“Why?”
I smirked. “Politics… corruption… power… these are all old stories. Why are you surprised by them?”
“This is not the world I’m used to,” Mila said. “This life is alien to me. I don’t know how you live it. I don’t know why my brother chose it.”
She looked around her room as though she couldn’t understand why she was there in the first place. She looked lost for a moment, and there was an element of hopelessness in her eyes. Her blue eyes were sharp but unfocused, and her mouth was turned down in uncertainty.
“There’s beauty in this life,” I said. “You just have to open your mind up long enough to see it.”
“See it?” Mila repeated, standing up and walking in front of me. “All I see is violence, death, and power plays between men with big egos. There’s nothing real here.”
I gritted my teeth and pulled myself upright. I took a step towards her so that we were only inches apart. She looked uncomfortable with my close proximity, but to her credit, she didn’t back away from me. I could feel more than I bargained for, however. That kiss we had shared the night Mila had moved in stood between us like a third person. I wanted to grab her right now, but I resisted the urge and buried the desire.
“Nothing real?” I asked.
“Nothing that I can see.”
“Then maybe you need to look closer,” I said. “Your brother came to me and pleaded with me to allow you to stay here. You are protected because of this club. You are safe because of this club.”
“But for how long?”
“This isn’t just about giving you a place to stay for the moment,” I said. “This is about giving you the tools you’ll need to get through the rest of your life.”
Mila frowned. “And how are you planning on doing that?” she asked.
“Simple,” I replied.
Then I swung my hand up towards Mila’s face as though I were going to hit her. She gasped and backed away from me, shielding her face with her hands. Then she straightened up when she realized I hadn’t actually intended on making physical contact.
“After I’m done with you, you’re going to know how to block a hit like that,” I said. “You won’t be running from a fight. You’ll be running towards it.”
“What if I don’t want to fight at all?” Mila asked.
I shook my head at her. “Life is a constant fight. It may not have to be physical. It may not have to be violent, but trust me, it’s a fight. So you better have some moves because otherwise, you’re going to cowering in the corner waiting for other people to come rescue you… every time.”
Mila looked at me carefully, and I wondered if I saw some grudging respect in her eyes. She took two steps towards me, and her eyes fell to the tattoos on my neck and arms. She raised her hands and traced the words ‘Fallen Angels’ that I had got tattooed on my right arm a few years ago.
Her fingers left a trail of heat behind them, and I could sense the chemistry building up between us. When Mila glanced up at me, I saw that she felt the same chemistry too. It was in her eyes.
“Ok,” she said, her fingers still on my arm. “Teach me.”
Chapter Six
Mila
I woke up to the hazy memory of a faded dream. In the dream, I had been running from a huge black wolf. At first, I seemed to be getting away from the beast, but my legs kept getting heavier and heavier until I was frozen in place with the wolf fast approaching. He was just about to gobble me whole when I realized that I was in a different place altogether and the wolf had disappeared.
I looked around, and it took me a moment before I recognized the broken shingles, faded paint, and rusty door from the house I had grown up in. Everything looked the same, but nothing felt the same. I walked up to the house and looked at it, hoping to find some connection, some tiny iota of sentimentality. But all I had was a sinking feeling of doom.
A woman walked out of the front door and looked at me like I was a stranger. She was not wrong. I was a stranger to her. Giving birth to someone doesn’t necessarily mean you know that person. A shadow moved past her suddenly, and I felt my breath catch in my throat. That same feeling of doom was upon me, and this time, it was imminent. Before the shadow could step into the light, my fear woke me up.
I sat up in bed and realized that I wasn’t back home at all. I was in my half-brother’s motorcycle clubhouse surrounded by a bunch of unfamiliar men who were forced to protect me because their president had a point to prove. I still didn’t know what that point was, but I had a feeling I was about to.
I dressed quickly and went downstairs. I was early, but I didn’t care. I figured it would take me a while to get my bearings, and I didn’t want to give Zack any more reasons to criticize me. I had been living in the clubhouse for four days now, and I still couldn’t figure him out.
Was he the strong and no-nonsense leader? Was he a renegade outlaw with a shady past? Was he a complicated person with a checkered conscience? Or was he just a broken man trying to cover up his flaws? I had no idea. There were moments when he looked at me when I felt something stir deep inside my soul. There were other moments when he made my stomach turn with disgust. The only thing that was consistent, however, was the knowledge that I was deeply and intrinsically attracted to him. And that told me that I needed to stay as far away from him as possible.
After that first night when we had shared that explosively passionate kiss, there had been no physical contact between us. We had come close a couple of times, but we had managed to maintain the somewhat grey boundaries.