Hannah woke up with the sun. It was a force of habit, her body clock forcing an alarm clock on her. This was her version of sleeping in though, waiting until the sun came up. She felt a chill go across her skin and realized the sheets had been kicked off her legs in the middle of the night. The reason why was resting peacefully, breathing evenly underneath her head and within her arms. Men were furnaces to sleep with. The Hannahe reason they could eat three Big Macs and not gain a pound was the Hannahe reason she constantly woke up in a sweat when she shared a bed with a man. Their metabolisms were insane. Normally, she envied men for that, but right now all she wanted was to get away from his roasting oven of body heat.
She was naked. So was he. Though the sheets sat lazily over him, mostly hiding his entire naked body from her, she had gotten plenty of visuals last night to fill in the gaps as she looked at him, asleep on his back, sprawled out across the bed. His muscled body seemed to glisten with what was left of the sweaty residue of their activities. A thin patch of dark hair covered his chest, just enough to be visible. A trail of much thicker, much darker hair carved a path between the bow of the muscles at his hips. If she closed her eyes she could still feel him inside and she shuttered as her blood heated a bit.
She stood up, grateful for the cool wooden floor beneath her feet as she moved through the cabin. A light breeze was coming from the kitchen window which was opened a crack. She had little regard for her own nakedness as she threw it open all the way. No one was around anyway, and besides, was she not allowed to enjoy nakedness in her own home? Not that this was her home, but she wasn’t about to censor the beautiful feeling of the cool morning air on her skin just because some suburban mom might be walking her dog a little too close to the cabin.
She fiddled with the coffee maker, getting it to turn on and pouring in water but having to hunt through several cabinets and the pantry until she found an unopened bag of Starbucks brand coffee. She had no qualms about opening it. Once you’ve had sex in someone’s place you were entitled to a little bit of free range in the kitchen in the morning, she felt.
She had sex with Chance.
She wasn’t sure if that was the right way to put it. He’d been tender and kind. She was afraid to call it what it might really be. He’d been kind and caring, he’d touched her softly and breathed her in. He’d called her beautiful, said he wanted to worship her. Those weren’t things you said to a one night stand or to someone you just had a tumble with without any real emotion. She knew he felt something, after all he’d kissed her so deeply in the office and told her as much. She liked him too. But her stomach dropped a bit at the idea that she’d slept with him.
She wasn’t sure exactly what it was about the situation that put her ill at ease. He hadn’t forced himself on her, he let her set the pace, he hadn’t even asked her to suck him off. Everything that happened last night had been her idea, her doing, her initiative. Maybe that’s what was bothering her. Maybe it was the fear of just how deeply she was moved, what she’d been willing to do without any prodding, any forcing.
The sounds of the coffee maker broke her out of her thoughts, it bubbled as it began to drip coffee to the pot below and she smelled the richness filling the air. No morning was going to be a good one if there wasn’t coffee. It was bitter and disgusting but there was something so comforting about it. It didn’t necessarily mean she was about to have a good day. But she at least couldn’t have a bad start to it.
She looked down. Her body was covered in scratches, red marks, and hickies. All of them were in places easy to cover with some clothes but she’d know they were there, she’d feel them when she moved. If she took her pants off or shirt they’d be waiting there for her to see. She smiled. Then she frowned. Hannah needed to get a grip on the situation, she was acting like some virginal freshman girl who gave her virginity away to a boy she barely knew. This wasn’t Hannah’s first rodeo, and Chance wasn’t a stranger from a bar or frat party.
The coffee maker beeped, announcing it was finished, and she pulled out a pale blue coffee mug, pouring the coffee in a steaming stream. It piled up and up, black against black until it was full and billowing out that Hannahe rich smell. It was comforting. There was a stillness to the world as you took your first sip of coffee. She took a breath and let it out and decided that nothing could be so stressful, so difficult.
But then a car pulled up in the drive way behind Chance’s bike and Hannah felt her stomach drop. So much for solitude and privacy in the morning. She watched just long enough to recognize Kat getting out of the car.
“Shit,” she hissed and set the coffee down.
This was going to be quite a sight for Kat: her son and a naked woman in her cabin. Hannah trotted quickly into the bedroom, not worry about waking Chance as she fumbled around for her clothes, putting them on in haste and tripping several times in the process. He groaned and rolled over, rubbing his eyes and looking at her.
“What are you doing?” he yawned.
“Your mother’s here,” Hannah hissed, clipping her bra on just as there was a knock at the door.
“Wouldn’t be the first time she walked in on me,” he said with a laugh as he got up, revealing himself completely to her.
“Yeah well I’m not exactly itching to have an experience like that for myself,” Hannah bit back, stepping out of the room just as she slid her shirt back on, covering the last of her exposed flesh.
He didn’t say anything after that and she was fairly certain he was moping or frowning or some other equally childish thing behind her but she didn’t care. She didn’t have time to be politically correct with her morning after banter. She stepped out into the foyer and up to the door, tossing her hair just a bit before she swung the front door open and hoped that her state wasn’t too obvious. Kat was waiting there with coffee in her hand and a bag from Dunkin Donuts.
“Morning,” Kat said. “I’m here to bring you back to civilization.”
“That sounds pretty amazing right now,” Hannah said, taking the offered goods and getting a strong whiff of the fried sugar of the donut and trying not to moan too much. Kat was a God-send right now.
“Couldn’t let me go for 24 hours,” Chance said, coming out of the room with his pants on, and slipping a shirt on just in time to cover his own bite marks and scratches that Hannah had put across his body.
“We’re in the middle of a war, if you’ve forgotten,” Kat said. “You got your little vacation. I hope you sorted things out. I don’t need details. But we need to get back to the clubhouse. We’ve got a few different plans to proceed forward with and you need to decide.”
Chance yawned, padding over in his bare feet to the coffee maker and pouring what was left in the pot into his own mug.
“Give me a second.”
“You’ve had several,” Kat said, her hands on her hips. “Get your things, and meet us at the clubhouse. I’m going to take Hannah so she can get changed and look presentable. If you’re not there by the time we get there, you will never hear the end of it from me.”
“Roger that.”
***
Kat and Hannah spent the entire car ride in silence with each other. It was more than a bit awkward because Hannah was fairly certain that Kat knew exactly what she had gotten up to with her son in the night. Then again, she kind of actively encouraged it by giving them the keys to the cabin. Not that that was helping the awkwardness at all. Hannah essentially felt like a teenager all over again, giving her boyfriend his first blow job and then having his mother drive her home a few hours later, blissfully unaware that she’d done things to her precious son that would make her blush. Kat wasn’t a blusher though, and somehow Hannah thought she was more likely to give her sex tips than she was to totally be scandalized about the possibility of the two of them together.
“Things are a little bit heated back at the clubhouse,” Kat said. It wasn’t lost on Hannah that she was breaking the silence with all business talk.
“It’s been less than 24 hours.”
“That’s plenty of time to start a full scale riot for us,” she said. “Link and Moose have some differing ideas about how to proceed, Ben likes to play one against the other, and no one else wants to take a side until they hear from Chance. Happy as I am that you two got your chance to talk and make up, it wasn’t exactly the best timing for Link to encourage some kind of weekend getaway for the pair of you.”
Hannah tried not to blush or feel overly offended that Kat was insinuating that her presence was the reason for discourse in the club. She couldn’t help but scoff a little bit at it. She wasn’t Chance’s babysitter, it wasn’t her job to say “No babe, we can’t have sex now, you have homework.” So she sat there silently.
“We’ll get it sorted after today,” Kat said, as if more to herself. Hannah rolled her eyes and nodded.
They stopped back at Kat’s house where Hannah could change into some clean clothes that hadn’t been ripped off as a foreplay to sex. They were still clothes of nothing but leather and denim and all rocker outfits. She still had a part to play. Having sex with Chance didn’t change the charade. She realized maybe that the cabin held a little bit of magic. It was like they’d been in their own world for a few hours where it was nothing but them and now she was back to reality. He was a man she’d known for a few weeks who was more her jailer than her friend. It may just have been the situation, the possibility of danger that was drawing her towards him. And the muscles didn’t hurt either.
She looked in the mirror, maybe the woman who slept with him at the cabin had just been this, the biker’s old lady who was there to be Chance’s arm candy. After all, she was dressed for her part when they got to the cabin. Though it was hard to erase the symbolism of him peeling off her clothes, piece by piece. She had not been playing the part of his old lady when he’d finally gotten to the bottom layer, the real her. Nothing but skin and her own body.
“Let’s go,” Kat said sharply when she came around the corner and found Hannah staring at herself a little too long in the mirror. “We’ve got things to do and if Chance isn’t there by the time we get there I’m going to beat him senseless.”
They rode to the clubhouse in more silence, except for when Kat would yell and honk at another driver and then mumble to herself. There was no talk of business or of her and Chance. It was kind of a relief, even if it made the tension in the car a little hard to bear sometimes. There was a massive element in the room and they were both obviously, actively avoiding it.
Hannah didn’t know if it relieved her or not to see Chance’s bike parked there already when they arrived. It certainly sent Kat into a frenzy who said how lucky he was he managed to get there first and how she was going to knock him around next time. They walked in and everyone was gathered together, Chance sitting on the head table, his legs propped up against a chair in front of him the like the guy from The Breakfast Club. Her first instinct was to stay put or sit in the empty chair across the way. But she was his old lady. She had a part to play. So she walked over and sat down next to him, only barely touching him and hoping the paleness of her face didn’t give away the torment underneath. He was stiff next to her, not moving to touch her at all as she settled in next to him. Everyone was making small talk and laughing as Chance sent out a sharp whistle to get their attention.
“Okay,” he said. “Now that we’re all here let’s get started.”
“We can all agree we don’t want a war with the Black Death,” Link said, standing up to speak first. “And we especially don’t want that war over some punk kid who couldn’t pay his gambling debts.”
He didn’t look at Hannah as he said and it was probably for the best because she felt her blood begin to boil, her face going from pale to red, she was sure. She swallowed it though and settled for clenching her fist against the edge of the table and trying to do as much damage there as she could. She wasn’t Hannah Bremer, Gabe’s sister, she was Chance’s devoted old lady. She had to sell that part.
“Where we differ, however,” Link said, turning to Chance and then to Moose, “Is in how to deal with the situation.”
“Well, let’s hear it,” Chance said.
“My proposition is this: I know some of the men in the Black Death who have been there since the club was founded,” he said. “Let me organize a sit down with them to sort this situation out. There’s no reason to lose men and revenue over something like this. It might cost a little money and a little pride, but in the long run a parley would go so much farther for both sides.”
There was a murmur of general agreement in the room. It seemed like a solid plan. Hannah was a little skeptical about how well a bunch of gang members could play nice with each other but she also knew there was protocol and Link had a point, no one was going to want a war. Chance was nodding as well, his lip pouted in thought.
“Seems reasonable, a little hopeful though,” he said. “I’ve been in situations where talks go downhill.”
“You also didn’t have me there to do the talking,” Link countered. “These are some old friends of mine. I trust them.”
Chance rubbed the bridge of his nose and nodded, massaging at his forehead. “What else do we have?”
Moose stepped forward, past Link, and then in front of him. Link rolled his eyes but backed up and let the younger man have the floor.
“There are other connections we can use that are less risky,” Moose said. “I used to date a girl back in high school who’s an old lady in the BD now.”
“Who’s this?”
“Her name is Cindy.”
Cindy sounded exactly like the kind of dead-end junkie trash the Black Death might attract as an old lady. Hannah tried not to roll her eyes. She was playing the part of an old lady after all.
“And what are we going to do with that info?” Chance asked.
“She can be a go between.”
“A spy?”
“No, but a liaison. We need someone on their side who’s also on our side. She’s perfect for that.”
“Why would she want to help us?” Chance asked. “And I’m not exactly sure the Black Death is going to appreciate that the ex-boyfriend of one of their old ladies is trying to use her as some kind of parley chip.”
“It guarantees an audience,” Moose tried.
“So does Link’s plan and there isn’t any hairy relationship drama waiting to rear its ugly head,” Chance said.
Then he was silent for a moment, deliberating in his own head. The final say was going to be with him, but it was clear from the rumble of the crowd who was on whose side. It wasn’t a democracy, not by a long shock. They basically got the opportunity to plead their cases and then waited for Chance to deliver final judgement on the whole situation. It had to be a little bit irritating and Hannah was a little annoyed she wasn’t in a position to throw her own opinion in. They were talking about her brother, after all.
“We’ll go with Link’s plan,” Chance said. “There’s less possibility of error. Moose, I appreciate the help and you’re still my right hand, but this is what’s best for everyone at the moment.”
Moose’s face was in a tight frown and his jaw was so obviously clenching underneath his muscles and skin. But he nodded. It was his job to follow orders. Link nodded as well, solemn but smiling just a bit. He walked off to go have a conversation with some of the men and that left everyone to mingle once more, talking to each other, debating the finer points of either plan.
That also left Hannah and Chance to sit in awkward silence next to each other. Everyone dispersed away, leaving them alone as if privacy was kind of thing they wanted or deserved. Hannah tried not to fidget too much, her eyes on a swivel. But she also needed to do something with her hands, with her body so she wasn’t just sitting there in silence with him. It was crazy how they could go from a night of total passion to pretending to be strangers the next day. They didn’t know how to be next to each other and Hannah wasn’t sure why.
Again, she thought of the bubble that the cabin had created. They had been in another place, another time, and they had nothing but each other. It created some kind of cosmic no fly zone where they could act on impulse, finally relieve some tension, and now they were back in the real world knowing that that never could happen again while they were here. Probably. Hannah wasn’t sure any more. But it was clear he was having doubts too from the way he was fidgeting all over the place. He was just as nervous, just as concerned about their situation.
At least she thought so. He was a hard man to read. He kept his emotions to bottled up and inside it was impossible to figure out which way was up and which way was down with him. He was more confusing than a teenage girl. But she didn’t want to dig too deep. She was terrified of what she might find there if she did. Did she want him to forget about the situation and reject her? Did she want to see if they could try again? She had no idea. She wasn’t even sure what she wanted and that night in the cabin hadn’t offered any clarity. Her hormones were high, her emotions out of whack. She was lost in a sea of pleasure. It was all something right out of those romance novels she hated but it had messed with her mind enough that she was in something of a confused state. What to do?
The best thing, she decided, for that moment, was to get up and walk away from him for now. She’d think better when she couldn’t smell how familiar his aftershave was to her nose. So she did. She moved away. She had no one else to mingle with but she could easily sit in the corner and pretend to be applying more makeup. She could feel him watching her but she wasn’t about to turn around and create some kind of across the room inner panic by looking at him.
Instead she kept to her own side and he kept to his. Things could only get worse from there.