Twenty-Four
FANG
Molly wakes abruptly, tossing back the cover and sliding her ass out of bed to head downstairs.
Or maybe to the bathroom first. Whatever her mission, she doesn’t waste time on her surroundings, completely oblivious to the fact that her father’s awake, arms crossed behind his head, staring up at the ceiling.
As I have for the past four hours.
“Make sure you eat something before you put cartoons on.”
The small scuff of her feet stalls most of the way to the door. “Okay.” No bargaining, no fucking around. Just a moment to think over the request, deem it reasonable, and carry on as asked.
Why can’t Jenna be the same?
My daughter exits the room, leaving the door half open. From where I lie, I can see the section of landing before the stairs. It’s a straight shot from the top step to the bathroom, Jinx’s bedroom to my left. If anyone’s coming up the stairs, I’ll see them when they reach the landing.
I don’t know where Jenna slept last night, and I want to say I don’t care. But the way I stare at that vacant area outside my door has me know otherwise. I care enough. Not a lot. But enough that this shit gets me twisted up in ways I don’t want to unpack.
I’ve got a daughter who needs a stable home.
I’ve got a lifestyle that means I can’t give her one.
And I have an ex who’s goddamn reluctant to pick up the slack.
My life is a fucking mess, and Jenna is a complication I don’t need.
Tell your dick that. Might need to rethink where I have Molly staying if I keep waking up this way.
She doesn’t need to be force-fed a lesson on the birds and the bees after an awkward sleepover.
Maybe Jezabel will let her use one of the girls’ rooms. Stay out back with them.
I’m sure I’ll figure it out, but for now…
The sheet billows back to the bed after I toss it aside, my thick erection standing proud in its black cotton tent.
I’d feel better if I could blame it on a dream—something outside my control.
But I’ve been awake for hours, and the only thing on my mind has been her.
Jenna. Not a single pleasant thought about the woman, and yet, here we are, raging boner and only one way to get rid of it quickly.
I lean over the side of the bed and pick up one of my boots, throwing it at the back of the door.
It sets the damn thing swinging with a loud clunk, the gap to the landing reduced to a half-inch strip of dull light.
Lifting my right leg to block anyone’s view of my dick should they walk past too closely or barge in, I grip my cock in my left hand.
It’s fucking awkward to do ass about face, but needs are a must when I’m too lazy to get out of bed to shut the door properly.
The first firm stroke from base to tip has me grit my teeth to stall the moan of satisfaction in my throat. I haven’t fucked anyone in weeks—one of my longest dry spells to date. And don’t my full and aching balls know it.
I set a steady pace, flicking through memories of the various women I’ve been with.
Our part-time bunny, Snoots; her friend Kaydence; the Amish girl; Racquel with the big tits from high school…
Reno. Fuck. My cock thickens at the last image.
I’m clearly a sadist. I muse over how good Reno looked on her hands and knees, curvy ass in the air and slimmer waist ripe for the grabbing.
My pending climax plateaus, stalled no matter how many memories of Reno I filter through—baser ones included.
Until my brain sabotages the moment by throwing in an image of Jenna, dark eyes looking at me while I touch her face.
My abs clench. Shit.
Somebody walks past my door.
Quietly panting through the need to flog the fuck out of my dick, I throttle my confused member and wait for the footsteps to quiet.
Circus’s door shuts.
I release a relieved groan and resume choking the fuck out of my cock, conjuring up images of Jenna looking at me like that for other reasons. Trusting me. God damn. My balls draw tight, and I crunch a little, the contraction of my stomach so damn severe with the force that I let it all go.
Cum coats my stomach, the high recedes, and all I’m left with is the predictable shame and confusion. Why her? Why the hell does she twist me up in knots when all she promises is trouble?
Why do I do this to myself?
I lift my sticky hand and peer down at the mess I created with a sigh.
My T-shirt lies within arm’s reach of the bed, so I twist sideways and retrieve it to clean up the evidence.
Gonna need to put a load of laundry on later.
I know some of the other guys give no shits about what they make Dolly handle, but my parents raised me with better manners than that.
I bin yesterday’s threads in my wash basket and take a new set through to the bathroom.
The warm water eases the invisible filth that lingers after my pull session, but only a little.
I need to get this shit under control. I can’t go around tugging one out every night to my fantasies and then face Jenna every day with the kind of detachment I need for a Devil’s Breed associate.
Sure, she didn’t grow up involved with the club, but blood is blood. She was bound the moment she was born.
I don’t catch sight of her on my trek to the kitchen, nor while I make a coffee and shove it down my throat for a quick start to the day.
Molly sits beside The Kid in the parlor, watching cartoons on Darko’s iPad; the only TVs in the house are in the brothers’ rooms. Chaos reckons nobody needs that distraction in common areas. I think he likes to keep us angry.
I wander through the foyer to his office and knock on the open door to announce my arrival.
“Come in.”
I step into what was once the library, but is now his workspace at the front of the house.
A mirror image of the parlor the girls hang out in, it has a huge window overlooking the yard and a fireplace set into the outer wall.
Ceiling-height shelves line the back and interior wall, half-filled with books left behind by the previous owners—modern and classic leather editions alike.
I know it makes Jinx mad that he doesn’t have free access to the collection.
Chaos gestures to a chair near the fireplace, opting to stay behind his desk himself.
“You look like shit. Rough night?” I drop to the upholstered seat and kick my legs out before me.
“Up early.” No explanation why. No further information offered.
Our president has always been the need-to-know kind of guy, and sometimes, I get it. It’s easier to control how people around you behave when you filter what knowledge they get.
My stare fixes on the glowing embers, a strange sense of betrayal circling low in my gut.
“I couldn’t get Jenna to tell me the name of the Blood Eagle last night—the dead girl’s old man.
But I did learn a few other things.” I don’t say when.
Don’t tell him that I also found out about Mary-Beth’s connections earlier in the day.
That I spent the hours in between deciding how much he needed to know.
That I chose to withhold information from my president because something in me wants to protect the newcomer. Dangerous fucking mistake.
Chaos slowly straightens in his seat and shifts a journal to the drawer. Likely Vanessa’s. “What did she say?”
I ignore the growing nausea and spit it out. “Jenna’s father is an ex-Devil’s Breed member.”
His chair creaks as he leans back. “Is he now?”
“In her words, he has some beef with the club for kicking him out that relates to Jenna’s mom. Wants to fuck up their skin trade as payback and figured he’d use his daughter to help him do that.”
“How would that work if she’s a Breed brat?”
“Grew up outside the club. They don’t know her face.”
He humphs, and I don’t need the man to use his words to share the sentiment. Still doesn’t mean we can trust her.
“She swears that’s all it is, but she also flat-out refuses to share information on another key event,” I say.
Chaos leans forward, elbows to the desk. “Outside the dead girl’s father?”
“Yeah.” I glance over my shoulder before drawing a deep breath and continuing. “Nandi was right to be suspicious of her. Jenna killed the girl.”
Chaos sighs. “How?”
“Don’t know.”
“Why?”
“Wouldn’t say that either.”
He hesitates, likely thinking. “No wonder she won’t tell you the name of the Blood Eagle, then. She’d invite retribution to her doorstep by doing so.”
“Exactly.”
Silence hangs thick between us save for the occasional crackle of the dying fire.
“You don’t seem overly concerned by what you told me, Fang,” Chaos observes, rising from his desk.
“Neither do you,” I counter. Although it’s weak. I know he does his best thinking after the fact. That his apparent blasé attitude is nothing but the man processing what he’s heard.
“I’d say you almost seem disappointed, though,” Chaos states. “Upset at the revelation.”
I glance up at him as he settles in the chair opposite mine.
Maybe I am disappointed. I wanted to believe Jenna was just another woman with a bad attitude.
Figured it’d be easier to ignore the physical attraction if I could justify it away with her shitty personality. But that’s not all there is to her.
She’s prickly by design, sure. But if I came to one conclusion in all my thinking last night, it’s that she wields that attitude out of protection, not aggression. She’s defensive because she has to be. Because behind all that sarcasm and sass, there’s a woman with a basic need to survive.
Which almost makes me respect her.
Fuck. “She’s confused, Chaos.”
“What about?” He leans forward and retrieves whiskey and two glasses from inside the table between us.
“Her loyalty to her father. The things she’s done.
What she feels obligated to do now.” I watch as he pours us two fingers each.
“Now that she’s seen the inside of the operation, she holds guilt over walking away from it.
Thinks it’s her duty to help her old man shut it down, for the women, not him. ”
“She’s probably seen some traumatic things,” he muses. “Definitely done at least one.”
“You don’t say.” I take the offered drink and hold it to my lips, inhaling the sweet scent. “My brand of charm doesn’t work with her, pres. Maybe you need to hand her off to Circus.” As much as it pains me to say it.
“She’d shut right down with him,” Chaos muses, relaxing against the chair and setting one ankle atop his opposite knee. “You might not see it, but you’ve built a rapport with her, and a quick one at that. She told you she’s associated with the Devil’s Breed. That’s not information to scoff at.”
“I know.”
“Then where’s your hesitation?” He studies me in my periphery, yet to touch his drink. “Do you think you failed because she hasn’t jumped into bed with you?”
Asshole’s the best psycho-manipulator I know. Steers you down roads you’d rather avoid and sits there, indifferent to the shit it brings with it.
I don’t answer, not liking how rough this road looks.
Asshole pushes anyway. “Is it because your sexual charm doesn’t work? Because she makes you use more vulnerable means to get to the truth?”
“What would you know?” I sip at the drink defiantly.
He smirks, looking toward the fire. “I’ve known you long enough, man, to understand why you goof around as a fuckboy.”
Fucker better watch his next words.
“You’ve never once gotten real with me. Not in the way Jinx does, or Loki.”
Skating a thin line.
“You’ve brushed off every goddamn issue in your life as a joke. Even having a kid with Reno.”
“You trying to get me expelled from the club or some shit?” I fake a stunted laugh. “Because you’re really making me want to smack you in the goddamn mouth right about now.”
“Take a deep breath, assshole.” Chaos finally entertains the idea of a drink. “I’m not the enemy here.”
“Then who is?”
He sets the glass down and stares me dead in the eye. “You are. You are your own worst enemy, Fang.” Bastard rises from the seat and returns to his desk, tossing a final, “Let that woman do something about it while you help the club,” over his shoulder. “And tell her I want a word. Now.”