Chapter 1
Three years ago
“Fuck, baby.” Fisher fists the base of his cock as I wrap my lips around him, teasing the tip with my tongue.
Rule number one of being with a biker, never let him leave for a run without getting him off first.
I always send my man off with an orgasm that will have him thinking of nothing but how good I give head. I’m not stupid. I know what happens when he’s on the road. Well not him, but when brothers of his club go on the road for days or weeks at a time. If men aren’t thinking about sex, they’re having it. And I don’t share. I don’t do the whole what happens on the road stays on the road bullshit my father put my mother through.
I heard her cry one too many times when she emptied his pockets and found phone numbers and condom wrappers.
That ain’t me and never will be.
I smile around his thick cock as he slides further between my lips. Hot. Needy. Greedy. Eager to come.
Six pumps into my mouth and he’s erupting on my tongue—salty and sticky.
I swallow all he has to give then lick my lips. He tucks back into his jeans wearing a sated grin on his rugged face, flashing me a glimpse of his pearly whites behind the dark hair of his beard he spent all winter growing and grooming.
“Gonna miss this sweet mouth tonight when I’m alone in that dank ass motel.”
“I’ll be sure to think of you later when I’m playing with my pussy.”
The rough pads of his fingers grip my chin. “Whose pussy?”
“Yours, baby,” I tell him as he squeezes me a little harder.
“I gotta get on the road.” His grey stormy eyes meet mine, holding my gaze for a beat before his lips graze my forehead. “I’ll text you later.”
“You better.”
“Don’t I always?” he runs a hand through his dark wavy hair that’s tickling the lobes of his ears and the back of his neck.
“Yeah,” I say softly as the door to our apartment closes.
A shiver moves through me as his bike roars to life in the parking lot. I make it to the window in time to watch him drive off. No matter how many times I watch him go it never gets any easier.
Present day
“Hey, it’s me again. I thought you were meeting at ten thirty to drive down to Nan’s with us. Dad was a no show too. I’m leaving. If you change your mind, you know where we’ll be. Love you, sis.” I listen to my sister’s third voicemail. She left it hours ago. I don’t reply.
I should, but I don’t.
I continue standing at my living room window staring out at the parking lot of the apartment building like a freaking dork watching the snow fall. I can’t do it this year. Put on a fake smile and pretend everything is fine when I am anything but fine.
The truth is I’m lonely.
For once I’d love to meet a normal guy. A guy who isn’t in the life—a regular man who is interested in me and not climbing the ranks. It’s why I refuse to date bad boys like the ones I grew up around. They want status or are so fearless that it scares me. I can’t be with another guy like Fisher. He followed my father’s path. Johnny Crow has a reputation. He’s not known for his kindness. He’s a ruthless man who serves as national president of Birds of Hell MC. An outlaw motorcycle club. He’s got an arrest record longer than a drugstore receipt.
Fisher’s doing time. I try not to think about him though. If I go down that road, I’ll end up in bed curled up with one of his old tees wishing he were lying next to me. Sometimes when I close my eyes, I can still smell his cologne mingled with the scent of smoke and sunshine. Thoughts of him seem like a dream. It’s been three years and yet it’s as though it was only yesterday, he was promising me forever.
Forever is short lived when you do what he did.
He’s written to me. Called even, but I can’t do it. I can’t see him, talk to him, or read his letters. Thinking about what we could have been what we could have had makes me sad. He could have been anything. But he chose to be like my father. The beauty of the love we shared is tarnished and stained with the ugliness of his crime and mine.
I’m guilty of loving him when I shouldn’t and he’s guilty of so much it hurts. His betrayal cuts me to the bone still after all this time.
I shake my head and swipe a finger under my left eye. I promised myself I wouldn’t shed another tear for Riley Fisher.