She racked her brain all the way back to the ranch, trying to think of a way to keep the rendezvous so that Miller could be taken down and the platinum could be retrieved…but Dax and the rest of the Skulls would be out of the line of fire.

By the time Angel got back to the ranch, the meeting was over and the party was in full swing. She stood by the door for a second and scanned the crowded room for Dax. People were dancing, smoking weed, and slamming shots. One couple was off in the corner, fully dressed except for a few adjustments, having sex against the wall. Angel’s eyes finally fell on Dax. She started to smile until she realized that there was a brunette on the other side of the stool where he sat, with her tits pressed up against his shoulder and her hand resting on his thigh. Angel suddenly had tunnel vision as she pushed her way through the bodies between her and Dax. As she got close enough to hear, the little bitch was saying, “I’ll suck you until you blow your load, baby, and then I’ll suck you some more…” Angel felt a surge of rage. She didn’t let the girl finish and she didn’t wait to hear Dax’s response. She walked up to the girl, grabbed her by the arm, and threw her backwards. The girl was skinny and teetering on six-inch heels. She went flying and fell on her ass in the middle of the floor. All activity stopped around them and everyone stared at Angel. She didn’t care. She was looking at the scantily dressed slut in the middle of the floor. She could feel Dax looking at her and without looking at him she pointed at the patch she was wearing on the denim vest she’d put on in the car just before coming in.

“Do you see this?”

The girl squinted at the patch for a long time before finally saying, “Yes,” in a slurred voice. She was either drunk or high, but Angel was too pissed to care.

“I’m going to assume that since you’re new here, you haven’t seen it before. That means you can get up off your ass and find another cock to suck. This one,” she said, pointing at Dax, “is mine. If I see you anywhere near it again, you won’t have any teeth left in front to get in the way when you give a blow job. Understand?”

The skanky little brunette nodded. Angel looked at the prospect behind the bar and said, “Help her up and get her out of here. I don’t want to look at her again tonight.”

The prospect looked at Dax. Dax nodded at him and he scurried over to do what he was told. Everyone watched him half carry her out of the clubhouse, and then suddenly the activity in the room resumed and Dax was the only one looking at Angel. The rage and adrenaline still flowed through her veins and the amused look on Dax’s face didn’t help. She stepped up to him and, to his obvious surprise, she reached down and put her hand on his crotch. He didn’t have an erection and, as mad as Angel was, she decided that very well may have saved his life.

“What are you doing?” he asked, still amused.

“Making sure that little slut’s offer didn’t turn you on. Why was she so close to you? I thought we agreed that we were exclusive the day you gave me this!” She held out the part of her vest with the patch on it. Dax was smiling as he said:

“We agreed you were mine.” It took every ounce of self-control Angel had left to keep from punching him in the face.

“So…I fuck you exclusively and you fuck whoever you want?” She was loud and attracting attention again, but she didn’t care. It wasn’t like any of these people had any secrets from each other anyways.

“That’s usually how it works,” Dax said, still grinning.

“Not this time,” she said. He raised an eyebrow at her and she said, “Do you have a problem with that? Because guess what? I’m not going to share. You want that little skank or any of the other skanks around here, you’re welcome to them…but if that’s the case I’m out of here and I’m not coming back.”

Dax reached out and grabbed her by the vest. He pulled her so that her body was almost touching his and in a low voice he said, “This patch meant more to me than anything else in the world…until I met you. When I gave it to you, it was not just a gesture, it was a symbol, and it meant something to me. I don’t want Heidi or any other woman. I was about to tell her that before you came in pissing on your territory.” He grinned again. “But I stopped because it was much hotter to watch you do it.” Angel’s rage suddenly turned into passion and she covered his mouth with hers. He pulled her up onto the stool with him and she straddled his lap as they kissed hungrily, biting and sucking at each other’s lips while the room looked on. Angel had never been into exhibitionism, but showing these people that Dax belonged to her went to her head like a drug. Dax’s hands were on her ass and his tongue was down her throat and she felt his erection growing underneath her and she’d never been so turned on in her life. For several minutes, she thought he was going to take her right there in front of everyone and as much as she knew she’d be horrified by that later, at that moment, she would have let him. Instead, he stood up and let her wrap her legs around his waist. Then as the bodies stepped apart to make a path for their president, he carried her down the hall to one of the guest rooms in the back and she happily showed him that her mouth was the only one he’d ever need to please him.

* * *

Dax and Angel spent hours making love in every possible position before using the shower in the guest room and then collapsing down onto the full-sized bed, naked and exhausted. It didn’t take long for both to pass out. Angel woke up several hours later with Dax sleeping peacefully beside her. She scanned the room with her eyes until they landed on the LED numbers of the clock on the dresser. It was just after two a.m. She listened carefully trying to decide if the party out front was still going on. She couldn’t hear anything, which didn’t mean much, since they were way in the back of the building. The room they were in was used for visiting club members and nomads that stopped by, and Dax had told her that it was basically soundproof so that they could have their privacy.

She slipped gently out of Dax’s arms and slithered off the bed like a snake. She stood at the edge of the bed for a few seconds watching the rise and fall of his chest. He hadn’t flinched, which meant that he was exhausted and probably wouldn’t wake up for a while. Angel went around the side of the bed to where Dax had deposited his jeans the night before. Still watching him, she knelt next to the pants and slipped her hand into one of the front pockets. When she didn’t feel anything there, she slid her hand into the other one. She brought it back out with exactly what she was looking for…a key ring with three keys on it. She knew that one of the keys was to the front door of his little house and the other to the front door of the clubhouse. She was hoping that the third one was to the meeting room he used when he met with his “executives.” It was the one room she hadn’t been invited into during the six weeks that she’d been around the ranch.

She found her own blouse and pants before standing up, and tiptoed toward the bathroom clutching them to her chest. Without turning on the light, she slipped into her t-shirt and jeans, without underwear, and slid the keys into her pocket. Then taking a deep breath, she slipped back into the bedroom. Dax hadn’t moved at all. She stared at him again for a long time, working up a plan to tell him she’d gone in search of something to drink if he woke up and noticed her missing. With her fingers virtually crossed she made her way quietly toward the door. She held her breath as she turned the knob, and let it out slowly as the door opened without so much as a creak. She slipped out quickly and closed the door, jumping a little at the sound of the catch as she closed it. She stood stock-still for a few seconds listening for activity coming from down the hall. The music was no longer playing and she didn’t hear any voices. There was still light coming from that direction, but they rarely turned them all off.

Still on the tips of her toes, she made it down the hall and into the great room. The place was almost cleaned out. On the couch were a couple of naked people. From where she stood she couldn’t see who it was, but the rise and fall of the back on top was the only movement she saw from either of them. One of the guys was passed out with his head on his arms at the bar and there was a naked club girl with her legs spread, asleep in the recliner across from the couch. If Angel had to guess, she’d say that that one fell asleep masturbating to the sight of whatever was happening on the couch. She knew she had no right to judge, but she shook her head anyways as she quietly crossed the room in the direction of the meeting room.

Angel held her breath again as she slid the third key on Dax’s ring into the lock. It turned easily and she pushed open the door. She stood quietly for a few seconds and let her eyes adjust to the dark before stepping inside and closing the door behind her. She was suddenly in pitch darkness. Again, she had to wait for her eyes to adjust and hold onto the chairs that sat around the big, round oak table in the center of the room, to make her way to the front.

Angel knew that Dax’s vice president Maximillian, or “Mad Max” as they called him, was out of town and had been since before she met Dax. He hadn’t told her any particulars, just that Max had to lay low for a few months. His road captain was a man named George Hanson, or “Handsome” as he was called. He had two sergeants at arms. One was a guy named Trent Phillips, who went by “Mad Dog,” and the other was Franklin King, who was still in jail alongside Scar for parole violation. She wasn’t sure who besides his road captain and his one sergeant at arms he had at his meetings, but she was running on the assumption that they were hashing out a plan for Friday. She hoped that there was a logbook or something that they used to keep track of what took place in their meetings.

She sat down in the center chair at the head of the table. She knew without even being able to see that it was Dax’s chair. A wave of guilt assaulted her until she reminded herself that she was doing this for Dax. She put her hands out and felt across the documents lying on the table in front of her. One of them was a leather-bound book. She picked it up and brought it close to her face before opening it. It was some kind of accounting…there were numbers in different columns. She didn’t know what it meant and she didn’t have time to worry about it right then. She put that book down, hopefully in the same place she’d picked it up, and she picked up a small stack of papers to her left. As she scanned the top one in what little light there was coming in through the blinds behind her she realized that she was holding exactly what she was looking for. She also realized that there was no way she’d be able to memorize or copy it in the dark room. She’d have to risk taking it with her and getting it back where it belonged before everyone began waking up. It was a huge risk, but a necessary one. It was the only way she’d be able to save Dax’s life…and despite everything else she was supposed to be doing there, that was her immediate priority. She stuffed the papers down the front of her jeans and slipped out of the room, locking it behind her. She grabbed a half-drunk bottle of water off the bar as she passed it and returned to the room she’d left Dax sleeping in…only to find him sitting up on the side of the bed, with his jeans on.