Chapter 2
Gage
I’d say that my wife is a Grade A bitch, but that would be too kind.
Even still. I always wondered if she’d come back.
Her sisters said it wasn’t a matter of if, but when.
I guess they were right. In her classic, selfish, dramatic fashion, Ami Olson chose this day.
Her nephew’s christening. A kid she’s never seen or even asked about, until today.
Other than her eye and hair color, her height and her body type, and the fact that she’s a lying bitch who tried to ruin my life, I know nothing about my wife.
We were married as strangers, and stayed that way, given that she chose to skip town the morning after our nuptials, telling everyone that I’d attacked her.
I’d passed out after drinking too much and couldn’t remember anything.
But I’d never hit a woman before, and I knew I didn’t do it.
Eventually, the truth came out that it was a plan by a traitorous former club member to wreck the alliance between Steel and Ami’s father, Viking. The traitor, otherwise known as Tracker, is now back at our club, being rehabilitated, like we’re a fucking halfway house for fallen fucking bikers.
Suffice to say, there’s no love lost between me and Ami. I stayed just long enough for the cake to be cut and to watch my brothers shamelessly hum and haw over a chubby-cheeked baby just like their old ladies. I didn’t think anyone noticed me slip out. I was wrong.
Because, when I roll my bike down my driveway, I see her sitting on my front porch.
The dark haired, dark eyed devil with a body made for sin.
I thought about it once, the day I married her.
Thought about getting her home and fucking her until we were both raw, but then I learned that all her beauty is wasted on her.
In reality, she’s a frigid ice queen and if I were to stick my dick in her, it would probably turn black with frostbite and fall the fuck off.
I park my bike by the garage and throw a leg over, making sure my boots hit the ground hard to let her know just what kind of pissed off fury she’s inspired in me just by daring to show up at my fucking house after she very nearly ruined her nephew’s party.
Her sister would have been devastated. Her father would have been ten shades of furious, and Steel probably would have lost his shit with her once and for fucking all.
I would have liked to see the latter two, at least if it could have somehow meant that Steph’s feelings were spared. She’s a good woman and she and my brother, Wing, are very happy. Leena, Ami and Steph’s other sister, married another brother, Wraith, and they’re also blissfully in love.
Clearly, someone broke the mold when they made Ami.
I want to ask her what the fuck she thinks she’s doing sitting on my porch steps, but I already know.
I know that I’m an intimidating motherfucker.
At least when I want to be. Six three, two hundred and fifty pounds, shoulders the size of a mountain and a face that has seen too much living to be considered anything close to handsome or youthful, even though I just cracked twenty-seven… I put it all to the best use possible.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” I snarl, and there is no mistaking the rage rolling off me like a storm about to let loose its full fury.
Ami cocks a black brow and stares at me like I’m the stupidest person on the planet. Like a man who looks like a thug doesn’t actually have a brain or feelings.
“Divorce? The papers? Did you think you could just walk out on me, and I’d leave it like that?”
Fuck, does she have to be so beautiful? It’s maddening. Porcelain cream skin, dark black eyes with the thickest lashes on the damn planet, a straight tiny nose, full lips, high cheekbones, and a dainty jaw that rounds out the heart shape of her face.
“Walk out on you?” The words come out choked, as though my lungs are collapsing. “That’s fucking rich considering it’s been over a year since I saw your face, and you were the one who chose to leave.”
I don’t let my eyes linger on the swell of her breasts peeking out of that damn dress or realize how short the hem is.
I don’t eye her pale, slender legs that seem to go on for miles, even though she’s barely past five fucking feet, or the curves that the bloody dress manages to both streamline and outline so neatly.
She, of course, is probably fully aware of how she looks in the thing, or she wouldn’t have put it on in the first place. The only thing better than crashing your nephew’s christening party is to look like a goddamn seductress doing it.
“We both know why I left.”
“Do we? Because last time I checked, it was because you sold my brothers on the idea that I’m a wife beater when I’ve never laid a hand on a woman in my life. Even when the truth came out and everyone knew I hadn’t done a fucking thing, you still stayed gone.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t think there was any point in coming back. Kicking a dead horse.”
“That’s how you refer to me? A dead horse?”
Her full lips tilt into an evil smirk that I want to kiss off her face and the fact that I have that urge to do it makes me want to slam my fist into something. Drywall. Concrete. Wood. Doesn’t matter as long as it’s hard and it hurts.
“How would you like me to refer to you? As the husband that I never wanted? Or maybe just as the sack of shit who I already can tell is gonna give me a hard time about signing these papers.”
“You’re a class act, Ami.”
“I learned from the best. You have a problem with it, thank my father. Who, I’ll remind you, signed me up for this shit in the first place.
I never wanted to marry you. You never wanted to marry me.
” She produces a stack of papers from behind her back.
“Sign these and it will be over for both of us.”
“No,” I hear myself say, shocking the hell out of myself.
Apparently, it shocks Ami too, though less than it surprised me.
Her nostrils flare like she’s just scented something disgusting.
Shit on the bottom of her boot. Less than shit.
I don’t know, but I hate that her eyes flicker over me and there is zero spark in them.
As if getting angry with me isn’t even worth the effort.
“Tell me, Ami,” I say, because suddenly I want to piss her off. I want to see the flames burning in those dark depths, the same flicker betraying her spirit as the day we were married. Even if it’s flames of anger and defiance, I want them back, burning. “How many times have you cheated on me?”
Nope. No flames. Her lips part and her tongue dances out, wetting them. I can tell before she even speaks that she’s going to lie to me.
“I’ve lost count.”
I chuckle, but it’s not the kind of sound that has any mirth in it. I know that, towering over her, I look like a demon in leather and denim, a dark shadow, and I milk it for all it’s worth.
“It’s not cheating if neither of us wanted to be married in the first place.
We both know this marriage was a sham. My father got what he wanted.
There isn’t going to be any war between your club and my family, so just sign the fucking papers and let’s get on with it.
” She stands slowly but has the nerve to lean forward and wave the stack of white right under my nose.
She might as well be a bull fighter waving that shit around because I see fucking red.
I want to charge at her, force her back against those steps, spread her legs and bury my face there until she is forced to admit to me that she’s my wife and we really are legitimately married.
I want her to apologize for what she said about me, for the way she left, for what she made my brothers think.
I want her writhing on my face, coming on my tongue, her shapely legs wrapped around my shoulders, her screams alerting the neighbors.
Yeah. Not going to happen.
Instead I snatch the papers out of her hand. She stares at me hopefully for a split second before she lets out an outraged gasp.
Because instead of going inside and finding a pen, I throw that shit straight down where it belongs on the ground.
“What the fuck?” Ami hisses as I unzip my jeans and whip out my dick.
Her eyes fly to my face, and her cheeks are scarlet, but yeah, there’s no way she’s watching me. I don’t give a fuck. This isn’t about my dick. Well… it’s hardly about my dick.
It’s. About. Me. And. Her.
I let out a satisfying sigh as I piss on all her fucking papers, and after—when I’ve squeezed out every last drop—I zip myself back into my jeans and turn to study her.
That red that crept up into her cheeks is now full-on anger.
And oh yeah. Those flames are blazing. Dancing in her depths.
They’re fucking beautiful. I’m no moth and she’s no flame, but I find myself admiring her spirit.
She’s a spitfire. Untamable. Guys would laugh in my face if they found out that I’d even thought about trying.
“This is not over,” she sputters. “I’m gonna get another copy of those and you will sign them or I’ll file for something else. I’m not gonna quit until I’m free of you.”
She storms off down the driveway and gets into her car and literally manages to screech the tires in a front wheel drive, in her haste to get the hell away from me.
After she’s gone, I stand there staring after her, a stupid, self-satisfied grin splitting my face.
Because what she doesn’t know yet is that she’s never going to be free of me.
Fucking ever.