“So I should just join the club and have my revenge?” Her voice rose in pitch. Secretly she’d always wanted Viper to pay for what he’d done. But more than that she wanted to know he would never hurt her again. It was wrong to want a man dead; wrong to condone violence, yet hearing Holt voice her secret desire sent a thrill through her veins. “As what? A club whore, like my mother?”
“Nah. You got too much class to be a club whore,” he said, entirely missing the sarcasm in her tone or the point she was trying to make. “You could be a house mama or someone’s old lady.”
Naiya didn’t know whether to be insulted or flattered. Yes, an old lady was the highest rank a woman could achieve in the biker world, but she hadn’t pulled herself out of the gutter just to throw herself back into another one. She had gone to college to make something of herself, and that didn’t mean taking orders, cooking meals, cleaning guns, and sitting on the back of her old man’s Harley on Sunday rides.
“I think I stick with my plan to be a forensic scientist, if that’s okay with you.” She hadn’t missed the fact that he’d said “someone’s” old lady. Not his.
“You gonna be happy working for the man?”
This time she laughed. “‘The man’ will give me a steady job that pays very well and is intellectually challenging and interesting. Plus I have another reason for choosing forensic science. One day, I’m going to find my dad.” She held out her hand, flashed her ring. “There’s a biker out there wearing the Skull Mark ring and DNA that matches mine. You found your family. I’ll find mine.”
“Lots of bikers have skull rings,” he said, his voice gentle. “Hell, I’ll bet most of the Sinners have one ‘cause we got a skull in the center of our patch.” His arms slid around her, and she thought that was a good thing. He needed comfort, and she could give him that. No one had ever needed her before, and she’d never had anything to give.
“So, what are you going to do?” She tensed, didn’t dare breathe as he formulated his answer.
“No Sinners.” His lips whispered over her hair. “I didn’t want to meet them. Tank said he’d come back in the morning. He said he’d sit in the lobby all fucking day, sleep on the floor, until I came back.”
“I’ve never had a friend like that,” she said. “Ally’s a good friend, and she’s done a lot for me, but you and Tank have something that goes beyond friendship.”
“We’re not gay.”
Naiya laughed. “I kinda guessed that from the way you … know your way around a woman. I just meant it’s a very close friendship.”
“We just got each other, always had each other’s backs. The day we met, I was just hanging around the MC, helping out, hoping they’d ask me to prospect. Tank came over and gave me some tips. Told me what I needed to do.”
“So he’s senior to you?”
Holt stroked a hand through her hair. “We’re both junior patch, but yeah, he’s been with the club a year longer than me.”
“I would have guessed you were older.”
“That’s what happens when life fucks you over.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “So that first night they sent him out to watch the bikes, and this chick comes and just sits on Zane’s saddle just to get some attention. Tank didn’t want to hurt her, but when he tried to get her off, she kicked him and he fell back, knocked over the row of bikes. Even I knew that was the end for him, so I took the fall. Took one hell of beating, and then the brothers tossed me a bunch of cleaning stuff, told me to detail every bike. Got the first bike done, turned around and Tank was beside me with a rag. It’s been like that ever since.”
“And it will be like that again. Go with him tomorrow and see the Sinners. Give them a chance.”
He twisted his hand in her hair, gently tugged her head back. “If I go, you’re coming with me.”
“I don’t want to go to a biker clubhouse,” she said, pulling away. “It was hard enough going into a bar. You don’t need me. The Sinners will help you get revenge. And since I’m safe in Conundrum, I can stay here until you do what you have to do, or I find a job in another state. I checked my email when I came back and I’ve got interviews at crime labs in Florida, New Mexico, and Rhode Island. There are lots of options.”
“You don’t leave.” He gripped her shoulders in his massive hands, his face contorted in a mask of pain.
Startled by the vehemence in his tone, she pulled away. “We don’t need each other. You have your club back, a revenge mission to see through. I need to get back to my regular life. We’re different people. We want different things. We live in different worlds, lead different lives. The things you do: stealing, and shooting people, running guns—even if you’re doing them to keep me safe—they aren’t okay with me. I can’t live that kind of life. I’m starting a career where I fight crime. I can’t be a criminal or hang around with a criminal organization.”
“You’re scared,” he said firmly. “And that’s why you should go. You can’t keep hiding. You gotta confront the things that scare you. Nothing’s gonna happen to you when you’re with me. The Sinners aren’t like the Jacks. All bikers aren’t the same.”
Holt was right about one thing. She had spent the last seven years hiding. She’d hidden physically and emotionally, burying all memories of that night so she could forge a new life for herself, untainted by the past. But, of course, it had caught up to her, and she was on the run again. Hiding. Not just from Viper, but also from herself and who she longed to be—a woman free to make her own choices, to live without fear. She wanted to be the Phantom of her own damn story.
“Don’t leave.” He reached for her, pulled her into his chest, leaned down and kissed her. Angry and desperate, his kiss was as much a claiming as a plea, a ravaging of her body and her soul.
She pulled away, gasped for breath, her breasts rising, pressing against the hard muscle of his chest. “Holt. What are you—?”
“I need you,” he said. “You’re mine, and I’m not going to let you go. Whatever I have to do, whatever it takes, however long … If you can’t live the biker life after I’m done with Viper, then I won’t live it. But you can’t leave me. I am nothing, Naiya, if I don’t have you.”
* * *
Adrenaline pulsed through Holt’s veins, followed by a surge of panic when Naiya tried to pull away. He felt right with her, complete, the way he felt with Tank, but this feeling was deeper, more intense. He’d felt lost without Tank. But if Naiya left, he would be destroyed.
With a fierce hold, he cupped the back of her neck and kissed her deeply, trying to tell her with his actions what he couldn’t say in words. He was totally and utterly raw, emotionally exposed, flayed by Tank’s revelation and Naiya’s threat to walk away.
Naiya smoothed the damp hair from his temples. “Is that a request?”
“It’s whatever you want it to be. Just so long as it means you aren’t walking out that door.” His future was no longer neatly laid out, his plan for vengeance no longer clear. All he knew for certain was that he’d been looking for something all his life and he’d found it with her. She was the only thing that made sense in the world. She was sweet in his arms but strong enough to defy him, beautiful and brave, stubborn and sexy. He had been through hell and survived, and his reward had come in the form of a woman who could bend but not break, challenge but not conform, submit but not surrender. Naiya was his. Totally, utterly, and irrevocably. And he would never let her go.
She gave him a slow, sensual kiss that sent all his blood rushing to his groin. “I have a feeling even if I did leave, you’d follow me.”
“To the ends of the earth.”
Naiya knew him in his new skin. Cared about him even though he didn’t know what it was about this new Holt that would attract a woman like her. He didn’t need to flirt or tease or seduce. He wasn’t the “good guy,” mediating his way through disputes, playing jokes, or being everyone’s best friend. The new Holt was demanding and controlling. Impatient. Serious. So far removed from the self he knew, he would be lost without Naiya to anchor him to the ground. He needed her now. Needed to claim her, body and soul.
As if she could read his mind, Naiya drew his head down, brushed her lips over his ear. “Show me. Show me how much you want me. Don’t hold back. Don’t stop. You have my permission to take what you need from me, do what you want with me. I trust you, Holt.”
As if a dam broke inside him, Holt crushed her mouth to his, driving away all his fear and panic as he gave in to the primitive instinct to conquer and claim. His tongue swept over every inch of her mouth, touching, tasting, drowning in her sweet surrender.
Naiya slid her hands under his shirt, pushing it up. She pressed a soft kiss to his chest and he yanked the shirt over his head. Licking her lips, Naiya placed her palms flat against Holt’s chest and stroked over his pecs. “I want to feel you against me. Skin to skin.”
Holt’s brain fuzzed with lust. Desperate to undress her, he shoved her shirt and bra up over her breasts, almost tearing them off her as she pulled them over her arms. When she was bare before him, he wrapped his arms around her, crushing her taut nipples against his bruised, scarred chest. She felt so right. Perfect. His. With a low groan he sank his teeth into the sensitive spot between her neck and her shoulder, sucking her skin between his teeth.
“I need to mark you,” he murmured against her skin. “I want the world to know you’re mine.”
* * *
Naiya sucked in a sharp breath as Holt left his mark, pain and pleasure mixing in a cocktail of lust that made her tremble in anticipation. For the first time in forever, she had opened up to a man—baring her deepest secrets. And now she was going to open to him another way—she was going to give him her body, uninhibited, unrestrained, without fear or regret—and trust that he wouldn’t hurt her.
Her heart thundered as her hand dropped to his belt. “Is that all you’ve got?” She yanked open his fly, shoved his jeans down, freeing his cock from its restraint. “I said don’t hold back.”
Holt’s voice dropped to a husky growl. “Damn. You might not believe it, or even want it, but you’ve got biker in you, right to the core.”
He kicked off his jeans and dropped to his knees in front of her. Naiya slid her hands through his thick, soft hair as he trailed his hand down her stomach to the waistband of her jeans. For a moment she thought—feared—he was going to slow down, but in five seconds flat her jeans were open and their hands were tangling as they shoved her clothing over her hips. Holt stood as she stepped out of her jeans and panties. With a deep, erotic growl, he cupped her ass and ground her hips against his.
Throwing aside her inhibitions, Naiya wrapped her hand around his thick cock, gliding her thumb over the smooth, moist head. “I want you. Inside me. Now.”
He jerked his hips, pumping into her hand, and his voice thickened. “There’s a condom in my pocket.”
She slid her hand up his cock from base to tip. “I’m on the pill. Are you…?”
Holt stilled. “Yeah. I’m clean. Never gone bareback before, but get checked out once a year just the same. And the last three months—”
“I trust you, Holt.”
The next thing she knew, she was spun around, pushed over the back of the couch. Holt kicked her legs apart.
“Yes. That.” Her breaths came in short pants. “More. Take me. Hard.”
He grabbed her hair, twisted it in his hand, and pulled her head up, making her back arch, her ass lifting in invitation.
She shivered in delicious anticipation as Holt slicked his fingers through her folds.
“Christ, you’re wet,” he murmured. “So ready for me.”
Before she could respond, he thrust into her, his cock sliding deep into her channel, parting the swollen tissue to accommodate his girth.
Heaven.
With one hand on her hip, he pulled out and thrust in again. Naiya moaned, pushed back against him. Her hands fisted on the soft, beige cushions, her body taut, straining for release. But in this position, she had no control. She could take only what he would give, the way he wanted to give it. And yet she knew if she asked him to stop, he would. With Holt, she held the power, and knowing that, trusting him, she was able to let it go.
“That’s right, darlin’, I got you.” Holt reached around and stroked her clit. Ripples of pleasure shot through her as she climaxed, her pussy tightening around Holt’s rigid shaft. With a soft grunt, he pushed deep inside her, drawing out her orgasm with slow, measured thrusts.
“Fuck. Gotta have you. Gotta move.” His hands clamped around her hips, and he hammered into her. Hard. Fast. His cock slid over her sensitive tissue, and another orgasm overtook her. Holt joined her, his cock thickening and swelling before he climaxed with a low, guttural groan.
He collapsed over her back, pressed kisses to the damp skin on her nape, and licked the bite on her shoulder where he’d marked her. Finally he pulled out. Semen trickled down Naiya’s inner thigh. She stiffened as the sensation triggered a brutal memory of the morning after Viper’s assault. Cold. Alone. Naked. Body marked. A gush of wetness …
Bile rose in her throat and she stood, hugged herself tight.
Holt’s forehead creased in alarm. “Did I hurt you?”
“No.” She edged away, grabbed her clothes from the floor. “I’m just going to … clean up.”
She made it to the washroom before her knees gave out. Sinking down to the cold tile, she bit back a sob. What a mistake. She’d never let a man come inside her after that night; never agreed to rough sex. Why did she think it would be okay now?
After washing up and pulling on her clothes, she splashed water on her face and twisted her hair back in a ponytail. Holt was dressed when she came out, standing by the window. He turned to greet her, but she couldn’t meet his gaze.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” She grabbed the remote and sat on the edge of the bed, flicking through the channels without really seeing the screen, looking for something to fill the black hole that had formed in her chest.
But Holt wasn’t so easily put off. He knelt in front of her and gently took the remote from her hand.
“Talk to me,” he said softly. “If I hurt you, I need to know. If it was too much…”
“I thought I could handle it, but I can’t.” She bit her lip, trembling. “I wanted to know Holt the Sinner. I wanted to know how far you would go and how rough you could be. I wanted to give you what you needed, but it was too much. You’ll never be able to let go with me. It all came back … Viper … the assault.”