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  Chloe gave the sleeping man one more peck on the lips before rising. She picked up his clothes, intending to fold them, when his cell slipped out of his pocket. Setting his pants and shirt on the top of a dresser, she scooped it up and dialed her phone number. Her own buzzed in her pocket and she took it out to save the number into her contacts. Happiness flared inside her heart as she laid Romeo’s phone on the nightstand, more than pleased that she’d gotten another part of him. Then she left the confines of the room. If she couldn’t fuck then she was going to drink. Perhaps a few shots of whiskey would put her out like a light.

  The clubhouse was dark. Quiet. Somehow, she figured it was because the wives and children had come visiting. Not all the members were married, of course, and perhaps most of them weren’t even faithful to their vows with the club pussy around. But for now, the bar was deserted, so she made her way carefully to it and searched for a glass. Grabbing a bottle of whiskey, she sat on a stool and thought about getting buzzed enough so she wouldn’t remember how horny she was.

  “Couldn’t sleep?”

  The voice was like a grenade in the silence, and Chloe almost fell off her bar stool as she gasped and whirled around.

  “Shit! You scared me.” She covered her frantically beating heart with her hand.

  “Sorry,” Dax said, although he didn’t sound sorry.

  The room was too dark to make out his features properly, but his presence was a force of nature sweeping through her. Chloe poured herself a shot and downed it, needing the liquid fortification. It burned all the way to her gut.

  “You never answered my question,” he said.

  “Uh,” she managed to gasp once the fire in her throat dimmed. “What question?”

  “Couldn’t sleep?”

  “Oh. Yeah.”

  He sat next to her, not talking. Not doing anything, really, and soon the silence between them twisted into something tangible. Every move, every breath he took, every shift of his body had the butterflies in her belly swarming and her heart pounding with excitement, even though she shouldn’t want him like this. It was enough to make her take another drink. The fire wasn’t so intense this time, but the alcohol did nothing to quell the anticipation brewing inside her. It had to be fate that was drawing them together like this.

  “Who are you, Chloe?”

  The question caught her off guard. Who was she? She was a glutton for punishment, that’s who she was. A giggle bubbled up, threatening to spill out, and she sent a glower to the damn whiskey. Traitor.

  “You were right about me, you know,” she said.

  “About what?”

  Chloe drank a little more and the whiskey fumes wrinkled her nose. Really, the stuff wasn’t that tasteful nor was it growing on her. “I’m not normal.”

  He snorted. “I think we’ve established none of us is normal.”

  She mulled that over. No, her life hadn’t been, nor ever would be, like the house in the suburbs with kids. Maybe it was the drink, but all the walls she’d built over the years suddenly seemed harder to lock into place. She looked over at Dax. Would it be so terrible to open up to him? Talk to him? Help him understand that she wasn’t the psychotic girl the doctors had told her she was? The darkness, combined with the whiskey, helped lower her guard and before she knew what she was doing, the words tumbled out.

  “I killed my mother.”

  Silence—open-mouthed, holy shit silence. She had effectively shocked him into muteness. Sometimes her mouth seemed to work independently from her brain.

  “My grandfather is old-school Japanese,” she continued, hoping to salvage something from the situation, even if it was just a thread of understanding. “He had a son and a daughter and was determined to make decent, if not profitable, marriages for both. My aunt turned out to have a pretty good arranged marriage. She had one daughter.”

  “Um,” Dax replied, shaking his head. “Kaiya, right?”

  She nodded in surprise. “You remembered.”

  He shrugged. “I was on a run to North Dakota when that whole thing with Shepard went down. Missed it. But I remember Romeo talking about it.”

  “Kaiya is one of the gentlest people I know,” she murmured. “My own parents, however, weren’t so besotted with each other as my aunt and uncle seemed to be. My mother was in love with someone else, had planned to marry this other man, until she was forced to marry my father.”

  “And I take it things didn’t go well.”

  Chloe shook her head. “My mother hated my father. Hated my grandfather. And eventually, she hated me for trapping her.”

  “She hurt you?”

  What her mother did to her was beyond a word as tame as hurt, but Chloe had learned how to cope as best as she could. “In ways that wouldn’t leave outward scars, but a sadist is skillful at hiding the evidence.”

  Chloe now wished she hadn’t started this conversation. Wished she could sweep the memories under the rug like she usually did, but it seemed like the ghost of her past wasn’t finished yet. Now out in the open, it seemed like she couldn’t shut up until everything was expunged from her soul.

  “I was thirteen when it happened,” she said quietly.

  He turned his head, and although she couldn’t see his eyes, she felt his piercing stare.

  “My mother thought of different ways to hurt me the most, and one of those ways was denying me my father. I grew up knowing that my father loved me, but his need for peace outweighed everything else. He stayed away—until that day.”

  “The day you killed her?”

  “Yes.”

  He didn’t say anything. She didn’t blame him. Sometimes even she didn’t have words for what had happened. But she had survived it. Been hospitalized for it.

  “My father visited unexpectedly,” she whispered. That day came rushing back to her like a freight train. “He and my mother argued. They were both bitter. She went to the bedroom, grabbed her gun and shot him. Right in front of me. Blood was everywhere. He was on the floor, and I knew I was next, so I jumped her. We fought. I got my hands on the gun. Turned it around. Fired. I killed her.”

  This time she didn’t even bother with the glass, chugging the whiskey like it was water. The amount took away her breath. It felt like it burned away her esophagus but Chloe welcomed the pain. It kept the tears at bay.

  “Sounds like self-defense,” Dax murmured.

  “There was a moment when it was. Then I hesitated and she pleaded, but I still pulled the trigger. I didn’t trust her.” It took her a moment for the fire in her belly to settle. “My father died in my arms. He needed me but I just… There was nothing I could do.”

  She fell silent again and the quietness of the club surrounded her and made her skin itch. Sometimes she hated the quiet. It had been deafening after the gun had gone off and her mother’s lifeless eyes stared through her. It was a memory that haunted her, so to deal, Chloe pushed it away with all her might.

  “What happened after that?”

  She took a deep, calming breath. “My grandfather kept me in the psychiatric ward for years, until I learned what to say and how to act. When I was eighteen, I got out and that’s when I developed my first tangent.”

  “Your first what?”

  “Tangent,” she repeated. “I…developed a fixation on one of the men who worked for my grandfather—my bodyguard. He’s the one who taught me to shoot. I wanted to please him so much I slept, lived and breathed my Sig Sauer Mosquito.”

  “By the tone in your voice, something happened.”

  “Something always happens.” She ran her fingers through her hair, pushing it off her forehead. “I get things confused. I mistake friendship for desire. Some doctors labeled it relationship obsessive compulsive disorder. Others said it was called limerence.”

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s common among people who experience attachment issues. Basically, I want the obsessive love I feel to be reciprocated. It’s a conscious expression of sexual incentive motivatio
n, or so the books say.”

  He nodded. “Oh. I get it. You think if you fuck Romeo, it’ll cure your problem.”

  She nodded. “Fantasy masturbation only carries you so far, you know?”

  “Why him?” he asked. “Romeo, I mean. Was it because he saved your cousin?”

  “That’s how he got on my radar. My grandfather collected intel on him and the Men of Hell. That’s where I first read of the club.”

  “So this feeling you have for him, it’s not real,” he surmised.

  “It is real,” she insisted.

  “No, it’s not. It’s a crush. Simple infatuation. You don’t know the first thing about him. In your mind, he’s some type of mythical hero you’ve put on a pedestal. Someone you want to fuck. Possess.”

  She jumped from her chair to punch his shoulder. “Shut up!”

  “No,” he said and surged to his feet. He loomed over her, trapping her against the bar. “Romeo is just an ordinary man. His real name is Beau. He pisses and takes a shit just like any other person.”

  “Stop this,” she ordered. She pushed against his chest. Too late, she realized just how big and strong Daxton Squire really was. Then that zing that existed between them, that succulent little desire that wove between them surged to life and all she could do was fist his shirt.

  “You don’t really want me to stop,” he whispered. Dax shifted until one of his legs parted her thighs. “You want this too much. I can feel that hot little pussy grinding down.”

  She lifted her chin. “I’ve said no. What are you gonna do? Rape me?”

  “Oh, honey, it wouldn’t be rape,” he said. He leaned down and nuzzled his nose on the top of her head. “Would it?”

  He gripped her hips, holding her in place. She tried not to show how much his touch affected her, even when he slid his hands up to cup her breast. He brushed a thumb across a turgid nipple, and the spark shot straight to her core. She couldn’t stop her back from arching in pleasure, which thrust her chest further into his hands.

  Dax brushed his lips across hers. “Would it, Chloe?”

  “No,” she breathed.

  God, she wanted nothing more than to have his steel-hard cock sink into her wet cunt and pump her until they both splintered apart. But whatever sanity she had left raised a red flag. The timing was a little too soon, her emotions a little too raw. She knew she would have regrets if he fucked her.

  But damned if she wanted to stop.

  He trailed his fingers down her body to slide under the waistband of her jeans, the touch a little ticklish. Her stomach muscles rippled in protest until his fingers brushed across the part of her panties covering her pussy.

  “Oh, honey, you’re so fucking wet,” he murmured against her mouth.

  He brushed over her slit. The cotton-wrapped finger rubbed little circles over her clit. She moaned and jerked her hips upward, bumping against him.

  “Oh, my God,” she breathed.

  “I can feel your heat. It’s burning right through this piece of cloth.”

  He jerked his hand out of her pants and fell to his knees in front of her, hurrying to unbuckle and unzip her jeans. She panted as she watched him, knowing she should tell him to stop, but unable to do so. He yanked her pants and panties down, helping her step out of one side before throwing that leg over his shoulder.

  “Ah, honey,” he murmured with awe in his voice. “You’re so smooth. That’s fucking hot as hell.”

  Using two fingers, he spread her labia and sank his tongue into her pussy. It wasn’t exactly the same type of fuck as a hard cock, but his finger thrust inside her, joining his tongue to cross over her G-spot, and she ground her pelvis into his face. She’d always been so easy to arouse, found it so easy to have multiple orgasms, but when his tongue, finger and mouth danced over all her erogenous zones at once, her body erupted in a glorious climax that caught her completely by surprise at its intensity.

  “Dax!”

  Pleasure weakened her knees. He lowered her leg and kissed his way up her body until he stood upright. She leaned into him, her body flushed with pleasure. His hard cock pressed into her stomach and already desire began pooling inside her again.

  “Who are you?” he asked softly in her ear. “How can you get weapons?”

  Chloe stiffened. Slowly, she pulled away from him. The darkness obscured his features, especially his eyes, and she wished she could see him, see what he was thinking.

  “Did you give me an orgasm in hopes of getting me to talk?” she asked.

  “It might have crossed my mind,” he said. “But once I had you on my tongue I couldn’t stop and all thoughts of seduction fled my mind. Truth be told, it was you who seduced me with your flavor.”

  He bent his head and kissed her, letting her sample her own musk upon his lips. But her heart ached knowing that not only did he not trust her, but that he had planned to use her own pleasure against her.

  She pushed him away and quickly redressed herself. “Well, I must say, out of all the methods of extracting information you could’ve taken, I’m glad you went for this one. It was much more pleasant.”

  “I want you, Chloe,” he said. “I’m willing to consider your offer. If you tell us exactly who we’re getting into bed with.”

  She sighed and capitulated, mainly because she did want them in her bed. And if honesty would get both men there faster, so be it. “My grandfather.”

  He cocked his head. “The rich guy who bought you the Mercedes? Just who is your grandfather?”

  “Hiro Matsumoto.”

  “Am I supposed to know that name?”

  She shrugged. “Have you heard of the Japanese Yakuza?”

  “Yes,” he said warily. “Of course.”

  “My grandfather is oyabun to the Matsumoto-kai Yakuza group in Los Angeles,” she said. “Basically, he runs one of the largest drug and gun cartels on the West Coast.”

  “Holy shit,” he muttered.

  Chapter Twelve

  Chloe watched the sun crest the eastern skyline. Tiredness dragged her eyelids down and she chugged the liquid caffeine in her coffee cup as if it was a life buoy. She hoped she wouldn’t fall asleep during a procedure because it wouldn’t be kosher at all to do a head dive into a body cavity.

  Men were moving around as the day started. She’d have to leave soon and sniffed herself to make sure she wasn’t offensive. Luckily, the hospital provided shower stalls so at least she could clean up there and wear a fresh pair of scrubs home.

  Finishing off her coffee, she then headed back inside to say goodbye to Romeo. Some of the members were leaving to hunt for whoever was after the club, so she had to take advantage of the open gate. Personally, she thought it was going to be like looking for a needle in a haystack for the bad guys, but she knew the need for affirmative action. When Kaiya had been abducted, she flew to Wyoming to look for her personally.

  Inside the clubhouse, Petunia and Trix were in the kitchen banging around, and the smell of bacon filled the air. She smiled at the women and headed up the stairs, not bothering to knock as she entered Romeo’s room.

  He sat on the side of the bed, his dark hair sticking up in all directions. Beard stubble graced his cheeks and jaw. She took a minute to appreciate him in all his nakedness.

  “How’s your arm?” she asked.

  He grunted.

  “Awesome,” she replied brightly. “Do you need another shot of morphine?”

  “Nah,” he said in a deep, rumbling voice. “I need my wits about me today.”

  “You can’t ride your bike.”

  “I know. I’ll borrow Sioux’s truck.”

  She dug inside her black bag for her keys, phone and wallet and slipped them into her pockets. “I have to get to work. Will you promise to take care of yourself?”

  He grunted again. She smiled and leaned over to kiss him. For a moment, he kissed her back, and a thousand butterflies danced in her belly.

  “Okay,” she murmured as she pulled back. “See ya later?
”

  He nodded, staring at her with a mixture of surprise, hunger and cautiousness. She waved her fingers farewell and left the room. As she retraced her steps, Dax filtered through her mind. She wondered if she’d see him and looked around, but she didn’t find him. Part of her was disappointed. Part of her was relieved. He’d left her so abruptly after her little revelation that her head still spun.

  The gate opened, and she drove out, watching in her rearview mirror as the compound was shut up tight again. She was glad the women and children would be safe from the assholes targeting the club. She hadn’t gone too far when the feeling of being watched came over her. It wasn’t anything outright and was more of a subtle realization, but she checked all her mirrors and saw nothing. Still, the feeling persisted all the way past the charred ruins of the Whiskey Lick Her, through the small town, and into the hospital parking lot. When she exited her car, she took a moment to look around, but saw nothing out of the ordinary.

  She hurried through a shower and changed into scrubs, covering her hair and feet before heading to the nurses’ station to see the board. She’d been put into two orthopedic cases, a hip replacement and pinning a broken arm. Bair Memorial was the only hospital with a trauma center for a hundred miles, so they received a variety of cases.

  The morning was busy. Chloe didn’t particularly enjoy working in ortho because she had to wear a lead vest under her sterile surgical gown. A lot of X-rays had to be taken to make sure the new hardware and screws lined up with bone. After the surgery, she was tired and hungry so she cleaned up her case, wiped down the back table and bed with disinfectant solution and smiled at the cleaning crew. They would be the ones responsible for making sure all the blood was mopped up. Chloe pushed her cart to the elevator and into sterile processing. Then she headed to lunch.

  She got her food and went to grab a soda when she literally bumped into Susan. The nurse had come back in a limited capacity, charting and doing minimal work. Now, she stared at Chloe with terror-filled eyes.