Whiskey Neat (The Uncertain Saints MC Book 1)

Text copyright ©2016 Lani Lynn Vale

All Rights Reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Dedication

Here I am again, trying to figure out just who the hell I should thank for this book. The one person that always comes to mind is my husband. He’s the best husband in the world. Likely you think that yours is, but you’d be wrong. Mine is. :) He’s the man who’s changed my life, and I fall in love with a little more each day.

Then there’s my mother, who works her butt off for me, folding my laundry and taking care of my kids so I can get one more chapter in.

Or how about my mother in law who introduced me to the book world. You can thank her now for inspiring my love for reading, which ultimately morphed into my love for writing.

Then there’s my kids. They may be holy terrors, but I wouldn’t know what to do without them.

Then there’s all the readers that make it possible for me to continue writing. Thank you all for loving my books.

Acknowledgements

Golden Czermak- I fell in love with this picture the moment I saw it. Thank you so much for taking it. It’s pure beauty.

Chase Ketron- The moment I saw this photo, I knew it’d be perfect for this book. Thank you so much for taking it.

Asli and Dani- thank you so much for all the hard work you put into this book to make it shine.

Other titles by Lani Lynn Vale:

The Freebirds

Boomtown

Highway Don’t Care

Another One Bites the Dust

Last Day of My Life

Texas Tornado

I Don’t Dance

The Heroes of The Dixie Wardens MC

Lights To My Siren

Halligan To My Axe

Kevlar To My Vest

Keys To My Cuffs

Life To My Flight

Charge To My Line

Counter To My Intelligence

Right To My Wrong

Code 11- KPD SWAT

Center Mass

Double Tap

Bang Switch

Execution Style

Charlie Foxtrot

Kill Shot

Coup De Grace

The Uncertain Saints

Whiskey Neat

Jack & Coke (5-6-16)

Vodka On The Rocks (7-6-16)

Kilgore Fire

Shock Advised (4-6-16)

Flash Point (6-2-16)

Griffin Storm wasn’t a man prone to violence, but when someone takes what Griffin holds dear, the world as he knows it is gone.

Retaliation, revenge and rage fuels him. His MC, The Uncertain Saints, do their best to offer support, but Griffin is beyond redemption. He’ll do what he has to do. Kill who he has to kill.

He doesn’t care if that means he dies. If it gets him what he wants, then it’s worth it.

He fakes it all until the night he walks into a sex shop for batteries and lays eyes on a woman that will change his life.

Lenore makes him think past tomorrow. Makes him want to see just what the future might bring.

But his life’s a dangerous one built around pain and deception, and not for the faint of heart.

He won’t give up the past, not until he’s done what he promised to do.

And if that means she’s not there when the dust settles, he’ll risk it.

Lenore, though, won’t give up on him. She’ll fix him, whether he wants her to or not.

Prologue

We could all learn something from bees. Doesn’t matter what the size, if you chase someone with something that’ll hurt them, the fuckers run. Plain and simple.

-Griffin’s secret thoughts

Griffin

Uncertain, Texas

“What are you going to do?” My partner asked me.

I looked over to him, closed my eyes, then scrambled to the nearest trashcan and lost my lunch.

This couldn’t be happening.

Not to me.

Not to him.

My God, he was the only thing keeping me sane.

The only thing keeping me on this earth.

What would I do without him?

Once done, I stood, feet braced apart, and reflected on what I was about to do.

“Don’t do anything stupid, Griffin,” my partner said, watching as the rage started to pour through me.

I was going to kill whoever did this…and enjoy every fucking second of it.

If I went to prison afterward, fine. So be it. It’d be worth it.

I looked over at him, really looked at him, and shook my head.

“You don’t know what it’s like,” I rasped, voice roughed.

“You’re right. I don’t. But what I do know, is that if you keep traveling down this path, you’ll fuck yourself. All your hard work. Your career. Your life…it’ll be fuckin’ gone. Get those thoughts out of your mind,” he said forcefully.

“You don’t know,” I said again.
“You don’t fucking know!”

It came out as a desperate scream…the kind where you don’t want what was reality to actually be real.

“You don’t freakin’ know. You don’t know!” I kept repeating.

I closed my eyes as a tear slipped free.

God, what had I done to deserve this?

I looked over at the table, in the middle of a cold, God forsaken morgue, where my son’s body laid for me to identify. And I
broke
.

“That’s my boy…” I cried, voice hoarse. “He was my baby. He was my boy.”

“I know, Griffin, I know,” Wolf whispered. “I do know.”

***

Two days later

I stared down at the coffin that held my six- year- old son.

Or what remained of him.

The cemetery at my back was filled with people. Family. Friends. Colleagues.

My ex-wife was really living it up, letting everyone know how hard this was on her.

My mother’s eyes were dead.

She looked like the light had gone out of her; none of her usual animation was where it was supposed to be.

I looked down at my dark washed blue jeans, black button down chambray shirt, and crossed my arms over my chest as I studied my feet.

My boots were new.

Tanner had been asking me for weeks when I planned on getting new ones.

We’d planned on going the day he got home from his mom’s, and I’d gone through three days of having the sole of my boot flapping every time I stepped funny, just so he’d be able to give me his opinion on which ones I should get next.

Because, you know, a six-year old’s opinion was important to picking out the most perfect pair of boots.

An opinion that I would no longer have.

“You okay?” My mother asked.

I nodded. “Yeah.”

It was a lie.

We both knew it was a lie.

But she didn’t call me on it. Mostly because she couldn’t lie about it herself, either.

Neither one of us was okay.

We were so far from okay that it was almost comical.

Almost.

The two graveside workers started to lower my son’s casket into the ground causing my heart to lurch.

It was a size that no one, not even the casket makers, should ever have had to make.

I idly wondered if they had depression issues.

I would.

Hell, I already did.

“You ready, son?” The pastor who was officiating asked.

I nodded.

“Yeah.”

My ex started to wail as the first scoop of dirt was placed on top of Tanner’s casket, and I wanted to smack her.

Not that I would, but a guy could dream.

My mother took my hand and together we watched.

Silent and still.

While the men and women that had attended the funeral slipped slowly away, the shuffling of their feet across the grassy cemetery lawn softly punctuating the sound of the dirt hitting the casket.

Five men, though, remained.

Five men at my back, who would always be there.

Mig. Peek. Casten. Ridley. Wolf.

Although they didn’t speak, I had their silent support…just like a brotherhood should.

Chapter 1

I work hard so my cat can live a better life.

-T-Shirt

Lenore

6 months later

“Do you have any batteries?” A deep male voice asked.

I blinked, looking up from the
Cosmo
magazine I’d been reading, and immediately blushed.

Freakin’
blushed!

You would think after owning a sex toy store for four years that I would be beyond blushing.

But, boy oh boy.

The man currently standing in front of me was to die for.

Drop dead gorgeous.

Tall, blonde, and so,
so
handsome.

Okay, I need to stop reading romance novels.

But, my God, he was freakin’ sexy.

He was tall with blonde hair shaved up the sides, leaving hair on the top of his head like the men on that Viking show were wearing. He had the bluest eyes I’d ever seen, and a beard covering the lower half of his face.

He had on a navy blue t-shirt tucked into dark washed jeans, with a brown belt around the waist.

He had muscles.

My God
, did he have muscles.

I didn’t even think I could span my hand around his biceps, they were that big.

And his t-shirt clung to his well-defined chest, making my mouth dry.

“Batteries?” He asked again, impatiently this time.

“Umm,” I hesitated. “The only types we sell are the ones prepackaged with the v-vibrators,” I stuttered.

He glared harder.

“Which ones have double A’s?” He asked shortly.

I stood on shaky legs, rounded the counter, and walked over to the huge wall of vibrators on the back wall.

We had every shape and type of vibrator known to man.

And, as a courtesy, we sold batteries with them.

In case, you know, you wanted to try it out in your car on the way home.

Well, not really.

I wasn’t sure why they were included, to be honest. Mainly to make the customer happy, I supposed.

I refrained from asking why he came to my place of business instead of the Dollar General down the street, and was glad I did in the next instant when he offered that information up willingly.

“The dollar store’s power is out due to the storm,” he said, grabbing the nine-inch whopper dong that was directly in front of him.

“Umm,” I interrupted him. “If you don’t mind me asking, how many batteries do you need?”

His shrewd blue eyes turned to me, and I had to bite my lip to keep from gasping.

“I need six of them,” he answered.

I nodded.

“Then that one,” I said, pointing to our most popular one, “Would be your best bet. It’s the cheapest that we have that takes six.”

I handed him the All American Whopper Vibrator and promptly blushed from the roots of my hair all the way to the base of my neck.

“Thanks,” he said, tucking it under his arm as he followed me back to the counter. “Got any drinks here?”

I shook my head. “No. Not unless you want a Capri Sun,” I said, pulling my stash out from under the counter.

He shook his head. “No. I don’t want to take your drink. Thanks…”

He stopped when a moan drifted up to us from the dressing room.

I sighed. “Be right back.”

I walked through the fetish wear and stopped at the closed dressing room stall that was only half a door for this very reason.

“Sir,” I said. “Ma’am. You can’t do that in here. I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

I freakin’ hated it when people had sex in the dressing rooms!

I mean, seriously! Who does that?

A moan was the only thing that drifted to me in reply and I started to get mad.

People thought that since I was just five feet two inches tall, that I wouldn’t bust my fist on their face…
but they would be wrong.
I grew up with two brothers who treated me like a little brother instead of a little sister.