Tainted Bastard (Tainted Knights 4)

There weren’t many people I liked, period, so Kassa was definitely special.

“Why aren’t we going upstairs?” Kassa asked as Gray shouldered his way toward the front of the crowd on the first floor.

“I like being front and center,” he told her, a muscle in his jaw ticking.

“Yeah, and it has nothing to do with the fact that he doesn’t want Nate drooling all over Kassa,” Kale muttered to me with a laugh.

I snorted, causing Gray to shoot me a glare, but I only lifted my brows in amusement. Silently daring him to call Kale out on it if it wasn’t true. He gritted his teeth together, and I lifted my beer to my lips in triumph.

A line of security stood between the front row of people and the stage. I was glad to see the added precautions as Harris had promised. Cash told me there had also been changes made to the security team for Thursday nights, but I hadn’t come in to check them out for myself.

“Kassa, over here!” Kin called when she spotted us headed that way.

She and Jace were standing with Kin’s stepsisters, Angie and Carolina. Carolina was jailbait, and Angie was more often than not a bitch, so I didn’t converse with either of them much. Behind them, Angie’s twin brother stood with a determined look on his face as he spoke to Carolina.

Kin’s family was weird, to say the least. Carolina was her stepsister from her dad’s current marriage. The teenager’s older sister, some chick named Georgia who looked a lot like her, was a raging psycho who wanted nothing more than her face splashed on the front of all the tabloids. Just like mommy dearest. Carolina might look like her sister, but from what I could tell, she was sweet and wanted nothing to do with her sibling or mother. Angie and Caleb were from Kin’s mother’s marriage before she died. The twins and Kin were tighter than most blood-related siblings I knew.

The four stepsiblings were pretty close. Even though Carolina was young, they always included her in everything. But I was fairly sure at least one of the four didn’t think of the teen as another sister.

Caleb bent to listen to something Carolina was saying so he could hear her over the dim roar of the crowd. As he came in closer, I watched his lids lower and his nostrils flare, as if he was breathing in her scent and savoring it. No one else seemed to notice the giant’s reaction, but then again, no one else was really looking. It wasn’t like Caleb was going to make a move on her anyway. What I knew of him told me he was way too honorable to try anything with a girl so young.

Didn’t mean he didn’t want to, though. The longing in his eyes as she smiled up at him was eating at him, that much was clear.

Kassa bumped into me as she stepped back from hugging Angie and Kin, but Gray’s hand was there to catch her before I could even try to steady her.

“Crap. Sorry, Sin,” she said with a laugh, touching my arm. Like always, her thumb skimmed over the scars on my arm.

I pulled away, not wanting to be reminded of the incident that led to so many changes in my life. I didn’t blame Kassa for any of it, though. It wasn’t her fault that stupid dog bit me. I just wondered how things would have ended up if the dog’s owners hadn’t been forced to pay the settlement in the lawsuit Kassa’s adoptive mother filed on behalf of my parents and me to cover my hospital bills.

That settlement more than paid for my bills, and then some. Coming during a period when my father had been laid off from the factory, it felt like a godsend at the time. But never having had so much money in their lives, my parents didn’t seem to know how to act with all that cash suddenly at their disposal.

Months later, Dad left Mom for Brandi, who’d come sniffing within weeks of their getting the settlement check. Their divorce wrecked Mom. She went from having a devoted husband to a cheating ex whose new wife loved to taunt her with how young and beautiful she was. I hated Dad and Brandi for doing that to Mom, the sweetest and kindest person I’d ever known.

Mom got sick, and she began to fade right before my eyes. She died when I was fifteen, and then I had to live with Dad and Brandi. Which, to them, was probably a good thing, because Dad’s half of the settlement was nearly gone, while Mom’s had still been substantial.

Not even a month after I moved in with Dad, Brandi’s seduction started, and the nightmare that became my life for the next few months began.

Kassa wrapping an arm around my waist pulled

me back from the memories, and I kissed the top of her head before stepping away from her and drinking my beer. She gave me a sweet smile, and I winked just as the lights were turned down, announcing the start of the show.

This close, I could see when each member took the stage, and I was waiting impatiently for Roanna. Peyton and Genesis were already there, but the other three were still off on the side of the stage. London and Aubree stood protectively beside Ro as she signed an autograph for some guy, who was leering down at her like she was a something sweet he wanted to devour.

I moved toward them just as Aubree urged Roanna up onstage. As soon as she had her mic in hand, the lights came up, and she was suddenly the vibrant, confident rocker chick who made me want to hand over my soul to her.

The cravings I’d fought for five weeks hit me hard. If she didn’t smile at me, I was going to lose my shit.

I grunted, realizing I was turning into an obsessive dickhead, but finding it harder and harder to control with every moment spent near Roanna. Staying away had only made my hunger for her, this gnawing ache in my gut, intensify. I wanted to know how she’d been doing since that night we hung out at her place.

Was she eating enough? She hadn’t even touched her dinner until I urged her to.

Had anyone else bothered her while I wasn’t around to protect her?

Fuck, I shouldn’t have avoided her for so long. If someone had tried to touch her, and I wasn’t there to save her—

At that moment, she looked down at the front row, her smile easing a tightness in my chest and making it easier to draw my next breath. Roanna waved at Kin and Angie, and blew a kiss at Carolina, who was now standing right in front of Caleb to avoid the rowdiness of the group of guys directly behind them.

Then she saw Jace, Kale, and Gray, and she winked seductively, just as I’d seen her do a dozen times before to any guy in the front row.