ONE
Pagan
The Henchmen were having an open house.
And anyone who knew me knew I loved a good fucking party. And that's what this was. Reign put the word out that the club was looking for new members; the right kind of people showed up toting cases of beer and handles of everything else. The music got to blaring, the liquor got to pouring, and the skirts started waltzing in.
To be honest, we didn't have a lot of parties.
The older members were settled down with their women and kids. Which left me, Cyrus, Reeve, and Edison being the only ones who were around to want to throw down. Five fucks didn't a party make.
On top of that, Reign didn't like a bunch of strangers in the clubhouse, still paranoid since some bastard came in and killed most of his men.
I guess I understood that shit.
But Reign was a good leader and he knew the slow trickle of new probates just wasn't going to cut it. He got a deal with a new Lebanese contact and needed as many men as possible to help run the guns.
We were a pathetic lot with only eleven members.
So he took the initiative, got word around, had some of Lo's guys come in to watch over and make sure no one was there for reasons other than to party and vie for a position.
I should have been in my fucking glory.
But I just wasn't feeling it.
I hadn't had a fight in almost two weeks. That was the crux of it. Slate was out of town, and everyone else at Hex was too much of a bitch to get into the ring with me. I wasn't used to it. And it was pissing me off. I had no outlet, so it was just all built-up inside.
"Come on, man," Cyrus said, throwing an arm around my shoulders, shaking his head. "I can't handle all these women myself. I mean... I can," he went on, smile sly. "But it would be a lot of fucking work, and I would need a serious protein and electrolyte regimen for a week after. Take a couple off my hands, would you?"
Cyrus was an easy guy to get along with. If you needed such a thing, he was the ideal wingman. He was always down for a good time even when his more staid brother wasn't. And unlike Edison, he didn't scare the chicks away with his dark and lethal vibe. In actuality, women flocked to Cyrus with his laid-back, charming personality. We had spent many a night on the town together when no one else was interested.
Normally, I'd hop up, grab another bottle, and follow him to the chicks.
"'Sup?" he asked when I didn't answer, as two guys moved into the seating area, sitting down on the couch, each with a beer cradled between their hands.
"You wore another MC's cut in here?" I asked at almost the same time. The leather was old and soft, the patches frayed and dirty from age.
"Lost ninety-percent of our MC to a raid a year back. Until we have new cuts to wear, we will keep wearing these."
You didn't even need to read between the lines to see that they were bikers through and through, likely raised in an MC. It was in the ease with which they were inside a compound, surrounded by other bikers and clubwhores and mysterious strangers in paramilitary garb.
Both were big, not quite as mammoth as Wolf, but close. The one who spoke was white with tats snaking down his arms and across his neck, somewhat short-cropped dark brown hair, and gray eyes. The tops of his hands were crisscrossed with scars in all stages of age, and there was one nasty one that cut through both his lips.
The other was roughly the same size as the first, black, and with giant shoulders and massive arms. His head was shaved; his eyes were dark and guarded, and while he was in a relaxed position, everything about him was humming with energy like he could jump up at anytime if he needed to.
"I'm Cyrus," Cy said, pulling the arm from my shoulders and reaching out to them. "This fuck is Pagan."
"Sugar," the first one said, making a smirk pull at my lips. Of all the biker names... fucking Sugar? His voice had an accent too- something I maybe pegged as Staten Island, a strange mix of other New York accents which made him leave the 'r' off at the end of his own name. Suga. "And this is Virgin." Oh for fuck's sake. At Cy's raised brow, Sugar shrugged. "Because he doesn't give a fuck."
"What was your MC in?" I asked, knowing for damn sure it wasn't baking cookies for charities and nice slow rides up and down the coastline that made the locals sweat unnecessarily. Because right there on their chests were one-percent badges. And you didn't wear them if you were some bullshit weekend warrior.
Virgin shot Sugar a look, both silently communicating something we weren't in on. When he spoke, his voice was deep, not rough and gravelly like Edison's, but smooth and slick. Bet my fucking cut that he got boatloads of pussy thrown at him. "Enforcing."
Hired muscle.
Cy and I shared a look, both knowing the same thing- Reign would like that. When it came to MCs, he was a bit prejudiced against the ones who ran drugs or women. He didn't like that shit, and he didn't want it in his operation. But hired muscle? Guys who knew how to use their hands? He'd be all over that.
"You guys met our prez yet?" Cyrus asked, moving to stand.
We had orders to bring what we thought were good prospects up to the big guys so they could get more info out of them, get a feel for them, maybe get some names to hand off to Lo's people so they could run them and check their records.
Reign might have wanted to build his numbers back up, but he wanted to be smart about it.
Alone, I tipped back my drink, watching another crowd of women make their way inside the front doors.
Desperate was a look that you could somehow also smell on a woman. Sure, all you had to do was look at the skirt that was short enough to see full ass and twat if they so much as slightly bent forward, the heels high enough to break an ankle in, the too-dark eye-makeup, the shiny lips, the tits spilling over their shirts. Some even had the added oomph of having their entire stomachs on display. One had a shirt so short that all you saw was underboob when she turned. But there was also something that seeped out of their pores, distinct even above the smell of whatever shitty cheap perfume they practically bathed in.
Each was distinct to the woman. But there were a few general ingredients they all had.
I need you to fuck me until I feel pretty.
I need you to make me feel as useless as I already think I am.
I need you to reinforce my daddy issues.
Then they went ahead and sprinkled a few concentrated drops of their own personal baggage in the mix, slipped into something slutty, and walked through the door.
I wasn't huge on fucking clubwhores. But did I maybe have a handful of them in the past? Fuck yeah I did. And I had no regrets. But given the choice between getting that smell all over me and trying to wash it off for a week after, or finding some chick at Hex or Chaz's who smelled like possibilities instead, I'd take the possibilities any day. Not because I wanted to settle down with those possibilities, mind you, just because they didn't get all over your skin after and make you feel slimy as fuck.
I was considering grabbing another underboob-showing chick, taking her back to a room, and fucking her until I got my surly mood out of my system, when she walked in.
She had a slut uniform on; I'd give her that. Her long, slim legs were almost completely on display in her skintight black club dress that her big tits looked ready to burst out of. Her black hair was long and had that wave shit going on. Her eyes were lined, her lips red.
She looked ready for a fuck.
But no amount of window dressing could mask the fact that she wasn't there, not yet. Desperate. It was almost like she was courting it, like she was looking for that one last experience that would reinforce what she believed about herself. And if she was looking for that, getting fucked by one, or a train, of bikers, was sure to give it to her.
Normally, I would shrug it off.
Hell, she was pretty enough, I might have even been willing to give her what she was seeking.
But no amount of slutwear or makeup could hide the fact that she was barely more than a kid.
There was no way she was even close to being drinking age.
So two weeks of frustration came to the surface, making my voice loud enough to be heard over the music, the conversation all around.
"What the fuck are you, eighteen fucking years old?" I asked, standing, waving my drink hand at her. "Get the fuck out of here. You're too fucking young to be a goddamn clubwhore. Go play with some Barbies and Bonnie Bell, and leave the fuck-me heels and dick-sucking lipstick to women who fucked their lives up enough that being a cumdumpster to a guy who doesn't even know her name is the highlight of her mother fucking week." My voice hadn't lowered, even as I put my drink on the bar and walked up to her, the loudness making her shock back, eyes huge. If I wasn't mistaken, those big brown eyes of hers were getting watery. Because she knew I was fucking right. "Want better for yourself," I added, close to her ear, as I moved past, walking out the front door and into the yard.
I sighed out a breath into the humid air. We were in the ball-sweatiest part of summer, mid-July, and even the night air offered no relief.
"That was... unexpected." Laz walked up beside me, looking off into the backyard where at least a dozen men and women were situated, ours and strangers alike. "Haven't exactly known you as the pillar of morality, Pagan. In fact," he went on, smirking, "I'm pretty sure it was you who was fucking some chick on Ward's desk at Hex last month."
I snorted, reaching up to scrub the scruff on my cheek. There was no denying it; that was me. There was also no denying that I generally laughed in the face of convention. I fucked often. I feasted on a fucking smorgasbord of no-strings-attached pussy. I busted heads for a living. I ran guns for fucking fun. I drank whenever I wanted. I crashed every type of vehicle known to man. I fucking lived by my own code and that was it. I didn't give a good goddamn what anyone else thought of it.
"She shouldn't be in a place like this looking like that."
"I agree," he said, rocking back on his heels. "Just didn't expect the scene, I guess." We both turned when we heard the door open, bringing with it a chorus of music and voices, to see the girl I had flipped on charging out, head looking at her feet, hands trying to pull the hem of her dress further down. She made her way out the gates and slipped inside some late model, nice sports car. "You need a fight or a fuck," Laz concluded, knowing me perhaps better than the rest of the guys did, having known me the longest.
I didn't fight because I needed the money per se. There were plenty of other jobs to be had. I fought because it was cathartic. I fought because I flew off the handle too easily if I didn't.
"Maybe I'll take a page out of your book and take a walk," I said, jerking my chin at him, then making my way toward the gates.
"Since the fuck when are you the first to leave a party?" Repo asked, raising a brow at me.
"Me? I'm not leaving. I'll be back to shut this shit down."
I would too.
I just needed to shake the mood, get my head in the right place, then I would go back, down some more booze, bullshit with some new prospects, and take a skirt to bed.
Because that was who I was.
I considered dropping into Chaz's, but figured more alcohol on top of a sour mood would not be a good idea. It would lead to some words with some random bar asshole and a back alley fight. I was an animal in the ring and I didn't temper that shit with real-life fights. I'd probably be facing fucking assault charges by the end of the night if I went that route.
So I walked past and went down a few more storefronts, grabbing the door for She's Bean Around, and slipping inside.
It would be somewhat useless to describe the place seeing as the two hot-as-sin, crazy-as-hell chicks who owned it were constantly changing shit. You walked in one day, it was hipster-chic. You walked in the next, it was full-on chick with pink everything. This particular night, the chick shit was gone, leaving the walls a distressed kind of white and all the accents normal brown or tan.
It wasn't a huge space, with maybe only a dozen small tables placed around, but it was a local hotspot, and it was early on a Friday night, so it was pretty packed.
"Jazz, pet, when you gonna stop fighting this and take me back to your place?" I asked as I walked up to the counter. Surly mood or not, when you saw a woman as hot as Jazzy, you fucking laid it on thick.
Jazzy was either half-black or half-Latina with her darker skin, honey-brown eyes, and a body that skirted the line of curvy and heavy- all tits, ass, hips, and thighs. And she fucking worked it. Her hair, like her shop, was ever changing. She was sporting her natural black this day, but I knew it could be pink or blue the next time I saw her.
That being said, she was Jazz, which meant she was a loud-mouth, smart-ass who had to put up with guys hitting on her a hundred times a day, so she was completely unfazed by it.
"How about when you show up at my place of business without fresh bruises, cuts, or dripping blood for a change?"
I raised my arms out by my sides, turning in a slow circle, showing the proof that I hadn't been in a fight in far too fucking long.
"So, we're fucking tonight," I concluded as she handed me a large black coffee with three shots because we danced this dance just about every single day since they opened.
"Totally. Let me just put a closed sign on the door, and you can take me right here," she said, placing her hand on the center of the counter, leaning forward, almost resting her tits on the surface.
"In front of all these people? I knew you were a freak, Jazz," I said with a wink.
"Go get a table while it's free," she said, rolling her eyes as she reached for the twenty I passed her. "And I'm keeping the rest of this as a tip for having to put up with your sexual harassment."
"All yours. Put it in for Momoa. Hunnam is overrated."
The girls kept two tip jars on the counter in front of the register. Every day, there was a picture above each, and you 'casted your vote' for which was better by putting your tip money in the corresponding jar.
"Right?" she asked, dropping the fifteen into a picture of him with a trident. "Blond guys just don't do it for me."
"One more thing in my favor," I agreed, giving her a smirk, and moving away to the one empty table she had indicated.
I was never going to fuck Jazz.
We both knew that.
That being said, it was just in both our natures to keep up the game.
I sat down, whipping out my phone to check some shit out, when a movement at my side caught my eye.
All I saw was something shiny and, maybe perhaps a bit paranoid being a gun runner, it made me tense up until I turned and realized it was a huge silver bracelet on a dainty wrist. Intrigued all the more, my eyes moved up her arm then neck, to find her face.
And fuck.
Leaving the compound was worth it if I could bring her back to bed with me. No desperation. All possibility.
And I really, really like the possibility of fucking her from behind while taking a hold of her long blonde hair, and pulling.
Pretty would be an understatement.
Hell, gorgeous might not even have covered it
Beautiful would be the only working descriptor for a woman who looked like her with her perfectly symmetrical features, nose that turned up ever-so-slightly at the end, big cornflower blue eyes, and lips that were begging for all kinds of dirty things to happen with them.
It didn't exactly escape my notice either that she wasn't my usual type, if I had such a thing. I was generally a pretty 'equal opportunity' kind of guy when it came to women. But there was, overall, definitely a tendency to go for women a little on the easy side both looks and attitude-wise.
This girl didn't scream easy. In fact, there wasn't even a whisper of it around her.
Everything from her perfectly tamed hair to her expertly applied makeup to her carefully chosen sundress that screamed sexy even though it was modest, told you that she wasn't the kind of girl who fucked some backstreet guy like me.
This was also evidenced by the suit across from her at her table. There was nothing distinct about him. He was good looking enough with plain brown hair, plain brown eyes, and bland voice. Everything was neat, trimmed, shaved, and in order. Typical suit.
The music being how Jazz liked it, meaning loud to the point of deafening, even though they were only an arm's length away, I couldn't make out what was being said. The guy was dominating the conversation though, prattling on and on as the girl sat back in her seat, cradling a reusable ceramic coffee cup with #girlboss written across the side in gold, matching the golden silicone top. Her face seemed at odds with itself. Her brows were raised as though whatever the guy was saying was somehow pissing her off, but her eyes looked a little deflated, maybe even desperate.
Girl like that looking deflated or desperate was a mother fucking sin.
Then, as if a cue from a higher power that I needed to make a move, the suit stood up, dropped a twenty on the table, touched the girl's wrist, and walked toward the door.
Me, well, I couldn't help myself, could I?
"You fucking serious?" I asked, loud enough to be heard over the music, making her head snap over, brows drawn together in confusion. "I mean, you take those tits, that ass, those legs, those lips, and what I can only assume is a prime USDA pussy and put it in his hands? Tell me, does he even finger fuck you, or is he too worried about his goddamn manicure?"
Those lips of hers opened and closed twice before she gave her head a little shake as if to clear it.
"Excuse me?"
There it was.
Loved that haughty shit.
My smile spread slow and wicked as I leaned slightly forward toward her. "You heard me just fine. And, what's more, you didn't deny it. Tell you what, you want a real man to take care of you, pet, you walk that pretty ass of yours down the street. There's a party going on. You can't miss it. I'll be there. You find me, and I'll show how much I love eating something USDA prime."
With that, knowing down to my bones, and maybe my dick judging by the way her eyes went the slightest bit hot at the word eating, I got up, and walked back to the clubhouse.
That bad mood of mine?
Fucking gone.