“But they’re a motorcycle club, too. Wouldn’t they be similar?”
He inhaled a breath so deeply, his chest slowly expanded like an overfilled balloon under his tank top. The sleeveless shirt was the minimum he wore around the house so the girls wouldn’t see his scars and ask questions. As he released that inhale, he talked slowly and carefully like he did when he wanted to make sure all his words were correct and every word was heard. Which automatically made her brace.
“They’re an outlaw club. We ain’t. I mean,” he shook his head, “the Fury used to be when the Originals were around. They probably did the same type of shit the Angels did, or do, but we ain’t like that now.”
“Oh. I—”
“Christ, Chelle, don’t read this fuckin’ book.” He tossed it across the room where it landed with a thump on the carpet.
With a gaped mouth, she watched it slide another foot before coming to a rest. “But I’m almost halfway through—”
“No. Just stop. We ain’t them. Never will be them. Every fuckin’ MC is different.”
“Since you’ve never read it, how do you know what’s in it?”
“Don’t need to read it to know.” He gritted his teeth and stared at his lap for a moment. After what seemed like a few more calming breaths, he faced her again. “Beautiful, listen, you got questions, ask.”
Ask? “You basically told me to not ask questions about your life, which also includes your club.”
“Yeah, got that. But don’t fuckin’ read that.” He jerked his chin toward the book. “If you really need to fuckin’ know, then ask. I might not be able to answer every question—‘cause you know how to ask a shitload—but will answer what I can.”
“You’ll answer what you can,” she repeated, not bothering to hide her disappointment. That statement pretty much meant he wouldn’t answer anything.
“Yeah.”
“So, basically, everything about your life will remain a secret.”
“We all got secrets, Chelle. All of us. Even you. But club business remains club business, it’s nobody else’s business. That’s one of the fuckin’ rules and I ain’t breakin’ any rules ‘cause I don’t want my colors stripped.”
His colors stripped? She dug deep into her newly-found, but still limited, MC knowledge. “I read on a website about a brother having his colors stripped.”
Shade groaned and scraped a hand over the black wiry hairs of his beard.
He said he’d answer what he could, so... “You lose everything when that happens.”
“Yeah.”
“And depending on why they’re stripped that could be... deadly.” Or bad enough to the point where the offender wished he was dead.
“Yeah.”
“I don’t want you to lose everything, so I won’t push if you can’t answer.”
He twisted his head to look at her. Relief. That was what was in his face.
“All I’m askin’, beautiful.” He grabbed her hand and lifted it. His gaze remained locked with hers as he pressed it to his lips.
His mouth parted and he tucked one of her fingers inside and sucked it while his tongue swirled around it. He could distract her from a topic he didn’t want to discuss way too easily, damn it.
Her lips parted and she released a ragged breath. It didn’t take much for him to make her wet and wanting. A look, a word, a touch and she melted.
They hadn’t had intercourse for the last week. They’d done other things but not that. She had wanted to make sure he was on the road to recovery before they did. When Jemma stopped by earlier, her opinion was that he was.
That meant it was time to take things back to where they were. Maybe not completely yet, but close.
She’d gone for years without sex. Since she started having it with Shade she struggled if it was only a few days. That was how good he was.
He always made her want more. More of him, more of what he could do to her, more of... everything.
And here he was in her bed right now. At least for another week. No reason to go to sleep wanting a man who wanted her and who conveniently slept by her side. Especially when his almost black eyes told her clearly what he wanted.
More than her mouth on him, like this morning. More than his fingers inside her, like last night. More than his lips on her breasts.
So much more.
His voice was thick when he asked, “Girls here?”
“Yes, they’re watching a movie downstairs with some friends.” When she left them, the five girls were cuddled up on the couch together under blankets, passing around large bowls of popcorn and containers of Ben & Jerry’s, engrossed in the latest Jason Momoa movie.
He pressed her hand to his boxer briefs and slid her palm along his erection. It pulsed beneath her fingers, causing everything on her to pulse, as well.
When she sank her teeth into her bottom lip, he pulled her lip free and brushed his thumb across it. “How quiet can you be?”