Dauntless (Sons of Templar MC) (35 page)

I blinked away my tears, everything that had happened hitting me in one fell swoop. “Don’t you see? Up until recently, death was the one thing I didn’t fear. It was
life
that scared the shit out of me. No one would care whether I lived or died. Only me. That’s Darwinian, ingrained into our psyches, as a survival instinct. I didn’t want to die. But I wasn’t afraid of it. If it came, it came. I don’t think about the future.”

His hands circled my neck. “Firefly, there’s so much wrong with that it breaks my heart to hear those words. If I could find fuckin’
Doctor Who
I’d steal that fucker’s Tardis so I could be by your side the moment life started dealing you those blows. I’d take them myself without hesitation.” His hands tightened and his eyes twinkled. “But as much as it pains me to admit,
Doctor Who
is trapped in the world of TV and I’ve only got the future with you. The past, I can’t change. The future, this present moment, is mine.
You’re
mine. So I need you to hesitate. To think about the future. ’Cause someone cares if you live or die. A lot of someones, actually. But right now it’s just me, pleading with you to have some self-preservation. Still be fearless, babe. Still be you. But be mindful of the fact that, if your light goes out, mine does too.”

“I’ve got to be fearless,” I explained. “If I’m not, it’s surrender. It’s weakness. They’ll get me. Consume me.”

“Who, baby?” he asked gently, stroking my spiky hair.

I met his eyes. “The demons. The ones I live with every day.”

His entire body jolted as if I’d struck him, and he was silent for a long while. Then he grinned. It was small, but it was there. “Good thing you’ve got a scary-as-fuck biker as your old man, then,” he told me. “I’m bigger, tougher, and a hell of a lot more attractive than any demon you can conjure up. I’ll conquer them all, babe. If it takes the rest of my life, I’ll do it. So you don’t have to be fearless. I’ll protect you, from everything. Even yourself. A little fear’s good, firefly. Means you’ve got something to lose. If you’ve got something to lose, you’ve got something to live for. To fight for.”

“I’ll fight,” I promised.

His nose brushed against mine. “Good,” he murmured.

My eyes went hooded. “But right now, I don’t feel like fight. I feel like surrender.”

His body stiffened. “You mean what I think you mean?”

I nodded slowly.

He kissed me, slow and rough. “You scared?”

I nodded. “Terrified.”

“One thing in this world you get to be dauntless with, baby, is me. This. Us.”

He led me into the bedroom as he spoke, his eyes darkening as he did so.

His mouth captured mine once more. “Clothes off, now,” he ordered.

The tone of his voice had me instantly wet, his eyes almost black as I stripped and stood naked in front of him. He didn’t touch me, but the weight of his gaze was a thousand hands on my body. In a good way.

“On the bed.”I did as he asked, watching as he shrugged off his cut and yanked off his tee. I drank in his body hungrily.

He rounded the bed slowly, lithely, like a panther. Opening the drawers beside his bed, he unearthed two sets of cuffs. Unease tainted the desire in his eyes. “You sure, Becky?”

“I’m sure.”

I was, like eighty percent. But this was Gabriel. I was safe with him.

He nodded and bent down, but he didn’t cuff me immediately. Instead, he kissed me, rough and brutal. Then he moved down, past my neck and aching nipples to my shoulder. He trailed kisses all down my arms until it was white-hot with his touch. That was when the icy steel encircled my wrist. I flinched at the click but managed to chase the ice away.

Gabriel’s gaze burned into me as he climbed over my body to reach my other hand. He repeated the same process, trailing his other hand past my bellybutton to my magic spot. I cried out in pleasure as he clicked the second set of cuffs on.

He kept working me while he moved his mouth to my nipples, giving them the attention they yearned for.

On the edge of release, he stopped.

I wanted to scream in frustration at his wicked grin.

“You don’t come on my hand,” he growled. “You’ll come in my mouth, and then around my dick.”

He lowered his head and moved down. Slowly, to torture me. Then his lips fastened around my clit, working it relentlessly until reality become fluid and soft and I exploded into a million pieces.

My hands rattled against my cuffs as I struggled to touch him. Realizing they were bound, the ice came back.

Gabriel’s body was on mine before it could settle and corrupt the moment. He clasped my neck. “Becky?” he rasped.

“I’m okay,” I whispered.

His eyes searched mine. “Gonna fuck you now. Hard. Can you take me?”

My entire body twitched at the sex in his tone. “Yes,” I breathed.

The word was barely out before he surged into me, his hands curling up with mine.

“Fuck,” he growled.

Then he fucked me. Hard.

And it was brilliant.

Magnificent.

I never feared cuffs again.

“
T
he enemy doesn’t stand
a chance when the victim decides to survive.”

-Rae Smith

Y
ou’d think
after committing murder life wouldn’t start looking up.

But since my life was upside down since the moment I was born, it did.

Every day wasn’t better. Some days were worse, and I had to literally battle through the air like it was made of jelly. Had to constantly fight the temptation to find nothingness.

Not because my somethingness was bad.

Because it was good.

So good I couldn’t understand it.

Couldn’t breathe around it.

The good wasn’t pure and white and sunshine. It was clouds, murky gray and polluted by the demons of before and memories of yesterday.

But I think that was better than any kind of pure goodness.

Because it was real.

Too real.

Which was how I found myself blowing off work in the middle of the day and searching for nothingness.

“A glass of your crappiest red, please,” I said to Laura Maye, flopping myself on the barstool. I resisted the urge to lay my head on the bar and smack at it repeatedly.

Laura Maye was the woman from that day at the supermarket, the one who had grinned like a kid on Christmas as Gabriel dragging me away.

Rosie had introduced us.

Which should have said it all.

The woman, like Rosie, was insane.

Completely and utterly. Like Rosie, in the best way.

I could only do well around women who only flirted with sanity, never embraced it completely.

She raised a perfectly groomed eyebrow, though her face was kind. Even underneath all that totally amazing makeup, she managed to relay a variety of emotions. I dug that. If I had that much makeup on, I think my face would crack if I tried to mimic her look of concern and hesitation. Though, maybe that’s exactly what I needed. The only thing I had was a heavy-handed kohl liner, my trademark. I’d been experimenting with toning down my mask, trying to let my real face peek out and not be shocked by it. It had been going well, until that day. It was a day when I was caught by surprise by the demons I thought I’d tamed. They’d shown up just to let me know how feral they were. So I needed more than winged eyeliner. I’d asked her to borrow her hot pink lipstick. You know, just to shake things up a bit.

“You sure about that, sweetheart? Considering your situation?” she asked, not unkindly.

I gave her a look. She obviously knew about my… situation. Nice euphemism for it. It was a small town, plus the biker circle was even smaller, and my kidnapping, rape, and rescue were not small news. Laura Maye may not have had an alpha biker claiming her and growling in monosyllables like the rest of the women did, she still had a weird place in it all.

“Oh it’s not the wine I have a problem with. More so the heroin,” I said, waving my hand dismissively.

The side of her face jerked as if a smile were growing there. She reached up for a glass and starting pouring. “Well, we don’t sell that here, so you’re safe,” she deadpanned.

I gave her a jaunty smile, or what I hoped passed for one. Safe? Yeah right. I could be ten thousand miles from a needle and still sense its pull. I’d never be ‘safe’ from it. Never be free. I just had to learn to live with the chains. Accessorize around them.

“Plus, I think after what you’ve been through, not having something to salve the burn might just be cruel.” She pushed the glass towards me and leaned forward. “We all need a little something to get us through the hardships that life throws at us, and babe, you’ve had a lot more than many.”

I gulped my wine, needing it to anesthetize against the kindness.

“I’m sure there are many people out there who’ve had it worse. I’m still here.” I shrugged.

Laura Maye didn’t buy my nonchalance. I wasn’t exactly convincing. “It’s okay to not be okay, you know. To scream at the world and curse whatever may control us all for putting you in this situation. To fall apart.”

I barely knew this woman, and the bitch part of me urged me to tell her to mind her own business and leave me to my own shit, but I didn’t. Such naked kindness shouldn’t be treated with vulnerability disguised as cruelness. I met her eyes.

“I’m already apart,” I confessed. “A thousand little pieces rattling inside an obviously hot package.” I grinned slyly. “I’ve already fallen apart. That was the easy part. It’s putting myself back together that’s the bitch.”

Laura Maye blinked at me a couple times and then nodded, pouring herself a drink. “Don’t I know it,” she murmured, her tone hinting at the fact demons lurked behind the long mascara laden lashes. She clinked her glass to mine. “To putting ourselves back together.”

“May we figure it out before we’re fifty,” I added.

She grinned and sipped her drink.

“There a reason why you’re sittin’ in here alone when you’ve got a very delicious biker sharing your bed?” she asked, her eyes going to the rest of the bar. It was pretty much empty since it was the lull between afternoon and evening. And it was a Wednesday afternoon. The place was still dope, and I had the feeling the people of the small town would filter in, plus the numerous tourists who headed for coastal towns this time of year.

I sighed, running my fingers up the stem of the glass. “I just needed a minute. A vacation from it all.” I glanced up. “A vacation from a life that is actually just starting to get good again. Because I can’t take all the good in one go, I have to escape and inject some of my bad into it, just to dilute it, so I don’t overdose.” I sipped the wine, for something to do more than anything. “Am I completely fucked-up?” I asked.

She put her bedazzled hand on top of my chipped black nails. Something as simple as a touch from a stranger was something I could handle now. “Yes,” she said. “Completely fucked-up,” she clarified. “But aren’t we all?”

I grinned at her.

Yeah, I liked her.

Spent the whole afternoon talking about everything and nothing, taking my little vacation. I left and my first glass of wine remained, unfinished and half full. I didn’t need a substance to chase nothingness.

I needed my latest addiction.

One I didn’t plan on kicking any time soon.

So I went home.

To Gabriel.

* * *

“
S
hit
, firefly, it’s freezing. What are you doing out here when you should be in bed with me?” Lucky asked, rubbing my arms before yanking me into his warm embrace.

I keep my gaze upwards, smiling. “You weak-blooded Californians,” I scoffed. “It’s barely cold.”

“I’m far from weak. Let’s go inside right now. Arm wrestle,” he challenged.

“Because challenging a woman who can’t even do a push-up counts as a display of strength?” I asked in a serious tone.

The arms around me tightened. “How about I use my considerable strength in the way which God intended,” he murmured.

I let out a chuckle and warmth pulled at my stomach as his hands delved into the front of my panties. I felt him harden at my back.

“First,” he mumbled, kissing my neck, “you need to tell me why we’re out here freezing our balls off.”

I sucked in a breath as his hand pushed all the way in, cupping me. “Only one of us out here has balls,” I whispered. “You’re feeling the evidence of that right now.”

Lucky chuckle and it vibrated in my ear. “Sounds like you’re evading the question, firefly.”

I sighed as he caressed me. “Sometimes I just need to look at the sky,” I choked out. “See how big it all is. How small I am.”

Lucky’s hand stopped, his body stilling for a moment before he whirled me around, pulling our bodies flush together. “You’re not small, Becky,” he declared. “You take up my entire soul. You’re far from small.”

His words made my trampled heart flutter. “Small’s good,” I told him softly. “’Cause all of that up there”—I gazed up again—“that’s all big, beautiful, magnificent. Infinite for all we know. It makes me realize how small I am. How small my problems are. My pain.” I paused as his hands flexed. “Sometimes I need reminding. Sometimes I need to feel small.”

My words hung in the night air and tumbled up to those very stars.

“I wish I could take that away,” Lucky rasped finally, his voice tortured. “All that pain, all that shit that makes you need to feel small.”

I reached up and stroked his head. “No you don’t. Don’t wish for that. Pain is who I am. It’s who I’ve always been. Without it I wouldn’t know who I’d be,” I whispered.

Lucky leaned forward. “Mine,” he murmured against my mouth.

I smiled a sad smile, even though he couldn’t see it. “Don’t you see? Loving you is the most exquisite pain of all.”

His entire body stilled the moment the words left my mouth. That infinite silence stretched out once more, but it was charged with intensity that rivaled even the star’s magnificence.

“You love me,” he said, the softness of his voice seemed to boom through the open air.

Instead of running from the fear that came with that statement, letting it out into the world instead of holding it captive in my heart, I surrendered to it. To him. And the fear of loving him. “Yeah,” I whispered. “I love you.”

He yanked me close so our foreheads touched. “You love me,” he repeated.

I swallowed. “Do I need to hit you on the side of the head? You’re playing on a loop,” I joked.

His thumb brushed my lips, silencing me. “No. I think I’m done.” He paused. “Those words make everything we’ve been through a little softer at the edges. It’ll never be okay, what happened to you, but at least something’s okay. You and me, babe. The world may be fucked-up—shit, we may be more fucked-up than that twisted world—but that’s okay ’cause you love me. And I love you. Fuck the rest of it.”

I smiled through my tears. “Yeah. Fuck the rest of it.”

He claimed my mouth in the moonlight, brutally and exquisitely. And I didn’t feel so small anymore. In fact, the two of us felt larger than the entire universe.

He pulled back. “Now it’s time for me to fuck you,” he rasped.

And he did. And everything else melted away.

* * *

I
n fairy tales
, when the couple exchange the ‘I love yous,’ it’s usually the signal for the world to become all bright and everything be okay.

We’ve established this isn’t a fairy tale.

So it was only right for the world to turn darker, almost completely black after the ‘I love yous’. One day after, to be exact.

We were lulled into a false sense of security, I guessed. Thinking that I’d put a bullet in Carlos’s head and they’d scared off all but one mysterious player in the game that had almost beat me.

Almost.

I’d gotten all smug thinking I’d won. Or at least wasn’t about to be beaten anytime soon.

Then it turned out that one mysterious player could indeed fuck it all up.

“You don’t have to keep trailing me, you know,” I informed Scott as we walked across the parking lot of the clubhouse. It was pretty deserted considering it was a Sunday and most of the big bad bikers were all whipped, having Sunday brunches or whatever.

“I do, and not just because Lucky tells me to and threatens my manhood if I don’t,” he replied. “And not just because I kind of enjoy the perks of hanging out at a strip club.” He grinned and I rolled my eyes. “But ’cause Devlin’s still out there. We might have eliminated all of his partners, and since you snipped our last loose end”—he grinned at me—“he’s most likely crawled back into his cave by now, but there’s still a risk. So I’m here.”

I shrugged. “Your funeral when you die of boredom now that I’m not a junkie or stripper. My life is dangerously monotonous now.”

He barked out a laugh. “Yeah. I doubt you’ll be living anything close to a monotonous life when you’re eighty.”

He may just be right.

I was meeting Gabriel after work, as we planned on heading up to the cottage and escaping all the chaos on the outside to embrace our own.

Peace, for us, was a fantasy.

Who needed peace? It was far too boring.