Authors: Jamie Begley
“Even my lips hurt,” Lucky complained, wincing when he took a sip of his hot coffee.
“I told you when you…” Willa paused, unable to bring herself to say the word out loud. “That it makes me…”
“Horny? Siren, that makes any woman horny,” he boasted, wincing again when she hit him on his shoulder before she sat back down.
The kitchen door opened and Bliss came in, yawning. She was wearing a short pair of lavender pajama shorts that barely covered her butt and a matching top that dipped between her breasts and was only held up by spaghetti straps. From the way her nipples poked through the thin top, Willa discerned she wasn’t wearing a bra. Willa was worried that was why Lucky was staring at the blonde woman whose body was perfectly proportioned.
“You’re late,” Lucky snapped at her, relieving Willa of her misconception.
Bliss shrugged as she went to the refrigerator. “I knew Willa would have it under control.” She waved her hand at the food laid out on the counter. “And I was right.”
“Tomorrow, be on time or your name’s going in the punishment bag.”
“What’s the punishment bag?” Willa asked.
“It’s a bag where they make you draw a punishment when you’ve been bad. Isn’t that right, Lucky?” Bliss poured herself a glass of orange juice, leaving the bottle out on the counter.
Willa itched to get up and put it back in the refrigerator but she made herself sit still, not liking the provocative way Bliss was talking to Lucky.
“Yes,” Lucky ground out, his eyes narrowing on Bliss.
Willa stood up, going to the oven where she took out the last tray of bacon then turning to set it on an empty burner on the stove.
“Careful, you almost burned me.”
Willa hadn’t been near enough to burn her, but Bliss’s harsh comment rattled her. Regardless, she couldn’t think on it long, because right then, several club members began trailing in one after the other.
She saw Shade come in with Razer. Lily had called her last night to tell her that she was off today and that Rachel was working the church store. Winter, Viper, and Moon came in as she placed toast in the toaster. Bliss merely moved to lean against another counter without trying to help.
Going back to the double oven, she leaned over to pull out the tray of biscuits.
“That’s not a sight I want to see first thing in the morning,” Bliss said nastily from behind her.
Willa’s face flamed at the insult, aware the whole room had heard the comment.
Willa heard Lucky’s chair scrape back. “Bliss, I want to talk to you upstairs in Viper’s room.”
Willa turned carefully to place the baking sheet on the stove. “Lucky, it’s all right.”
“No, it’s not—”
Before Lucky could complete his sentence, Willa watched in horror as Bliss’s hand went to set down her orange juice, deliberately sliding it forward and knocking over the cookie jar that Willa had filled an hour ago with Lucky’s cookies. It shattered on the floor in a thousand pieces, which was exactly how many pieces her heart broke into.
Willa’s already frayed nerves snapped.
“Why did you do that? Why have you been so mad at me? I thought we were friends.”
“Friends!” Bliss yelled at her. “Friends don’t stab each other in the back.”
“How did I stab you in the back?” Willa asked, thoroughly confused.
“You fucked Shade! I saw you go downstairs with him! You stayed down there a long time in the bedroom. Does Lucky know you fucked Shade on the same bed you do him every night?”
When Lucky and Viper approached Bliss angrily, Willa held her hand up to stop them, wanting to hear the rest of the filth spewing from her mouth.
“Does Lily know?” Bliss gave a bitter laugh. “He wouldn’t cheat on Lily with me, but he did with you. Do you want to know the funniest part? The night before Lucky was supposed to leave for Ohio, he wanted me to fuck him, and I didn’t! I turned him down because you made me that fucking candy. He fucked Raci, Ember, and Stori all night, instead. I won’t make that mistake again. If you want me to go upstairs with you, Lucky, let’s go.” Her voice had turned sultry, her wanton insinuation like a slap in Willa’s face.
Willa turned around, giving the room her back as she battled her rising temper. “God, give me strength.”
“What did you say? If you’ve got something to say—”
Willa turned around sharply. “I said shut up!” Willa yelled, going toward Bliss angrily. “I didn’t have sex with Shade. We talked! That’s all! He showed me Lucky’s medals and talked to me about their time in the service. That was all we did!”
Lucky, Viper, and Bliss all took a step back at the fury on Willa’s face. All the anger she had been holding in for days, weeks, and years came spilling out at the woman who had broken a cookie jar she had cherished.
“Why is it that you felt like you had the right to talk to me like that? You wouldn’t have talked to anyone else that way, just me!”
Bliss started trembling. “I don’t know.”
“It stops now! Do you hear me?” This time, Willa yelled at the whole room of onlookers.
They all nodded in unison.
“That chore list sucks! If I want to cook and manage this kitchen, then I’m damn sure going to do it! Okay?” She glared at Viper.
“Knock yourself out.” Viper’s concession didn’t slow her down.
“If I want to do it, I will,” she snarled at her husband who was about to protest. “If it gets to be too much, I’ll tell you.”
“One person can’t do it all. You can’t handle this kitchen and your baking business—”
Willa cut him off. “I don’t plan do to it alone. I plan to hire someone. Ginny can quit the diner. She hates it. Everyone can keep their freaking clothes on while she’s in the house for a few hours a day. Everybody should pick the chores they want to be responsible for. If they don’t get done, dock their pay and give it to Ginny to pay her for doing them.”
“We usually vote on…” Viper began then stopped at her glare. “We’ll try it on a trial basis.”
Willa went to the pantry, taking out the broom and dust pan, angrily sweeping the broken glass and cookies up jerkily.
She pointed the handle of the broom at Raci. “If I want to wash dishes by hand, I will. It relaxes me.”
Raci jerked back as the broom handle nearly tapped her nose. “Okay.”
Willa dumped the glass into the trash can before turning her heated glance toward Winter. “And if I want to fix my husband breakfast and wait on him because it makes
me
feel good, then I will!”
“But, it’s archaic—” Her teeth snapped together at Willa’s glare. “All right.”
Stori moved out of Willa’s way as she put the broom and pan back in the pantry. Willa shut the pantry door then stopped in front of Stori, pointing her finger at her chest. “If anyone is going to make my husband’s lunch, it’s going to be me. If I’m not here, then he can fix it his own damn self.”
“Okay.”
Willa looked at her watch, realizing she was going to be late for work, and she hated being off schedule. She was almost out the kitchen door when she turned around.
“And, Rider, put down the freaking toilet lid in the half bath when you’re done, dammit.”
“I’ll remember that.”
Her tirade wasn’t over as her gaze focused on Jewell. “Do you see a nose on my face?”
Jewell gave her a strange look, nodding her head.
When Willa slammed her hand against the kitchen door, sending it flying the rest of the way open, Jewell hastily moved out of the way so it wouldn’t hit her when it swung back.
“I want my perfume back. It’s been missing since the day I moved in, and I smell it on you.”
She stormed out the kitchen door, still yelling her angry volleys over her shoulder as she headed toward the front door. She was going to get The Last Riders under control, and if not for good, then it would at least be until her and Lucky’s house was built.
*
*
*
The kitchen was silent as they all listened to Willa’s shouts from the other room as she left.
Lucky saw Moon open his mouth to reply when he heard Willa yell at him to get his boots picked up off the floor.
“Don’t say anything. She might come back,” Winter whispered.
Moon closed his mouth, flinching at the sound of his boot hitting a wall, which had them all staring at each other in trepidation that she would come storming back into the kitchen. The slam of the front door had more than one member giving a sigh of relief.
Raci went to stand by the back door. “Do you think she’s really gone, and she’s not faking us out?”
After several seconds, Viper opened the kitchen door, looking into the other room. “She’s gone.”
“Thank fuck.” Jewell sat down shakily at the kitchen table. “I thought she was going to kick my ass.”
“Mine, too.” Winter’s hand was trembling as she lifted her coffee cup to her lips.
The tension in the room didn’t dissipate with Willa leaving, though.
“Bliss, that’s the last time you hurt a member.” Viper’s cold voice was directed at the cause of the unexpected showdown which Willa had won.
“Willa’s not a member.” Bliss’s defiance had disappeared when Willa’s rant had begun. Now she stood in the middle of the members who had gathered in a circle around her.
“I wasn’t talking about Willa. I was talking about Lucky. She’s his wife, so anything you do to hurt her hurts him.”
Lucky saw Bliss’s eyes move in his direction. Coldly, he stared back as Viper began stripping Bliss of her rights as a Last Rider.
“A member has to have eight out of eight votes from the original members to be voted out. When you mouthed off to Lily, you had six out of eight. Two members voted to give you another chance—Lucky and Rider. I’m taking another vote.” Viper glanced at Shade. “Call Knox and get his vote.”
Viper continued talking as Shade moved to the side, making the call.
“I vote out.” Viper looked at Razer. “In or out?
Razer didn’t hesitate. “Out.”
“Train?”
“Out.”
“Lucky?”
Bliss’s tears didn’t affect his vote.
“Out.”
“Shade?”
“Out and Knox votes out.” Shade placed his cell phone back in his pocket.
“Cash?”
“Out.”
All eyes in the room were on Rider when Viper called his name.
“Rider?”
Rider, who had saved Bliss from expulsion three times before, was Bliss’s final hope.
“Please don’t, Rider. I promise—”
“Out.” Rider’s curt vote sealed Bliss’s fate.
Bliss’s shoulders began shaking while she stood as an outcast among them, but Viper showed her no mercy.
“Since I know you don’t have a place to go, you have until the end of the month to get your shit packed and find somewhere else to live, preferably not in Treepoint. You could go back to Ohio.”
“If I don’t belong to The Last Riders, I don’t have anything to go back to there.”
“You don’t belong to The Last Riders anymore, so there’s nothing waiting for you there,” Viper agreed harshly.
Bliss wiped away her tears with the back of her hands, walking through the room of angry members to leave.
None of the members were happy Bliss was being forced to leave. They all knew her feelings for Shade were hard for her to get over. They had all hoped the woman would be able to move past her love for him.
Lucky glared at Shade. “You brought Willa inside the clubhouse without me?”
“She wanted to know what was wrong with you. I told you to tell her about your PTSD before you were married.”
“I was going to tell her.”
Shade crossed his arms over his chest. “I saved you the trouble.”
Lucky’s hands clenched into fists. “When did you take her downstairs?”
“The night she came to borrow Lily’s cookbook.”
“That was a Friday night.”
“Yes, it was.” Shade’s cavalier attitude pissed him off even further.
“What did you tell her?”
“All of it.” Shade gave a laconic shrug. “I showed her all those fancy medals of yours, told her how Kale died, and how you nearly got your ass killed—all of it.”
“I was—”
“I know, you were going to tell her. I saved you the trouble. Plus, she gave me a kiss for saving your sorry ass.” Shade pointed to his cheek. “Right here.”
“Let me show you my gratitude.” Lucky punched Shade’s smug face, making him stumble backward into the counter, knocking the platter of omelets to the floor.
“Watch the food!” Rider yelled.
Shade gave him a triumphant look before swinging his fist back and nailing him in the stomach. Lucky launched himself at Shade and both of them barreled into the kitchen table, crashing it to the floor and sending Winter and Jewell scrambling to get out of the way.
Moon pulled Lucky to his feet while Viper and Train yanked Shade back.
Lucky struggled against Moon’s grip.
“Take it easy, brother.”
Lucky knocked him back with an elbow to his face.
“What the fuck was that for?”
“I saw you looking at Willa’s tits when she was sweeping up the cookie jar.”
Moon gave him a shit-eating grin. “Can you blame a brother?”
“When I get finished with you, you’ll be riding back to Ohio in a hearse.” Lucky picked up one of the kitchen chairs, throwing it at Moon who ducked out of the way. It hit one of the crockpots sitting on the counter, tumbling it off the edge and sending oatmeal oozing onto the floor.
“I said to watch the food.” Rider pushed Lucky back before he could attack Moon again.
Moon was pissed off enough to shove Train when he tried to keep Moon from attacking Lucky. Train’s mercurial temper rose and he struck Moon in the eye, sending the two men into a fist fight while Lucky went at Rider.
“Why in the fuck are you hitting me?”
“Leave my fucking cookies alone.”
Rider began hitting him back in defense, the two barreling into Viper who was still trying to contain Shade.
“What in the fuck is going on in here?” Knox barked out, coming into the room and then tossing the brothers apart.
Lucky managed to catch himself on the kitchen counter, holding his jaw that Rider had managed to land a blow on. Straightening, he angrily started at Knox then stopped. He hadn’t lost what sense he had left to go for him.