Page 10 of Stripping Keys (Devil’s Riot MC Tennessee #6)

CHAPTER EIGHT

KEYS

What the fuck was I thinking? I’ve gone and lost my mind.

No, I didn’t lose my mind. I knew exactly what I was doing when I brought Marla back to the clubhouse and locked her in my room.

I expected her to go off on me when she woke up to find she wasn’t in the hotel but in my room. She surprised me by not flipping her shit. She’d been much calmer than I expected her to be. Simply demanded to leave.

It was probably more she was waiting for a moment to get one over on me, but I know her. She’ll go off in time, and I’ll be waiting. There’s no way she’s gonna go off on me and me not be prepared for it.

I meant what I told her when it comes to her being mine. I see past the shields she keeps in place. To have that, when it comes to her and me being in here together, she drops it. I want the woman I know her to be. I want the secrets that she hides.

That right there might make me a hypocrite to want something I won’t give in return. My secrets are something no one will know. I’ll keep them until the day they put my ass in the ground. No one will learn the truth of my past.

It’s the last thing I need. If those around me learned it, they’d look at me differently. That’s not a chance I’ll take when it comes to my past. No one is to know what I did to survive living in that house.

Without much talk between Marla and me, we both consumed our meals from the diner. She polished off all of her food without any coaxing. Gotta admit it’s good to have a woman who doesn’t care about eating in front of me, and it's not a salad or only eat half and say she’s full.

Once we finished eating, I left her to watch TV for a while as I sat at my computer and worked. I’m surprised she hasn’t asked to see West or to leave the room yet. I’m sure she’s either pissed and not talking to him or she’s planning her escape.

I doubt the latter, though. I saw the look in her eyes when I told her what was happening between us.

My cock twitches in my jeans at the thought of having her.

I’ve wanted her for months. Hell, her voice haunted me for years.

I’d fuck women and think of her voice while doing so.

I didn’t have to see her face for her to consume my head.

After seeing her, though, that’s what fucked with my head more than anything.

I couldn’t get off without envisioning it was her I was fucking.

There’s no denying the fact I wanted her, but I also have never been a choir boy. Sex was like second nature to me. I need it to focus just as much as I need to eat and sleep. Fucked up as it sounds, it’s what I need. Doesn’t matter how I get the release, as long as I get it.

“Are you going to work the rest of the day?” Marla’s question breaks through my thoughts before I could go down that train of thought. It’s the last place I need to head for thinking-wise.

Spinning my chair to face her, I lean forward and brace my elbows on my knees. “You got somewhere you need to be?”

“No,” she snaps and narrows her gaze on me. “I’m just not one for being couped up all day.”

I cock a brow, knowing she’s full of shit. I remember her telling me that her favorite thing to do after she finishes working on something is to relax and binge-watch one of the shows she loves. Woman was obsessed with older shows like Baywatch , MacGyver , and others like that.

“I also want to see West,” she admits, blowing out a breath.

“I’ll text him and tell him to come in here and hang with you. I’ve got to go meet with my brothers again.”

“And I can’t hang out with West somewhere besides this room, why?”

“Until I know you’re not gonna up and try to run, your sweet ass is in here.” Standing, I cross the short distance to where she’s stretched out on the bed and climb over her. I brace myself up on my arms, not wanting to give her my full weight, but I give her just enough for her to feel me.

“You should still let me out of this room,” she fusses.

“And I will,” I tell her, dipping my head down ‘til I’m a hair's breadth away from her lips. “When I’m done with church, I’ll let you out of the room for a little while. But so, you know, your parents are here. They’ve been here and refuse to leave until they see you. Same as Marshall and Marley.”

“Great,” she grumbles, her body tensing underneath me. “They won’t leave until they get what they want.”

“You don’t gotta tell them shit if you don’t want to.” Though she should give them something, it’s only right to fill her family in on something so they’re not stressing over what their child/sibling is up to.

I’ve seen what the three of them are like when they’re all in the same room together. Marshall, Marley, and Marla might all be like oil and water when together, but they all love each other. It’s just the way they are with each other.

“You’re right about that.” Marla scoffs. “I won’t be telling them a thing about what I do.”

“Baby, you might not want to tell them any of it, but I’d suggest giving them something. Your mom’s been worried sick about you.” Anna was a good woman, from what I can tell. If anyone deserves answers, that woman surely does.

Marla seems to lose some of the hostility in her body at the mention of her mom. “I’ll think about talking to my mom,” she grits out.

“Good.” I brush my lips across hers, and she opens her lips on a gasp.

I want nothing more than to take advantage of her opening to me, but I don’t have time. I’ve got to get to church.

Marla is a temptation all of her own. She could breathe, and I want her. Giving in to kissing her would be the easiestthing I could do. Fighting the need for her is the hardest.

Earlier, when she’d been dressing, I fought myself to keep from taking her then and there.

I’m sure she’d enjoy the tease of being in nothing but a towel while she slipped those panties of hers on over her legs.

The very fact she wasn’t wearing a bra made my hands itch to jerk the top of her tank top down and wrap my lips around one of those little hard pebbles she calls nipples.

Through the tank top she’d put on, I could see the outline of the nipple rings.

It was something I hadn’t known about her, and it makes me wonder what else she’s got pierced.

It’s something I look forward to finding out.

“Behave for me, baby,” I murmur against Marla’s lips and pull away, getting off the bed and looking down at her. “I shouldn’t be long.”

Instead of giving me words, Marla huffs and rolls her eyes.

Grinning, I move to my desk, grab what I need, and head for the door. I unlock it, open enough to step through, pulling it shut right behind me. I take a moment to secure the lock, locking her in. It might seem fucked up to do, but I’m not taking the chance of her running away.

I should go back in there and say to hell with everything else.

If I did that, no one would see either of us until I felt I was sated from my need with her.

What I need to do is once I finish this meeting, take her to my place.

If I did that, I could enjoy doing everything I want to do to her for days on end.

Sighing heavily, I shove the keys in my pocket, push thoughts of fucking Marla to the back of my mind for the time being, and head down the hallway toward church.

While Marla slept, we met twice to talk to over all the details not just what Marla had given us, but the sit-down that Nines and Blow had with Calyx, West, and Marla.

That bit of news pissed me off that I hadn’t been in on it, then again, none of them knew what she was to me. Even now, they’ve questioned what’s going on with me, but I’ve not answered them about what’s happening. Just that I’m keeping her locked up for her own good.

Unlike the rest of my brothers, I have a deadbolt lock that is key only. You can’t access my room without it, and you can’t get out without it being unlocked. It’s probably overboard, but if you live a life like I did, you learn to protect yourself anyway you can.

Plus, putting her in my room is better than her being put in a cell to keep her safe. Nothing can touch her while she’s in there.

Although I probably should have texted West and sent him in there before locking the door. It would have given her company.

But I didn’t.

She’ll be okay until I’m done with church. When I finish, I’ll go get her and give her time with everyone else.

Church is more of the same. My brothers arguing over the intel we’d been handed and what Blow and Nines reported to all of us.

It’s a fuck load of shit that could fuck with not just a few of us, but the whole damn club. We thought we’d taken care of the group when we saved Chelsea. Then the shit happened with Olive. The heads of the snake keep being chopped but growing back. It’s not a damn snake but a fucking hydra.

Between the times we were breaking, I’d spent time looking into my own sources of information to see if I couldn’t find anything more.

Everything I found was all about concreting what Marla had given us.

She’d been more than a little thorough in what she found, which I found more than alarming.

The danger she put herself in to find out what she found out was more than enough to scare a man to death.

During those months, she worked her ass off getting the club the intel, she all but been on radar for those men without being on radar all at the same time. They knew someone was getting information, they just didn’t know who. To them, Marla had been a sweet piece to look at.

“We need to just take the rest of the group out and be done with it,” Scorn remarks from his seat. “Then we won’t have to deal with this shit anymore.”

“We do that without a plan of attack, we’ll not only get ourselves in the line of sight of every ABC agency, but we’ll also put the women and children in more danger than they already are,” Shiner grunts.

“Have we heard back from our friends in the sheriff’s office or the police department?” Griz asks, his focus on Blow at the head of the table.