Chapter Fourteen
Gracie
The gates to the clubhouse were closed, but as the bike rolled closer, Spike and Cain pulled them open to let us in.
With one look at the driveway, I knew my suspicions about something being very wrong were confirmed.
It looked like every biker was at the club.
At least five of my uncles were walking the grounds, not even bothering to conceal their guns.
“What’s going on?” I asked as soon as Perish parked and cut the engine.
“The shootout wasn’t about the Grassis,” Perish said, climbing off and waiting for me to do the same, then walking behind me, blocking me from the street view.
“It was about the club?”
“It was about me,” Perish said as my father burst out of the front door.
“Sweetie, what are you doing here?” he asked, trying to mask the anxiety in his voice. “Everyone is supposed to be at Hailstorm.”
“I… um…”
“I went to get her,” Perish said, his hand going to my hip to push me forward until I squeezed past my father and stepped inside the clubhouse. “She was attacked,” he added.
“I’m fine,” I assured my father quickly. “I forgot to check the fire escape,” I said, sighing.
“It’s not your fault,” Perish said, beating my father to it.
“Perish,” Fallon said, beelining for the man who was still standing behind me, a little too closely to be casual. Like he expected a madman to come charging through the door at any moment and needed to put himself between me and that imagined person. “You need to start talking.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “But I want someone to check over Gracie first.”
“Check over me? I’m fine.”
“She was attacked,” he reiterated, tone grave.
“It was nothing.”
“An attack is, by fucking definition, something,” he shot back.
“Really,” I said, looking at Fallon who, out of the three men, would likely be the most logical.
“It was no big deal. He just grabbed me from behind,” I said, touching my midsection.
Did it feel a little achy? Sure. But it was no big deal.
“Slapped a hand over my mouth. I got out of the hold and ran. That’s it. ”
“Does it hurt?” Fallon asked, nodding toward my midsection.
“It’s a little achy. That’s it.”
“Coulda bruised a rib,” Perish suggested.
“No, he couldn’t have. Is it just me, or did you all turn into Neanderthals suddenly? I’m fine. It was no big deal. I’ve been hurt worse sparring with you,” I told Fallon.
“Should check,” Perish insisted. “Any of the girls here?”
“No. I sent them up to Hailstorm since I didn’t know what was going on. Still don’t,” he added a little pointedly. “But, yeah, she should be checked out.”
“I can check,” my father suggested.
“No,” I squeaked. My dad and I had a healthy relationship. But I was in a romper. Checking my midsection would require getting down to my underwear. That was awkward.
“I can,” Fallon also suggested.
“No.”
“I’ve seen you in a bathing suit.”
He’d seen me in little board shorts and a one-piece top. I’d always felt a little weird about being mostly naked around my extended family.
“Hardly.”
“What if I got you a change of clothes and you could just pull up the tee a little?” Perish asked.
This was a serious situation.
But did desire spark at the very idea?
Yeah, yeah, it did.
There was no rationalizing with the kind of desire I felt toward Perish.
“Fine.” I said it with a grumble, with a sigh. Like it was a major annoyance and inconvenience. So no one around knew that I was actually excited to be examined.
“Be quick,” Fallon demanded. “I want to know what the fuck is going on.”
With that, Perish finally moved out from behind me just to walk in front of me, expecting me to fall in line.
Everything about him seemed as genuinely frustrated as I was pretending to be. It should have put ice on my desire. It didn’t.
Perish took a turn toward the basement where the club kept changes of clothes of all kinds, and I followed him down.
The silence started to feel heavy, awkward.
But the second I reached the lower step, Perish turned.
And it wasn’t annoyance on his face.
It was something that had my chest doing that popping rock candy thing again.
Then his big hands were raising, pressing to each side of my face. Gentle. Yet somehow a little possessive at the same time.
“Don’t gotta lie to me,” he said.
“I’m not lying,” I assured him. “I’m really okay.”
He tilted my head up, angling my face around. His gaze scanned my face and neck, looking for damage I might have played down.
“It was over in like ten seconds,” I told him, my hand going to his wrist and giving him a squeeze. “I’m not that delicate.”
“Yes, you are,” he objected.
His hands slid down the sides of my neck, resting there for a second, then gliding down to my shoulders to gently push the straps of my romper off.
Without the straps, the thin material drifted downward until it pooled at my feet.
And I felt, oh, I felt everything.
The cool prick of the air washing over me. The goosebumps rising. The way my belly swam and my heart tripped over itself.
My gaze was fixated on Perish, though. So I saw the way he tensed, how deep his exhale was, how his pupils blew wide.
I was suddenly incredibly thankful that I wasn’t like some of my cousins, who were top-heavy and wore bras pretty much at all times.
The little extra padding in the chest of the romper made it so I didn’t need to have anything on underneath.
And Perish, yeah, Perish was appreciating the sudden near-nakedness.
His hands went to my hips, resting, then sinking in for a second in a way that felt possessive.
He was clearly fighting for control.
I knew the whole club was around.
But I still wanted him not to find it.
A second later, though, he exhaled hard and ran his hands over my midsection in a very medical kind of way, fingers poking in, looking for signs of pain.
“I’m okay,” I repeated.
I heard the thickness in my voice.
The way Perish’s eyes slid closed for a second made me think he heard it too.
But he kept rigid control over himself, poking and prodding until he was satisfied that I wasn’t going to die on him or something.
Then his hands fell to his sides, curled into fists, and he turned and walked away toward the storage cabinets to rummage around for a change of clothes.
I almost laughed when he came back with loose sweats and a comically oversized hoodie.
He set the hoodie on the edge of one of the bunk beds before lowering himself to his knees in front of me.
He ruched up one of the legs to slip it over my foot, then the other.
The material slid up, but before he could fully slip the waistband into place, his head leaned forward, his forehead hitting me just under my navel.
He exhaled hard, warm breath teasing over my skin.
My hand went out automatically, pressing to the back of his neck.
But it was only for a second.
Then he yanked the pants up, turned, and grabbed the top.
He wouldn’t even look directly at me as he pushed my head through and waited for me to slide my arms in.
“Come on. Fallon’s waiting,” he said, moving past me.
I tried to tamp down the disappointment, but it stuck with me the whole way back to the common room.
“She’s okay. Doesn’t even seem to be any bruising.”
That got nods and relaxed shoulders from my cousin and father.
“Should I, uh, not be here for this?” I asked.
Fallon glanced at Perish, waiting for his input.
“Think it might be best if she stays. Seems like she’s part of this, unfortunately.”
“Okay,” Fallon said, waving over toward one of the bar stools.
“Look like you need a drink,” my Uncle Pagan said, giving me a soft look from behind the bar.
“I wouldn’t turn one down,” I admitted.
I swiveled to watch him throw some concoction together, mostly so I wasn’t caught staring at Perish as everyone filed inside to hear whatever this meeting was about.
“What’s the matter,” Pagan asked, pushing me something in a very bright blue color that smelled the kind of sickly-sweet like I liked, “we didn’t have any fucking horse blankets down there for you to wear?”
“I know, right?” I asked, laughing off my ridiculously oversized outfit. “This is good,” I told him after a tentative sip. “What is it?”
“You know how Laz has that ‘Kitchen Sink Soup’ recipe where he just throws everything in the pot?”
“Yeah.”
“This is my ‘Speed Rail Cocktail,’” he said, gesturing toward the shelf under the bar. “Little bit of everything in it. Figured you might need it.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, exhaling hard, though not for the reasons he was thinking.
“Need me to knock anyone’s heads together?” he asked, making a little smile pull at my lips.
If there was one thing you could count on Uncle Pagan for, it was wanting a fight.
“Not at the moment, but when I do, I know who to come to.”
“Yeah, you do,” he said.
“Hey,” my father said, pushing my cousin off the stool next to me so he could sit down instead.
“Hey, Dad.”
“Before this meeting starts, I want to check in without anyone listening.”
“I’m fine. I promise.”
“The thing is, sweetheart, you’re always fine.”
“What?”
“You’re always fine. Even when you’re falling apart, you’re gonna insist you’re fine. Dunno why you feel like not being fine isn’t an option, but it is. So, if you’re not fine, that’s okay.”
He wasn’t wrong.
I didn’t like to feel like a burden to anyone, even though I knew my family would never feel that way. So I did always insist I was okay, even if I wasn’t.
But in this case, I really did mean it.
“I appreciate that, Dad. But I really am okay. It was barely anything. It wasn’t even the scariest thing that’s happened to me this month.”
“The shooting,” he agreed.
“And the drunk guys,” I mumbled before I remembered that, yeah, I’d left that little nugget out of conversations with my family.
“The who now?” my dad asked, stiffening.
“Where are they? What do they look like?” Uncle Pagan, a shameless eavesdropper from way back, asked.
Oh, geez.
This was just what this night needed: more reasons for the men in my life to worry about me.
“Just a couple of stupid drunk guys. They followed me for a few blocks over at that dive bar by 3rd Street.” I waved a hand.
But there was no waving off something like that. Not in this town. Not with these men.
“Did you hear a name?” my father asked.
“Give me some descriptions,” Uncle Pagan demanded.
God.
This was getting away from me fast.
“It was nothing! Just a couple of idiot drunk guys. I actually ran into Perish when he was out taking a walk, and he walked me home.”
“Where was your car?” Uncle Pagan asked.
“The master fuse,” my father concluded.
“Yeah.”
“I am going to need a lot more in—” my father started.
But just then, the door closed for the last time, and a hush fell across the clubhouse as everyone waited for Fallon to start speaking.
“Got word from Hailstorm,” he said, making all the men straighten, worried about their women and kids. “All the wives and kids were scooped up and are settled. Our older cousins are mostly there too.”
“Mostly?” Malcolm asked.
“Violet is out of town with her husband. Willa is at work and won’t leave until after her meeting.
Chris sent several guards there with her, some inside, some outside.
She’s safe. And Hope, well, Andres is closing ranks around her.
Think we can all agree she will be safe.
The only thing is… no one can locate Layna. ”
“She’s in the air,” I piped in, letting out a strange choked sound when every head in the building turned my way.
“She’s on a flight to Vegas. She should be landing in…
” I went to reach for my phone before remembering it was in my purse back in my office.
My father held out his instead. “In like three hours. I don’t think she is going to come back. She has an important game coming up.”
“I think she’ll be okay,” Perish said.
Fallon gave him a long look before nodding. “Edison, make sure you get in touch with Layna when she lands.”
He got a nod from Uncle Edison, then he turned to Perish.
“Now, what the fuck is going on?”