Page 20 of Trick
I’d found myself thinking about Lauren at the oddest times over the past three weeks – while working out at the gym, alone in my bed at night, and even when turning Melina down the night she offered to suck me off. I took one look at her bleached blonde hair, and immediately pictured Lauren’s fiery, red curls wrapped around my fist instead. My cock – which was only half-heartedly twitching with Melina’s hand on my zipper – gave up at that point and completely deflated. I’d made up some dumb excuse and hauled ass up to my room, spending the rest of the night with only my right hand for company.
It hadn’t helped that I’d listened to the rest of that damned audiobook and now couldn’t get the memory out of my head of Lauren calling out for that Damian asshole. I’d looked up the guy who had done the narration with her, Nathan Downing, who thankfully looked nothing at all like the rugged, growly voiced hockey star he’d portrayed. The dude looked more like an accountant, or an insurance salesman, giving off a distinctly nerdy vibe. For some reason, that had made me feel a little bit better about the entire clusterfuck.
I’d thought I might have had a chance to make some headway with Lauren the evening she’d stopped by the clubhouse with a cake for Viking, but that was thwarted by Melina, who’d made a play for me right in front of her. I’dimmediately brushed her off, literally and figuratively, but when I turned back to Lauren a few moments later, the stool next to me was empty and she was across the room hugging Viking goodbye without so much as a glance in my direction. After warning Melina to keep her distance from now on, I’d headed up to my room – alone.
I took comfort in the fact that I’d rattled her when I’d walked in on her in King’s kitchen, licking icing off her finger. The sight of her pink tongue running across the pad of her finger, then the look of sheer bliss on her face when she tasted the homemade icing, was enough to make me weak in the knees. I hadn’t been able to resist commenting on it, and her eyes had widened and a faint blush had appeared on her cheekbones before she whirled around and joined the ladies back in the living room.
The reaction I’d received at the diner last Wednesday hadn’t been nearly as satisfying though.
I’d flirted.
She’d shot me down.
Again.
I’d been having dinner with Hawk and Bodhi, and they’d both witnessed me going down in flames. They’d ragged on my ass the rest of the night about it, too.
I felt like I was back to square one with her, and I had no idea what to do about it.
Now, as I walked into the common room over a week later, I was pissed off, frustrated, and confused as hell about why I couldn’t get the damned woman off my mind.
The room was fairly quiet at the moment, but I knew it wouldn’t be long before it would start to fill up with clubbrothers, bunnies, and the assorted hangarounds who usually joined us to party on a Friday night. I sat down at the bar and ordered a beer from Tony, the prospect on duty. Before I’d even popped the top, I noticed Viking sitting at the other end of the bar talking on his cell phone.
“I’ll send one of the boys over right now. It’s no wonder the battery is dead. You’ve probably been givin’ it one hell of a workout. That smoke detector ain’t a kitchen timer, you know,” he chuckled into the phone before ending the call. He stood up and hollered down the bar to Tony.
“Prospect, find the other prospect and send his ass over to my niece’s place with an extension ladder. He needs to change the battery in her smoke detector. She has new batteries, but it’s the one up high so she can’t reach it.”
Viking was old-school and refused to call any of the prospects by their actual names until they were patched in and given road names. It could get a little confusing at times.
Before Tony could respond one way or the other, the old man spotted Sinner and Cowboy walking in, and ambled off to join them at the poker table.
I motioned Tony over. “Rod’s working at the gym tonight,” I told him. “I’ll take care of it myself.”
His brows rose in surprise at my offer before he caught himself and just nodded instead. “Any luck on filling the open prospect spot?”
Cowboy’s son, Linc, had been officially patched in as Wrangler recently, leaving us short on prospects.
I shook my head. “We’ve talked to a couple of guys who expressed interest, but neither one are gonna make it.” One had been way too nervous, not even able to look us in the eyewhen we spoke with him, and the other only wanted to prospect because he thought he’d have access to a constant stream of pussy on tap.
“I might know a guy,” Tony offered. “I went to high school with him. Ran into him a few nights ago, and we got to talkin’ about the MC. He’s a solid guy – at least he was when we were in school. He’s just finished getting certified as a mechanic. Seems interested, and I think he’d be a good fit.”
“Talk to him again. See if he’s available to meet with the officers after Church on Sunday.”
“Will do.”
I clapped him on the shoulder, then headed out to the garage to grab a ladder and one of the club’s trucks, refusing to examine the reasons I was doing this myself, instead of handing it off to one of the other brothers.
Once I was standing on Lauren’s doorstep, I acknowledged exactly why I was taking care of this job myself. My eyes roved over her like a caress, from the top of her head to her feet, lingering on her curves just a tad longer than would be considered socially acceptable. She glared at me and oh-so-casually crossed her arms in front of her chest, but she wasn’t quite quick enough to keep me from seeing that her nipples were hard.
I gave a satisfied smirk at the knowledge that she wasn’t quite as unaffected by me as she pretended to be. Maybe I ought to ask her to dinner. I’d see how the next few minutes went, first, since she hadn’t been especially receptive so far.
“Hey, darlin’. I heard you need a little help.”
“What are you doing here? Um, I mean, I thought Uncle Bill was sending one of the prospects over?”
Ignoring her wary expression and forcing my eyes away from her chest before I popped a boner on her front porch, I picked up the ladder and stepped forward, causing her to step back out of the doorway to let me inside.
“None of the prospects were available, so you’ve got me instead.”
