Chapter 13 Oak
Oak
Ithink I’m losing my fucking mind, but it has nothing to do with my past that suffocates me everyday.
It has everything to do with her.
She’s infested every one of my thoughts, injected herself in my veins, and has a death grip on my heart.
It’s as if she’s made herself comfortably home inside the walls I’ve built up strategically to keep people out.
No one has ever fought for me like she has.
And it’s her fight, the sheer will that speaks to me on a molecular level, a communication that only her and I can understand, one that is made for us that has me wanting to fight beside her instead of against her.
I’m losing this war.
I’m no longer fighting on the opposing side.
I can’t stay away from her and I don’t want to stay away from her.
And seeing her last night?
Her sinfully beautiful body on stage for all those men to see had me seeing red.
I had a visceral reaction to take my gun and unload each bullet into every one of their heads.
They shouldn’t be alive for seeing what’s mine. None of them had no fucking right to see her soft and lush curves.
God, if one of them had even landed a hand on her I would’ve ripped it right off.
I had every intention on marching up on that fucking stage, hauling her over my shoulder and leaving.
I almost did until she finally met my eyes through the dimmed red lights. She more than saw me, her body became alive. I saw it. How her breath quickened causing her breasts to rise and fall deliciously. How she had to clench her thighs because her pussy was wet for me.
Me.
Not them.
Then the show she had started for those men ended and the one for me began.
I was in a trance. My breath caught with each sway of her hips and my cock grew harder with each view of her delectable ass.
She had me wanting to kill every man in there to wanting to fuck her in front of them to show them that she was mine.
I’ve never felt that way before.
That possessive.
But I reined it in, barely I might add.
When her little performance was over her spell was done.
The only thing I had on my mind was that I had to have a fucking taste of her. She had herself on full display and I wanted to take a fucking bite.
And fuck me she didn’t disappoint.
The salt of her skin was bitter yet sweet. And the smell of her arousal had me salivating. I was almost done for. Almost gave into temptation right then and there. I wanted to. God, did I fucking want to.
But I didn’t.
I held back, probably for the last time.
Because if she is to tempt me again I don’t think I’ll be strong enough to resist her.
“You can suck my dick, Crow,” I hear Snake snap at Sheriff Blake Crow from across the table at Church.
Crow narrows his eyes at him but Snake only smirks.
Fuck, I know that smirk. And I know that mischievous look in his eyes.
“I’m trying to help you here.” Crow’s voice stands firm and unbothered.
Snake snorts. “Letting them stake up home in your department doesn’t seem like help.”
“Can’t really say no, can I? Then that will be going against them and raise suspicion. At least this way they think I’m working with them and not you.”
As much as I hate Crow even I have to admit the righteous fucker is right.
“He’s right,” I say. Snake arches a brow at me with a facial expression that says, still don’t like him. On that we can agree.
“Hold the fuck up,” Dex says stunned, eyes comically wide. “You’re actually agreeing with the bastard?”
My finger taps against my thigh underneath the table.
“If he declines the feds from setting up house in his department that screams an alliance with us. Like he said, they think he’s working with them but he’s not.
Right, Crow?” My eyes, as hard as glaciers and as cutting as ice meet his.
I’ll give the fucker credit; he meets my stare.
He doesn’t even appear fazed. But maybe it’s because his eyes are just as hard as mine.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen them soft. Not even when I first met him all those years ago.
“Keep your enemies closer. Isn’t that what they say, Oak?” His tone is nonchalant but I can read between the lines.
My finger twitches again.
“I need you to tell me everything you know. And if that means I have to see your ugly mug more often then so be it.”
He runs his hand along his jaw. “Never been accused of ugly before.” Again, he’s unbothered. Like his bullet proof vest nothing can affect him.
“Have you learned anything?” Sticks tries to break the tension between us by directing Crow’s attention to him. I would like to say that it works but it doesn’t.
Anytime Crow is near I have to remind myself repeatedly not to punch him in the fucking face.
“They’re investigating on the deaths of The Crowned Devils MC but have no credible evidence and are only going by leads,” he informs Sticks.
“Then should we be worried?” Pax asks.
“The FBI wouldn’t be sticking their nose in business unless they have something. It’s what I’m trying to figure out,” Crow tells him.
Pax sighs disappointedly. “Can’t really talk our way out of this one can we?” Ever the pacifist.
Crow lets out a chuckle that sounds unused. “Unless you have a hell of a lawyer.”
“And we can’t kill them.” Now it’s Snake’s turn to sigh disappointedly.
Sticks shakes his head at him while Dex smothers a laugh.
“No killing,” I warn Snake specifically. “Figure out what they have and soon before it’s too late,” I order Crow.
He raises a brow. “Didn’t I just say I was going to do that?”
My damn finger twitches again. “I’m making sure you don’t fuck us over.”
His hard eyes narrow. “I wouldn’t do that.”
“You fucked me over once, Crow. Just making sure there won’t be a repeat performance.”
“You’re still harping about that?” He asks genuinely baffled.
I say nothing in return. “My father literally died because you fuckers didn’t include him in shit and you’re still harping about that?
Over an unfortunate mis-fucking-communication?
” His voice doesn’t rise but I can feel his quiet anger.
It’s the one thing that Crow and I have in common.
Our anger never rises. It’s stays cold and lethal.
Then again we both served. Him in the Army and I in the Marines. Perhaps it’s a quality only we have.
“You’re calling fucking another man’s woman a miscommunication?”
It’s so silent that one can hear a pin drop. The tension so heavy and think in the air that not even a chainsaw could sever it.
“One that I had no knowledge of. If I had known I wouldn’t have touched her.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I would expect you from one veteran to another to believe my character.”
“Your character means shit. You weren’t my brother in arms. You didn’t fight by my side.”
“No, I didn’t but I had brothers of my own. You don’t think I didn’t see the Dear John letters? How that fucked with their head. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone let alone partake in it. I didn’t know, Oak. Lana-”
“Don’t say her fucking name around me, Crow.”
He shuts his mouth in a firm line. His eyes cut mine. It’s his only tell. Mine freeze and his harden to stone.
Deep down I hate to admit how much we are alike.
“I’ve apologized, Oak. Countless of times. But maybe it’s not me you want the apology from, maybe it’s her.”
I’m silently fuming.
I hate how well he can read me.
Lana never gave me closure. Never once apologized for cheating on me with Crow.
Never once felt an ounce of guilt. She blamed me.
It’s because I was pulling away that she went behind my back to find comfort in someone else.
Because I was suffering with grief and didn’t know how to fucking breathe without feeling guilt.
I still fucking can’t.
But with Gracie Mae I’m starting to figure out how. I see the possibility of living.
“If you’re going to continue this I’m going to need popcorn,” Snake quips but when I cut a glance his way it’s then I see him telling without saying directly to drop it and pick it back up when the others aren’t here.
I subtly nod my head and he returns the gesture.
Crow rises from his chair, unfolding his large frame to look down at every one of us. A power move if I ever saw one. But I’m not going to allow him to act all righteous because he isn’t.
Rising from my own chair I stare him down from across the table. And while I am the biggest and broadest man here I can tell that means nothing to him. He isn’t intimidated by me. Nor afraid.
“Boys,” Sticks clears his throat.
For once I’m not going to listen to President’s orders.
Not when it comes to him.
“Oak, not during Church,” Sticks warns me with a hard edge to his voice.
Fine then. “Crow, how about I walk you out.”
“I was just thinking the same,” he replies through terse lips.
I nod my head and allow him to walk out in front of me but not too far ahead in case the fucker decides to make a break for it.
Not that I think he would. He was once a soldier and the man is filled with pride. He doesn’t run from situations he runs towards them full force without caring about his own life.
Before I walk out I hear Sticks order, “No blood being spilt.”
Yeah, we’ll just have to see about that.
I’m so consumed with my anger that I don’t even realize that Crow has stopped walking.
I’m about to give him a piece of my mind for almost slamming into him when I hear the familiar sound of laughter coming from across us.
There I see my sister, Nora and Gracie Mae sitting together on the black leather loveseat laughing with one another like old friends.
Nora is wiping the underneath of her eyes from laughing too hard. Tears always happen whether she wants them to or not when she’s laughing too hard. I haven’t seen her that way in a long time. Ever since the incident.
Gracie Mae has her hand over her heart as she’s laughing with her. Her head tipped back exposing her kissable neck.
She’s absolutely beautiful, breathtaking even. And the sound of her voice I want to put on repeat. Memorize it for when I wake from the inevitable nightmares.