Page 22 of Lockout (The Vikings MC: Tucson Chapter #11)

Keely

I t was finally here. We’d all been looking forward to this party tonight and now the clubhouse was packed full of people. The club had invited friends, allies, and family, so there were people spilling out onto the property.

Both the bottom half of the clubhouse and the Bunker were open for everyone to go in and get drinks and hang out. According to Kit, it wasn’t as wild of a party as the guys used to throw back in the day, but there was still alcohol as far as the eye could see, thanks to Toxic.

I took ‘not as wild’ to mean there weren't a bunch of half-naked women everywhere, and that was fine by me and the rest of the old ladies.

“You want to dance?”

Glancing over my shoulder, I laughed and shook my head at Warrant. “There’s no music, Warrant.”

He held up his hand and motioned to someone and suddenly music split the air, and my ear drums. The sound was adjusted to just below a level that would make your ears bleed. “You were saying?”

“I’m not dancing with you,” I told him. “You’ll just use it as an excuse to cop a feel.” Besides, I wasn’t exactly sure where Lock and I stood. I didn’t want to be disrespectful.

He leaned onto the bar top, grabbing a drink that Scarlett passed over to him. “Can I give you some friendly advice?”

“Sure,” I said, tone suspicious.

“One of the easiest ways to catch yourself a guy, is to show him that other men want you.”

I blinked at him. Warrant and the other Berserker’s Rage guys had showed up this morning. How had he already clued in to what was happening between me and Lock? My eyes strayed over toward the door where Lock was talking with Hush, Pyre, and Ruck.

There were Viking’s Rampage, Berserker’s Rage, and Saint’s Outlaws spread everywhere. You couldn’t take a step without bumping into one of the men from the three MCs.

My eyes met Warrant’s again. “Is it that obvious?” I asked, doubt creeping in.

He chuckled. “For those paying attention.”

I didn’t really like the sound of that, but what could I do? Putting my hands on my hips, I scowled at him. “I don’t really like to play games, Warrant.”

“It’s not playing games,” he said with a shrug. “You’re hot. I’d do you. And it’s just a dance.” He continued as my mouth fell open. “Those are all just facts. And you’d just be capitalizing on those facts.”

“Wow, Warrant,” I said with a laugh. I wasn’t even sure what to say to any of that.

“How about this,” he said, leaning toward me a little. “You give me one dance tonight. Whenever I choose.”

My eyes narrowed as I studied him. He was gorgeous.

Just like all these guys were, but there was no spark with him.

Not like there was with Lockout. I thought of him as a friend.

My heart was steadily thumping in my chest, not trying to break free like it did whenever the Viking’s Rampage president looked my way.

“What have you got to lose?” he asked, when I took too long to respond. He held out his free hand.

I stared at it, then met his eyes again as I shook his hand.

I couldn’t help feeling like I sold a piece of myself to the devil.

This was bound to get me into trouble, I just knew it because Warrant was involved.

But what harm was there in a dance? Squeezing his hand to keep the shake going, I gave him a pointed look.

“No touching my boobs or butt during this dance.”

He looked disappointed, but nodded. When I released his hand, he brought the shot to his mouth and downed it. “You’re no fun, Keely. Hands will stay above the waist, I promise.”

I shook my head as he wandered away. Looking over at Scarlett, I smiled. “Hey, can I get a Long Island Iced Tea?”

She laughed as she started making the drink. “You’re planning to have a good night if that’s what you’re starting with.”

I grinned at her and shrugged. It’d been so long since I’d really let loose and gotten drunk.

This was the perfect place to do it. None of the guys here would ever let anything happen to us women, so we were going to paint the town red.

Or rather, the clubhouse since we weren’t planning to leave it.

Sitting down over at the tables, I smiled at the other women as I took a sip of my drink. My eyes watered a little and I turned to look at Scarlett. She gave me a thumbs up. I wasn’t sure what that meant but she’d made this drink so strong it might end up being my only one.

“You, my friend,” Seek said, pointing at me, “are slacking.”

I sighed. “Can we not talk about my sex life tonight?” I held up my drink. “I’m trying to forget.”

“What sex life?” Seek asked.

“What happened to the just kissing him thing?” Billie asked, before I could say anything to Seek. “Seems like that would work.”

“I’m a coward,” I muttered, taking another sip of my drink. “That’s what’s happened.”

“Then just give him the eyes,” Dani suggested. We all stared at her. She shook her head. “I don’t even have to say anything to Smoke. I just give him a kind of…” She gave us a look that could only be described as sultry.

“I’m pretty sure I can’t pull that look off,” I told her with a laugh. My baby sister had grown so much since she lost her loser ex. She was happy, and that made me so grateful to Smokehouse. He’d given her all the confidence Eli had taken from her. “When I try that…”

“You look like you have indigestion,” Billie joked.

They all laughed. Not one of us doubted that Smoke moved heaven and earth to get to her when she gave him that look.

“Then just grab his dick,” Isla offered.

Kit sprayed out a little of the drink she’d just taken, directly onto me. I gasped and stared down at my shirt. No one said anything for a split second, then we all started howling with laughter.

“I’m so sorry,” Kit gasped. She grabbed some napkins off the table and started vigorously swiping at my boobs.

“Or that,” Isla said, pointing at what Kit was doing. “But lower.”

“Oh my God, stop,” Eva said, holding her sides as tears streamed down her face.

I grabbed Kit’s hand—if I didn’t stop her she was going to rub a nipple off—and patted it. “It’s fine. I’ll go change in a bit.”

“She-” Kit pointed to Isla. “I wasn’t expecting that.”

“Hard to predict what Isla is going to say,” Gwen said with a laugh.

“You could talk to him,” Sloane pointed out, getting back to the matter at hand.

I groaned. “That would also require me not being a coward, remember?”

Jordan shrugged. “I say you let him take care of it.”

“Except he hasn’t made a move,” Seek said.

I kept my mouth shut, because he had made a move and I put a stop to it. But that was before I’d talked everything over with the women and decided that I should just have sex with the man. We were also fighting when he did…

“Don’t worry,” Billie told our group. “There’s a plan in place.”

“What does that mean?” Susie asked.

I stared at her in shock. “What plan?” Then my eyes narrowed. “Wait, Warrant?”

She nodded, smiling a devilish little smile.

“What about Warrant?” Tori asked.

“You told him to ask me to dance?” I asked, ignoring Tori.

“No, I wouldn’t do that,” Billie said.

“Warrant asked you to dance?” Daisha asked, a slow smile spreading over her face. Everyone had the same look of understanding crossing their features.

“If you didn’t then who-” I asked, then paused.

“Toxic,” the whole group said together.

As though just saying his name summoned him, Toxic appeared next to the table, the club’s own alcohol soaked demon. “This is a dangerous looking group.”

We all laughed at that. “So you have some kind of scheme going with Warrant to annoy Lock?” Seek asked.

Toxic gave Billie a pointed look. “That was supposed to be a secret. Especially from that one,” he jerked a thumb in my direction.

“She’s in on the plan,” Billie said with a wave of her drink.

He eyed me. “You are?”

“Well, I don’t know exactly what the plan is…”

“She’s down for what will happen after the plan,” Kit explained.

“Fucking,” Isla supplied in a helpful tone.

“Jeez,” I muttered and sank down in my chair. My face was on fire. “Can we please talk about something else?”

“I still want to know what the plan is,” Jordan said.

“You’ll see,” Toxic said with a wink. He walked off before the girls could pry any more information out of him.

“Ground rule for tonight,” I said, giving everyone a mock glare. “No more talking about me and Lock.”

“Spoil sport,” Gwen said with a laugh.

“Fine, we’ll give you a break,” Jenny said while the group nodded.

“Thank you,” I huffed. “I’m going to put on a new shirt.”

The party had been going for a couple hours now, and everyone was well on their way to wasted. I didn’t want to miss whatever Lock had planned for Static and Idaho’s patching in, so I hurried upstairs to my apartment.

I changed into a new shirt, then went into the bathroom to wash my face and neck. Whatever had been in Kit’s drink had dried a little sticky. I stared into the mirror for a few moments. “Just kiss him tonight. It’s not that hard.”

It’d almost happened after our…date? I wasn’t sure what that had been but he’d paid for lunch, so in my book, that was a date.

Never had a date that involved flying around in a helicopter but we weren’t going there right now.

I was choosing to believe it was a date.

Then Butcher had interrupted. Which was probably better because we’d been standing outside in the middle of the club’s property.

Not the best place to initiate anything.

Drying my hands and face, I fluffed my hair a little and stepped out of my apartment.

Then froze as I saw a man I didn’t recognize pinning a woman against the wall.

My mouth fell open because there weren’t that many single women here tonight.

If that was one of my friends she was going to be in deep shit with her old man.

Then I shook my head. No way. They were all so madly in love with their guys, they wouldn’t even look at another guy.

“Excuse me,” I said.

They both looked over and I let out a sigh of relief when I saw who the man was kissing. Then I stared in shock, because I recognized the man. Standing there, making out with Sylvia, was US Attorney Jack Rainer. “Hi, Syl.” I said. Then gave him a large grin. “Rainer. How are you?”

Sylvia gave me a smile that was equal parts guilt and satisfaction. “Oh. Hey, Keels. Um…You know Rainer?” She motioned to the man who was still pinning her to the wall.

“We’ve met,” I said, trying to keep my grin from getting too big. It was just so nice to see a beautiful, amazing woman like Sylvia find a nice man. And Rainer was a damn good man.

All I’d have to do was sic the guys on him if he got out of line. But when you needed help there was no one better than Jack. Besides, no one was going to hurt Syl with any of us around. We all loved her so much. She was a part of our family, and because of that we’d protect her.

“I should get back down there,” I said, flashing Syl a look that told her we’d be discussing this later.

She blushed and gave a slight nod as I walked past them and back down the stairs.

The music hit me like a wave of energy and I let my eyes scan all the people as they drank and talked.

It was crazy that I was involved in all this now.

It wasn’t all that long ago that I’d spent most of my nights in my quiet house, studying for whatever case I was working.

Now I had this huge group of people who cared for me enough that they were helping me with a very dangerous situation.

I wouldn’t give them up for anything. I loved being a part of the club, even if I wasn’t an old lady.

Whatever happened with me and Lock, I was keeping these people. They were my family now.