Page 9

TICK TOCK

I needed a fucking break. The edge I carried was still sharp, my fists still twitching for action. So I spent the day doing something that made no damn sense, and was so damn normal. Normalcy was not my thing.

I was looking for my own place. When we moved from Washington, I sold my parents’ old home. Nothing fancy, but it had memories, roots, history. That money had been sitting in the bank ever since, collecting dust. It was time I did something with it, something that grounded me.

Hell, maybe I thought buying a house would make me feel less like a ghost drifting from one run to the next.

The realtor had tried to sell me on some tidy shotgun house with a porch and a patch of dying grass. Said it had "charm" and "potential." I didn’t give a shit about either. What I needed was privacy, something out of the way, something I could lock down tight with reinforced doors and blackout shades. Something no one could get into unless I wanted them there.

Why? Because lately we’d been watching our backs more than usual. Ever since Rancid started slithering into Bulldog’s ear, things hadn’t felt right. The walls weren’t as safe, the air wasn’t as still. Clubhouse used to be a sanctuary. Now it felt like a powder keg.

I didn’t want to be too far from Bulldog, he was still my Prez, and I’d bleed for that man, but I needed space. I needed something I could call mine. A place where I didn’t have to keep my gun loaded under my pillow. Somewhere quiet. Out of reach. Mine alone.

Mine .

My mind hadn’t been on safety or peace. It had been on her.

Amethyst.

That sweet little thing with eyes too wide and a mouth that tasted like sin. I’d walked away from her, but my cock hadn’t gotten the memo. Neither had my mind. Every night I lay in bed, picturing her spread out, begging, purring. I could still taste her on my tongue, could still hear that shaky little gasp when I buried my face between her thighs.

I needed to stay away.

She wasn’t just temptation, she was trouble. The kind of trouble that followed you home and didn’t ask permission before tearing your world apart.

I didn’t want to care what she was doing, who she was doing it for, or how many men stared at her with their dicks in their hands. But I did. I cared too fucking much.

That leash, that bell, the way she looked up at me like I could ruin her and she fucking thanked me for it. It was taking a toll on both my mind and my dick.

"Mr. Barrero?" the realtor’s voice cut through my thoughts.

I turned to look at her. She was too polished and way too eager. She was holding a clipboard, some god awful beige brochure in her hand.

"It’s got great bones," she said, forcing a bright smile.

I gave her a long look. “I’m looking for something better. And you better have something worth my time lined up soon.”

Her face twitched, but she nodded and turned to lead me out. I didn’t apologize. I didn’t explain. My patience was thin, and my mind was a million miles away... with her .

I stepped out onto the porch, the wood creaking beneath my boots. The late afternoon heat clung to my skin like sweat-soaked leather, the Louisiana humidity refusing to let up. The sky had that hazy golden hue, sun sinking low with a promise of another sticky night ahead. I pulled on my shades, letting the tinted lenses take the edge off the light as I surveyed the quiet street.

Didn’t matter how peaceful it looked. I knew better.

I walked down the steps, slow and deliberate, each movement buying me time from the storm still raging in my head. My bike waited like a loyal beast at the curb, and with one last look at the house I wouldn’t be buying, I swung my leg over and rode off.

Toward the city. Toward the noise. Toward the damn thing I couldn’t forget.

The streets of New Orleans were alive with that strange mix of life and decay. The heat stuck to everything like sweat and honey, and the sound of jazz curled through alleyways thick with smoke and sin. Voodoo shops sat next to corner bodegas. The smell of fried shrimp and cigarette ash soaked into the old bricks. This place was like a woman in her own right... dark, sultry, and laced with danger.

I made my way toward Cherry Smoke, a biker bar tucked behind a crumbling brick wall a few blocks from the Quarter. Owned by Ajax, our club’s Secretary. He was one mean bastard with a mind like a steel trap. The place was more than a bar. It was a fortress. A place for patched members to drink, talk business, and breathe without eyes on their backs. It was a safe spot to sit and breathe without watching my back.

Barrel was already inside, sitting at a corner booth with a plate of blackened gator bites and a half-drunk beer in front of him. The place was loud, filled with leather and smoke and laughter that always carried a hint of something violent.

I slid into the booth across from him.

“You look like shit,” he said.

“Thanks, brother. You got a way with words.”

He didn’t smile. Didn’t even glance up. Just took another bite of his food, chewing like the weight of the world was sitting on his shoulders.

I flagged down the waitress, ordered a burger, and cracked open a cold bottle of beer. We sat in silence for a while. Comfortable. Until I noticed the way Barrel kept fidgeting.

“You gonna spit it out or keep twitchin’ like you got fleas?” I asked.

Barrel sighed. Set his fork down. “I’ve got a daughter.”

I blinked. That wasn’t something I expected from a man like Barrel. He was hard as stone and twice as cold. I figured his heart had been carved out years ago by club life or by something darker.

“Didn’t know that,” I said carefully.

“Not many do. I kept her out of the life. She’s smart. Got her head on straight. At least she used to.”

“You worried?”

“Yeah,” he admitted. “She’s hidin’ something. Been actin’ off lately. Real jumpy. Missed work. I stopped by her old job, and they said she never worked there. I ask her and she lies sayin' she got fired. Now she’s telling me she’s got classes, but I ain’t buyin’ it.”

“Could be nothin’.”

“Could be,” he agreed. “But New Orleans ain’t soft. You know that. I’ve seen girls end up in ditches for less.”

“So what are thinking of doing?”

“I heard Bulldog’s Old Lady talking about help in the kitchen. My kid’s a decent cook. She’ll make do.”

I nodded slowly. “Are you sure bringing her to the clubhouse is a good idea?”

He hesitated. “I need a way to keep an eye on her. Can’t watch her if she’s always out somewhere slippin’ through my fingers.”

My jaw tightened, carefully selecting each word. “The clubhouse ain’t exactly Sunday school, Barrel. You’ve seen what kind of men we got rollin’ through there.”

“Yeah,” he said. “But like anyone would actually cross me or mine. I’ll put a bullet in their head before they even think about it. Besides, I’ll put word out, she’ll be left alone.”

I didn’t say anything. Just took a long pull from my beer and leaned back into the booth.

If a girl like Amethyst ever walked through those doors… with her sweet little mouth and trembling thighs… they’d eat her alive. And if his daughter was nineteen, barely a woman, just a college girl looking for footing?

Barrel was fucking insane.

We finished our meal without another word on it. Just club talk, patch politics, the usual.

But I couldn’t shake this feeling building in my gut. Like something big was about to happen.

The streets had grown quiet and there was a heavy stillness in the air. I ignored it as I rode back to the clubhouse, to the small room in the back of the house where I stayed. My room was nothing fancy. As private as it could get in a house full of men that came and went as they caw fit. It was one bedroom, dark wood floors, blackout curtains. Just the way I liked it.

I dropped my cut on the chair, cracked my neck, and sat on the edge of my bed, still thinking of her.

Amethyst.

What if a girl like her, barely grown, sweet pussy like that and a virgin, ended up in a place like that, surrounded by wolves?

I’d kill every single fucker who even looked at her wrong. No questions asked.