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  Why hadn’t they killed me already?

  “We’re taking her with us.” Remy pulled the final strap tight and checked to make sure Bren was fully secured before turning back to address Top.

  “And why are we doing that?” Top asked, eyes narrowing at me.

  “She didn’t kill Bren, that shit-heel did.” Remy cocked a thumb over to the corpse Dollar was still in the process of tying off to the back of Remy’s bike.

  “I don’t give a rat’s dick if she did or didn’t.” Top started fuming. He was practically itching to violently vent his frustration. “Did she see you kill that shit-heel?”

  “What difference does it make if we kill her here or at Muse’s?” Remy shrugged it off.

  “Rem, I’m all for you gettin’ your dick wet, but there’s plenty of pussy at Muse’s Place. Hell, I’ll have her drag all the girls out. I’m sure tonight we’re all gonna need them anyhow.”

  “No.” Remy walked right up to the giant. “She stays.”

  “Like hell she does.” Top roughly grabbed my hair and easily dropped me to my knees.

  I screamed and thrashed until I felt the cold edge of a knife against my throat. For such a large man, he was horribly fast. My eyes went wide in panic, but I stayed as quiet as the grave, all the while staring, pleading with Remy. But why did I think he would help me? He was the only one I’d actually seen commit murder.

  “Top, wait!” Remy snapped. “I need some strange tonight. I’m tired of those worn-out whores.”

  Top reluctantly pulled the knife away and shoved me onto the ground.

  I landed in a fetal position and with shaking hands, touched my neck. My fingers came away bloody but not bloody enough to be life-threatening. You almost died, warned the booming voice in my head, and even that was almost drowned out by my pulse which sounded like machine gun fire in my ears.

  “Fine. But I get first crack at her.” Top wrenched me out of my stupor and back to my feet. His concrete slab of a hand slapped my ass so hard that I was propelled off the ground, and after the searing pain, it immediately went numb. “When you’re done, the boys get to turn her out, too.”

  “Whatever.” Remy shook his head in indifference. There was a bit of reluctance in his voice, but the roles were crystal clear. Although Remy had the balls to stand up to him, Top was the man in charge.

  “All right, let’s get the fuck out of here,” Top bellowed as I imagined a Norse warrior king might as he led his men into battle, then he mounted up. The rest of the bikers followed suit.

  A wave of apathy rolled over me. I should’ve listened to him. I should’ve ran. Getting shot in the back had to be better than… The thought of what waited for me at wherever we were going was unfathomable. These things don’t happen to quiet, boring girls like me. This killer bought me another night but at what cost?

  By sunrise, I’d be wishing I were dead.

  “Get on the bike,” Remy said.

  I hesitated, weighing what little I had for options.

  “Are you going to run?” Remy eyed me carefully. His deep brown eyes glinted with curiosity, but behind that was something else… remorse, maybe?

  I opened my mouth to speak, but there was nothing worthy to say. The remorse was for his friend that died, not for me. Maybe I should just run. That had to be better than being raped.

  Remy gently placed my glasses in my hand and pushed me toward the bike. I hadn’t even noticed I’d lost them. Then it hit me. Shame—that was it. It was written all over his face. Remy didn’t like what was happening to me.

  But could I trust him?

  No, of course not. Hope was ridiculous, but I couldn’t willingly decide to kill myself either. I sighed at my own weakness and climbed up on his bike.

  He checked to make sure the lead line attached to what was left of Todd was secured, then he hopped on himself.

  I spotted a small, beaten-up book peeking out of his back pocket. The title wasn’t showing, but the author’s name was Lovecraft. I’d never heard of him or her. The font and cover art had the look of classic literature. It struck me how odd this was for a biker to carry around.

  A biker who was so clearly different from all these other men.

  Who was this man?

  Someone set a timed explosive device near the pumps as the long line of bikers rode off. Several minutes later, it finally detonated. A massive fireball erupted from the underground fuel tanks and turned the night sky into brilliant daylight for the briefest of moments.

  Everything I’d known since coming out here was burned away.

  We rode through the night along empty back roads for hours, never seeing another set of oncoming headlights. The maddening, slapping and skidding of Todd’s corpse along the pavement mercifully ended a while back when the arm that anchored him to the bike’s cable ripped free at the shoulder. At several points, the gruesome sound and the way bike pulled to either side of the road from the weight made me gag. The remaining limb attached to the rope was completely drowned out by the bike’s engine and the wind. When most of the body was gone, the performance of Remy’s bike improved tenfold, and the whole thing became at least possible to ignore.

  Not that I could, of course.

  It was all too hideous and fresh. Something out of a slash-’em horror film. My mom was an ER nurse at a small hospital back home, and I would visit her a lot when I was younger. Seeing bloody wrecks wheeled in by EMTs was all too common, so I was always able to deal with gore better than most people. But this was at a whole, new level.

  When Remy briefly stopped to cut the mangled tether line, freeing the last of Todd, I finally threw up. Honestly, I was surprised I didn’t pass out.

  Dragging Todd seemed like such an obscene overreaction at first, but then some pieces started to fall into place. The way the other bikers apologized to Remy, Top crying, and their mourning embrace. It went beyond even close-knit camaraderie. I think that Bren was related to Remy and Top in some way.

  My old life melted farther away by the second. I didn’t trust Remy or even like him. He’d stood idly by while my aunt and uncle had been brutally murdered. He was a monster that could kill without a second thought.

  Once we’d gotten back on the road, Remy pushed his ride that much faster. His bike, unlike the other American motorcycles, had a surreal sense of speed. We were so far behind, that the rest of the gang’s taillights were almost a memory.

  Remy leaned forward and twisted the throttle. The night’s wind, still warm this far into the summer, rushed over us like an ocean wave. The dark landscape became a blur. Remy, the bike, me – we were one connected body. At the speed we were going, I was terrified that we’d lift off the pavement and fly away.

  My God, the power…

  I was forced to hold onto him that much tighter, not only to stay on his bike but – and I hated myself for it – some part of me was clinging him just to hold him. To feel him all around me. My legs, my arms... We could hate one another, but on the somber ride to what was probably going to be my own, hellish end, we were closer than lovers.

  The road was hypnotic. His tires, gripping the asphalt along with the pounding engine, sent vibrations reverberating throughout my inner thighs. It rattled my ribs, lungs, and chest so I had trouble thinking straight. That rhythmic drumming, raw and unyielding, escaped my lips with every exhaled breath.

  We roared through the sea of red taillights and finally fell into a loose formation with the other riders.

  It dawned on me that this was the first time I’d ever been on a motorcycle, and as much as I tried to deny it, I felt a sense of complete freedom and—something else. I thought it was danger or dread, but it wasn’t. There was a foreign ache that ran through my muscles. It was a wicked kind of excitement from a darker part of my personality I didn’t know I had. The road chill had finally started to set in, but the warmth of the man in front of me cut the bitterness in the air.

  Something about Remy’s scent was intoxicating. The leather, gasoline, and
dust made me want to bury my face deeper into his broad, muscular shoulders. Although I didn’t have the words to describe how I would even know, he smelled like I thought he should. Fresh sweat from exertion mixed with oil from the bike, the copper notes of old blood, and spent anger. So much anger.

  Remy was danger personified.

  I was lost in the enveloping sensation of being wrapped around him. His radiating heat mixed with the steady, pulsating vibration from the bike, the abrupt roughness of the road, and our subsequent jerks and thrusts. The bike’s rumbling trapped itself within me.

  I squeezed Remy so tight, I feared he’d think I was trying to throw him off the bike.

  Swells of barely contained pleasure crashed against me like the coming tide. My muscles contracted against it. I refused it, fought to will it away, but that ecstasy of all these new sensations was relentless. My breathing spiked as I noticed that I was actually getting wet!

  I wasn’t paying attention to the fact that we were weaving in and out of bikes at well over a hundred miles-per-hour. All I could think about was how it felt being so close to him.

  One of Remy’s abrupt shifts loosened my grasp on him, creating just enough space for the wind to hit my chest like a sledgehammer. My fingers slid off his hard chest, across his ribs, then slipped from him completely. My heart in my teeth, I could feel my thighs immediately give way. I screamed but couldn’t hear my voice over the engine, the road, and the wind.

  Holy shit, I was falling!

  Remy’s deceptively strong hand whipped out behind me at the last possible second and slammed me into his back. I grabbed him as tightly as possible, the denim skirt I was wearing crumpled upward into a thick belt as my inner thighs ground down the back of his rough jeans. My pussy quivered as I slid over every coarse fabric ridge before slapping back onto the oiled leather seat.

  He didn’t even slow down.

  Remy leaned forward again and pushed the bike even faster. The engine screamed as we blew past the rest of the bikers in the wrong lane of the highway. I screamed uselessly again as we were bathed in the deathly yellow floodlights of an oncoming tractor-trailer truck. My world went white with nothing except the light and a long thunderous howl from the gigantic truck’s horn.

  At these vicious speeds, there would be no stopping the semi or us. We’d be turned into a paste.

  Remy leaned forward until his chest pressed against the gas tank with me flush on his back, then accelerated even more. He dared the mechanical monster to blink, to jack-knife, or hell, just to hit us. I don’t know. I mashed my eyelids shut and simply let whatever was to happen…happen.

  At what felt like an eternity later, Remy sailed us out of the path of the screeching truck. Tire rubber burned all around us from the truck trying hopelessly to stop. The hot slipstream of air behind it as we passed slammed into us like an explosion, threatening to topple us.

  It was a testament to his skill and tenacity that Remy was able to keep us on two wheels at all. He slotted us up front in the formation right next to Top. They shared a look, Top shook his head in amused disbelief, and everyone kept on riding like it was nothing.

  I was a screaming, crying mess whose heart was on the verge of bursting for so many reasons.

  Right then, I knew that regardless of what happened, I was never going to survive Remy.

  Chapter Two

  …

  Remy

  On my Kawasaki, I was completely in control.

  At over a-hundred-miles-an-hour, I became a god.

  Life was simple at that speed. There was only one direction to go. I was all alone in an ocean of pavement and no force on earth could stop me. The whipping wind and the rumble of the road was the only place I felt at home anymore. The faster I went, the clearer things were. The ride was never long enough, especially not after such a shit show like tonight.

  The neon haze of our destination peeked into view like an oasis mirage. The worst part of the ride began – the slow down. It’s when everything I’d been outrunning from the whole ride started catching up with me.

  I wished I could blow past Muse’s and just ride forever.

  The Burnt Pig Bar, although we just referred to it as Muse’s Place, was as close to a permanent residence as a few of the members had. Top, Spare Rod, Fish, and Twitch and Twatch all had their mail delivered here.

  The bar, basically a squat box of brick and glass, wasn’t much to look at, but the attached motel had a totally different feel. A pool, valet waiting area, white columns, and massive windows. A biker would be hard-pressed to find a better place to spend a night after a long-ass haul across the pan handle, but not tonight. I didn’t want any of it.

  Tonight there was work to be done.

  That two-stage, neon sign with the pig rotating over the flickering flame, typically a sign of good times ahead, was now just a reminder of the shit show the Steel Veins had become. I thought about Bren…

  How did we fuck that gas station job up so badly?

  We pulled into our normal parking spots behind the bar.

  Muse leaned against the open door already waiting for us. She liked to meet us in person whenever we arrived if possible. It was relatively easy for her to know when we were on our way in. In such flat, wide-open countryside, she’d have been able to hear us coming for miles.

  Huge fake tits, black-dyed hair, long black dress, black everything, Muse was a total Elvira-type chick. But instead of being borderline albino, she was a smooth, dark caramel in both skin tone and texture. No one ever believed she was pushing fifty. A real snake charmer, Muse could talk the moon out of its shine.

  Despite all the bullshit today, it was always good to see her.

  She’d always sauntered over to Top’s bike first, but this time she moved a little quicker when she saw the body across the back of his seat. She had her arms out with a consoling hug before he’d even thrown down his kickstand.

  Top spared a pained glance at Bren, then swept her up into a big hug. She whispered something to him, and the man broke down like a child. No one faulted him for it, not today. Top wore his emotions like the patches on his vest.

  Part of me envied that kind of weakness. All I felt after that long ride was overwhelming apathy.

  I killed the engine and had to pry my cargo’s arms free to get off the bike. I traced the girl with my eyes. Uncertainness and terror marred her soft, if a little plain, features as she glanced around and took everything in. Her glasses reflected the outside floods. It was the first time I’d ever seen a frightened deer on the other side of pair of headlights.

  Dark, shoulder-length wavy brown hair, now a tangled mess from the wind of the ride, and skin pale enough to trap the moonlight, she had tight curves buried under a billowy, white linen shirt and jean skirt that buttoned up the front. Her smooth skin was unblemished and radiant.

  Supple was the word that came to mind. I had to touch it to see if it was real.

  I lifted her skirt at the side of her waist, and slowly ran a finger down the length of her thigh. Her body trembled slightly in the wake of my dragging finger. Her heartbeat was pounding so hard that I could feel it behind her knee. She was such a small, fragile thing.

  I could wear her like a belt.

  I walked around the bike to see if I could draw her gaze.

  She didn’t move. Her full cheeks were marred with dust and streaked with lines of mascara.

  She was pretty.

  That, of course, would make everything worse for her.

  “Get off my goddamn bike,” I demanded

  I thought about the speed, the truck that almost hit us, and riding in the pack with the other guys. Most of the time I’d forgotten she was on my bike at all. Maybe I overdid it with that ride? Then I remembered the piece of shit that killed Bren.

  My baby brother, Bren was the last decent thing about the Steel Veins, and now he was dead.

  No. I hadn’t gone far enough. A bullet to the head was too merciful. I should’ve dragged that fucker beh
ind my bike while he was still alive.

  She slid off the seat and pulled at the edges of her skirt as if she could somehow make it longer. “My name is—”

  “I don’t care what your fucking name is.” I rubbed two fingers across leather seat where she was sitting, it was slightly damp. Looking to see if she would flinch, I brought them to my nose and breathed it in.

  Breathed her in.

  She lowered her head.

  Brushing aside her hair, I found her chin and forced it back up at me. I expected to see resignation and despair like the slags we typically fucked here, but no. This girl glared at me, her hate-filled eyes sparked with defiant intensity that was surprisingly invigorating.

  Good.

  “Hold onto that hate. That’s the only friend you have here,” I said, walking past her. The guys were helping Crutch hobble inside. The fun was over for now. There was work to do. “Let’s go.”

  Despite how much she hated me, the girl was my goddamn shadow as we all piled in through the bikers’ entrance. I absently pointed to a table in the corner. She dutifully went off and sat down. I then joined the rest of the guys by the pool tables.

  Crutch was tossed a bottle of whiskey then was taken into the back room to get cleaned and sewn up. He’d sleep like death tonight, but he’d survive.

  I had Tee grab the shovels and take a few guys out to the back meadow to start the hole. We’d get a stone for Bren in a day or two, but we’d put him in the ground tonight.

  The staff had the bar cleared when Top walked into the room, cradling the boy. Bren’s face looked so pale, like he’d been replaced with a mannequin. It hit hard because he was so young – everyone’s kid brother. He was our club’s unofficial mascot. Top took it the worst for obvious reasons.

  Our club’s membership path, like most, went Acquaintance, Hang Around, Prospect, then finally Full Patch. Bren had skipped Acquaintance status, but was stuck as Top’s personal Hang Around for – hell – ever since he was big enough to reach the handlebars. The only age requirement in the charter to be a Steel Veins member was a valid motorcycle license.