TEAMS
Czar heads Team One
Reaper, Savage, Ice, Storm, Transporter, Alena, Absinthe, Mechanic, Destroyer
Steele heads Team Two
Keys, Master, Player, Maestro, Lana, Preacher, Ink, Code
OLD LADIES
Blythe, Lissa, Lexi, Anya, Breezy, Soleil, Scarlet, Zyah
Seychelle Dubois sat on the bathroom floor staring at the toilet for the second morning in a row. She felt like an idiot. “No, Savage, I’m not pregnant. And I’m not a secret drinker either.”
“What the hell is wrong? Should I call Steele? I want you to go see him.”
She pushed herself up, glaring at him. “I do not need to see a doctor. Do you remember the talk we had on privacy?” Stumbling over to the sink, Seychelle washed her face with cold water, rinsed out her mouth and then started the process of brushing her teeth.
Savin “Savage” Pajari continued to watch her in the mirror. He leaned one hip against the doorjamb, arms crossed over his chest. His eyes were arctic blue, so cold they made her shiver. It didn’t help that he wore a thin pair of drawstring pants, indicating he was going out to practice with his whip. She had been avoiding watching him the last couple of days because for some unexplained reason, just the sight and sound of it turned her on like nothing else in the world possibly could. That was the last thing she needed to know right now on top of everything else—that she was truly messed up in the head, or body, however one wanted to look at it.
“Seychelle, we did have a talk about privacy, and I told you how I felt about it when it came to my woman. Now fuckin’ tell me what’s going on.”
She took her time finishing with her teeth, rinsed her mouth multiple times and then turned to face him, leaning her butt against the sink, arms crossed to match his. “I’m having hideous nightmares. Really vivid nightmares. They make me sick.” She did her best not to make it an accusation, but she knew it came out like one. What was she accusing him of? He wasn’t in her nightmares.
Savage studied her face for a long time without speaking, those blue eyes burning like ice over her. He was gorgeous. That was half her problem. She could stare at him endlessly—forever. He had a body on him, all man, more muscles than was good for him, tattoos over scars and burns. He had the words Whip Master burned into his skin on his chest and Master of Pain burned into his back. The tats didn’t cover either burns, although she knew Ink, a brother in his club, had done his best with the beautiful artwork on him.
“You gonna stop there and make me ask or you gonna tell me what these nightmares are about, angel? If they’re making you sick, they’re fucked the hell up.”
There was a warning in his voice, but no expression on his face, just those blue, blue eyes, cold as a glacier, telling her he wasn’t going to let it go.
They had agreed to have truth between them, but that really meant she told him the truth and he withheld things he didn’t want to talk about. They’d been together for months, and she loved him far too much. It wasn’t a good thing by any means.
“Last chance, Seychelle, start talking.”
“It was a nightmare, Savage. People have them.”
“Two fuckin’ nights in a row. The same nightmare. Bad enough that you puke in the toilet and you don’t want to tell me about it.”
That was a straight-up accusation. Worse, he was right. She didn’t want to tell him. That stance. Arms across his chest. Those eyes that wouldn’t let her look away no matter how much she wanted to. He’d given her space the day before because she’d asked him to. She’d been upset. Joseph Arnold, a stalker, had been sitting in her cottage waiting for her with a gun, and Savage thought she was upset about that. She had been, of course, but that wasn’t the only reason. There was a multitude of reasons she was questioning her sanity. Mostly, it had to do with herself, the things she was discovering she needed in her own sexual relationship, and that truly frightened her. She needed to come to terms with it.
There were just so many things coming at her so fast. She wasn’t a person who took things in fast. She just wanted everything to slow down so she could take a breath and assimilate everything at a much different pace than they were going.
“It isn’t me that is going to have the sore ass. I’m not asking again.”
She detested the little flare of dark excitement that sent heat to her sex. It didn’t matter how annoying she found it that he just stood there so casually. He was unmoving, those eyes of his holding her in place, probably seeing that flicker of reaction she couldn’t control, knowing blood pounded in her clit and her sex fluttered just at the thought of what he intended in spite of her absolute abhorrence of his intentions.