to throw her straight into the shark tank?”
“Wasn't planning on coming at all,” I mutter, grateful for Tasha's intervention. She might be a ball-buster, but she's got a protective streak a mile wide when it comes to outsiders. “Didn't realize it was party night.”
“Well, since you're here...” Tasha links her arm through Cece's, smoothly extracting her from my side. “Let me show you around. I need a break from the boys.”
Before I can object, Tasha is already pulling Cece away from me, disappearing into the crowd. My first instinct is to follow, but Dom claps a heavy hand on my shoulder, anchoring me in place.
“Relax, brother,” he says, his words slurring slightly. “Tasha will take care of her. Besides, you look like you need this more than me.” He shoves a shot of whiskey into my hand.
I down it without thinking, the burn doing nothing to loosen the knot in my stomach.
Watching Cece disappear into this chaos feels as though I’m sending a lamb straight into a wolf den.
Not because she’s helpless—far from it—but this place is built to overpower anyone who isn’t used to it.
Hell, even I feel unsteady tonight, and I’ve been coming to this clubhouse for years.
“So,” Big says, leaning in close enough that I can smell the bourbon on his breath. “I can see you didn’t take my advice. She the reason you’ve been missing the last few days?”
“Didn't realize I needed your permission to have a life,” I growl, snatching another shot from a passing tray. The liquor burns down my throat, doing nothing to calm the anxiety churning in my gut as I scan the room for Cece.
Big laughs, but there's no humor in it. “When that life involves bringing civilians into our world? Yeah, brother, you do.”
“She’s here now, isn’t she?” I fire back at him. “Nowhere in our charter does it say you get to vet the people patches fuck, Big.”
Big's eyes narrow, his jovial demeanor evaporates. “This isn't just about who you're sticking your dick in, Brayden. This is about loyalty. About priorities.”
“My loyalty to the club has never been in question,” I snap. “Not once in ten fucking years.”
“Until now.” Big's voice drops, meant for my ears only. “You've been MIA for days. Missing runs. Skipping church. All for what? A piece of pussy that'll run screaming once she sees what we really are?”
I take a step forward, closing the distance between us until we're nearly chest to chest. “Watch your fucking mouth.”
Big doesn’t back down—he never does—but something shifts in his expression. Surprise, maybe. I’ve never challenged him this directly before.
“Interesting,” he says, studying me as though I’m some new species he’s just uncovered. “I’ve watched you drop men without blinking, but mention your little church mouse and suddenly you’re ready to square off with your own president.”
“She’s not what you think.”
“No?” Big’s eyebrows climb. “Then what is she? Because from where I’m standing, she’s a distraction. The kind that gets brothers killed. The kind that has a man picturing fences and Sunday dinners while he forgets who he really is.”
I clench my fists at my sides, fighting the urge to knock that knowing smirk off his face. “You don't know shit about her.”
“I know her type.” He takes a swig of his beer. “Good girls slumming it with bad men, thinking they can save us. Fix us.”
“She’s nothing of the sort,” I argue, unable to blunt the edge in my voice. “She’s not trying to fix me. She’s trying to claw her way out of the life she was trapped in.”
Big’s eyebrows shoot up, genuine surprise replacing the earlier condescension. “Out of what?”
“Out of a world where she’s only ever been what everyone else needed her to be. They kept her boxed in. She’s finally breaking free.”
“And you’re the crowbar she grabbed.”
“Maybe we’re both prying our way out of something.” I scan the crowd again, my unease growing every time I fail to spot her. “Where the hell did Tasha take her?”
“Ladies’ room, most likely,” Dom slurs, waving a hand toward the back hallway. “Tasha always scoops up the newcomers before the scene gets too much. She’s good at that.”
I toss back another shot, the burn sharpening my focus. My attention keeps snagging on the hallway where they vanished. Every second Cece is out of sight tightens something in my chest.
Yeah. That’s enough waiting. She’s been gone too long.
“I’ll be right back,” I tell Big and Dom.
I slip past them in the direction I last spotted Cece.
I push through the crowd, ignoring the brothers calling my name and the half-naked women trying to catch my eye.
The music pounds in my skull, the smoke and sweat and booze making everything feel unreal.
All I can think about is Cece—what she's seeing, what she's thinking.
Whether she's already regretting ever getting involved with me.
The hallway leading to the bathrooms is dark, the bass vibrating through the walls. I spot Hammer pinning some girl against the wall, his hand up her skirt, her leg hooked around his waist. He doesn't even notice me passing by.
The women's bathroom door is closed. I hesitate, my hand hovering over it when I hear her voice coming from down the hallway.
I follow the sound, rounding another corner where the hallway opens into a small lounge area.
Cece's sitting on a worn leather couch with Tasha beside her, their heads bent close together in conversation.
Relief floods through me, followed immediately by wariness when I notice they both go silent the moment they spot me.
“Um...hi?” Cece says, a nervous smile playing at her lips when she sees me standing there.
Tasha rolls her eyes dramatically. “Seriously, Bray?”
“What?” I shrug.
“You might be worse than Dom. She was gone for ten minutes from your sight.”
Twelve, but I definitely wasn’t counting. Not at all.
“See. Cave men, the entire club of them,” Tasha chuckles.
“What else have you told her?”
“That you couldn't have picked a worse time to bring her to the clubhouse for the first time.”
“Didn't realize it was Domino's party,” I admit, leaning against the doorframe.
“Clearly,” Tasha snorts. She turns back to Cece. “I was just telling your girl here that we're not usually quite so...” she pauses, searching for the right word, “...excessive. I mean, don't get me wrong, the boys are always animals, but the strippers are special occasion only.”
I watch Cece's face carefully, trying to gauge how much damage control I need to do. To my surprise, she doesn't look horrified. Uncomfortable, yes, but she’s not checking for escape routes.
“I'm fine, really,” Cece insists, though her knuckles are white around her beer bottle. “It's just...a lot to take in at once.”
“That’s one way of putting it,” Tasha laughs. “My first club party? I made it twenty minutes before locking myself in the bathroom and crying until Dom took me home.”
“But you didn’t let it scare you off,” I say.
“What can I say? I love the bastard. Speaking of which, I should get back to the birthday boy,” Tasha says, standing up and smoothing her jeans. “You two good here?”
“We're fine,” I answer before Cece can speak. “Thanks for the rescue mission.”
Tasha winks at Cece. “Us old ladies have to stick together. Come find me if you need another break from the testosterone.”
I watch Tasha saunter back down the hallway. When we're alone, Cece looks up at me with those big green eyes, uncertainty written all over her face. “I'm sorry if I embarrassed you,” she says quietly.
“Embarrassed me?” I push off the doorframe and move to sit beside her. “Why the fuck would you think that?”
She shrugs, picking at the label on her beer bottle. “This is your world, and I'm clearly not...part of it. I stick out like a preacher at a porn convention.”
I can't help the laugh that escapes me. “You're worried about embarrassing me? In this fucking place?”
“Well, yeah.” She gestures vaguely toward the hallway where the sounds of the party booms. “I'm clearly not the type of woman your friends expected you to bring around.”
I reach for her hand, relieved when she doesn't pull away. “Trust me, princess, if anyone should be embarrassed, it's me. I shouldn't have brought you here tonight.”
“Because you're ashamed of me?”
“Christ, no.” I tug her closer until our thighs touch on the worn leather couch. “Because I wanted to ease you into this world, not throw you into the deep end.”
She smiles a little at that, her fingers relaxing in mine. “I'm tougher than I look, you know.”
“I know exactly how tough you are.” I brush my thumb across her knuckles. “That's not the point.”
“Then what is the point?”
I exhale slowly, trying to organize my thoughts. The shots I downed aren't helping with clarity. “The point is that this—” I gesture toward the party “—isn't who we are all the time. It's not who I am. Normally, when shit gets wild like this, I make an appearance, drink a beer, and head out.”
“You’re telling me, in complete seriousness, you have never participated in a club party? With all those naked girls out there begging for your attention.”