The club has been my everything but I can’t do it. I won’t do it. I won’t turn her over to the Eaters, and if Deator and the rest of the club try to make me, then I’ll make another plan. Because I plan on keeping her.
I walk to the bathroom door, just to be closer to her, when my cell phone rings. Grabbing it out of my pocket, I answer gruffly. “Yeah?”
I know it’s Deator by the caller id, but I’m not in the mood right now. He’s called every day to check on the situation and each time I’ve assured him that I have it under control.
His rough voice comes across the line. “Let her go.”
Thinking I haven’t heard him right, I ask him, “What?”
He says it again, firmer this time, so there’s no mistaking what he’s saying. “I said let her go. She’s a victim of the Eaters, just like a lot of people in their territory. Let her go and tell her not to come back.”
I mumble my agreement and hang up the phone, knowing there’s no way I can do that. I can’t let her go. And I know, without even asking, if Deator is willing to let her go instead of using her for the good of the club, then the plans the Eaters have for her are bad. Really bad.
Chapter 9
Bruin
I stand in the kitchen, waiting on Penny to come out. I fix us both a sandwich, her turkey on wheat and me a ham on white. Of all the other things I’ve learned about her these last few days, I’ve also learned what foods she likes and doesn’t. Setting the food and some bottles of water on the table, I go to her bedroom door and knock softly. “Penny?”
She opens the door but her eyes won’t meet mine and I know that’s not going to work for me. I always want her eyes on me. Her face is heated from the shower and she has my long T-shirt on that I gave her yesterday to sleep in. Just seeing her in something of mine leaves me wanting. The primal urge to push her back into the bedroom, throw her on the bed and have my way with her, to finally claim her, is huge.
I stroke my hands down my jeans and then hold one out to her. “I fixed us some sandwiches.”
She looks at my hand but doesn’t take it. She walks past me and into the kitchen. I follow behind her, her white-blond hair up in a bun on the top of her head and my shirt stretched across her ass covering her thighs.
She walks to the table and sits down. The hem of my shirt rises on her legs and I can’t look away from her. “You okay?” I ask her.
She nods her head and takes a bite of the sandwich. We eat in silence, but it’s a comfortable silence. I know what she thinks. But I also know how she feels.
Even eating she’s graceful and each time she takes a drink, I get hot just watching her throat move.
She drinks down the bottle of water I gave her and I do the same. When she’s finished, she’s staring at her plate. I can see it, she starts to say something over and over, but never lets it come out. Frustrated, she blows out a breath and stands up, walking to the sink and rinsing the plate off.
I can’t keep doing this. I can’t be this close to her and not have her. One taste of her and I’m a goner. Any and all control I’ve ever had is out the door when it comes to her.
I walk up behind her, trapping her against the sink. I reach around her and set the plate into the sink with one hand and pull the few stray hairs that have escaped her bun off her neck with the other. I lean down, nuzzling her neck as my hand cups her breast. There’s no bra, so only the soft material of my worn shirt is between us. I think back to her yelling at me, telling me one way or another she’ll be leaving soon, and the emotion of it fills my voice. “What if I don’t want to let you go?”
Her heart starts beating wildly and her nipples tighten under my hand, telling me what I already know. The smell of her desire fills the air but before I can claim her, she slips from my grasp again.
Her face is red and her eyes are wide. “I offered myself to you because the Eaters are going to kill me for running off like I did. I offered myself to you because I don’t want to lose my virginity to one of them or someone worse. I offered myself to you because I wanted you, but it wasn’t because I’m some easy slut.”