Silver and Chrome: A Bad Boy MC Romance (8 page)

CHAPTER
EIGHT

EVELYN

 

 

“How… how is that even…
possible?” I bite my tongue again before I add,
You’re a fucking criminal!
I’ve already spoken more candidly during this interview than is proper, and
although there’s no way I plan on working here, and Bash doesn’t seem to mind,
that doesn’t mean I have to continue to act unprofessionally. That’s not me,
that’s him, and I won’t stoop to his level.

 

Bash’s
dark eyes bore into me, just as they did on Saturday night. I can feel him
probing and pushing, but I have no idea what he’s searching for. It was his
eyes that I recognized right away. As soon as the door opened. It’s just the
rest of him that doesn’t look familiar.

 

If
I passed him on the street looking like he does now, but he was wearing dark
glasses, I would have just walked on by. Well, I probably would have sneaked a
peek at his ass or something, but that’s it. I’m not blind, after all, and even
the sport jacket and tie combo he’s wearing can’t hide how well-built he is. But
I never would have known that this man had his cock buried to the hilt inside
of me just two nights ago.

 

Gone
is the razor-sharp stubble that covered his jaw. Gone is the leather, the
jeans, the messy hair. The tattoos are all covered. He looks the part of a true
corporate exec. Where the hell is Bash?

 

Oh.
Right. Bash is gone. This is Sebastian. Whatever. Split personality much?

 

He
finally nods, as if answering a question to himself with something he finally
found in my eyes. “I didn’t start off wanting… this.” He motions around
himself. “I still don’t. But it is what it is. Shit happens.”

 

Shit
happens?
He’s explaining away founding a billion-dollar company
that he doesn’t really want with
shit happens?

 

“I
assume you’re going to elaborate?” I prod. I may not really be interested in
working here, for him, but that doesn’t mean I’m not curious now.

 

Sebastian
lets out a heavy breath and lays one of his big hands down onto the wooden
tabletop of his desk. There are papers everywhere, and more than one coffee
cup, but he seems to find the one spot where he won’t knock anything over.

 

“The
reason you had to sign an NDA, why anyone that is going to work with me has to
sign one, is that the fact that I run this company is a secret. One that I
intend to keep. I let Hans run the day-to-day, but every major decision goes
through me first. He’s the public figurehead, but I call the shots.”

 

“Why?”
After spending so much time with Edward, the entire notion of someone running a
company and not wanting all of the glory is completely foreign to me. I can’t
imagine a scenario where Edward would want someone else taking the credit for
anything he did.

 

Sebastian
stands up and stands next to the huge floor to ceiling window behind his desk. He’s
looking out and quiet for a moment. When he starts to talk again, his deep
voice almost startles me.

 

“You
can’t even see the bar from here,” he says. “We’re on the complete opposite end
of the city. I picked this location specifically for that reason. So that the
two parts of my life would have the least chance of meeting. And now you
appear.” He turns and shoots an accusatory glare at me.

 

“Excuse
me?” I think back to what he’d just said, trying to replay it to find something
I missed, but then he just shakes his head and turns back to the window.

 

“Never
mind. I know I have a few things to explain. Things I wasn’t planning on
getting into today. Or ever, really. But here we are. Understand that I’m
forced to tell you things here that I’ve never told anyone, which means I have
to trust you. I know you’ve signed the NDA, but this goes deeper than that. The
NDA means I can come after you financially. But if you break my trust in what
I’m about to tell you, your finances will be the least of your concern.”

 

The
edge in his voice is back, the one he used when I first arrived, and my heart
begins to pound just as hard as when he used it that first time. I don’t want
him to think he can intimidate me, but at the same time, I can tell he’s
serious, so I just nod.

 

“This
whole thing started about ten years ago in my garage. At the time I was a biker
only, and part of the same club that I’m in now, although at that time, just a
new recruit. We didn’t have a lot of money, as we were fairly new on the scene,
but I’d been around bikes my whole life and had been fixing them for years on
my own. I started to just fix them for the crew, eventually needing to make a
few parts that I didn’t have access to. Things just grew from there, and
eventually I was machining more and more parts for a greater variety of
people.” He’s gazing out the window as he speaks, not paying attention to me. That
allows me to watch his face. His jawline is strong, but tight, like he’s
stressed. Even the hand that was resting on the table earlier is clenching down
now.

 

“I
kept it secret from the club, how big things started to get. I didn’t want them
to think I had sold out and gone corporate. But they began to notice that I was
spending less time with them. Eventually, I realized that in order to be a part
of both the club and the business, I would need outside help. Not only that,
but honestly, I was in over my head.” He snorts a little, bullishly. “I wasn’t
cut out for all this,” he mutters, gesturing to the office and its
accoutrements, and even his magnificent view. “I was just a guy with a big
idea. A grease monkey, at heart. I didn’t know the first thing about being a
CEO, and honestly? I didn’t want to.”

 

Bash—or,
rather, Sebastian—wets his lips. The way his tongue darts over them, just the
tip, brings a thrill to my core I’d rather not admit to. It’s all I can do not
to squirm, but like a bloodhound scenting its prey, somehow Sebastian seems to
know. His gaze flicks to mine briefly before dipping to my skirt as I uncross,
and then recross, my legs beneath it. The corner of his lips quirk, I think,
though it could be my imagination. Either way, my cheeks flush.

 

“You
should know, Evelyn, based on how we met the other night, that I’m not exactly
cut out for corporate niceties. The social order of running a business. The
pussy-footing, the brownnosing. All that shit.”

 

I’ve
heard far worse words than “shit” exit Sebastian’s mouth in the short time I’ve
known him, but here, in his office, the curse ricochets like a gunshot. My
blush deepens, not because I’m some kind of goody two-shoes—I think our time in
his MC’s back room proved that—but because I can’t get a fucking
read
on
him, no matter how hard I try. He keeps trying to convince me that Sebastian
and Bash are two separate entities, at least here, in his ivory—or, rather,
chrome
—tower,
but it seems like the snarling biker just can’t be contained. I’ve caught a
glimpse of him more than once since I arrived here, and it’s throwing me off
something fierce.

 

Pull
yourself together, Evelyn,
I chide myself, although it does no
good. My thoughts keep drifting to the way Bash took control of me, and the
small, fingertip-shaped bruises on my hips throb in reply. Great. Like I need
another reminder, or another distraction from the story he’s trying to tell.

 

Sebastian
lets out a little breath, somewhere between a chuckle and a sigh. It’s a sound
I’ve heard before, an intimate one, and as soon as I hear it, the poppy-red
tinge to my skin spreads to my throat, swathing me in a prickling heat that
makes it hard to breathe. I swallow thickly and wonder, does he have me all
figured out? Can he see the battle I’m waging inside? And goddamn him—why isn’t
he struggling the same way I am? What
was
it with these types of men?
Not that Edward and Sebastian are anywhere
near
being in the same
league, but it does occur to me that they’re both powerful, in their own ways.
I could be developing a type—an emotionally unavailable one that could ruin my
career just as easily as it could ruin my dating life.

 

You
aren’t dating him
, I remind myself.
 And you don’t want
to. 
That last part sounds more like a question than a statement, even in
my own head.

 

“By
this time, I had employees,” Sebastian continued, pulling uncomfortably on his
tie, as if to emphasize his frustration with the noose that running a
legitimate business had become for him, “but I needed someone to run the day-to-day.
That’s when I hired Hans, the current CEO. I let him take over the public side
of running it, but had lawyers draw up complicated legal papers that ensured
that I would always be the real head of the company and all major decisions had
to pass by me. Although for the most part, I just defer to Hans.  He knows far
better than I do how to run this place. In the end, all the legal shit just
means that I’d continue to own a majority stake, but one obscured through
untraceable holding companies.”

 

“Why?”
I blurt. Sebastian finally looks at me. He seems confused by the question. “Why
go to all of that trouble? Why not just quit the club and do this full-time?”

 

“If
I’m going to quit anything, it would be this.”

 

He’s
hinted at as much before now, but I still don’t get it, and he can tell. He
elaborates: “This? This is just money. It’s how I pay my bills. The club is my
life. It’s my family. If I had to choose between my job or my family, I would
choose my family. Wouldn’t you?”

 

“Yes,
of course, but…”

 

“Never
mind,” he says again. “I don’t expect you to understand, and I don’t care to
explain. The only reason I’m telling you this is because you happened to meet
me there. At the club. As Bash. And now you’re here. As I said, I’ve spent
considerable time and resources keeping these two lives separate. In this life,
I’m known as Sebastian Redding. In the club, I’m only known as Bash. Most guys
don’t really use their last names, anyway. A few who did know it back in the
day have all long since moved on or died. But I don’t need to explain shit to
you any further than I already have. It’s already more than anyone else knows. Which
is why I expect you to keep your mouth shut about all of it.”

 

I
just nod, unwilling to trust what might come out of my mouth if I speak.

 

“Fine.
So around here, only Hans and the board know the true nature of my relationship
with the company. No one else needs to, except my EA, of course. That was the
purpose of the NDA: to fill you in about who you’d really be working for
without worry that it would leak. But consider the rest of it even more top
secret. The club stuff. No one here knows that. Not the board, not Hans, no
one.”

 

“I
would never divulge any of your secrets,” I say, doing my best to keep my voice
even as my eyes flit over to the door. There’s a good chance I’m sitting in
this office talking to a crazy person. Dual personalities, secret CEOs, holding
companies—none of it sounds real. And even if it is, that doesn’t make him
sane. Who goes to such lengths just to keep being a criminal? Why bother,
unless you really love that lifestyle, which makes Bash even scarier. He
dismissed Catherine pretty fast. Am I even safe here? Was that just him getting
rid of a potential witness?

 

What
was I thinking, screwing a complete stranger? Oh, right. Look at him.
Can
you be that hot and still crazy?

 

A
knock at the door makes me jump.

 

“Come,”
he barks.

 

A
young man sticks his head in. “Oh, excuse me, Mr. Redding. Mr. Peterson asked
me to inform you that there’s a strategy meeting in ten minutes up in Bearing.”

 

“About
what?”

 

The
man’s eyes shift to me, and then back to Sebastian. “Uh…”

 

“It’s
fine, Evelyn here is good with secrets.”

 

“The
parts, the missing shipment,” the man says. As soon as he does, Sebastian
scowls.

 

“Of
course. That’s all anyone wants to fucking talk about today, isn’t it? I
thought we were just going to get a replacement. Didn’t Hans call Germany?”

 

“That’s
just it, sir. They can’t get them to us for at least a couple of weeks, and—”

 

“That’s
bullshit. We need them in days.” Sebastian’s voice is raised now, and his fists
are clenched again. Much harder this time, the knuckles already turning white.

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