think thug. Yet they’re the ones picking on the weaker links.
“With you graduating and me kicked out half the damned time, we’re going to have to send a message over the summer for people to steer clear from Violet and Stone,” he says. “Otherwise Chevy and I are going to have a load on our hands.”
“Name the time and place and I’ll be there. Pure balls to the wall, brother.”
The doors to Eli’s truck slam shut and Emily stands in the June heat holding her elbows like she’s cold. She’s statue still as she studies the mass of men swapping handshakes and hugs. Eli ignores everyone as he lops an arm around Emily’s shoulder and ushers her inside. As he opens the door for her, he shoots me a glare that screams that I should have already asked how high to jump.
“Shit,” I mumble.
Razor slaps his hand hard onto my back. “Have fun babysitting.”
I flip him off as I move to follow Eli and what I don’t expect is the barricade of black leather cuts slipping in front of me.
“Is there a problem?” I ask.
The sergeant-at-arms for the Lanesville chapter offers an apologetic tilt of his head. He knows me. I know him. His name is Dragon and he’s been drunk at my house and Olivia’s several times in my life. “Members only inside until this shit is cleared up.”
It’s like being offered a plate of food and being shoved into a high chair at the kids’ table. I could run my mouth, but rules are rules regardless of who I am by blood. Blood doesn’t mean shit. Being a member of the brotherhood is what matters and I’m not in. Thanks to Emily, I may never be a part of the greater whole.
Pigpen saunters up beside me. He’s in his midtwenties and a wall of solid muscle. Most men wet themselves when he looks in their direction. “Eli wants him in.”
Dragon nods and extends his hand to me, palm up. “I need your weapons.” I swear under my breath and Dragon continues, “Club rules. You’re not a member so you don’t carry.”
Silence falls and the stare of the twenty-plus men beats down on me as I relinquish the knife secured to my back. I then lean down, lift the cuff of my jean and unstrap the knife from my leg. Regardless that I surrendered without a fight, they still pat me down. Anger pulses within me. I’m a second-class citizen and will remain one until I get myself into this club.
Pity rolls around in Dragon’s eyes as he gestures for me to go in. That rips through me worse than any knife or fist that’s been thrown at me over the years.
I step inside the dimly lit building and the entrance T’s off into a hallway. I check right, then left and Eli rounds a corner in dangerous mode. “Did you stop and smell some roses while you were out there bullshitting?”
“I’m a hang-around to them.”
“And you’re going to remain one if you fuck this up. Emily’s in the office and she’s to remain there even if she hears her parents. I need to talk to them without her. Do you read me?”
Loud and clear. “Which door is the office?”
“Second one on the left. I don’t need to mention that if Emily’s unhappy, I’m unhappy.”
Perfect. “I don’t have a weapon.”
“If you don’t leave the office then that won’t be a problem. If you want to be a part of this club, then I suggest spending the next few minutes keeping my daughter safe and happy.” Eli turns his back to me and disappears around the bend.
Just a few more hours and I’ll get my life back on track. Take care of Emily. Keep her in the office. Tell her a few jokes. I round the corner and stop dead. Every single time I see Emily she knocks the breath out of my body and that tank top of Violet’s she’s wearing sure as hell doesn’t help. Spaghetti-strapped that cuts into a V-shape.
Whether Emily is aware of it or not, the trim of her white lace bra peeks out and so does a hint of her cleavage. I scrub a hand over my face to prevent myself from ogling, but the image is already burned in my mind.
God, she’s beautiful. Tanned skin. Gorgeous legs. Everything about her perfectly shaped and the memory of how warm and soft her skin felt under my touch last night still haunts me.
She’s Eli’s daughter, Olivia and Cyrus’s granddaughter and her continued presence is ruining my future, but damn if my body doesn’t react to her being near. Emily stares up at me with those dark brown eyes and while they are as naive as a doe’s there’s absolutely no innocence in the smile that spreads across her lips.
“Your life,” Emily whispers in this slow, seductive slide, “is about to suck.”
She’s a little late with that threat because it already does, but a sinking sensation suggests that she’s going to make things even worse.
Emily
“GET BACK IN the office.” Oz towers over me as if his mere massive height and thick shoulders would freak me out into complying, but after hearing what Eli said, Oz sort of resembles a kitten with his hair spiked along his arched back.
“And if I don’t, what are you going to do?” I probably shouldn’t smirk while saying that, but I can’t help it. This is too good to pass up. According to Eli, the big bad Oz has to listen to poor defenseless me.