Page 19 of King
I almost drooled. If the brownies yesterday and the cookie I’d eaten earlier were any indication, this woman had some damned good skills in the kitchen. By the way her tongue had explored my mouth and her body had moved against mine, I knew she probably had some damned good skills in the bedroom, too. My cock throbbed as I imagined how her tongue would feel exploring the rest of my body. Dammit, I didn’t want to leave this woman, but I didn’t have a choice. My responsibility to the club came before the needs of my dick.
“Thank you,” I said, reaching for her and pulling her close. She felt good in my arms, fitting against me as if she’d been made for me. Her eyes widened as I smiled down at her. “I hate that I got called away. I would have enjoyed staying for dinner.” My eyes roamed over her face, memorizing every beautiful feature. This close, I could see a ring of darker blue around her irises. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d looked into a woman’s eyes, but damn, hers were pretty.
She swallowed hard and I bent my head to kiss her cheek, not trusting myself to do anything more.
“I’d love to kiss you again, sugar, but your kids are upstairs. Besides, if I did, I don’t think I’d be able to leave anytime soon.”
A flush bloomed on her cheeks at my softly spoken words, and those pretty blue eyes narrowed on me as she looked at me warily.
“You’re quite the ladies’ man, aren’t you?”
I snorted a laugh at that. That implied some sort of attempt at seduction or a pursuit for a woman’s affection. I couldn’t be bothered with that shit. So, ladies’ man, no. Manwhore, maybe, or at least I was in my heyday. I’d slowed down a little bit over the last couple of years. I still enjoyed thehell out of women, but I had been getting bored with the “get in-get out-get gone” routine I’d perfected over the years. Hell, I didn’t even bother trying to remember their names these days. By the next morning, they were just nameless, faceless women I’d fucked the night before and had already forgotten about.
“No, I just know what I want, and I’m not afraid to take it.”
“And you want me?”
I shot her a wicked grin. “If you don’t know that already, then I wasn’t doing something right.” My phone went off in my pocket, with a text chime this time. I cursed under my breath as I let go of Ella so I could pull my phone out. It was Trick, letting me know he would be at the club in five minutes.
“Shit, I need to go,” I muttered. I dipped my head to drop another quick kiss on Ella’s cheek, taking a split-second to breathe in the scent of vanilla mixed with something sweet that seemed to be embedded in her skin.
“Oh, just one more thing. Your daughter is gonna be just as pretty as her mama when she grows up, and Sinner told me that the boys are already sniffing around. You’d better keep that knife of yours handy.”
Ella blushed again, either because of the compliment or the reminder of her threat from yesterday. I shot her a wink as I headed out the door. I climbed into my truck then glanced next door to Sinner’s place. I heaved a sigh as I started the truck and put it into gear, then backed out of her driveway and headed toward the strip club.
Sinner would likely be pissed as hell if I went after Ella, and I wasn’t sure I’d blame him. She wasn’t like the women I picked up at the clubhouse or Inferno. She wasn’t a random woman I could fuck and forget about by the time I’d tucked my dick back in my pants. I had a feeling she wasn’t the kind ofwoman I could forget about, period, and fuck if I knew how I felt about that.
By the time I stalked through the door to Fallen Angels, I was good and fucking pissed – at the asshole who assaulted Mandy, at myself, hell, even at Ella for being so damned tempting. I’d spent the fifteen-minute drive reliving every second of my time with her, and I couldn’t decide which need was stronger – the need to bury myself balls-deep inside what the undoubtedly the sweetest cunt I’d ever tasted, or the need to walk away now before I fucked things up for Sinner and me both. The raging case of blue balls I had wasn’t helping me think any clearer, and being here are the strip club wasn’t going to ease that need one damned bit.
I had rules in place about the strippers. I employed them, so I didn’t touch them. Yeah, we might be an MC, but we were still running a business here – a really fucking profitable business – and smart employers didn’t fuck their employees.
Now, the members of the club were a different matter, so if the ladies wanted to do more than dance for the brothers, that was up to them. As long as no money changed hands other than for a lap dance or a tip, I didn’t give two shits what they got up to when the dancers weren’t on-stage as long as they understood that it didn’t affect their employment one way or another.
I noticed Star working the floor with a tray of shots balanced on one hand as she rubbed a customer’s shoulder with the other. Her tits, covered in the tiniest scrap of fabric possible, were mere inches from his face, a fact which he was definitely enjoying judging by the way he was licking his lips. Star and the other club bunnies occasionally filled in at the strip club if we were short-handed, but glancing around that didn’t seem to be the case. I spotted several of the scantily clad servers, more than enough to handle the relatively light Sunday night crowd.I tucked that question away for later, then made my way to the back office.
I slammed the office door behind me, causing the man who’d ruined my night to jump in his chair. Skid snickered as he sat in the padded office chair with his feet propped up on the corner of the desk, looking as if he didn’t have a care in the world. Trick was standing against the wall, leaning on his beloved baseball bat like it was some kind of gentleman’s walking stick. He straightened as he tipped his head my way in a silent greeting, then swung the bat up with one hand to slap it against the palm of the other.
“You got his ID?” I flicked my gaze to Skid, who nodded as he handed over a worn, leather wallet. I flipped it open and pulled out his driver’s license.
“Steven Paulson, aged thirty-eight.” I eyed the fuck-weasel in disgust, taking in his pasty skin, unkempt hair, and shaking hands. He looked at least ten years older than he actually was. “Seems to me that you’re old enough to know better than to fuckin’ touch someone without their permission.”
He tried to hide his nervousness behind a layer of false bravado as he glared at me from beneath lowered brows. It would have been more effective if his eyes hadn’t kept skittering away from mine, as if he weren’t quite strong enough to meet my gaze. I could sense his fear, which grew with each “thwack” of Trick’s bat against the palm of his hand. It brought a satisfied smirk to my face, and I pulled one of the wooden chairs to me, flipped it around, and straddled it as I sat down in front of him.
I folded my arms over the slats on the back of the chair, then tilted my head ever-so-slightly as I stared at the miserable shitstain nervously fidgeting in his chair. I deliberately didn’t speak, knowing that the uncomfortable silence – broken onlyby the rhythmic smack of the bat in Trick’s hand – would amp up the dumbass’s anxiety over what was coming. Skid and Trick both knew enough to wait for me to begin talking, and surprisingly, so did Steven Paulson.
“Would you care to explain what the fuck you were thinking when you put your hands on one of our employees without her consent?” I kept my voice deceptively calm, knowing it would throw him off even more. I was right. He swallowed hard and his eyes darted to the other two men in the room before coming back to rest uneasily on me.
Paulson’s eyes were drawn to my cut, and I smirked as they widened even more as he spotted my president’s patch. I was almost impressed that he hadn’t pissed himself yet, but that would come soon enough. Hopefully, Trick would have him out back by the dumpsters before that happened. It was a bitch to try to get the smell of piss out of carpets.
“According to your license, you only live a few miles away. Now, since you’re a local, I’m pretty damned sure you know who we are. It’s not a secret that our club owns Fallen Angels either, so you probably knew that, too. So, the way I see it, you came into our bar and thought it’d be OK to assault one ofouremployees. You thought it would be OK to disrespect her,andour MC? You’re even dumber than you look, Stevie-boy.”
The sound of Trick’s bat slapping against his palm was the only sound in the office, aside from Paulson’s ragged breathing. At the rate he was going, he would hyperventilate before Trick even took his first swing.
I got to my feet and shoved the chair to the side, then took a step forward so that I was looming over Paulson, who cringed and huddled back in his seat. Skid swung his legs downoff the desk and stood, and Trick stepped forward, with his bat now cradled in the crook of his arm like it was a baby.
“Now, here’s what’s gonna happen, motherfucker. These two gentlemen are gonna take you outside and impress upon you the importance of keeping your fuckin’ hands to your fuckin’ self. Count yourself lucky, because we’ll let you walk away afterward.” He tried to stifle the pathetic whimper, but I still heard it and flashed him a menacing grin. He whimpered again when I leaned over and grasped him by the shoulders, giving him a less than gentle shake.
“If you show your face around here again, or I ever hear that you’ve put your hands on another woman without a fuckin’ invitation, you won’t even get the chance tocrawlaway next time. You got me?”
