Marek (Knights Corruption MC #1) (11 page)

The ride back to the club was executed in silence. While I knew there was a chance of an extraction, I opted for taking the cage, aka van, instead of my bike, knowing full well I was gonna be the one escorting our
guest
back to our club. We only made it a habit of kidnapping people who needed to be reasoned with, and while this was a completely different turn of events, it couldn’t be helped. We had to drive at least one nail into the SR’s coffin, and stealing the president’s daughter was the biggest ‘fuck you’ we could send.

Her hands and feet were bound tight enough so she couldn’t wriggle free but not tight enough to cut into her lovely, creamy skin. Stone and Hawke were in the back with her, keeping an eye out just in case she chose to do something crazy. She’d already shocked the shit out of me once that day, and I wasn’t taking any chances.

The rest of the men were in front of us, throwing the line of formation out of sorts with me and my VP riding behind everyone else. But the cage always held up the rear in case things jumped off and the riders fell into danger. There were enough weapons hidden behind secret panels to arm a small tribe, so it was up to whoever was riding in there to be sure we had our eyes peeled for anything. If we rode ahead of the others, we risked the lives of all the riding brothers in case they were ambushed.

A soft moan wafted through the otherwise silent vehicle. She’d drawn my attention immediately, and I couldn’t help but inquire about her well-being. When I’d first laid eyes on her crouching in the corner of that small-ass, dingy room, I felt my chest constrict. A shiver of something foreign shot through me, and I had this inexplicable need to comfort her. To tell her that, although we wouldn’t harm her, she had to come with us. But, of course, I never uttered any of those words, instead choosing to confront her like the man she probably believed me to be.

An intruder.

A killer.

An invader who was there to snatch her away from the only world she’d ever known.

And she was right. I was there to take her, to integrate her into our club and never allow her to see any of the Savage Reapers ever again.

“Is she all right?” I queried, never taking my eyes from the road while I impatiently waited for them to answer.

I counted two deep inhales of breath before one of my men’s voices cut through the building tension.

“What the fuck?” Hawke yelped.

“What?” I shouted, tightening my grip on the steering wheel. When he didn’t answer, I yelled again, more authority cutting my tone and letting him know how serious I was. “What’s the problem, Hawke?”

“She fuckin’ bit me,” he grumbled, Stone chuckling beside him in amusement.

“Why the hell did she bite you, man? What were you doing to her?” I growled, the thought of him touching her inappropriately instantly angering me.

“You asked if she was okay, so I pushed her hair off her face to see her eyes, and my fingers fell too close to her mouth. Then she goddamn bit me,” he repeated, his disgust apparent in his tone.

“Did she hurt you?”

“Hell yeah, that hurt,” he complained.

“Good. Think of it as payback for the little escapade your woman subjected us to.” The lilt of my voice told him I was messing with him, even though he totally deserved it for not getting Edana out of the clubhouse before she started throwing knives and shit.

“How is that my fault?”

“You need to control your woman better, brother.” Stone was still laughing about his buddy cradling his hand in his lap, a gesture I could clearly see from the rearview mirror.

“Fuck you,” he murmured. “Just because you don’t feel any pain, ever, doesn’t mean shit to the rest of us.” My eyes flitted to the woman lying between the two men and saw a fleeting look of confusion pass over her lovely face. “This shit hurts,” Hawke continued to gripe.

“Man up, pussy,” I demanded from the front, relaxing my grip on the leather of the wheel.

Over the next few miles, I envisioned gazing on our new captive until my heart was content. It’d been dark in her room and, although I could see she was beautiful, I couldn’t wait to see her in the light of my private space. Sprawled on my bed or washing in my shower.

Get it together before you fall into more trouble than you know how to dig yourself out of.

Luckily, the clubhouse was directly ahead of us, pushing me from whatever wayward thoughts had invaded my sanity.

Once the van came to a stop, I hurriedly threw it in park and made my way toward the back. Stone had opened the door and filed out directly behind Hawke, pushing his shoulder in jest and continuing to tease him about his fingers. Thankfully, Hawke wasn’t feeling the initial effects of the incident, but when I grabbed his hand to see the supposed damage, I was shocked to see she’d actually broken skin.

She sure is a feisty one.

Leaning close to her ear, I warned, “Don’t think about biting me, sweetheart, because I won’t be held accountable for my reaction.” I was serious, although I doubted I could ever lay a hand on her in anger. Sexually was a completely different story—one I hadn’t yet written, of course.

Her eyes scanned my face, landing on my mouth for longer than was normal for someone in her situation. Finally, I guessed when her curiosity had been sated, she connected with my eyes, and it was in those beautiful dark brown orbs of hers that I saw her complicity. She was scared, of course, but something else hid behind her gaze. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any time right then to figure out what it was.

Escorting her from the back of the vehicle, I made sure she was stable before bending down to cut the ties around her feet. “Don’t think about running either. Nowhere for you to go,” I promised. That time I didn’t wait for her to acknowledge me, clipping the ties effortlessly before standing in front of her once more.

She was a tiny thing, my own six-foot-one frame towering over her. From what I could see in the darkened lot of the club, she was slim. A little too slim for my taste. She wore a large gray T-shirt, which fell to just above her knees, and from what I gathered when I flung her over my shoulder, she was wearing tiny-ass shorts underneath. An old pair of slip-on shoes adorned her small feet, a hole in the side of the left one making me furrow my brow in irritation. Her eyes followed mine, and when she realized I was staring at her shoes, she shifted her feet, hiding the damaged one behind the other.

Ushering her to walk in front of me, I placed my large hand on the small of her back, the heat from her skin powering through her thin shirt and hitting me right where it counted. My dick twitched in my pants and before things got too
hard
for me, I adjusted myself, grateful she was facing forward and didn’t see me grab my crotch.

I had no idea why I worried about what she saw, or felt for that matter. I wasn’t a heartless man. Ruthless when I needed to be, but not heartless. But I never cared what women thought of me or my club before. Plenty of them had thrown themselves at me ever since I could remember, and not once did I ever apologize for my actions or words, never caring one way or the other if I ever saw them again.

But she was . . . different.

I knew it in my soul.

I knew she was going to ruin me, yet I had no idea how.

Sully

Funny how life changes at the drop of a hat.

No warning.

No planning.

A simple prayer for my life as I knew it to cease . . . and in barged our biggest enemy.

Be careful what you wish for and all that shit. Isn’t that the saying?

A sudden chill coursed through me. We were inside the Knights Corruption compound, leisurely walking toward what I assumed was their private bunker of sorts. The place they held meetings, threw wild parties and partook in unspeakable things. Well, if they were anything like my club, at least.

The only things I knew about the KC MC were what I’d heard over the years. So far, I hadn’t witnessed any of their brutality. I certainly expected to be beaten after I’d attacked the man who snatched me from my room, then again when I bit the man with the long dark hair.

But nothing.

Neither one of them had laid a hand on me, which I found it very strange.

I was used to being punished for the simplest of things. Not having dinner ready on time, innocently glancing at one of the club members while they spoke, not cleaning up someone else’s mess in a timely fashion. Those were the reasons I was punched and kicked. I couldn’t even imagine what would have happened to me had I ever reacted and hit or bit Vex or my father, or anyone in the Reapers for that matter.

I would be dead. Of that, I was sure. So I was simply baffled why I’d chosen to react in such a manner with our most hated enemy.

Walking into what appeared to be a common room of sorts, I was instantly put on guard, ashamed of my appearance and what I looked like to the people suddenly swarming all around us. My hands were still restrained, my fingers interlocked and resting in front of me.

I quickly took in my surroundings, my eyes flitting over the beige-colored walls, neatly swept floor and array of various couches and chairs littered around the entire room. The area looked nothing like the common room back at my club. There were no dried bloodstains on the floor, no pile of used condoms strewn about and no liquor bottles cluttered into a massive mess in all four corners.

“Well, what do we have here, Prez?” an older man behind the bar asked as we continued to walk through. Keeping my head down, I heard the man who was guiding me speak up.

“We snagged us the SR princess,” he responded. His voice was neither celebratory nor cocky; he was matter-of-fact, and it was even more unnerving than if he’d been boasting about his acquisition. We walked a few more paces before something dawned on me.

The man who’d stolen me from the only home I knew was the
president
of our enemies? How was that even possible? My father would never barge into enemy territory, instead choosing to send his foot soldiers to do his dirty work for him.

An abrupt growl sounded to my left, drawing my attention right away.

The large man with the blond hair stood a few feet from us, his attention on the one and only other woman in sight, a beautiful blonde-haired woman who looked extremely out of place. She carried a small black medical bag, one I’d seen many a time back home when some of the men needed patching up. She was unaware the man was staring at her and she continued forging ahead, her head down and reading something on her phone. It wasn’t until she walked right into him that she looked up. They were close enough that I could hear their conversation. Hell, anyone paying attention could hear them.

“Stone,” she cried out, “you startled me.” A light blush crept over her cheeks as she continued to stare up at him. Endless tense seconds passed before she spoke again. “Did you all just get back?” She hadn’t seen me; it was apparent in the innocent way she tried to engage that Stone character.

She certainly wasn’t a club whore. She could have been the man’s old lady, but I didn’t think so. Maybe she was someone they simply called in to help out whenever someone was injured. I had no idea, but I knew she wasn’t integrated wholly into their . . .
our
way of life.

“Back to tend to him again, Adelaide?” he asked, stepping back so he could gain some distance. His posture was rigid, and I saw his hands curl into tight fists. Thankfully having something other than my own uncertainty to feast on, I leaned in so I could hear them better.

“You know damn well I have to check on him, to make sure he’s okay. You don’t want him to die, do you?” she asked. She gripped her bag tighter and appeared as if she was fighting the urge to tell him off, knowing she was outmatched with all the men milling around the room. If I dared to ever ask such a question, I would have been reminded of my place, and quickly. I waited with bated anticipation to see how he was going to react, bracing myself to witness a deplorable act.

“You don’t have to constantly touch him the way you do,” he seethed. Although their talk was quiet, it drew the attention of the man behind the bar. He stepped around and quickly walked toward the two of them.