Vendetta Road (Torpedo Ink 3)

Lana burst out laughing. “Are you honestly threatening the club because I didn’t tell you my name?”

He took a step toward her, his face going red with anger. Soleil held up the tongs threateningly. Lana just remained looking cool, the way she always did, although her eyes had gone cold and watchful.

“I’m going to give you one warning, Stallion. If you lay one hand on me, I’m going to hurt you like you’ve never been hurt. They won’t call you Stallion anymore because you’re never going to be making babies.” She spoke very low, but her voice carried absolute truth.

“Everything all right here, Lana?” Ink asked, as he emerged from the shadows. He was a big man and covered in a multitude of tattoos. He spoke softly, like most of the Torpedo Ink members did.

Preacher, Lana’s older birth brother, came up on the other side of her, both men blocking Stallion’s view of Soleil. “Hey, sis, sorry we’re late. Got caught up in the wet T-shirt contest.”

Lana rolled her eyes. “Of course you did. You can’t tell fake from the real thing.” Her gaze went past him to lock onto Ink. “Neither of you can.”

“Is that where Ice went?” Soleil asked. It took an effort to keep her voice very casual. She was used to pretending everything was okay. She’d been doing that most of her life.

She hadn’t thought of all the parties going on everywhere all around them. She knew there was anything he might want to do right there for him, and he was very, very sexual. Women fawned all over him. She’d been with him only a month, but in that time, she’d noticed that everywhere they went, women looked at him, flirted and tried to entice him. How had she ever thought someone like Ice would be satisfied by a woman like her?

She turned her back on the others, fussing over the chicken. Ink reached around her to take the tongs out of her hand. “Babe. Really?”

He ignored Stallion’s posturing. The man could bluster until the cows came home, but he wasn’t going to fight them. Eventually, with no one paying him any attention, Stallion slunk back to his campsite, stomped over to one of the women, caught her wrist and yanked her with him as he stalked away.

“I don’t know what that means.” Soleil raised an eyebrow toward Lana. “Does ‘Babe. Really,’ actually mean something?”

Lana shook her head. “No, but they pretend every time they say it that it means something defining. It really means they have no vocabulary. Don’t pay any attention to them. The minute you do, you’re encouraging their bad behavior.”

“Talk about bad behavior,” Preacher said. “I saw that little smile you gave good old Stallion. You were egging that poor boy on. You wanted to kick his balls up to his throat.”

Lana shrugged. “That could be true. He was looking at Soleil like he was going to eat her for dinner and then he threatened the club because I wouldn’t tell him my name. Both offenses deserved his balls meeting his throat.”

Soleil wouldn’t say so out loud, but she kind of agreed. The man gave her a creepy feeling. She wasn’t choosing someone to look at next time. If Ice wanted that, he would have to do the selecting himself.

She looked around her. There was a sea of bikers. Hundreds in every direction she gazed. Fires danced in pits. Music vied for the airwaves. The sounds of motorcycle pipes as bikes were revved and tires smoked before taking off for difficult and dangerous tricks. Laughter and delighted screams could be heard. The scent of weed was prevalent. The smell of alcohol. If she wanted to walk off the panic welling up in her, how was she supposed to do that?

Panic was sliding up her throat, choking her. She didn’t look at the others. She couldn’t. She needed to be alone to think. She wrapped her arms around her middle and took a step, immediately feeling the vibrator between her cheeks. It had felt playful and sexy and fun when he was close to her. Now it felt dirty and tawdry and foolish. Ice was out there somewhere in that sea of bikers, and she was locked here in this place, afraid of taking a step in any direction. She didn’t have Lana’s or Alena’s confidence to just strut around and feel hot and desired.

She would do anything for Ice. She knew he could make her feel like the only woman in the world. He could make her want to leave a vibrator between her cheeks and take off her top and dance for him in a crowd. But he’d gone off and left her so he could watch other women in wet T-shirt contests.

She looked around again. There were so many fires going it was fairly light in spite of the time of night. It wasn’t like she could just call for a ride. Where could she go? Winston wanted her dead, and he’d even gotten some friends of his to try to kill her.