Page 14

Kenna

By the time the guys rolled in from breaking up the fight outside, I was halfway drunk with my best friends. In this case, alcohol was the only way I could pretend like I didn’t get fingered in the bathroom like a horny teenager.

The girls and I danced until I was sweaty, hot, and happy for the first time in months. Not because of the whiskey, but because I was home. Ghost, David, none of it even mattered anymore.

I should never have stayed away so long.

And if I was being honest, whatever was happening with Puck and I left little sparks of excitement arcing through me. Toss in Jester’s flirty glances, making me feel like the sexiest woman in the clubhouse, and I was having a great time.

No drugs. No bullshit. A great time. I was home.

The only damper was when Puck didn’t seek me out and disappeared. I’d gone looking for him once, I wouldn’t do it again. I tucked away the pang of disappointment and decided that Puck Kelly wasn’t going to ruin my night.

I passed David on my way from the bathroom. My stepdad’s eyes were red rimmed, and he swayed a little on his feet. “Dude.” I fortified myself to catch his weight when he tossed an arm over my shoulder and leaned on me. “I think it’s time for you to go home.”

“You just might be right, kiddo.” He tapped my nose with the knuckle of his index finger like he’d always done. It was only then I realized he hadn’t since his bitch of a girlfriend moved in. I wanted him to be happy, but was he?

To get him in his car meant dealing with Nadine. My buzz fizzled out at the mere thought of her. We staggered back toward the main room and I glanced around for help. My quick whistle got Jester’s attention. He crushed out a blunt and snorted a laugh as David swayed at my side.

“Old man can’t hang anymore.” He lifted David from me and steadied him with a grip on his arm. “Let’s get you home.” Then he looked around, zeroing in on Nadine. “Yo, time to load up.”

The face she made was caught somewhere between shock that Jester addressed her and anger that he was ordering her around. I could understand that sentiment. She grabbed her purse and scampered after us, jostling past me at the door so she could grip David’s other elbow. Like she was really helping.

“Oh, please don’t puke in my car,” she whined as she unlocked the door with the key fob.

“He won’t,” I assured her. Though half of me wished he would.

“He’s not that drunk. Probably his pills interacting with the beer.

When was the last time he ate?” David swayed on his feet as he shrugged out of his vest and handed it to me.

I folded it, kept in draped over my arms patch out.

I wasn’t new to how to handle the damn thing.

And knew as soon as Jester got him in the car, he’d have to take it.

It wasn’t ideal for me to hold the leather, but I knew to care for it with the proper reverence.

“He picked at his dinner; said he wasn’t hungry.”

He hadn’t liked it and, of course, she couldn’t see that, didn’t care to. “Stop by a burger joint on the way home and get him some fries or something.”

Her leveled glare over the car told me how much she thought of my advice. Like I hadn’t lived with the man most of my life.

“Here, I’ll take it.” She ignored David, walking right by Jester, who gave her a what the fuck look as she grabbed for the cut.

“Nah…” I stepped back, just out of her reach, clinging to the worn leather. “There is a protocol for that.”

“Give it. He can have it at home.” Her pink nails were sharpened to points and scratched across the leather when I sidestepped her quick handed snatch.

“What the hell?” She’s lost her fucking mind .

I wasn’t trying to keep his cut. This was just what they’d always done.

Get fucked up at the clubhouse, hang your cut on the wall, and let the guys give you grief the next day.

“There are fucking rules Nadine, you can’t just toss his vest into the back of your car. ”

“Cut it out,” David grumbled from inside the silver sedan as Jester straightened from buckling him in.

“Why do you have to make everything about him a battle? The jealousy is over the top, McKenna.”

No one called me by my first name, except family. She was not that. I had enough whiskey in me to snarl at Nadine. “This isn’t about you or me, you dumb bitch. Rules are rules.”

The words toppled out before I could stop them.

She went for me, but Jester grabbed her by the back of the shirt. “You heard her, this is the way it’s done. Time to go home.”

“Of course you want us to go home, so she has free rein to do whatever she wants.”

Jester released her shirt, making her stumble back a few steps, and gave me a curious lift of one eyebrow. “The fuck is this crazy bitch going on about?”

Nadine’s eyes widened as she gaped at him. She’d mistaken her position within the club. Even if David married her, it wouldn’t mean shit to Jester.

“Apparently, I’m fucking the entire table.” I passed him David’s cut.

His mouth split in a wide, shit-eating grin. “Really? Now that’s exciting.” He tossed his arm over my shoulder, leaving Nadine to bump the passenger door to her car closed with her hip and make her way to the driver’s side.

“Too bad she’s already someone’s ole lady. Just a drunk slut like her mother.” She’d waited until she had the car between us before showing her true colors.

I hadn’t ever considered myself a slut. So shocked she said it, I just stood there with my mouth open.

Jester’s smile fell. “Watch your motherfucking mouth, lady. I’ve had about enough.

” He dropped his arm, rounded the hood, and advanced on her until she backed into her driver’s door.

“Whatever you think you know, bitch, you don’t.

Kenna’s never been a patch’s ole lady, but any damn one of us would be proud to have her. ”

Looming to his full height over her, he sneered. “More than I can say for you.”

She was half sinking to her knees when he walked away, tucking his arm back around me.

He pulled me closer, letting his hand slide down so that his fingers brushed my hip, as he draped David’s cut over his shoulder, and called back to her.

“You really should educate yourself if you’re going to hang around here.

Even if she was still shacked up with Ghost, what’s his, is mine.

” Then he winked at her. “Rules are rules.”

Guiding me with his hand on my hip, we walked toward the door.

“David might kill you.” I hissed but didn’t pull away from his touch.

The warmth of Jester’s fingers, his closeness, felt good .

Better than good. Would I fuck the whole table?

Absolutely not. But Puck? Jester? Whatever disappointment I’d felt had disappeared.

Oh, hell yes.

The door closed behind us and in a way on Nadine. Whatever court she thought she held here, Jester had just smacked her crown off her head.

“Nah, he ain’t gonna remember shit. That’s the only reason she’s flapping her dick sucker.”

Puck was back inside, one hip resting on the table pool table, deep in conversation with Cam and Merc. He turned his head and caught my gaze. I shivered, thinking about what we’d almost done in the bathroom. Then he looked away with a slight smirk.

“Hey, what’s Puck’s deal?” I asked Jester as he moved to hang David’s cut on the designated place on the wall.

Jester laughed, tossing his head back and shaking out his hair before twisting it up and slapping the dark tie in it.

“Darlin, he’d be first in line to fuck your brains out if he wasn’t such a glutton for punishment. I don’t think he’s fucked anyone since he ditched what’s her face.

I gawked at him. “What the fuck?”

“No shit—” He sighed—“Big guy just likes torturing himself.”

I snorted.

“Kenna, he’s wanted to bag you for years.”

“He’s had every opportunity,” I pointed out.

“Has he though?” Jester held his arms wide. “He was with that white-trash bitch, then you were with Ghost, then…”

“What?” I pushed against his chest when he trailed off. “Then the frat party ruined me?”

My skin went cold. Once again, the whiskey made my lips loose.

His face went hard, cold, and the chill that ran from my skin up my spine was more arousing than anything he could have said. The royal flush tattoo across his throat shifted as his jaw tightened. “Not a chance. Keep those fucking demons out of your head.”

Jester hadn’t been in the room, but he’d been there. I could remember the way he’d stroked my face before Puck had put me in that cop car.

“But it’s true, isn’t? I’m tainted now.” That was the fear. The real reason I’d stayed away.

“Keep it up and I’m going to show you what it means to be tainted and used.” His voice was edgy, in a way that spoke to a part of me that pushed away all the fear and self-doubt.

He backed me up toward the bar, a stool bouncing against my knees.

I glanced at Puck, who studied us but made no move to rescue me.

Because I wasn’t in any real danger—at least, not any I didn’t want to be in.

Hashing out all the things that tormented me with someone I’d trusted for years…

was freeing, arousing, and stripped away all my inhibitions.

“How are you going to do that?” That my voice didn’t tremble was a miracle.

“Darlin’…” He bent down, hovering so close that his breath heated the side of my neck, my ear. “You say the word and I’ll turn that ass the prettiest shade of pink it’s ever been.”

The sexy bastard knew what he was doing, because he left me standing there wet and trembling as he sauntered back to the corner booth where he held court. Nadine’s friends would probably run right back to her about it.

Good.

They were all status climbers. Every last one of them. Her words sank in, settled in with my self-doubt. My mom was right here, too, at my age, with just as many options.

I stood there for a few minutes, catching the breath I hadn’t realized I held. Then I turned back to Puck, who grinned.

The fucker knew, he knew exactly what Jester had made me feel.

He looked like he liked it as much as I did. I held his gaze until he ducked into the tribute hall with the rest of the officers.

Desire infused with whiskey swirling in my system, I came to a conclusion. I was about to give all these washed up bitches something to talk about.