Authors: Jenika Snow
She didn’t know Kink from the next guy, and aside
from a few conversations she had been involved in with some of the bikers,
Malice being the main one, she kept to herself. It was better that way because
once she was on her feet she wasn’t about to stay in River Run. She didn’t want
to stay anywhere in fact. Cookie wanted to travel the country, not setting
roots down in one specific place, and just enjoying being alive. There was
nothing worse than someone forcing a person to do something, and Cookie would
never let that happen to her again.
“Hey, sweet cheeks.
Mind getting me a couple shots of Jack?”
She glanced at the man that stepped up to the bar.
She knew him from the last few weeks she had been here, and knew that he was
called Pierce and was a prospect. She had overheard the other girls that worked
this place talk—and the bikers, too—that he got that name because he had some
interesting piercings down below. She forced a smile and nodded, and without
verbally responding grabbed two shot glasses, set them down in front of him,
and poured Jack Daniels in them.
“Thanks,
darlin
’.” He gave
her a wink and a grin that she knew probably had most women spreading wide for
him, and walked over to the pool table. Tuck and Malice were in the middle of a
game, as were a few other prospects they had just recruited. She didn’t mind
the drinking, the wild atmosphere, or even the fact these guys liked their pot.
She was just thankful that Lucien had let her work for him. Staying in that
cabin day in and day out, seeing the girls who had gotten beaten the worst, and
knowing that she could have been dead right now if things had gone differently,
had her thankful for every little scrap she got.
Hearing something behind her, Cookie turned around.
Pepper, one of the
girls who worked at the clubhouse and
slept around with the members, stepped behind the bar and was
clearly
looking for something. Tonight Pepper wore a very small black ruffled skirt,
one that barely covered the cheeks of her ass when she bent over, and a white
button-up blouse that was short enough that she had it tied right below her
breasts. Her flat belly was on clear display, and the ring that was through her
navel dangled and showed a little Playboy Bunny icon on the end.
“Hey, girl, have you seen that rock thing?” Pepper
asked, bending over and rummaging through the bottom shelf.
“Rock thing?”
Pepper stood and looked at Cookie. “Yeah, that big
ass piece of rock that you can stick a liquor bottle into and pour shots out
of?”
Cookie nodded. “Ugh, yeah, actually I have.” Aside
from Tatum the girls didn’t talk to her unless they had to. She didn’t know if
they saw her as some kind of competition, but compared to them Cookie was a
damn blimp, less than attractive and was absolutely no competition in any way.
She turned and grabbed the rock Pepper was referring to. It was a slab of
granite with a spout coming off one end. Pierce had actually brought it in one
day for a card game the guys were playing. Why they didn’t just drink out of
the bottles was beyond her, but maybe they wanted to class shit up and make it
feel as though there had a bartender right there beside them. She lifted the
thirty pound rock, and handed it over to Pepper. The woman struggled for a
second when it was in her hands, and Cookie smiled internally. That thing was
probably heavy as hell for a woman of Pepper’s size. She trotted over to the
card table on her heels, which could have been considered deadly weapons, and
set the rock down beside Tuck. The scarred biker reached out and wrapped his
thickly tattooed arm around Pepper and dragged her onto his lap. There was a
lot of debauchery going on, but what was different from watching woman whore
themselves out—which was still essentially what these women were doing at the
clubhouse—was that the club pussy, as the guys called them, were actually doing
this to settle down. She didn’t understand it, didn’t know what the thrill and
temptation of being an “old lady” to these rough guys was, but to each his own
and all of that bullshit.
Before Pepper could call her over, Cookie grabbed a
bottle of whiskey and headed over to the table. Compared to all the women in
this place Cookie was dressed like she was going out in a blizzard. Jeans and a
t-shirt weren’t considered overly dressed by most standards, but when the
female population in this place was wearing latex and spandex that barely covered
a nipple, Cookie looked like a nun. She set the bottle on the table, but kept
her eyes downcast and her focus elsewhere. She did her job, and that was it.
But the guys were already three sheets to the wind, so they didn’t try to
strike up a conversation.
Good.
And then right before she made it back to the bar
the front doors opened, and in walked Kink. He looked pissed. He had a cut
above his eye and a bruise forming on his cheek. He had gotten into a fight
clearly, but if he had a few scrapes on him she could only imagine what the
other guy looked like. She turned her attention away from him and quickly made
her way to the bar.
“I need something to fucking drink, and make it
strong as hell,” Kink said loudly, and although she didn’t look behind her she
knew he was talking to her.
She turned and faced him, saw that he was looking at
one of the girls grinding on the stripper pole, and knew before he had even
started that he’d be fucking her tonight. He just had that look on his face
that most of the guys in here got when they were about to screw someone. Cookie
hadn’t realized she had been staring at him until he turned and looked at her.
God, how long had she been watching him? It hadn’t felt like very long, but
even one second was too long. For a moment she still couldn’t pull her focus
away from him. He had this faux hawk thing going on with his dark brown hair,
and although most guys just looked ridiculous with a hairstyle like that, it
actually made Kink look more dangerous and rugged for some reason. He stared at
her with his blue eyes, ones that were cold, void of emotion, and if they could
speak would probably tell her to do her fucking job.
“I’m sorry.” She turned and closed her eyes, feeling
like the biggest dumbass for even saying that out loud. She quickly got him a
double shot of the strongest whiskey they had, the kind that she had heard the
guys curse at when they finished throwing them back, and turned to set it down
in front of him. But he was still watching her with that impenetrable gaze, and
all she could do was stand there and stare at him right back. It was like his
gaze had frozen her in place. She swallowed hard when he grabbed the shot glass
and drank it without ever taking his eyes off of her. He slammed the glass back
on the table, didn’t even flinch after he swallowed, and she knew he was more
than pissed. Rage ate him up.
“Give me another one,” he said while still staring
at her like this damn predator ready to attack his prey.
She refilled his glass and set the bottle down
beside him.
He smirked, but it was just a tilt at the corner of
his lips. “Smart girl,” he said and tossed that drink back as well.
“Brother, where you been?” Ruin asked as he came up
and stood beside Kink at the bar.
“Sam Adams,” Ruin said and winked at her.
She grabbed
the beer and tried not to listen to their conversation. But it was hard not to
be drawn into the sound of Kink’s deep, masculine voice, or the way it made
this tingling sensation travel through her body. She couldn’t explain it,
couldn’t even understand it herself, because it was a feeling she had never
felt before. It frightened her, aroused her, and confused the hell out of her.
She didn’t know how much time had passed with the
two guys speaking behind her, while Cookie busied herself with wiping down the
counter and liquor bottles, but then she heard Kink speaking again.
“Hey.”
She looked over her shoulder, not expecting him to
be talking to her, but he was. He stared at her, and she lowered her gaze to
his thickly corded neck. She could see tattoos peeking out from underneath the
collar of his shirt, and then she looked at his arms. God, they were so big and
muscular, and the tattoos that lined his golden skin made him seem even more
lethal.
“Get a good look,” he said in a monotone voice.
She snapped her gaze up to his face, felt her cheeks
heat from embarrassment because she had been blatantly checking him out, and
then shook her head like an idiot. “I … I, well, I’m sorry.” She didn’t know
what to say, and the stuttering made her feel even more juvenile. To be honest
she had never been really sexually attracted to a man. With Morris it had been
more of a security thing she felt. With Kink it was so very different. He was
big and strong, and she knew he could handle his own. He could protect her with
his strength, and then there was the fact he was so very attractive in a
non-handsome way. It was like a roughness that called to the very feminine side
of her.
She should have turned around when he ignored her,
but she didn’t. He didn’t smile, didn’t even respond when she apologized. It
was like he had wanted to embarrass her, wanted to call her out so she was
forced to face what she had just done. He finished off what had to be his
fourth shot, turned, and then made his way toward the couch that Lucien was
sitting on. Another woman came up to Kink and started grinding on him, and
Cookie knew she needed to stop acting so foolish. A man like Kink was not the
kind of guy she wanted to get involved with. But right before she turned her
back on him she saw him look up at her as the woman was grinding her ass and
pussy on his lap. He grinned, freaking grinned at her,
like
he found it amusing that she was humiliated watching what was happening. Maybe
he smiled because he liked her watching what was being done to him, or smiled
because he found it amusing that she couldn’t stop staring. Either way Cookie
forced herself to turn away and finish cleaning, because at least that would
help her keep her mind off what she really wanted … Kink.
Chapter Two
Kink brought the beer to his mouth, took a long pull
from the bottle, and glanced at Malice. The other man was speaking to
Tuck
, and Kink felt pretty shitty since he had gotten all up
in the man’s business when he’d first brought his old lady to River Run from
Fairview. Kink had his own shit going on, but that wasn’t an excuse to take it
out on a member of the club. Malice and Tuck clapped each other on the back,
and moved away, but before Malice could move past Kink and over to the bar Kink
called out. Malice stopped and faced him but didn’t say anything. They might
get things done in the club, and leave their personal drama outside, but it was
time for Kink to make things right. He stood, took one more hit from his
cigarette, and snubbed it out in the ashtray on the table. He straightened,
looked the other man right in the eye, and just said what he needed to say.
“Listen, man, about getting in your face about Adrianna when you first brought
her back to the club—”
Malice took a step closer, cutting off Kink. They
were matched in height and muscle mass, but even if Malice took a swing at
Kink, he’d accept it. When Malice had brought the abused and scared Adrianna
back to River Run from Fairview, Utah, Kink had been in a bad place. Not only
did they have a handful of women they had brought back from Denver, ones that
had been beaten by their pimp, but they had also brought back club pussy from
the Fairview charter. Now they were deep with women that were in trouble, ones
that needed rehabilitation from their pasts, and others that just needed out of
Utah because of some fucking crazed cult that needed their dicks ripped off for
messing with the club.
“Listen, I know that you got a lot on your plate
with Callie and Sarah and shit, and despite you being totally off the mark, and
crossing that line about Adrianna when we had the meeting, I understand that
your head was elsewhere.” Malice placed a hand on his shoulder. “Let’s just
move on, okay?”
Just hearing his ex old lady pissed him off. But he
pushed it aside because that wasn’t what needed to be said right now. Kink
nodded.
“Yeah, brother.”
Malice nodded. “Let’s just keep the anger and
violence for the ones that deserve it.”
Kink nodded. “Yeah, man, definitely.”
Malice grinned. “Good, now I need to see my woman.”
He turned and left, and immediately Kink looked at Cookie. Since she had come
into the club’s life, he had wanted her, but he had kept his distance and put
her from his mind. He had drowned himself in alcohol, pot, and easy club women,
and he had never felt as dirty as he did now as he stared at her. But nothing
could change what he had or hadn’t done, and despite wanting her, Kink knew
that he couldn’t be with her, not in the way Malice was with Adrianna. Cookie
was a damaged female, had probably lived a horrendous life, and him getting
involved with her would mean bringing her into the dangers of the club as his
woman. He didn’t know her personal background, but he had a vivid imagination.
He looked at her again and forced himself to sit
back down. The thing he didn’t know was if she had been prostituting herself
like the other women they brought back from Denver. He knew that some of the
women hadn’t gotten that deep into the “business” yet, so maybe she was one of
them? But he wasn’t meant to have a woman of any caliber in his life. Kink had
done the old lady route, albeit for a short fucking time, but he had tried. And
now he had a seventeen-year-old daughter to show for the few weeks of trying to
be a good man and settle down. He loved Callie more than anything else, but
recently he had found out her bitch of a mother had been trying to move out of
state with his kid. That was also another reason he didn’t need any women in
his life permanently. He had too much shit going on right now, and he couldn’t
devote any kind of meaningful time or emotions to an old lady, especially one
that could be damaged in a way that he couldn’t bring her back.