Horse (Rolling Thunder Motorcycle Club Book 6) (13 page)

Gabby

Nathan wanted us to have alibis for the evening, so Horse and I went out to eat. The idea would be that I’d been in class and then we’d gone out, and I didn’t have time to get raped and kill two people in between.

I hadn’t really taken Nathan’s advice about staying out of Faerie seriously before. I hadn’t been raised there, and wasn’t even an official member of the royal family. Now, though, I wondered, and it sounded as if Horse was thinking of the ramifications, too.

“Would you want the Crown, Gabs?”

I shook my head. “You know what I want out of life. I want to live and work in this realm, and I want to help catch the seriously bad guys. Faerie was a place I visited for a couple of years.
This
is home. If I’m Queen, I have to live there, and…
shit
, Horse. I love you. I don’t want to move away from you.”

“If you were Queen you could bring me with you.”

“You’d leave the gun shop and the MC?”

He shook his head and looked out the dark window. “I don’t know, Gabs. I hope I don’t have to decide.”

“So I just won’t go back. Some royalty lives here. Sophia and Aaron are Dragon and Swan King and Queen, and they live here.”

“Most swans live here, less than half choose to live in Faerie,” he countered

And I had no return argument, because all rabbits live in Faerie. Except me. Sophia splits her time between realms because she has subjects in both places.

He reached for my hand across the table. “I don’t want to hold you back, Gabs. If it’s something you want, we’ll figure out a way to make it work.”

“I want to be sure those boys never rape anyone else,” I admitted. “I’m glad I stopped before I killed them, but now, if they rape a human who can’t recover as quickly as me, and who might have lasting damage from the violence and forced invasion, someone who’ll be traumatized by the pain and loss of control and…
fuck
.” I whispered the last part. “Maybe I should’ve killed them.”

“It’s good you didn’t when you weren’t sure if anyone had seen you with them. You have to know I want to take them apart limb by limb, and I’m guessing the Amakhosi will feel the same, but we have to be smart about it.”

Nathan met us at the RTMC bar after we ate, and he had a vampire with him.

Not just any vampire — The Abbott.

We went into the office with Duke and Brain, and Nathan asked me to tell the group what had happened.

“How are the men I — are they alive?”

He nodded. “They’re in the hospital and they’re both in comas. As far as I’m concerned we should let them waste away in there — unless someone feeds some life force to them it’s doubtful they’ll come back. I had our tech guy wipe all the cameras in the area on the off chance one of them caught the boys taking you, or caught you running away. You’re in the clear and they got what was coming to them.” He smirked. “Both of them had their pants down around their ankles, and I guess one of them fell on the other as you ran out. There are all kinds of questions about what they were doing when they collapsed into comas. The hospital is running lots of drug tests, assuming they were high on the same drug.”

The door opened and Ghost stuck his head in. “Dawg said ya’ll were in here, and that Gabby looked upset.” His gaze met mine. “You okay?”

I looked at Horse and he waved Ghost in. “No, she isn’t, and I’d like you to know what happened. I take it Dawg’s working the bar and couldn’t come with you?”

Ghost and Dawg have turned into good friends. We don’t have sex, we just talk. When Horse is busy or has to work and he wants someone with me, he calls one of them. I usually arrange to be with one of my lovers when Horse is scheduled to work when I’m not in class, but the timing doesn’t always work and he knows I keep my gun with me when I’m home alone, in an effort to keep from being terrified at every noise.

I’d brought up the possibility of having a wolf in my bed, and Ghost had told me he couldn’t fuck one of his best friends’ girls. Wolves apparently aren’t built that way. Dawg once told me if it would help, he’d take part in a ménage if Horse is also present, but so far Horse hasn’t seemed interested, which is fine with me — I’ve grown used to having these two wolves as close friends.

So I sat between Horse and Ghost, and told the room about the men grabbing me, one of them raping me, and then how I’d drained them.

When I finished, The Abbot leaned forward, his eyes kind. “You know who and what I am, yes?”

I nodded because I couldn’t find my voice.

“I monitor the strongest supernaturals in my territory, and tonight, you popped up on my radar in a big way. I’ve known about you, of course, but before you were someone to watch — a little rabbit who might one day find her power but so far had not. The potential was there, and now you’ve fulfilled at least some of it.”

“How do you see her now?” asked Brain.

“A Rabbit who could go to Faerie in a few months — once she’s learned what she can do with her new power — and take the Crown, if she wants.”

“I don’t want it.”

“Your father couldn’t drain a human unless they’d let their shields down during an orgasm. You ripped open the other human’s shields to drain him, Gabriella.” The vampire sat back and asked, “Why did you stop before they were dead?”

“You know who my father was?”

He nodded.

“I’m not him,” I whispered, and then added in a normal voice, “It felt good, but I’m not him. I won’t
ever
hurt an innocent, and I’m not even sure I want to go around hurting the bad guys.”

“I need you to come to me and put your hand on me and try to drain me. You can’t, but I need to feel what you do, Gabriella.”

I didn’t want to touch the Master Vampire right now, much less attempt to take his power. I tried to change the subject. “No one has ever told me what the legends say about human-born rabbits.”

“Do as I’ve asked and I’ll tell you the stories.”

The five feet I had to walk to him felt like a quarter mile, and I didn’t know what to do when I reached him.

“Put your hands on me and try to fill yourself.”

I nodded and touched one hand to his chest, rested the other on top of his thigh, and sucked his energy in through my palms. Nothing worked, and I remembered how I’d ripped through the shields of the human. I’d been terrified and it’d just
happened
, so it took a few moments for me to figure out what I’d done.

I tried, but didn’t do it full force, and Abbott put his hands around mine at his chest. “You won’t hurt me, Gabriella. You ripped through the humans’ shields and hurt them, and I know you don’t want to make me mad, but I promise you won’t hurt me. Your terror fueled you and I don’t want to frighten you, but if you don’t do as I ask, I will.”

I tried to remember how it’d felt, but I just couldn’t replicate what I’d done. Fear trickled through my veins and I opened my eyes. Abbott’s gaze met mine, and I heard him in my head saying, “
It’ll keep getting worse until you show me what you can do.
”

Abbott had once kept me from being afraid, and now he pushed terror into me. Soul crippling terror that made me want to curl into a ball and scream, except his voice was still in my head ordering me to take his power, promising I’d feel better if I did.

He’d been right about my terror fueling my abilities, and I ripped into his shields and sucked him into me. It didn’t work as well as it had with the human, and I didn’t get the same surge, but I got a trickle and I quickly stopped and took a few steps back as the inexplicable terror driving my abilities was suddenly gone.

Now, I was frozen in place by the Rabbit’s fear, unable to move though I wanted to turn and run, my heart furiously beating in my throat as every nerve in my body vibrated.

The vampire’s eyes met the Lion King’s with unspoken meaning, and Nathan reached for me and pulled me into his lap. “Will you let me even out your energy, Gabriella?”

I nodded, and felt his hot, feral energy wash over me. It didn’t go in me, as it does when we orgasm together, but it still helped soothe me as it mixed and merged all of the energies inside me. The ugly, dirty energy of the rapist and would-be rapist had been eating at me like heartburn, and the Amakhosi helped me blend it — as well as what I’d gotten from The Abbott — with my own essence it until it was mine. I claimed it, I took control of it, and with his help I transformed it from what it had been to what I wanted it to be.

When he finished, I leaned against him, exhausted. “Thanks. I didn’t realize why I felt so uptight.”

He stood with me in his arms and walked me to Horse. I was half asleep as Nathan said, “Take care of her, Grizzly. She’s a treasure.”

* * * *

Horse

I took Gabby from Nathan and cradled her in my lap. “What did you do to her?” I’d felt some of it, and trusted him to help her and not harm her, but she was barely conscious and I needed to understand what had happened.

“Just helped her deal with all of the energy she’s taken into herself today. She’s fine, but she’s exhausted.”

“She’s just taken on new powers,” said Abbott. “Abilities no Rabbit in recent memory has had. She might sleep as long as twenty-four hours while her body catches up with her new power signature.”

“Aaron is out of town,” Nathan told us, “but he and Abbott are going to work with her until she learns to control her abilities.” He shook his head and told me, “You aren’t the strongest Grizzly on the planet, but you’re likely in the top five. Your energy exchanges with her during sex are going to power you up as well, and could push you towards the top of your species.”

I looked at Duke and Brain, then back to Nathan. “Grizzlies don’t have a power structure, so it shouldn’t matter.”

“The Concilio pulls the top two Grizzlies into their advisory council,” said Nathan.

“And I have monthly meetings with the various leaders in my territory. It’s one of the ways we keep the peace.” The Abbott looked to Duke. “Were you aware of his strength when you patched him in?”

“We knew he was strong but I don’t think we had any idea…” Duke looked to me. “You’re our brother and we take you as you are. No member of the MC has ever been asked to join the Concilio’s council, but we’ll all trust you won’t take vows with them that supersede your vows to us.”

“This is another of those unforeseen things? Something you didn’t count on when you let other species in?” I asked.

Brain nodded as Duke said, “You’re one of us, Horse. You’re family. We don’t kick family out.” Not unless they turned their back on the club, and then they weren’t kicked out, but killed — but we didn’t need to bring that up around outsiders.

Too much was happening too fast, and I adjusted Gabby in my arms so her head was the way she liked it, leaned against my chest. “Gabby doesn’t want to be Queen, and I want to keep selling guns and teaching people how to shoot them. Neither of us wants the complications this much power will bring into our lives.”

“We need to teach her to hide her power signature then. You already know how, but it’s going to be more important than ever for you to do so,” Nathan told me.

“Because people can sense my power through her, until she learns to rein it in.”

No one responded and I sighed. “I’d like to get her home and into bed, if ya’ll don’t mind.”

“I’ll drive your bike if the Lion will drive the two of you,” Ghost offered. “I can hang out on your sofa for the night as an extra guard, so you can sleep beside her without feeling the need to patrol every half-hour.”

Yeah, the RTMC is my family, and Ghost is my brother.

“One more thing,” said Nathan. “I’d advise getting her into a martial arts program. Right now her instincts are to freeze or run, but with training we can give her the muscle memory to fight.”

“Randall runs a class for teenage wolves.” Abbott looked at Duke. “Perhaps you could ask him to include her in his classes?”

Two months later

Gabby

Because carrying the load for a double major apparently wasn’t enough, I’d been having regular lessons with Aaron in how to manage the power surge I’d received after the stupid humans had given me a crash course in how to drain them.

I learned it’s normal for leaps in power to happen in times of trauma. Rabbits don’t view rape in quite the same way as humans — it’s still bad, but it isn’t the horrible, life-changing event it is for humans. We freak when it’s happening, but afterwards it’s just another sexual encounter. While it’s happening, it’s an assault and we fear for our life — which was why I’d drawn on powers I didn’t know I had. Or as Aaron says, revealed powers I was capable of but hadn’t yet tapped into.

My attackers spent a week in a coma before Abbott decided to step in. He’d poked around in their heads and discovered they’d been responsible for dozens of rapes, sometimes alone, sometimes together. Abbott had decided the boys were a scourge on humanity and had drained the rest of their life force and told me their deaths were on him, not me.

As for my training, apparently being raised by a psychopath gives one some of the strongest shields on the planet. Rabbits naturally have formidable shields, and mine were even more so.

When I left Drake Security today, I was mentally and physically exhilarated. Sometimes I leave here exhausted, but today Aaron had made sure it was an energy building day, thank goodness.

Even better, Aaron said we’d only need to work together once a month from here on out, just to be sure I’m keeping up good shielding habits.

I put my helmet on and looked at the bike Horse had bought me — the smallest Harley Davidson one could buy — a little 500cc engine in all black. I’d asked him if we could make it pink and the look on his face told me I should be happy with it in black. Angelica told me she’d help me put some stripes on it, though, and I couldn’t wait to personalize it a little. I’ve changed my mind about the pink, though. I want teal stripes.

I have a driver’s license now, as well as a concealed carry license, though I rarely carry a gun on me. My big Grizzly Bear insists on my doing so at times, and he, Aaron, Nathan, and Ghost take me to the range to shoot, but I think I’ve had the most fun with my martial arts training. I spend a few hours a week with Angelica and Ghost, learning and sparring. It’s fun, now that my nervous system no longer shuts down when a fist comes flying at my face. There’s something empowering about having your arm just fly up and block it before you have a chance to think about it.

Where the idea of being an FBI agent as opposed to a mere analyst had once upon a time been terrifying, I was beginning to think it might be possible. If they’d have me, someday. And if they wouldn’t, I’d begun to also see myself working for Aaron Drake.

No matter what, I’ll never turn my back on Horse. He’s the love of my life. He’s what gives life meaning.

If I’m someday required to take on the Crown, it’ll be on
my
terms, and I’ll keep a residence in both realms.

So much has changed since the day I first met Ghost and Horse at the gun shop. Angelica is one of my best friends, as is Sophia. However, I’m close to all the ol’ladies of the RTMC. And Ghost and Dawg? Who’d have thought I’d someday see wolves as my protectors instead of as The Big Bad Wolf who wants to eat me — and not in a good way.

I’m close to all of the men I have sex with, but I don’t love them. I care for them, and I know them well, but Horse is my one true love. He doesn’t have sex with others often, but in an effort to gain his own powerful allies, he has threesomes with Abbott, where the two of them fuck a woman at the same time. He also fucks a few of the club sluts when he’s there alone and the urge hits him. I love hearing about it afterwards — he enjoys himself, and what woman wouldn’t want her fiancé to have fun?

Yeah, fiancé. If something happens and I get pushed into taking the Crown, no one can make me unmarry my Grizzly Bear, but apparently it would be practically impossible for me to marry him after I’m already Queen. You’d think the reigning monarch could marry whoever she damn well pleased, but the few Bears in Faerie — none of whom are Grizzlies — fall under Mab’s rule, while the Rabbits are aligned with Titania. They’d both have to agree to such a union, which isn’t likely to happen.

The guest list for our wedding looks like a who’s who of the supernatural world. The Dragon King, Swan Queen, Lion King, Wolf Alpha, The Abbott, Bran Petrescu, Mordecai… but the most valued people coming are the ones I consider my friends and family. Gen had once told me the MC was like a family, but I hadn’t understood at the time. Now I do, and I never want to do anything to lose my new family.

I drove to the apartment in the city from Aaron’s office. Horse would be staying at the house tonight because I’d decided to get all old-fashioned about not seeing each other the day of the wedding. We’d stopped calling them my apartment and his house. Our stuff was divided between the two, and it was safe to say we both lived at both places. We have a city apartment and a country house, and Horse has used a combination of mirrors and skylights so I’m good in all of his underground house, now.

Ghost was waiting for me when I arrived at the apartment, and he opened the door and let me in with a hug. I showered and fixed my hair, and Angelica poked her head in as I started on my makeup.

“I’m so jealous of your hair,” she said. “It’s always beautiful, but it looks especially good tonight.”

I grinned. “Yeah, I actually took the time to fix it.”

“Does it look like that when you come back from rabbit? Or do you have to get it cut?”

I sighed. “It looks like this when I come back, but I don’t shift much in this realm.”

“And you aren’t going to the other realm, which must bite. Does it bother you to stay human without shifting?”

“Aaron wants me to shift twice a month, but says once can just be for a few minutes. He wants me in the woods hopping around for a while the other time, though, and so far he’s made arrangements for it to happen, so we could be sure no human accidently saw an eighty-pound rabbit hopping through a field.” Because rabbit shifters weigh the same no matter what form we’re in, which is presumably why Rabbits stay in Faerie.

I must have satisfied her curiosity because she changed the subject. “Dawg dropped me off on the way to pick everyone else up, but you need to be ready when he gets back with them.” She nudged my makeup an inch closer to me, and I rolled my eyes at her as I dipped my brush back into the eyeshadow.

When I finished, she brushed my brows and gave me a few final few swipes of contouring before reaching for my dress.

There’s no way I’d have
considered
wearing this dress a few months ago, but Horse had bought it for me, and I’d learned there are times it’s okay to look sexy in this realm.

And a girls-night-out bachelorette party is one of those times.

We’d have four bodyguards tonight — two men from Drake Security because Viv’s husband is super-protective of her, plus Dawg and Ghost because Horse is protective of me. Aaron had provided a limo, and I’d been told tonight was going to be
epic
.

We went out to eat first, and the girls had reserved the entire loft area of a restaurant so we could cut up and play without bothering the other patrons. Angelica and Harmony stuck with me most of the night, but I also played with Cassie, Gen, and Bethany a good bit.

We went to another bar with live music for a while, and then they took me to a nightclub called The Diamond Club, which Kirsten informed me is owned by The Abbott, and that’s how they’d managed to get a whole section of the balcony reserved for us — and bouncers to keep everyone else out of our section.

Some other women were here — I’d met Samantha Levi a few times but had never spent a whole lot of time with her, but we had fun on the dance floor. She introduced me to a beautiful transgender woman named Tara, and we danced a while, too.

And Harmony kept handing me iced teas all night, which I’d learned are one of the strongest mixed drinks you can get, though they don’t taste like it. By the time the end of the night came along and we were watching the drag show, I was happier than a pig in nice cool oozy clean mud. I just wanted to roll around in my happiness and absorb it into me.

When they called me to the stage towards the end of the drag show, though, I refused at first. Bethany finally took me by the hand and the two of us went out together, which wasn’t so bad. Maybe.

She danced with me until I forgot the crowd, and then a bunch of muscled guys wearing not-much-at-all dirty danced with me. Finally, Tara slow danced with me as she told me, “It’s become kind of a tradition for me to kiss the bride-to-be amongst your group, but I don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable, little bit.”

I looked into her eyes and could feel the male and female energy — more woman than man, but kind-of both, in an odd sort of way. “I think I’d very much like to kiss you, Tara.”

Her hand reached to the back of my head and she leaned me backwards, and took control of me with her mouth. I opened mine and let her in, and suddenly remembered the crowd as they started whistling and cheering, but I didn’t care.

When she let me up she turned me and I saw Ghost, and happily went into his arms. “Shit, I think I need to sober up. Is the room supposed to spin?”

Even as small as I am, I hadn’t been able to walk through the crowd without saying “excuse me” and “pardon me” a million times — and being felt up even more. However, Ghost worked us through the crowd so it seemed no one even noticed us, and I didn’t get felt up a single time. He walked us to a little enclosed courtyard outside and sat with me on a bench.

“How did you do that?” I asked, happy for the cool night air.

“How’d I do what?”

I shook my head. “The way you can move with no one seeing you. I don’t get it.”

“If you want, I can show you the basics sometime. I’ve taught Angelica some of it and she’s decent at it when she puts her mind to it.”

“You don’t have to put your mind to it, though. It’s just who you are.”

“My dad taught me from the time I was little.”

I’d met his dad a few times, an older gentleman who works for Aaron, he seemed nice enough, but both of them were so
secretive
.

* * * *

I awoke the next afternoon between Ghost and Dawg. We all had our clothes on and I didn’t think anything had happened, but I wouldn’t swear to it.

“I think she’s awake,” Dawg mumbled.

“And hasn’t started puking, which is a good sign,” said Ghost from my other side.

Ghost’s arm was over my hips, Dawg’s legs were woven through mine, and my head was tucked between Ghost’s other arm and his torso.

I’d learned that single wolves in a Pack often sleep with a whole lot of people to a bed, sometimes with a bunch of mattresses pushed together on a floor, and it’s rarely about sex. More about cuddling — it’s one of the things lone wolves miss. Dawg and Ghost were relaxed and comfortable, and I was all cuddly between them.

I didn’t remember every detail, but I recalled enough to know we’d come home and fallen asleep without any hanky-panky. I’m pretty sure Dawg carried me into the house, and I thought Ghost had brought my shoes when they fell off.

I nestled in a little more. “If you’d have told me one day I’d snuggle in bed between wolves, sleep with them but not have sex, and then wake up feeling safe and warm and loved — with no fear at all…” I sighed. “There’s no way I’d have believed it. Thanks to both of you for helping me not be afraid of you, and for being my friend.”

“We’re happy to have you in the family, little bunny.” I looked up to Ghost and smiled as he grinned down at me.

* * * *

Hours later Angelica, Harmony, and Gen were fussing over my dress, hair, and makeup while Ghost and Bash hung out in the other room. We still had the limo, and they were supposed to take us to the marvelous venue Sophia had told us about, on the banks of the Tennessee River.

The day passed in a blur, though if I think back on it, each second packed the emotions of a lifetime.

Duke officiated and pronounced us man and wife, ol’man and ol’lady, and when I tripped over my own two feet on the way to the reception hall, Horse sat me on his right shoulder and walked me the rest of the way.

We didn’t promise fidelity in our vows, but we didn’t have to. My heart belongs to him, and his heart belongs to me. I’m happy when he’s happy, and I love hearing about his escapades when he has good sex with someone else. He’s genuinely happy for me as well. It isn’t that we control our jealousy — it’s that Rabbits and Bears don’t feel jealousy.

We danced and celebrated at the reception. We talked to friends, we cut up with Horse’s MC brothers, and I thought life was just about perfect.

But then my heart skipped up into my throat as the doors opened and the power shifted. I was too short to see who’d arrived, but I felt the trepidation in the room as others realized who it was. I knew it was a monarch, but it didn’t register as being
my
monarch. The ballroom grew silent and Horse herded me towards the center of the huge space as the crowd parted, and my heart dropped into my stomach as I saw the Rabbit King. He smiled as if he were happy to see me, but I could see venomous displeasure in his eyes.