CHAPTER EIGHT
Alessandra
WAKING UP I FEEL stiff and very sore, and my hand is sweaty and cramped. Opening my eyes, I follow my arm down to my hand finding Felix asleep in the chair holding it.
As if he can sense me awake, his eyes snap open, and he sits up straight.
“How are you feeling?” he asks huskily, rubbing his face with his free hand.
“Like someone stabbed me,” I croak. I shift in the hard bed, not very comfortable and I’m starving for something greasy.
“I want to get you out of here, take you back to the club,” Felix states, wasting no time to tell me what he’s thinking.
“Then what?” I shrug. Curious where we go from here.
“You ask a lot of a fucking questions.” He raises a brow, his tone un-amused.
“Is that a problem? To ask questions?” I tilt my head to the side. He rubs at his chin, his long caramel colored hair falling into his face.
“It is when I don’t have the answers, especially the ones you’re looking for, Dirty Bird,” he replies honestly, and that slice in my side begins to burn.
“Has Raven come to see me?” I ask, trying to sit up. Felix shakes his head and I can’t help the look of confusion that crosses my face. Why wouldn’t she come see me?
Noticing my confusion, Felix stiffens. “What aren’t you telling me?”
Taking a long breath, I rub at my forehead nervously. “She checked that room and said it was clear—”
“Yeah, you told me when you were half drugged up yesterday,” he informs.
“So, is she just a shitty cop, or did she set me up?” I ask myself rather than state to Felix.
Felix’s shoulders rise as if he’s about to explode with rage, his thick brows slicing inward.
“Let’s get you out of here, and I’ll look into it,” he mutters with so much force I can tell he’s ready to draw blood. Something warm surfaces knowing he’d go to lengths for me, but then again I don’t want to be the reason for another blood bath. Besides, I can handle my own shit.
“Felix,” I shake my head with hesitation. “Don’t. I’m just paranoid. Obviously I’ve been hanging around you too much, scared everyone is out to get me.” I roll my eyes for effect.
Felix stands, looking down at me with heated eyes. They pin me where I lay, making my body come back alive in a heartbeat.
“That’s because I’ve learned from personal experience to trust very few people in my life. You get to throwing your loyalty around too easily and that is when you get stabbed in the back.”
My eyes snap to his, his words making so much sense. Especially since I was just literally stabbed.
Holding the crook of my arm, he pulls the IV out and presses his finger down where a trickle of blood tries to escape. A slight sting races up my arm from the IV being torn out.
“What are you doing?” I ask with alarm.
“Getting you out of here,” Felix informs as if it’s obvious.
He throws the blanket off of me and I notice I’m wearing a hospital gown and it covers very little. My thighs are showing, and it dips down low to my breast. I try to pull on it, but it does no good.
“Shouldn’t a nurse check me out, or I need to sign some papers?” I squirm.
Felix flinches with my suggestion. Like I’m being ridiculous.
“Fuck that. I’m taking you back to my club, to my bed, and nobody is stopping me from that,” he retorts.
He slides his arms under my body and lifts me from the bed. I wrap an arm around his neck and pull him in close out of instinct. The feel of his warm, hard body against mine is all I need to know that I’m safe. His strong scent of leather and spice bringing me home.
Felix steps outside my room, and I notice Machete and Gatz standing guard.
“Get the truck, we’re leaving,” Felix orders, his voice rumbling through my body.
“Um, sir.” A concerned nurse rounds the nurse’s station. Her hair a frizzy mess, and her Looney Tunes scrubs wrinkled. “You can’t just take her without a doctor’s consent!”
Felix’s grip tightens around my body as he holds me close. He lowers his head, his eyes hooded and daring. Little hairs on the back of my neck stand seeing a darkness cross him. His body stiffens beneath me, and his heartbeat throbs in his temples.
“You going to stop me?” Felix growls, challenging her. The nurse stops, her hands fumbling with the bottom hem of her top as she looks the other way. “I didn’t think so,” Felix clips.
He stomps toward the entrance, and I can’t help but nuzzle the crook of his neck.
There is nowhere else I would rather be.
It both disturbs me and excites me.
Felix
When Machete parks the SUV, I scoop Alessandra up and slide out of the back seat. We don’t even make it to the front door before Jillian rushes out in complete panic.
“Oh my God, Alessandra, I was so worried. Me and your mother wanted to come, but they wouldn’t let us…” I step passed her into the club, and she continues to follow us blubbering in tears. Her mother is trying to dance with Mac, who is standing on the couch with a broom to keep her back. I can’t help but smirk at the scene, until my eyes fall on Zeek standing by the bar with his arms crossed, eyeing me. That look of hardness, judging me as I hold onto Alessandra. I return the ‘fuck you’ stare, and make my way down the hall where I run into Machete.
“Get the doctor to come check her out, make sure to get whatever fucking meds we need and shit,” I tell him.
“On it,” he gives a curt nod.
“Are you okay?” Jillian asks, stepping up behind us.
“I’m fine, Jillian. I promise,” Alessandra tries to soothe Jillian over my shoulder, as I ain’t fucking stopping. Making it to my door, I kick it open and shut it. Locking it.
“You couldn’t even stop and let me talk to her?” Alessandra snaps hatefully. I glare at her tone.
“Nope.” Stopping means questioning. Questions from my boys wanting to know why I’m stuck to Alessandra like a love-struck boyfriend, and I ain’t ready to find the answer to that.
Slowly I lay her on the bed and pull out of my cut and jeans. Grabbing my shirt, I tug it over my head and slide in beside her, tearing the cheap hospital gown off of her. Her cheeks turn a shade of red, but I don’t give a fuck about her humility. It took everything I had not to slide into that shitty hospital bed and feel her skin against mine. To feel her heartbeat and know she was going to be okay.
Hovering over her, my hands slide along her bare arms, my lips and nose brushing against her silky skin. The smell of honey and coconut taking me to a paradise that is in the sun and not cold darkness that has become my life.
Sliding my hands along her side, I stop at her wound and slowly lower my head. Gently kissing around it as if the remedy to her pain is held in my lips. Her fingers tangle into my hair in a caring matter as I continue to kiss her body.
“Felix,” she whispers.
“Yeah?” I glance up at her.
“Us, this? What does it mean?” I’m so sick of that question, as I don’t fucking know and don’t want to think about it. It scares me because my biggest fear is I don’t deserve this, and it will be taken away from me.
“That’s what I plan to figure out, and we ain’t leaving this bed until we do,” I tell her, sliding up beside her I pull her into me. Her ass fits into my body’s curve perfectly like she was made for me.
Who knew someone so wrong for me, so opposite would break everything I ever knew. Demolish the code of Outlaw and rebrand the criminal that I am.
Two Days Later
Music from the bar is loud and thumping “Wrong Side of Heaven” by Five Finger Death Punch. It makes me wonder how Jillian gets those kids to sleep with all of the noise. But that isn’t what wakes me up. Alessandra crying does.
“No, I don’t want to!” she wails, and I take a hand right to the mouth.
“What the fuck?” I sit up and find her face clenched tight with fear, and she’s covered in sweat.
“Black Bird,” I whisper loudly, trying to shake her awake. She begins to slap at me, screaming no, and I become frustrated.
I take a fist to the jaw, a knee to the chest, and slap to the face in the process of trying to wake her from her nightmare.
I grasp her by the throat to pin her down from hitting me and it’s as if I just injected her with a sedative, she relaxes instantly in my hold. My brows furrow in confusion as I stare at her. Her eyes now open and looking up at me. It seems every time I grab her here it’s as if she gives me complete control of herself. It has to be related to her past.
Shifting next to her, my hand still on her throat I rest my head back on my pillow.
These feelings I have for her are strong. I don’t know if it’s love because I’ve never felt it before. I don’t want to be in love. Nobody will look at me with fear, but as a man who is pussy whipped.
I am not that, nor will I ever be. I am in control, strong, and the fucking vice president of the Sin City Outlaws.
“I don’t love you,” I whisper into the back of her head, making sure she knows I’m not the prince to save her from her fucked up world. I’m the villain in her world, and that needs to be very clear.
“I don’t love you back,” she mutters.