36. Daisy
Chapter 36
Daisy
T he Strike had once been a farmhouse off old Route 52, one of the roads bikers frequented on long rides through the mountains. The party was in full swing by the time we pulled up to the rambling structure, its faded brown siding softened by the moonless night. Bikes were lined up three deep out front, costumed bikers spilling out of the place, onto the old porch and down into the gravel parking area at the front of the building.
Music blared from inside, some kind of old-school heavy metal that made me feel like my ears were bleeding, mingling with laughter and the roar of a hundred conversations happening all at once.
“Wow, it’s packed,” I said as Wolf pulled Benji to a stop in the parking area.
More than one person in the crowd turned to look as we pulled up. Benji’s bright green paint stood out among the bikes and pickup trucks in the lot, to say nothing of its price tag.
“Told you,” I said.
“We’ll be fine once we get inside,” Otis said.
“If you say so,” I grumbled, getting out of the front seat.
The attention didn’t diminish as we made our way inside. One guy in the crowd recognized Wolf and raised a hand in greeting, but everyone else either didn’t know us or was disavowing us at the Strike.
Great.
It probably didn’t help that Jace looked like an absolute beast (no pun intended) in the leather mask. He’d started to bulk up again, eating like a machine and working out in the mini-gym he’d set up in the ballroom since he couldn’t go anywhere.
Still, he was less out of place than the rest of us. Among the sea of pirates, biker zombies, and vikings, there wasn’t a single prisoner or slutty cop.
So much for flying under the radar.
The music reached a deafening pitch as we crossed the old porch and stepped over the threshold into the bar. It was almost wall-to-wall bodies and I had no idea how everyone managed conversation over the electric guitar blaring from the speakers mounted near the ceiling.
A long bar dominated one end of the big main room, and people flowed in and out of the smaller rooms on either side.
“I’ll get drinks.” Wolf shouted the words but I still barely heard him over the music, so I just nodded.
I moved deeper into the room with Jace and Otis. It was weird looking over and seeing Jace in his leather mask.
Weird and sexy. Which made it even weirder.
I was just about at the end of my self-imposed celibacy rope and his leather mask wasn’t helping, to say nothing of his leather pants and muscled chest. I didn’t even want to think about how screwed up I had to be to want to fuck the guy who’d put me through so much misery, let alone while wearing a getup that was essentially the costume poster child for violence and domination.
The crowd lost interest in us as we faded into the woodwork of the drunk, costumed crowd. Apparently they didn’t see us as much of a threat, maybe because Jace’s pants were so tight he couldn’t have fit a weapon in there. Otis and Wolf didn’t have pockets in their orange jumpsuits, and unless I was hiding something in my not-so-secret booby place, I wasn’t packing either.
I bobbed to the music while Jace and Otis scanned the crowd and a few minutes later Wolf returned holding four beers. He handed one to each of us, then tipped his head to one of the smaller rooms.
We moved deeper into the bar just as the electric guitar riff to “Welcome to the Jungle” started.
We passed into a shrunken version of the main room, minus the bar. Partygoers stood in groups, almost all the costumes featuring some version of the leather cuts worn by bikers everywhere. The women wore plenty of leather of their own: leather skirts even smaller than my own, leather bikini tops, thigh-high leather boots.
Almost every inch of visible skin was tattooed, some with the Barbarians logo and others with roses and thorns, skulls, the names of mothers and lovers, animals, and pretty much anything else I’d ever seen inked on skin.
At one end of the room, two pool tables were surrounded by several people, all in costume, all drinking. They were filled with raucous laughter, but I wasn’t under the illusion that it would be shared with us.
We were outsiders here. The greeting we’d been given on arrival made that clear.
We took up residence at one of the tall tables stained with water rings from countless bottles of beer and a few seconds later, Wolf and Otis peeled off, leaving me with Jace.
I didn’t ask questions. The music was too loud, plus I’d learned that one of the Beast’s secret powers was coordination. Sometimes it was planned. Other times it was on the fly. But they had a sixth sense for how to move, how to split up, to achieve whatever they were looking to accomplish, and that was true whether they were trying to get information or trying to get me — and themselves — off.
Dammit. My underwear was wet again, the thought of getting fucked by all three Beasts, Jace back in the fold, enough to get my blood simmering.
I tried thinking about Blake’s second phone, the one I’d found in his room when I’d found the letter from Mac to my mom. Wolf and Otis had given it to Aloha, but it had only been a few days and we hadn’t heard anything yet so that topic didn’t do much to distract me from my raging libido.
I shifted and took a drink of the cold beer, trying to distract myself. But Jace was right there, his arm brushing against mine on the table, his warm skin sending a zing of lust through my body. I could smell him, that same scent that had haunted my memories while he’d been gone, the one that had lingered in the air like smoke from a bonfire when it clung to my clothes and hair.
And that fucking mask. It was scary as fuck. So why was I having a hard time blocking out the fantasy of fucking Jace while he wore it?
In less than a year I’d gone from prissy virgin to total whore, fantasizing about getting fucked by the masked man standing next to me.
The fact that he’d broken my heart only proved how fucked up I’d really become.