Angel: RBMC: Ankeny IA Read online

  “It wasn’t me. My mother blocked you. She closed down all my accounts, disconnected my phone number, and told me if I contacted you again, she’d ruin you and your family. She always hated them, and I never knew why. It wasn’t my choice, I swear.” Her pleading was getting to me.

  Unsure as to whether I should believe a word she said, I tossed back the drink and motioned for another.

  “What are you suddenly doing back here then? Shouldn’t you be in college?” I’d forgone college for the military because I saw it as my way out of the hellhole I’d grown up in and my mother wanted me to join. If I could’ve taken Jasmine with me when I left, I would’ve.

  “My father had a heart attack, so I came home to be with him and make sure he was okay after his surgery.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” I murmured. Her dad had been a nice guy. Quiet, but always wanted to know how I was doing in school. He’d moved out of the house the day after Korrie disappeared and a For Sale sign had popped up.

  “I’m sorry about your mom. Though that doesn’t seem sufficient in the slightest,” she said softly.

  Once I had another drink, I downed it and requested another.

  “How many have you had?” Her voice was small, and when I glanced her way, she looked worried.

  “Does it matter?” I asked, suddenly exhausted and defeated. When the bartender set the next one in front of me, I stared at it. Then I lifted it to my lips and drank. Once it was empty, I set the glass down, pulled cash from my wallet, and dropped it on the bar.

  Proud that I barely wobbled when I stood up, I looked down at her. “You broke my fucking heart.”

  Slightly unsteady, I walked away and out the door. As I crossed the still wet road, a car honked at me as it flew by, and I flipped it off.

  “Jesus, Jude!” She latched onto my arm and dragged me across the street. “You damn near got hit! Which room is yours?”

  We went into the hotel, and I handed her my card key. Mumbling the room number, I tried to clear my vision. She led the way, and I let her.

  The lock beeped and clicked, then she turned the handle I half fell through the doorway and leaned against the wall to get my balance. The door had barely closed when she cradled my cheek in her soft hand. “I loved you more than was wise,” I thought I heard her whisper.

  I stared into her green and brown eyes, shimmering with tears. With a catch in my heart and my words, I replied, “And I loved you more than was safe.”

  She took a shuddering breath and reached up to press her lips to mine.

  That’s all it took, and I was lost.

  Whatever the reason, be it the grief, nostalgia, the love that still resided in the back corners of my heart, I dove into her. My fingers tangled in her molten hair, and I pushed her against the opposite wall. Her breath left her in a huff.

  “Do you have any idea what you’re doing?” Slightly sobered, I whispered against her skin as I trailed kisses down her jaw and scraped my teeth on her skin.

  “Yes,” she said on a soft exhale.

  “I have to leave in the morning. I won’t be back for a long time. If ever.” I gave her another out.

  “I don’t care,” she insisted.

  With a growl, I clutched her ass and lifted her. I carried her to the bed as my heart nearly burst from my chest. Between the alcohol and her, I was floating on a river of blind need.

  Our clothes drifted to the floor, and my mouth tasted her everywhere.

  It was as if time had fallen away and we were those two lovesick teenagers sneaking to the treehouse to do things we were too young to really understand. Lost in each other, we clung to the past.

  “Jude,” she groaned as I sucked first one nipple, then the other. Two fingers found their way in her slick, wet heat and she arched into me. My thumb circled her clit, and she whimpered.

  Her body was beautifully the same, yet better. Where before she’d been a teenager, barely blossoming, now she was a woman. Lush and firm in all the right places. I couldn’t get enough of her. I worshipped her. I drowned in her taste, her touch, her sighs.

  When I lined up to enter her, I paused. Locking onto her gaze in the dimly lit room, I admitted something I hadn’t told a soul. “There’s been no one since you.”

  Shock mixed with disbelief preceded the tear that trickled from the corner of her eye and into her hair. “Me either,” she whispered.

  “You still on the pill?” We’d snuck down to the free clinic the morning after our first time and she’d gotten on birth control. We thought we were so grown-up.

  She nodded, and I groaned, “Thank fuck.”

  When I sank into her, it was like dying and going to heaven.

  “This Goes Out To You”—Adelita’s Way

  The second he filled me, I was transported back to a simpler time when nothing was more important than being together. A time when I’d loved him with every fiber of my young being. A time when it had only been us.

  “Jude, oh God, Jude,” I chanted as I wrapped my legs around him and he pounded in me. My nails dug into his ass as I met him thrust for thrust. Uncaring that it was likely a hate fuck, I pretended we were still in love. That the years and lies hadn’t ripped us apart.

  Without missing a beat, he dropped to his elbows and buried his face in the crook of my neck. The whispers against my skin were merely breaths of air. I had no idea if he was cursing me or reliving memories.

  Each stroke brought me closer and closer until I hovered on the brink of ecstasy. “I’m almost there,” I gasped. He seemed to know what I needed, as he doubled his efforts. In the back of my mind, I was aware of the bed banging on the wall.

  The faint tingling snuck in and the pressure built until the explosion hit me and I shattered. Blind with the bliss that pulsed through me, I cried out, arched my body into his, and drifted. As reality sifted through the euphoric haze, I realized he’d stopped and was heavily panting as he held himself tense above me.

  “Jude?” I questioned. His dark eyes opened and found mine as I reached up to kiss him. It was a soft plea of a kiss that he answered with a savage reply. His tongue delved into my mouth, and we battled for something out of reach.

  He broke free and flipped us over so I was astride him. The shock of the sudden movement sent a squeal from me, and my thighs clutched his hips.

  Raising his arms above his head, he watched me as I noted all of the changes the years had wrought.

  My fingertips followed the contours of his chest. Muscles that he hadn’t had at sixteen tempted me, and I trailed my hands over them in wonder as he silently watched my movements. “These are new,” I said as I traced the lines of the tattoos on his arm and side. He nodded.

  Every fiber in my body tensed when his thick cock twitched inside me. “Jude!” His name was both a prayer and a curse as I found myself desperately needing to move. Instinct had me riding him slowly. His lips parted and he watched me with hooded eyes as he brought his arms down to grip my hips with his fingers.

  While I sensually rode him, he rose up to grind into me. It was heavenly, but then it always had been with him. Through the years I’d questioned whether the thrill had been in not getting caught. Now, I knew it was so much more than that.

  On a particularly powerful thrust up into me, he gritted out his demand. “Fuck me.”

  My heart tripped and my stomach fluttered with a million butterflies trying to escape. Digging my fingers into the firm muscles of his chest, I did as he commanded.

  Slapping skin beat out the tempo of lust, but the undercurrents were something far stronger. Tendrils of feelings I thought had been destroyed, reached out and wrapped around me, tying me to him in ways the human mind couldn’t comprehend.

  “Get there, baby,” he ground out through clenched teeth, and one hand slipped down for his thumb to circle my clit. The endearment that slipped out caused my motion to stutter until sheer need took over and I used his body to reach my climax for the second time.

  Again, the world ti
lted on its axis as the greatest pleasure flooded me. Through every spasm, I jerked and shuddered until he thrust up one last time and shouted my name.

  Completely drained, I collapsed on his chest as my heaving breaths slowed and my heart ceased its hammering. My nose nuzzled into his neck to savor his scent. As I drifted off, I was aware of his rough hands stroking my back and hips.

  Several more times throughout the night he woke me with kisses to my shoulders, my neck, or my temples. Each time I reached for him with needy limbs, stealing emotion and ecstasy in the dark of the night.

  His whispered words made me want things I knew I couldn’t have. “You feel so fucking good. Made for me. What I wouldn’t give to go back.”

  After the last round, as the sun was peeking around the dark curtains, he held me. My back curled into his front, I felt his body shudder and the soft sob that escaped him.

  “Let go, I won’t let you fall,” I whispered.

  “It’s too late. I’m already a fallen angel,” he whispered back and though I pressed his hand harder to my chest, I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer.

  I woke up in the bed alone. The eerie silence of the room told me he was gone. My chest collapsed as tears leaked from my eyes. Blindly reaching for his pillow to search for his scent, I grabbed onto a small piece of paper.

  It was a note written in his meticulously neat handwriting on the hotel notepad.

  Korrie~

  My goddess of the underworld. I wanted to hate you. You have no idea how I wish things could be different, but I have commitments that I can’t get out of and you have school to finish. If it’s meant to be, maybe our paths will cross again. Until then, take care and remember I loved you more than was safe.

  Jude

  “I love you more than is wise,” I whispered, and my fingernail traced his words. The fact that he used the past tense told me all I needed to know. Regardless of what we had once meant to each other, that time had passed.

  I’d seen him at the funeral in his uniform full of ribbons and had run my fingertips through his short raspy hair. I knew what that meant. He’d been handsome as a young man, but the soldier he’d become was so much more that he took my breath away.

  What he didn’t know was, he also took my heart.

  While I knew there would never be anyone like him for me again, I was also realistic enough to know the season of our time together had ended. What we’d shared the night before had been closure.

  Goodbye.

  But then why did it hurt so bad?

  “Angels Of The Silences”—Counting Crows

  Eight years later…

  “Voodoo. You got a minute?” I asked quietly. He was sitting at the bar with his ol’ lady, Kira, standing between his legs. Her pregnant belly was huge, and he had one hand splayed possessively over the top of the basketball-shaped curve.

  “What is it? Is everything okay?” she asked. He looked to me, then back to her.

  “Club business. Sorry, babe,” I said to Kira with an apologetic shrug.

  “I’m sure everything’s okay.” He kissed her, then gently nudged her forward. “I’ll be back out in a bit. Wait here for me. Zaka, guard,” he said to his dog as he pointed at Kira.

  “You’re a fucker,” she said with a chuckle. Ghost was standing next to her and he almost spat out his beer.

  “Did you just tell your dog to guard your woman?” Ghost choked out.

  Voodoo laughed and followed me to Venom’s office. Once we got there, I closed the door.

  “What’s up?” he asked, looking around the room at Venom, Raptor, and me.

  “We found Lester Damen.” Voodoo tensed as soon as the words left Venom’s lips.

  “Where?”

  “Small town in Kentucky.”

  “Really,” Voodoo murmured.

  “Yep. Outside of Louisville,” Raptor said with a grin.

  “You talk to Coy?” Voodoo asked. Coy was the president of the Louisville chapter.

  “We did. He’s going to get us some recon on the douchebag. When he has more details, I’ll be flying down with a couple of the brothers,” I told him. We’d already voted that if we found the piece of shit that had literally paid money for Voodoo’s ol’ lady’s innocence, we would deal with him.

  Permanently.

  Dude was a seriously evil person. A real sick fuck that used his daddy’s connections to keep himself out of trouble. Underage sex, drugs, prostitution, along with his perversions were only part of what he’d been mixed up in.

  “I’m going.” Voodoo crossed his arms and clenched his jaw.

  “Brother, not a good idea. You want to take a chance that Kira has that baby while you’re gone?” I reasoned. She was due within the next week or two. He let out a defeated breath and clutched his hair as he roared in frustration. Shit on the desk rattled. A bottle of Crown tipped over before he calmed down enough to speak.

  “Goddamn it. Angel, you make sure he pays. You hear me? He doesn’t walk out alive. Period.” Tension rolled off him in waves.

  “I got this, bro. Trust me. Prez already approved my choices. I’ll take Ghost and Chains, if he can get away from the shop.”

  “We’ll discuss it at church, that way he can prepare his schedule,” Venom added. “Also, after thinking about it more, I’d like you to have Phoenix with you too.”

  “I can go if you need me to,” offered Raptor.

  “No, I need you here. I’ve got some things I need to deal with, and I need you to cover things for me while I’m gone.” We all stared curiously at our president, but he was tight-lipped. None of us questioned him either.

  “Sure, P. No problem.” Raptor studied Venom but said nothing.

  “Let’s go return to the party,” Venom said in dismissal as he stood from his seat.

  “Roger that,” I replied as I nodded and exited the room. My brothers at my back, we joined the rest of the club and the few family members who were there for the weekly dinner and get-together. Since we had snow damn near to the rooftop, we were cooking inside, but it didn’t slow anyone down.

  Music filtered through the surround-sound speakers, and several brothers sat on the covered back patio with the heaters going. It was the only place they could comfortably smoke this time of year.

  “I call next game,” I shouted over to Phoenix and Chains, who were playing pool.

  Kira swore, and I looked to make sure everything was okay. “I’m so sorry,” she said as a prospect went to grab the mop to clean up the pitcher of water she’d spilled.

  “If Croc was here, we wouldn’t be using the fucking mop,” muttered Chains as he took his shot. He was right. Croc had been our member with the gift of water manipulation. Not only wouldn’t we be using the mop, it was weird not to see him around. He’d thrown us all for a loop when he’d announced he was headed to goddamn Australia. It wasn’t something we saw coming, but he seemed happy the last time we talked to him.

  The phone rang, and the prospect manning the bar answered.

  “Angel, prospect at the gate says there’s someone asking for you,” he said.

  “Who is it?” I asked suspiciously, because I hadn’t been expecting anyone.

  “Says he’s your father,” the prospect replied after asking. My spine stiffened, and I ground my teeth together. I hadn’t spoken to the man since the day we laid my mother in the ground eight years ago.

  Voodoo’s gaze darted in my direction. “I’m going with you. This one you can’t deny me,” he growled.

  Unable to gather my words, I nodded. When I got up, not only did Voodoo follow behind me, so did every brother in the room. A weird ripple in my stomach had me swallowing hard.

  This is family—not the piece of shit at the gate.

  We all ignored the cold as we crossed the lot to the gate. The prospect was outside of the guard shack, watching the man who called himself a father.

  “What the fuck do you want?” I barked out before I even stopped walking.

  “Jude,”
he cajoled. “Don’t be like that. I um, can we talk alone?”

  “Hell, no. Anything you have to say to me can be said in front of my brothers.” I scoffed.

  He blew heated air into his hands as he tried to see if I’d give in and call off my brothers. Not a chance in hell.

  “I need your help.”

  “Excuse me?” I snorted in disbelief. “You think I’d be willing to help you? I wouldn’t piss on you if you were on fire.”

  His pleading look dissipated, and his eyes went cold. He stepped closer to the bars and quietly said, “If you don’t want all your little secrets to get out, you might want to help your old man.”

  My hand shot between the bars, jerking his body until his face was pulled between the bars. “Don’t fucking threaten me.”

  No, I didn’t want them to know some of the dark secrets I kept hidden in the even darker recesses of my mind. But if this piece of shit wanted to threaten me, he had another thing coming.

  “Then do it because you care about your sister,” he choked out. His face still framed by the bars, cheeks smashed into them, he locked his gaze on mine.

  “What the fuck are you talking about?” My lip curled in disgust.

  “Meet with me in private, and I’ll tell you what I’m talking about,” he bartered.

  “I don’t fucking trust you. Either Voodoo is with me or you can go fuck yourself.”

  “Fine.”

  I turned to look at the brothers who had my back. At my nod, they fell back, but they still stood by the door to the clubhouse where they could see us. Voodoo stayed at my side.

  “Talk. You have five minutes,” I growled out, losing patience. My breath caused little clouds to form as I spoke.

  “I have cancer,” he said. I barked out a laugh, and he glared.

  “Well, I guess Karma exists after all,” I said with an evil grin. “So what the fuck does that have to do with me?”

  “I need you to, uh, fix me,” he admitted.