Breaking Away [Smoky Mountain Motorcycles] (Siren Publishing Classic) (8 page)

Jake shrugged and nodded. “Most likely. It isn’t exactly my area, but I have connections. I’d have been able to dig up some dirt. Hell, I think I still will, just to have in case they show up again. Either that or I’ll pull my gun out and show them to the property line.”

* * * *

Willa shivered a little at his dark tone. Perhaps she should be worried, but all it really did was make her hot. She knew he’d never hurt her, and the idea of him protecting her sent a warm shiver down her spine. It made her feel safe and cherished. No one had ever really taken care of her like that before. His use of the word gun, though, stuck in her head and brought back something that had been on her mind all day. She hadn’t intended to bring it up, but since he’d delved into her past, it was only fair.

“Last night, you were dreaming about being shot, weren’t you?” she questioned softly.

He froze, and a cold frown crossed his face. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

She chewed her lip for a second before pushing on. “That’s fine, I guess, but I just wanted to let you know, it’s okay. If you wake up like that again, and need an…um…outlet for your emotions, I’m okay with that. I want to be there for you, however you’ll let me.”

She watched the battle rage in his eyes as he seemed to be struggling with old ghosts. “I could have hurt you,” he whispered in a husky voice filled with guilt.

“But you didn’t, and I know you never would. It’s okay, really.” She reached out and squeezed his hand, carefully watching his face.

His eyes closed for a few seconds before he took a deep breath as if he’d come to a decision. “I’d been undercover for a long time when it happened. Honestly, it’s a wonder I lasted that long, but I didn’t get too deep in any organization. I just dabbled and kept my ears open. Mostly, I was there to protect Maggie. She was the one who was good at getting people to talk. She was friendly and outgoing, and everyone naturally trusted her. That day, it should have been me. I always went into the bar first to make sure it was clear, but I was off my game that day. I guess I was starting to feel burned out. The things I’d seen, some of those things you just can’t unsee, you know? I was whiny and bitchy and moving slow. She beat me to the door and paid with her life. I think that’s what gets me the most. It should have fucking been me.”

Willa was still holding his hand. She wasn’t sure what to say to his tortured words. She brought his hand to her lips and kissed it softly. “I am sorry about your partner, more sorry than I can ever say, but I am so very glad it wasn’t you. Even if tomorrow you wake up and realize just how boring I am, I will treasure every minute. You don’t know what a gift you’ve given me by just being you.”

He reached out, and trailed his fingers across her cheek, catching a tear. She hadn’t realized she was crying. She forced a deep breath into her lungs and took a long drag of her beer. “Sorry, guess I got a little carried away.”

“Don’t.” His voice was soft and filled with so much longing. “No one’s ever really cried over me before except my mama. You humble me with your trust. I swear on my life I will never let you down.”

He lovingly caressed her cheek with his callused hand, and she turned into it, placing a warm kiss on his palm. Their eyes caught and held. Heat exploded between them, and he’d have kissed her right then and there, she knew it as sure as she knew her own name. It didn’t matter that they were in the middle of a crowded barbeque joint. It didn’t matter that their food was sitting in between them half-eaten.

“Y’all doing okay over here?” The waitress’s twangy voice brought both their heads up, breaking the spell.

“Uh, yeah. Yeah, everything’s fine,” Jake managed to say, though his voice was raw and shaky.

Willa doubted she could have spoken at all. She forced herself to sit back and blindly grabbed at her plate. She came back with a large potato wedge, which she shoved in her mouth.

They finished their meals with casual talk, but she felt a new closeness to him. When the waitress tried to tempt them with dessert, Jake gave her a wicked look.

“No thanks, I have the sweetest thing to eat right in front of me.” He tossed a handful of bills on the table, probably more than twice the meals actual tab, and pulled Willa to her feet. “Let’s get out of here, babe.”

His stormy-gray eyes were back to smoldering, and she felt her pussy begin to weep with need.

The bike idled in a low purr as they sat at a stoplight waiting for it to go green.

“I love this,” Willa whispered in his ear as she pressured her luscious breasts into his back.

“Love what?” he asked, loving warmth coming off her body. She felt so good, the way she wrapped herself around him. She was so warm and trusting. She made him feel ten feet tall.

“Riding. I’m not sure I’m ready to go buy my own bike like Danny, but I think I could become addicted to being on the bike with you. About the only place that is better is bed.”

He chuckled softly, letting the dark need come out in his voice. “You know there’s nothing that says it can’t be both.”

He felt her breath hitch as his words sank in. “I’ve read about that in books, but never imagined doing anything that wild myself.” Her voice was shaky, but defiantly filled with interest.

“Just what kind of books are you reading?”

He could almost feel her blush, but she answered, even though her embarrassment was plain in her voice. “Danny turned me onto the hottest online publisher. The books there are smoking hot! But like I said before, I never thought that type of stuff actually happened in real life, at least not for someone like me.”

“What do you mean someone like you?”

“Well, come on, Jake, I’m not exactly a dainty little thing.”

“I think I warned you about that earlier.” The idea of spanking her luscious, round bottom took hold in his mind, and he felt his erection straining the zipper on his jeans.

“Oh, come on, Jake, be realistic.” He felt her laughing, but his next words quickly stopped that.

“You want reality, here’s reality. You’re mine, and no one insults what’s mine. If I have to wear your cute little ass out every day till you believe it, then that’s what I’ll do.”

Jake wished he could see her face as he listened to her sputter. She was absolutely adorable. “You can’t just throw me over your knee every time I say something that you don’t like,” she finally managed.

His reply was on the tip of his tongue when he heard the unmistakable rumble of motorcycles coming up behind them. Looking up at the light, he cursed. He’d been so engrossed in their conversation that he’d missed the light turning. It had gone green and now was turning red again.

He looked into his rearview mirror and counted six riders on bikes. Calm down, he told himself. The odds were slim they were the same bikers that put him in the hospital. The bikers that took him out were in that one percent that were truly dangerous. The vast majority of riders were good people.

He felt Willa stiffen behind him, and he wanted to curse. He reached down and gently squeezed her knee. “It’s okay, baby. I see them. Don’t worry. Nothing will happen to you as long as I’m alive.”

She squeezed him tight, as if she was trying to melt into him, but he felt her slight nod. “I trust you,” she whispered softly.

The bikes rumbled to a stop all around him. He couldn’t see the patches on the backs of their leather and jean jackets, but the tattoo on the bicep of the man to his right told him what he needed to know. He ground his teeth and curse.
Son of a bitch!
He recognized that tat as the Southern Rising. They weren’t the biggest gang around, but their leader, Reb Watkins, was one psycho bastard. But he was smart, too. He made sure they only hit big business and the government. Some people called them the modern-day Robin Hood. Jake didn’t trust the fucker any farther than he could throw him, and as he glanced to his left, he wanted to kick something. Of all the damn luck, Reb didn’t ride out with his boys that often, but today just had to be the day he did.

“Well hello, stranger, where you been hiding?” Reb questioned in his deep southern drawl.

“Ah, come on now, Reb, you know he’s been hangin’ with his pig friends.” This came from a bald, pierced thug in the back of the pack.

“Yeah, you know how pigs stick together.” He wasn’t sure where that had come from, but he felt Willa tense against him.

He had to get this situation under control. He considered blowing through the red light and trying to outrun them but only for about five seconds. He might be able to outrun them, but it would be dangerous as hell. There was no way he could take that chance with Willa on the back of the bike.

He needed to play it cool. Giving Willa’s knee another squeeze, he hoped she would realize and play along.

“Whatever. I think it’s pretty obvious who and what I’ve been doing.” He nodded back toward Willa. “My old lady’s been taking real good care of me these last few months. If you had a fine woman like this, you wouldn’t be too eager to hang out with a bunch of dudes either. I’ve been enjoying lots of TLC,” he said with a waggle of his eyebrows before he turned back to face the light.

Of course, he should have known, they wouldn’t just let it go, not Reb.

“You’re saying you haven’t been licking your wounds, pig?” Baldie challenged.

“Look, just say whatever the fuck you want to say. I’ve been getting along just fine since they closed the Rusty Screw.” The light turned green in front of them, and Jake fervently wished a car would come up behind them and force them to move on through the intersection.

“I’m saying you got to be a pig. We know that fat bitch Maggie was a cop, and since she was cougaring all over you, we figure that makes you a pig, too.”

“At least his taste has improved. That’s one fine-looking piece of ass you have on the back of that bike.” This came from Reb, and Jake went from furious to terrified. It sent a cold chill down his spine that Reb had taken notice of Willa.

He hated that he couldn’t defend Maggie. She’d been his partner, mentor, and friend. It felt like betrayal, letting them talk like that about her. It burned like acid in his stomach, but he knew what he had to do. It was a wonder the steel handlebars of his bike weren’t permanently twisted from his white-knuckle grip. But Willa had to come first, and he sent up a silent prayer.
Forgive me, Mags.
“Look, asshole. I took a bullet in the leg and another to the side of the head because of that bitch. So don’t preach to me about pigs. Back the fuck off. The only thing that kept that day from being a royal clusterfuck was the fact that it got another cop off the street.”

“That’s your story, huh?” Reb challenged, though his voice stayed disturbingly calm. It really bothered Jake how Reb’s intense, black gaze never left Willa, but he had to stay in control of himself.

Jake shrugged. “It doesn’t really matter to me what the hell you believe, Reb. I don’t answer to you or anyone else.”

A flash of blue light caught his eye, and he turned just as a police car pulled up behind them. The gang turned as well when the siren on the squad car chirped. The loud speaker crackled, and the deep voice of the officer boomed out at them. “All right, boys, you know you need to move on. We don’t allow loitering and cruising here.”

The members of the Southern Rising cursed and surged forward in a thunderous roar, all but Reb. He hung back, looking over Jake and Willa, but Jake wasn’t taking any chances. The officer had given him a great excuse to get the hell out of there. He took it.

He gunned the bike’s powerful engine and roared off, forcing himself to not look back over his shoulder. In the rearview mirror, he saw Reb nodding thoughtfully to himself.

Think! he silently screamed. He didn’t dare head back to Willa’s B and B. There was no way he was bringing that kind of trouble down on her already-struggling business. In the distance, he saw the flashing sign of a hotel. That wouldn’t do. It was too close, and the gang was still in the area, but there was a smaller no-tell motel on the outskirts of town. Decision made, he flicked his blinker on.

* * * *

Jake could feel her shaking as he slid twice the room’s charge across the stained counter toward the motel clerk. “Something around back.” It wasn’t a request. He used his deepest “large and in charge” voice.

The clerk smirked and handed him a tarnished metal key on a worn plastic ring. Jake eyed it, surprised that any motel still used the old-fashioned keys instead of the plastic key cards. Not like they had much choice. He took it, and within seconds, they were rolling the bike around the back of the hotel so it wasn’t visible from the main road. He didn’t think they had been followed, but he wasn’t taking any chances.

“Why are we here?” Willa finally asked. Her voice had an odd husky sound to it.

“I didn’t want them following us back to the bed-and-breakfast. Just think of it as a way to check out the competition.”

“Seriously?” He had been trying to make her laugh, but he was relieved to see the indignant look on her face.

“An adventure?” he teased, hoping to get a rise out of her. She was still shaking pretty bad as he slid the key into the lock and flicked on the lights. “Well, at least it’s clean.”

And that was about all you could say about the room. That and the bed was plenty big.