Page 23 of Mac (Demented Souls #7)

M ac had been sure he'd screwed things up when he'd slipped and used the endearment from the language he hadn't spoken more than a few words of in more than twenty years, at least that he’d been aware of at the time. Some of his brothers had pointed out him speaking it, but it hadn’t been intentional.

Somehow it had felt natural to use the phrase for Elyse.

He'd been so surprised when she'd kissed him instead of telling him to leave, that it took him far longer than it should have to respond. Now, with his arms full of the woman he'd been watching, and craving, for days, he had nowhere else he wanted to be.

With one hand splayed along her back, and the other sliding along her naked thigh, he lost himself in the feeling of her tongue making a slick, cool trail along the shell of his ear while her hands buried themselves in his hair. Then her teeth clasped one lobe and he startled a little.

"How sensitive are you here?" Her words whispered along his skin.

He resisted the urge to pull away and rub his ear, instead he inched his hand farther up her leg in an effort to distract her. It worked because her head fell back, and a low moan escaped her throat as she ground her hips against his.

"How about we get a little more comfortable." He kept his voice soft.

"Sounds good to me, how's the bedroom sound to you?"

"Like heaven, which way?" He picked her up with ease, thankful for the hard work he'd gotten used to over the years for keeping him fit. Following her directions, he carried her into the bedroom and laid her back against the bed before stepping back to toe off his boots.

Elyse sat up and reached to remove her clothes, but he stopped her.

"I want to." Keeping her clothes on and removing them himself would let him keep the pace he wanted.

He felt like a green kid getting laid for the first time.

The last thing he wanted to do was blow his wad in his jeans.

No. Doing it this way would help him stay in control, at least until the time was right.

Elyse cocked one brow at him but laidback without taking anything off. Instead she watched as he tugged his t-shirt off over his head and tossed it aside before moving back over her.

Mac kissed her hard, letting his hands roam her body with a caress here, a squeeze there, seeing how she reacted to each touch.

After a moment, he pulled back and moved down her body, palming one breast through her shirt and teasing the other nipple with his lips and teeth, still through the padding of her hoodie.

Her fingers wove through his hair again and pulled him closer.

as her head fell back against the bed. She groaned and her body arched against him.

She responded to his touch with unrestrained passion, making him want to touch her even more.

He wanted to see if he could make her lose all control as he pleasured her, and at the same time, enjoyed what lay between them.

He couldn't wait to bury his cock in her.

He couldn't help but wonder if she would be as hot and responsive as he did his best to show her as much pleasure as he found with her.

H e lay beside Elyse, her body warm, pliant and relaxed in his arms. Staring into the darkness, he couldn't help but remember the moments of passion between them, the way she'd cried out her completion, the way she'd demanded just what she needed to get there, more than once and the sweet words she'd murmured against his chest as she'd fallen asleep a few minutes before.

He should get up and go home, but he couldn't make himself do it.

It had been too long since he'd shared his bed, or any bed, with a woman who only wanted him, and not something more.

Elyse only cared about him, not about his status with the club, which wasn't much, other than the time he'd been there.

She wasn't here for him to buy drinks for before she'd let him get laid.

She had invited him over because she had wanted to seduce him.

Mac found himself smiling into the dark at the memory of how adorable she'd been, half drunk and embarrassed as she'd tried to own up to her deceptions.

Not that he hadn't been able to see through them from the very beginning.

He'd known she hadn't asked him over because she was lonely.

What he hadn't known was quite what she'd had in mind.

Not that he would complain. This had been better than he'd hoped for.

His phone rang in the pocket of his jeans, somewhere on the bedroom floor.

He muttered a curse as it was Tuck's ring tone, then carefully extracted his arm from under Elyse's head and slid from the bed, trying not to wake her.

It took him a moment to find his pants in the dark, but he pulled the phone from his pocket and slipped from the bedroom to answer the call.

"This had better be important." He would have snarled but he couldn't figure out how to do that and whisper too.

"Would I call you at 2 a.m. if it wasn't?" Tuck's voice came back.

"Son of a bitch. What do you need?"

"We've got a situation; I need you at the club house as soon as possible."

Mac sighed and scrubbed one hand across his forehead.

"I need you here. How soon can you make it?"

Mac sighed. He knew how long the drive was but added ten minutes so he could get dressed and leave Elyse a note. "Give me thirty, maybe thirty-five."

"I'll be waiting." Tuck didn't say goodbye, just hung up.

Mac scrubbed one hand over his face then headed back to the bedroom for his clothes.

M ac pulled his bike into the yard at the clubhouse and frowned.

Only a few bikes sat in the row in front of the building.

He'd expected if he was being called in, then they all had been — this only confused him.

After backing his bike into line with the others, Mac went inside where he found Tuck sitting at one of the tables in the main room, a mug of beer on the table in front of him.

Mac joined him, pulling out a chair and sitting without waiting for an invite.

"What's up?"

Tuck watched him a moment, silent, then finally spoke. "You were involved with that guy last month, right?"

Mac frowned, not sure what guy the president was referring to, then he remembered. "You mean the pedophile? I wouldn't say involved, but I'd been out there and knew who he was. I was one of the votes for his getting lost in the desert." He drew air quotes around the word lost.

"I think most of the brothers felt that way, but more voted to do it legal."

Mac nodded while Tuck was silent for the space of several heart beats, then spoke again.

"I need some advice from someone I trust, someone with more experience than some of the other guys, and hopefully a cooler head."

Heat washed through Mac as he shifted in his seat. Tuck had never done this before. Had never singled Mac out to ask his opinion. It made some of Mac's irritation at being called out of Elyse's bed fade.

"What's going on?"

"I think we've got a trafficking ring running through our territory."

"Well, yeah. We're part of it, bro." Mac scowled. This couldn't be why the president wanted to talk to him.

Tuck waved a hand. "No, I know about that one.

" The bald man shot him an unhappy look.

"That's not what I'm talking about. I've received a tip about a group bringing in some women from out of country, but more frequently moving kids from one part of the US to another. Kids that were kidnapped here."

"Fuck," Mac said the word with conviction.

He looked around and found Savage behind the bar.

The new prospect had taken Sackett's position as bartender when he'd arrived, and after Gizmo had tapped the other prospect to work in his security company.

They had another, Jake, who often worked behind the bar as well, when he wasn't driving the tow truck for Mac, but it looked like the newbie got the shit shift at 3 a.m. Mac waved and signaled to Savage he wanted something.

"What can I get you?" Savage sounded bored, but at least he didn't sound pissed to be on shit duty.

Mac stared at the president's mug and thought about what he wanted. What he wanted was about half a bottle of good scotch, but this wasn't the time. "Bring me what he's drinking." He nodded toward the mostly full glass on the table.

"Coming right up." Savage's tone lacked enthusiasm, but he didn't waste any time delivering the drink. "That all?"

"For now," Tuck said, pulling the shiny half dollar from the small pocket on the side of his kutte and rolling it across the backs of his knuckles as he continued to watch Mac.

Once the two of them were alone, or as alone as they would get with just the three of them in the room, and Savage halfway across the room at the bar, Tuck spoke again, "Tell me what you're thinking. "

"I'm thinking we need to find a place to dispose of some bodies then we need to do some hunting." Mac took a sip from the cold brew then set the glass on the table. He forced himself to unclench his teeth and shook his hands to keep from fisting them on the table.

There were a lot of things Mac would tolerate, but abusing children was not one of them. It was one of the few things that made him angry enough see red and lose all control of his good senses.

Tuck sighed, bringing Mac's attention back to the situation at hand.

"Okay, I know that's not what you were looking for. I'll try to be more helpful. First, is this a credible tip or just one of those here, this will keep you busy ones?"

"It's possible the whole thing is a distraction, something to keep us busy enough to not notice something else going on, like they did when they sold arms to the cartels more than ten years back."

Mac nodded, remembering the incident, and the fallout from it.

"But I don't think so. I trust this source. I think it's on the up and up. Which only makes the whole thing harder."