It was a little strange to be back at school after the two-week sexcation I’d indulged in with my favorite student. We were a real couple in all the ways that truly mattered so the secrecy and wrongness of our relationship seemed trivial and, at this point, annoying. King was an adult and more than capable of making his own decisions. Anyone could see that just by looking at him. So, would it be so wrong for him to take a teacher eight years his senior for his lover?
Well, when I thought about it like that, the optics weren’t exactly good.
Still, I didn’t like passing him in the halls without touching him, teaching him with two desks and three meters of space between us instead of over the dinner table or in bed before the sun came up, when our naked skin was cooling but our brains were buzzing with sex-induced adrenaline.
If King’s flashing eyes were any indication, he didn’t like it anymore than I did. He was nearly done though. It was the end of April and technically, because he was an International Baccalaureate student, he would be done in mid-May after his two-week period of rigorous exams. He told me he was taking me away immediately even though I would still have my two junior classes to teach. I’d booked a sub because it was either that or face King abducting me and leaving my classes in the lurch. Besides, I’d caught him doing research on his computer for Graceland and there was no way I was going to miss the opportunity to go there.
We just had to get through the next two months and we could be together for real. I didn’t let myself think too much about what that actually meant given that most everyone in Entrance thought I was dating Zeus and that his son was only my student. How they would react when they found out I was actually dating King, I couldn’t know, and frankly, I was beginning not to care. The biker mentality was, apparently, contagious.
I was thinking about all of this while my fourth period junior history class took a pop quiz when a commotion erupted out in the hall. Immediately, I flashed back to two weeks ago when I’d found Benny writhing on the floor. It still haunted me in my idle moments and I imagined that it would for a long time to come.
Louise burst through the door, her huge blue eyes wide with exhilaration. “There’s a fight!”
Immediately, the class erupted into chaos as everyone jumped out of their seats, bottlenecking the door as they raced into the hall.
I followed them.
Carson Gentry was on the floor with another football player, Tom Anton, on top of him beating away at his face with two huge fists.
“Fuckin’ faggot,” he was snarling.
Rage exploded within me but before I could start forward through the crowd, King was there behind Tom, pulling him off Carson as easily as someone might remove lint from their jacket. Then he was on him, lifting Tom against the lockers with a hand at his throat.
“What the fuck?” he garbled, trying to kick out at King.
King leaned his body out of reach and squeezed tighter so Tom’s voice was cut off to a wheeze. “What the fuck? That’s what I’m askin’ you, motherfucker. You got a problem with a man likin’ another man, you keep it in your bigoted head and keep your ignorant mouth shut. You can’t do that, this day and fuckin’ age, you’ll find it shut for you.”
I couldn’t understand what I was seeing. It didn’t seem possible that King was defending the same guy who, just months ago, he’d had tossed up against a wall in much the same fashion he had Tom strung up now.
“You don’t think he has it rough enough at home? That he hasn’t fuckin’ suffered for it after what happened to Benny? You’re fuckin’ filth, man.” King growled.
“Okay, break it up,” Warren ordered as he made his way into the fray, Harry Reynard of all people, behind him.
“Let the kid down, King, before we have to suspend you for being a hero and completely ruin the moment,” Harry ordered in his soft British voice.
It was strangely hilarious, the entire situation.
Someone grabbed my hand and I looked over to see Benny. He had just returned to school that day, but I’d gone to visit him over the break and found out that Carson had started a campaign to try to get him back. It was all over school that Carson, the ultimate pretty boy and ladies man, was gay and in love with Benito Bonanno. Most people thought it was delicious gossip and rather sweet if a little awful that Carson had almost gotten Benny killed.
There were some who thought Carson was suddenly diseased.
Tom Anton, one of his best friends, was obviously one of them.
Benny stared up at me with sad eyes so I squeezed his hand in reassurance.
King let go of Tom to turn to the two male teachers and explain himself. It was a mistake. Tom swung out so quickly that no one had time to shout out a warning. He caught King right under the left side of his jaw and sent him staggering back.
My palm spasmed in Benny’s as I fought the urge to storm forward and wring the little prick’s neck.
“You would defend the cocksucker. Probably feel guilty about being the one to sell him the drugs in the fucking first place. Everyone knows you and your thug ass dad are pushing bad shit,” Tom leered.
Harry was behind King, taking his arms firmly behind his back before he could attack, while Warren took Tom in much the same pose.
“That’s enough, Tom,” Warren bit out.
“You ruin peoples’ lives with that shit,” Tom shouted. “You think you’re some hero but everyone around here knows you and your fuckin’ family are scum.”
“That’s enough!” I shouted, stepping away from Benny and into the fray.
I stormed up to Tom and sneered, “Only cowards result to name calling and violence without provocation. You want to put the spotlight so badly on everyone else, maybe we should take a closer look at what you’re hiding, Tom?”
The boy went white as a sheet.
I nodded curtly. “That’s what I thought. Now, be quiet and follow Mr. Warren and Mr. Reynard to the office.”
“Bring King,” Warren said to Harry over his shoulder as he began to escort Tom to the office.
Harry hesitated. “He didn’t do really anything wrong, Warren. He was defending the boy.”
“He was incendiary. He needs to be punished as well.”
“No,” Benny stepped forward, in line with me. His full bottom lip quivered but he jerked his chin up and said, “King was one of the people who found me. He saved me. Now, he saved Carson from a disgusting bully. Just because you don’t like that he’s a biker or whatever, doesn’t mean you can punish him when he’s just being a decent human.”
Inside, I clapped uproariously.
Outwardly, I bit my lip and watched.
The students began murmuring their agreement until someone started chanting, King, King, King. Soon, the hall vibrated with the call and when they wouldn’t stop, not even when Warren ordered them to, he scoffed and went off with Tom dragging behind him.
The group broke into a little cheer, and I caught King’s eyes in time to see him stare in awe at his supporters, as if surprised that anyone would be on his side.
It made my heart ache to see it, but I resolved then and there to always be the one beside him, even and especially when it went against popular opinion.
The truth was, he was young, too wild and reckless, filled to the brim with sex and vigor. His eyes promised to burn me alive, incinerate my inhibitions, turn my morals into ash and my soul into tinder. He held the torch, the threat against everything I had ever stood for, and he had the balls to dare me to come closer. Yet somehow, I found myself obeying, willingly laying myself on the pyre at his feet with open arms. Because if I was going to burn, I was going to make sure we did it together.
“Fuck, you know how to a make a man feel like a fuckin’ god,” King growled as I took him into the back of my throat.
His hands flexed in my hair as he pulled me back and forth over his cock slowly, firmly, so that each thrust was a journey I’d buy tickets to ride over and over again.
He pulled out of my mouth and I immediately held it open for him, my lips wet and swollen from paying homage to him.
“You suck my dick so good, babe,” he praised me, rubbing a thumb over my plump lower lip.
I pulled it into my mouth and sucked hard until he grunted and pulled away to replace it with a firm thrust of his cock.
God, I couldn’t get enough of the way he tasted, salty and clean, the feel of his silky skin over steely flesh, ribboned with thick veins that begged for the trace of my tongue. I groaned around him, wrapped my hands around his hips so I could grab his firm ass and shoved myself further down his length.
“Fuck,” he shouted, slamming his hand against the tile wall.
We were in the bathroom at Eugene’s. I’d brought him into the handicap-accessible washroom when I’d realized that King was still tense and wired from his confrontation at the school earlier. I remembered Skell’s words about blowjobs and decided that it was a good time to test that out.
It appeared to be working.
I dragged my tongue over the underside of his shaft, flicked it over the sensitive crown and hummed at the taste of his precum.
“Wanna fuck you,” he growled, bending down to grab me.
“No,” I protested, flicking my head back and forth over the throbbing end of him. “Want you to come in my mouth.”
“Fuck,” he stuttered out, wrapping my hair in his hands like reins.
I covered my teeth with my lips and started to work my wet, clutching mouth up and down over him. Drool edged out of my mouth, ran down his pulsing shaft and dripped off his balls. I reached up to take them in hand, rolling them back and forth in my palm until his legs seized and his hands clenched in my hair.
“God fuckin’ damn, Cress, I’m gonna come,” he bit out.
I groaned my delight loud and long around him and was rewarded, a few seconds later, by the salty flood of his cum on my tongue. He shouted hoarsely, his eyes squeezed shut, his gorgeous pink mouth slack as he fed me his cock. When he was finished, I cleaned him up with my tongue and placed a kiss to each side of his groin.
“Delicious.” I grinned at him as I stood up, my knees creaking in protest.
I loved the sound, loved the ache under my kneecaps the way an athlete may have appreciated a hard-earned sports injury.
“You’re fuckin’ delicious,” King said, tugging me to him to plant a hot, open-mouthed kiss on me.
His tongue swept through my mouth, testing to make sure I’d swallowed every last drop of his cum.
“Gotta take care of my woman,” he said against my lips as one hand trailed down my torso to cup my wet pussy through my underwear under my dress.
“No, I’m good until later. That was just for you.”
“Babe.”
“King.”
“Babe.
“King,” I mocked him then pressed a firm kiss to his lips. “Seriously, when you were wooing me, you went down on me like ten trillion times and I never repaid the favor. Let me have this.”
“Like eating you,” he told me something I very much already knew because he ate me at least once a day, but it was still something I loved to hear.
“And I love sucking your cock. Besides, we’ve been in here long enough, everyone is going to know we hooked up in the bathroom.”
“Babe, you think Eugene’s needs a bathroom this big? It’s a fuckin’ biker bar. What do you think we use it for?” he asked then burst into raucous laughter at my disgusted expression.
“And I thought I was being so original,” I muttered bitterly, which just made him laugh harder.
“Come on, you dork,” he said affectionately as he slung his arms around my shoulders. “Let’s get back to the crew.”
“I’m going to, um, wash up. I’ll meet you out there,” I said with a blush.
He swiped my pink cheek with a thumb and shook his head. “Can take my cock better than a working girl and she can’t even say she has to wash up afterwards without blushin’ like a virgin.”
I slapped his hand away and glared at him, fighting my smile as he sauntered out of the bathroom. I was still smiling when I washed my hands and then while I made my way back to the bar.
“You should have seen him,” I told Tayline later that night as we sat at the bar while King, Cy and a few other members played pool. “He was like an avenging angel. It was amazing.”
She snorted as she took a sip of her tequila on the rocks. “Your own personal Satan.”
I beamed at her. “Exactly, but better because he laughs a lot and it’s super sexy.”
The other girls at the bar with us, Cleo and Lila, laughed.
“I know most people think bikers are racist, misogynistic, homophobic pigs,” Tay said. “And a lot of them are. But for the most part, The Fallen men are good ones. King just proved he’s the best of them.”
“Zeus always says he is,” Cleo added. “Has since he was a boy. Seriously, Queenie, just when I think I can’t get anymore jealous of you, you say something else about King that makes me swoon.”
I laughed, looking over my shoulder for the man in question but he’d disappeared. The rest of the guys were still shooting around, drinking beer and talking. I frowned, because King didn’t smoke or anything that would take him outside and he was pretty serious about keeping me in his sight at all times, but I figured he’d just gone to the restroom.
Minutes later the girls and I were laughing about Lila’s latest disaster date—this one had flirted with anything that moved including the female and male servers at the restaurant they went to—when the atmosphere in the bar changed.
“Eugene!” a male voice shouted.
It sounded vaguely like Nova.
Eugene, who had been polishing glasses behind the bar, half listening to Lila’s story, moved into action instantly. He moved surprisingly fast for such a big guy. I watched as he quickly unlocked a sawed-off shotgun from under the bar and then disappeared down the back hall.
The other brothers were already mobilizing, the few civilians in the bar staring wide-eyed around them as bikers checked their weapons and moved out the front and back doors.
Cy and Bat came to stand in front of the us at the bar, their stances wide and their posture ramrod straight.
“Fuck,” came a shout and then, because everyone had quieted and someone had turned down the music, I heard the pop pop of gunshots.
“It’s King,” I whispered brokenly, somehow knowing it in my heart.
Tayline’s hand found mine and squeezed.
By the time King stumbled in between Mute and Nova, I was on my feet behind Bat and Cy, facing the door with my hand over my rattling heart.
My blond king was completely battered, blood lacquered across his face like some kind of grotesque Halloween mask. His beautiful halo of golden hair was matted with dirt and more blood. The tee he was wearing was torn by a slash mark that had clearly been made by a knife and he was completely unsteady on his feet.
“Oh my God,” I tried to yell but there was no breath in my lungs so it came out more like a wheezing gasp.
“What the fuck happened?” Lila demanded as they leaned King up against the bar and moved out of the way.
I took King’s sweet, battered face by the chin and cataloged the angry ripple of open, bleeding skin over his left eyebrow that accounted for the amount of blood seeping down his front.
Something in my chest was withering, going hollow and rotten and dying.
“I asked what the fuck happened,” Lila shouted at the bikers.
Mute glared at her and took one of his signature menacing steps forward but Nova slapped a palm against his chest. He turned to Lila but his eyes were on me, his voice uncharacteristically grim as he said the two words capable of terrifying us all, “The Nightstalkers.”
“They came here?” Cleo gasped.
Eugene trundled into the room carrying a prone body and dropped the leather-clad form to the floor without care. The man didn’t groan as he hit the ground with an almighty thump so he must have been knocked out all ready. I stared at the Nightstalkers MC rocker on his leather jacket, the laughing demon that grinned red-faced from back of the cut.
“Bat, Cy, help me load this fucker in my truck and we’ll take ‘im down to the compound,” Eugene growled.
He wasn’t technically part of the club, but I didn’t know the specifics other than that, apparently, Eugene was in someway related to the Garros.
The bikers moved to help him.
I slid my fingers into King’s wet hair and pushed it behind his ear.
“King, honey,” I whispered to him. “What the fuck happened?”
His hand came out and tiredly wound its way through my hair until it found the back of my neck. “Went to the john and four of them jumped me, dragged me out the back door and started beatin’ on me. Got one of them in the throat and managed to shake off another long enough to shout.”
“Thank fuck I was takin’ a leak,” Nova muttered, his distressed eyes on King.
“Amen, brother,” King agreed.
“Does this happen often?” I asked, my voice still reedy and thin with shock.
King was watching me, his eyes growing sharper and sharper as he recovered from the head banging.
I didn’t look at him, couldn’t bear to see the blood streaking his gorgeous face. It reminded me too much of Marcus and Lysander, too much of the many times I’d tended to my bleeding brother after he got into yet another scrap.
“Cress,” he called softly.
I ignored him to listen to Mute who grunted, “Used to.”
“People know not to fuck with The Fallen,” Nova explained. “We got complacent. Used to be a time at least one brother was with an officer at all fuckin’ times.”
“An officer” I parroted, hating how uninformed I was.
“There’re ranks in the MC,” Tay leaned forward to explain softly. “The higher ups are officers. King’s obviously not an officer but he’s still a target because he’s the Prez’s son.”
“So, this happens,” I concluded.
Mute nodded. “Happens.”
Fuck.
Fear solidified its hold on me, embracing me in its cold fingers, locking me in its sticky arms.
“Cress,” King called again.
He knew what was happening, I knew he did, but I couldn’t stop the panic from overtaking me and overriding the new Cressida with the old.
“Need to get you to the Doc,” Mute told his best friend.
King ignored him. “Everyone out.”
Only the bikers were left inside, the others having been ushered out by Lab Rat, Blade and Boner, who were still out front keeping watch in case one of them decided to call the police.
“What?” Cy barked.
“Everyone. Out.” King shouted, his bloody hair flying as he shot unsteadily to his feet. “Nova, Cy, Bat, go help Eugene take the motherfucker to the compound so we can fuckin’ question him. Mute, go tell the other brothers they can come in and work cleanup soon as I’m done talking to my woman.”
Fuck.
All eyes swung to me, most of them confused but Tayline and Eugene’s looks were filled with wary condemnation.
They could see it, the fear hugging my back like a hovering mother. It wanted me back, had missed me for the brief time I’d been free.
“Fuckin’ now!” King demanded.
They moved.
It took them two minutes to get out and I took those two minutes to deep breathe. King waited beside me, his breath laboring through his lungs, blood dripping off his nose and splattering on the floor at his feet.
“Cress,” he said softly when we were finally alone.
But he didn’t touch me and I was so grateful, I could have cried.
If he touched me, I’d be done.
“Look at me, babe,” he ordered.
I turned to look at him and the sight brought instant tears to my eyes.
“Can’t do it,” I whispered through my aching throat.
His eyes flared, so blue against the red blood.
“I want to, please understand. I want to be there with you through the thick and the thin and the laughter and the freaking bloodshed but now that I see it can actually be like this…” I shook my head and took an instinctive step backwards.
“I might not even patch in, babe,” he said, reaching a hand out to me.
But I was too far away for him to grab me, and he needed the support of the bar at his back because he was still too fucked up from the fight to be steady on his feet.
“Doesn’t matter, you’re not in the club now and look what’s happened to your beautiful face,” I cupped my hands over my mouth and tried to fight the panic.
I kept thinking of my hands covered with Marcus’ blood, of Lysander’s face splattered with gore and brain matter after he shot my rapist in the back of the head.
“My bachelorette party,” I blurted out, desperate for him to understand why I was collapsing like the inside of an old house. “Sander took me out because I didn’t have any friends and he wanted me to have a night of fun before I got married. I was eighteen,” I swallowed painfully. “We got really drunk while bar hopping and at the last place, I met this really cute guy. He bought me drinks and stayed with me for over an hour just chatting. I thought he was so pretty, just like someone out of a Nora Roberts book. He asked me to get some fresh air and I didn’t think before I said yes.”
God, I could still feel his hands on me, the feel of the rough brick against my cheek as he’d slammed me against the wall and wrenched up my skirt.
“I was drunk and stupid and he took advantage. He was all over me and I was screaming. Sander had wondered where I’d disappeared to so, thank God, he came outside and found me. They fought, but Marcus got a good shot in and sent Sander into a pile of crates. I was frozen. So stupidly frozen against the wall, terrified.”
King growled, the sound low in his throat. “Come here, Cress.”
I shook my head frantically, back in the place that had taught me not to live on the edge. “He came at me again, had my shirt ripped open and my panties torn off in seconds. I really thought he was going to… anyway. The next thing I know there’s this loud pop pop just like I heard tonight and something wet rained down over me just before Marcus slumped against me hard and I fell to the ground with him pinned on top of me.
People heard the commotion by then and something tackled Lysander before he could help get Marcus off me, so I just laid there with him bleeding out all over me for minutes before anyone even realized I was under him.”
“If he wasn’t already dead, babe, I’d hunt that motherfucker down, kill him slow, over years,” King said, his voice nearly as low, dark and menacing as his father’s.
“Can’t do it,” I repeated, barely in the room with him, still back in that time with the bloody body covering me like a shroud. “I can’t be your Queen because I’m not strong enough to do this, the violence and the possible death. I couldn’t stand to lose you and I don’t think… no, I know I can’t stand by you knowing that the kind of life you lead, so like Sander’s, could make that a real possibility.”
King stared at me. I didn’t look at him, but I could feel his eyes on me, marking every inch of my body, memorizing me because he knew I was about to walk out the door.
“Don’t do it,” he warned.
“I’m so, so sorry,” I repeated, already turning away, the panic in my throat so hot and bitter, I knew I needed to get out of there so I could throw up. “I know you’ll be better off without me, King, You need a real Queen by your side. I’m smart enough to know, that’s not me.”
I turned and ran out the front door, knowing Tayline would be there waiting to take me home because she already knew me well enough to know she’d have to.
King didn’t follow.