Page 22

Puck

A good fight always left the clubhouse rocking.

Kenna slipped off my bike straight to the dance floor, drinking and shaking her ass with Dylan, Riley and the others.

There were women who did stuff like that for the attention.

They were out on the floor now, patch bunnies and older groupies.

They shook their asses in a cheap-ho mating call.

There were men here horny enough to fall for it.

Not me. Not Kenna. She was smiling, laughing, paying zero attention to anyone. I watched her, unable to look away. Not because of the sultry sway of her hot little body, but because of the happiness on her face. The way the darkness had finally been chased away.

That shouldn’t matter to me, I wasn’t her man. But I sure as hell walked into that bar and behaved like I was.

I needed distance, space, room to breathe that wasn’t filled with the seductive scent of her. The one that made me want to drink her up, lick her all over, and taste her while she came screaming my name.

The far end of the bar, between the front door and one of the storage closets, had always been the darkest, quietest place in the clubhouse. I sat there alone, wishing I still drank. Maybe liquor could chase away the thought of her.

Instead of a smooth shot of whiskey, I smoked a blunt by myself. Instead of being calmed by the weed, I grew irrationally irritated with myself, with her. Why did she make me want her so bad?

She felt too fucking good on the back of my bike, and it was becoming all too easy to want her there. She was barely back in all our lives, and I wanted her all to myself.

Like she could read my mood, she stayed away, choosing the more positive attitude of the ladies. Good. Made it easier to sulk.

Jester gave me a wide berth too, as if he thought I was pissed off at him. I wasn’t. He hadn’t crossed any lines, wouldn’t. With an inkling of what I felt, he’d put Kenna squarely in his no-fly zone.

I was pissed at myself that he even had to.

Because I didn’t want anyone to touch her but me. And it wasn’t my right to feel that way.

“Hey.” Her voice was soft as the music changed. I didn’t jump, but my heart raced, startled.

I huffed a sigh, leaned back on my elbow on the bar.

She was all flushed, glistening, and almost sweaty, my shirt rolled up and tied around her waist. It was then I noticed she wasn’t wearing a bra.

The barbells in her nipples pressed against the thin, damp fabric.

I rubbed my lips together and licked them, trying to ignore the throb starting in my groin.

She put her hand on my thigh and leaned in so that I smelled her. Like coconut and something else tropical. With an undercurrent of whiskey. Her eyes were a little glassy, her cheeks flushed like they did when she was coming hard.

“What’s wrong?”

I shook my head. “Nothing.” Everything.

“Come on, come hang out.” She tugged on my arm, but I jerked it away. “I’m good. I think I’m going to head out.”

She blinked, hurt. “Oh.”

Yeah, I was that asshole. Something she should probably remember.

“I’ll have Jester take you home.” That recommendation seared through me like a hot knife.

“No, I can find my own way.” She frowned, confused now. Maybe I wasn’t the only person feeling conflicted.

I should tell her. Tell her what? That I was a coward, because I didn’t have the fucking balls to say how badly I wanted to bend her over this bar? No, it was more than that. I could feel the niggling of something else. I’d known her too long, cared about her. We were friends.

I wanted more.

“What’s your deal?” She still watched me with those big drunk eyes, reminding me of the truly dark shit I thought about her, wanted from her. Had it just been us that night at the frat house, I’d have fucked Kenna—drugged or not. I was a bastard.

“Nothing.”

“You kiss me like that at the bar, in front of everyone. Touch me…in all the dirty places whenever you can, then brush me off without an explanation.” She was working up to a sexy package of tiny drunk fury.

I wanted to kiss her again. “I’m sorry for that.”

“Are you fucking serious?”

“I am. I’m not in a place for whatever this is, and I don’t have time for it. I should have been clearer about my intentions before you—”

“Before I what?” She poked a hard finger in my chest. “Before I wrapped my lips around your cock?”

I tried to swat her finger away but grabbed and held it instead. “Yeah, before that.”

She leaned in and made a strangled sound in her throat. “I don’t know whether to kiss you or smack you.”

“You don’t want me, Kenna.” I laughed without humor, for the first time being honest. “Whatever is going on here is some misplaced sense of hero worship. You’re going to wake up tomorrow and realize you’re a lot better than whatever we’ve got going on.”

“And that should be my decision, shouldn’t it?” Tugging her hand from mine, she folded her arms and stamped a booted foot. I couldn’t help but let my gaze wander from the top edge of the leather, over several inches of creamy thigh before my flannel shirt cut off my view.

Jesus. She was wearing my shirt. But when I thought of taking it off of her, it wasn’t to keep, but to spread it out on the sand outside and fuck her until we were both too spent to be angry.

I was a fucking asshole.

“You don’t get to just do things to me, then toss me away like I don’t matter. That makes you no better than Ghost.”

She might as well have smacked me. My chest tightened with anger. I was a lot of things, but I’d never hurt her like that. Never put her in the positions he did. Hell, I didn’t even want her at Miller’s tonight.

This needed to end.

“I’m not anything like that. Kenna, I’m not your boyfriend. I should have made that clear up front. I’m sorry for that.”

Then her eyes flashed hot. “Maybe I will ask Jester to take me home.” She teetered on her tiptoes, her face hovering just under mine, and she snarled. “We both know he’ll actually fuck me.”

She made it two steps before I grabbed her arm and yanked her back against my chest. Jealousy, white hot, clawed at my rib cage. “No, he won’t.” I growled.

The sexy little brat shook free of my arm but turned so that her body was pressed against me. “We’ll see about that.” She pushed free and stomped all the way back to him.

I didn’t chase her, I couldn’t. She was so fucking beautiful. Even when she pulled Jester down and whispered in his ear. He grinned a little before she went back to her friends.

As soon as he could pry himself away from the contingency of groupies that hovered around him, Jester strolled over to me. “What you do to piss her off?”

I grunted.

“Listen, brother, I don’t need you to tell me she’s off limits. But you need to wrap that up before someone else does.”

“Fuck you.”

“More like fuck her. Work it out and get her out of your system.” Then he grinned wide. “Trust me, that’s a hot little piece of pussy you won’t be disappointed with.”

I nearly hit him, had to fist my hand on the bar to keep from doing just that. Maybe he was right. But I knew better, once would never be enough.

“I can’t.”

“Brother…” He shook his head with mock sadness. “You’re dumb as shit for even thinking you can’t. If it doesn’t happen tonight, it’ll happen tomorrow. And the day after that, and so on. You want each other too bad.”

“Don’t I know it.” I pushed my hair from my face.

He turned serious. “At some point, you have to stop punishing yourself for your baby mama’s shit.”

When I didn’t respond, he didn’t push. My personal life had always stayed that way, but hurricane Jessica had blown through every aspect of my life and fucked it all up. I was just now putting the pieces back together.

Eli was happy. We had a home, I had a thriving business, and the MC. Then here came Kenna, reminding me of the things I hadn’t had in a long time. Things I wanted really fucking bad, but couldn’t let myself have.

***

Fall in the desert meant it could be hot as fuck during the day, but freeze your balls off at night. Today hadn’t been bad, but the chill in the air now rippled across my skin when I pushed open the door. I had a moment to wish I had that insulated flannel shirt on the ride home.

I wasn’t about to ask Kenna for it back. She’d looked too damn good with the thing wrapped around her, swallowing her whole.

The whole point in leaving had been not to think about her. Fuck me, I couldn’t even make it to the bike without my brain turning to Kenna.

I didn’t make it far before I heard her behind me. Rapid clicks in those god-damn boots. I didn’t even need to turn to know it was her, so I kept my course to the bike.

When she’d been a teenager, before my kid was born, I could remember her chasing after us in the parking lot—so excited for a baby to be around. I hadn’t planned on my life turning out how it had, or for her to grow up to be so fucking delicious.

She caught me at the bike. “Hey, wait a damn minute.”

I swung a leg over the seat and laughed a little. “Thought Jester was taking you home.”

She pursed her lips in a pout, then ducked her head. Making me want to kiss across the freckles over her nose.

“He say no?”

Her head jerked up, anger dancing in her eyes like she’d just remembered to be mad at me. “ Actually …he said if I wanted to go that route, I had to tell you first.”

“That what this is? You telling me?” My stomach tightened, my finger stalling on the ignition button.

“Are you fucking serious?” She glared at me. “He’s never been what I wanted.” It was the way she said it, the sultry, half angry slide of that last word that made my cock hard.

I couldn’t afford to do this—get wrapped up in a woman that wasn’t ready to shoulder my baggage. Kenna was loyal, smart, sexy, but she didn’t really know what she was in for with me. Hell, she couldn’t even drop a shirt off at my house without my past dancing around in the front fucking yard.