OWNED & UNTAMED (A Back Down Devil MC Romance Novel) (5 page)

“You need help,” I said and walked away.

I smiled when Eden looked at me. Then I kept going.

When I got to my room, the woman I had left there was still there. And, yes, her name was Cassie. She was on the bed in nothing but bra and panties. I put my beer on the dresser and grinned.

“Can I help you?” I asked.

“We have unfinished business.”

“My shoulder is patched up. You sucked my cock. I think we’re solid.”

She rolled to her back and opened her legs. Her right hand slipped right into her panties. “Nope, we’re not done yet, Duke. I’m still wet.”

I grabbed my jeans and tore down my zipper.

It was my duty to make sure Cassie didn’t leave my bedroom without what she came for.

And trust me… she was going to come.

Cassie shut the door and I took a deep breath. I smelled her perfume and hot sex. The bed was destroyed, pillows on the floor, a lamp knocked over, the blinds above my bed looking like someone had tried to escape.

That was just how things went with me.

I sat on the corner of the bed in nothing but jeans, finishing off my then warm beer. I grabbed for my phone and looked at the phone number that had called me just before Peter shot me.

It looked damn familiar. I couldn’t put my finger on it though.

There was one easy way to find out.

Call the fucking number back.

I meant to do it early but after being shot I was rushed to a friend’s house where his wife helped to patch me up. She was a doctor and they were trying to climb out of some bad financial decisions from the housing crash and turned to the MC for little favors here and there. We helped them when we could and they did the same for us.

Liquored up, I was on my back, staring at a poster of some fucking boy band that their teenage daughter loved as the doc ripped into my shoulder to get the bullet out. Lucky for me I didn’t need any further treatment. Just to be patched up a couple times a day.

Soon enough we’d be riding to the Hell Five bar and raising a little hell of our own.

Before that, I needed to figure out who called me. Because the phone hadn’t gone off once. Whoever the fuck wanted me called me four times in a row.

I hit the call button and put it on speaker.

It rang three times and the second I heard the voice, I dropped the phone to the floor.

It was a call from the only woman I loved for more than one night.

It was fucking Belle…

six.

(belle)

The big news wasn’t all that big of news.

Maggie slept with her ex last night.

Shocker.

He called right after we left the restaurant and she blamed the wine for the decision. I called bullshit on her but she didn’t want to hear it. So when her ex - Al - called her, she let him come over. She slept with him. He spent the night. Then he said he had to work early. Al left and sent a text five minutes later saying he had been seeing someone and felt guilty for sleeping with Maggie.

By the time I left the diner I made up my mind that all men were assholes.

There was only so much I could help with Maggie and her relationship issues.

I drove back home, sat in the driveway, refreshing my email, waiting for something to come through. I had two projects that were moving along slowly. Nobody worked on Sunday, which was fine, but for me I didn’t want to be home.

With my phone in my hand, it started to ring. I jumped and touched the screen just as I realized it was a number and not a contact.

“Hello?” I asked.

I heard a shuffling sound and a thud. Then I heard
fuck
and more shuffling.

“Hello?” I asked again.

“Hey,” a rough voice said.

It sent instant chills through my body. Not the kind you got when you were afraid. The kind when you know something… something intense happened. Not good, not bad, but just intense.

I promised myself I would never forget Duke’s voice. Or his last words to me.

Sweetie, you’re better off…

“Duke?” I asked, never thinking I’d actually say his name again.

“Belle?”

Hearing him say my name made me shiver again. My inner thighs were trembling. The temperature in my car rose by the second.

“What are…”

“You called me?” he asked.

Oh… shit…

“I… yeah… last…”

“You called me four times,” he said.

He sounded pissed off.

I collected myself for a second.

“Yeah, I did. Sorry. No. Wait.”

“Belle, what do you want?”

“What do I want?” I asked. “Seriously?”

“How did you get my number?”

“Jim’s phone,” I said.

“Shit.”

“What?”

“Nothing. How… how are you?”

I felt the trembling stop as the anger entered the picture. Straight ahead of me Jim came out onto the front porch. Still wearing the same clothes as the day before. His hair a mop mess. A beer in his hand.

“Terrible,” I blurted out.

“Oh?”

“You fucked up, Duke.”

“Excuse me?”

“You left Jim behind.”

Did you really just say that?

“You called to tell me that? At fucking one in the morning?”

“Because Jim tried to kill himself.”

“Holy shit…”

“Well, I don’t know if he meant to try. But he came close. Very close. Almost choked on his own puke.”

“Look, Belle… there’s nothing…”

“Don’t give me your excuses,” I said. “He’s a shell of what he was before he left.”

“We all are, sweetie,” Duke said.

I hated Duke’s voice. Calm. Soothing. Rough.
Sweetie.

“You fucked me over too,” I said. “You fucked everything. You got him into the military. You and him…”

The rage bubbled.

My eyes filled with tears.

“That’s it?” Duke asked as I lost my breath. “You got all that off your chest?”

“Fuck you.”

“You called me, Belle.”

“I need help with him,” I said. “He’s going to kill himself. I know it.”

“I’m a lifetime away. You don’t know a thing about me.”

“I know, Duke. You think you’re tough with a motorcycle now? Jim can barely walk straight.”

“I saved him. That was all I could do.”

“So that’s what you decided? To leave a brother behind? To leave me behind?”

“I already told you… you’re better off.”

“I’m not,” I said. “I wasn’t then. Don’t tell me what I should think or feel.”

“Then don’t fucking call me for answers you don’t want.”

I hated him. I hated everything about him.

Jim drank his beer and turned. I saw him stumble and I knew it wasn’t from his leg either. He was drunk already. In the early afternoon.

“I hope you’re happy,” I said.

“I’m not,” Duke said. “Got anything else for me?”

“You’re a real asshole. My brother needs you. You were the only one who could ever talk to him. He’ll never admit it…”

“You want to help? Walk away. Don’t try to get into that mind. You have no idea what it was like over there. What we saw. What we did. What we went through.”

“I don’t. I would never say I did. But you promised…”

“Fuck promises,” Duke growled. “Don’t spit promises back at me.”

“I’m sorry I called.”

“So am I, sweetie.”

Just like that, the call was over. The years of waiting, lingering, wondering what it would be like to talk to Duke again and that’s what I got. Not that I should have expected anything else. From what I heard and tried to learn, Duke came home and was a different person. He got into fights, got arrested, gave up on the entire military life and image. He then started hanging out with the local motorcycle gang and got accepted into it.

I stared at Jim on the porch and wondered if the same would have happened to my brother if he hadn’t lost his leg.

I climbed out of the car and held back on my emotions.

When I approached the porch, Jim finished off his beer and put the bottle on the wooden railing.

“Rough day?” he asked me.

“Nothing out of the ordinary, Jim,” I said.

I started to move by him and his hand shot out and grabbed my arm. I spun and he stepped back, keeping his balance. The son of a bitch knew how to walk with his prosthetic leg when he wanted to.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Got all day to listen?”

“Seriously, Belle. That look on your face. I only ever see that look when a boy hurts you. Who?”

I felt my face get red. “Nothing, Jim.”

“Where were you?”

His eyes were narrow.

“Brunch with Maggie. She’s having issues.”

“What kind?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“Yes I do,” he said. “Go get me a beer and we’ll talk.”

It was a rare moment to talk to my brother without fighting. He didn’t want to talk about him neglecting himself. Or his house. Or the tree out back. Or anything that remotely resembled a normal life.

Still, it was better than finding him choking on his vomit.

I got two beers and sat on the top step of the porch. Just like I used to do in a different life. I used to sit with Duke. I’d wrap my arms around his arm and put my head on his shoulder. We’d sit there until sundown. Then Dad would find random excuses to come outside and bother us. His way of trying to protect me.

I used to sit there too and smoke. After everyone went to bed, I would sit there and smoke a cigarette or two, feeling cool as anything. I killed that habit a long time ago though.

Jim put his bottle toward me. “Cheers, sis.”

I clanked my bottle to his. “Cheers.”

“Tell me about Maggie.”

“Trust me, it’s nothing interesting. She’s hung up on her ex. Every time this guy calls, she falls right back in love. Sleeps with him. Then he breaks her heart the next morning.”

“Sounds like a fucking tool.”

“Exactly,” I said. I glanced at Jim. “When was the last time you were out on a date?”

He turned his head at me. “What the fuck does that matter?”

“Just trying to have a conversation.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter. Is Maggie okay? She safe and all?”

“Why? You want me to talk to her for you?”

“Shit. No. I didn’t say that. How’d you get that out of a question? Dammit, Belle…”

Jim grabbed his leg and bent it. He then ran his fingers back and forth where his leg ended and the prosthetic began.

“You know, Maggie has her own cleaning business,” I said. “She’s really good.”

Jim raised an eyebrow. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. I could have her help out around here. For both of us.”

“Right. Both of us.” Jim took a big drink.

I opened my mouth and held back for a second. Then I asked, “What happened with you and Duke?”

“What? Where did that come from?”

“Just curious.”

“Trust me, sis, it’s none of your damn business.”

“So do you have anything to talk about?”

“Nothing.”

“Other than Maggie,” I said. “So worried about her. You should have asked her out a long time ago then.”

Jim looked at me. “Why? So I could get sent over there, get blown the fuck up, and come home to a broken woman? Why put her through that? Day in and day out, worrying about me. Wondering if and when I was going to be able to call or write. Wondering if it was me each time she watched the news and heard about another situation over there? And now… what? Have her catering to me as some fucking cripple?”

My jaw dropped.

Jim threw his beer bottle back and pounded the entire thing. He put the bottle between us and pulled himself up. I watched as he walked across the porch to the railing, putting his hands to it, staring off the side of the porch.

“Jim…”

“Let it go,” he said. “Go back to bitching at me about a dirty pan in the sink.”

Yeah, and that’s why I never brought any of that stuff up to Jim. If I did, he would spout off something about fighting a war and then compare to what I yelled at him for.

Jim went back inside and I didn’t even bother chasing him down.

To be honest, I was fucking tired. Of everything.

There had been a split second of hope that Duke would come and fix everything - like he always would and the way he promised he always would. But that wasn’t going to happen.

It was a dream gone bad.