Page 38 of I am Dressed in Sin (Death by Daybreak MC 2)
They pushed me away, and I let them. Because I wasn’t ready then. But I’m ready now.
“Then?” he queries back in challenge, giving a harsh laugh and trying to storm past me. I grab his arm and he goes still again, turning his head slowly back to look at me. It occurs to me then that I really am playing with fire here. Since when did I ever get it into my head that any of these men were less dangerous than Gaz or Cat? That any of them gave a shit about me? Back then, I must’ve been working on instinct, recognizing that fragile red thread that connected our souls.
Now, I’m working on fact.
“You fucked me in the chapel, Grainge,” I tell him, my voice so much softer than normal. “Like you needed me.”
He grits his teeth, running his hand over his mouth in frustration. Whatever lies he wants to tell me—or himself—he can’t deny the facts.
“Maybe I just wanted one, last taste of the president’s daughter?” he queries, but not like he’s even trying to be cruel, more like he’s asking himself a question with an answer he knows but doesn’t care to admit to.
I frown at him.
“Don’t cheapen it,” I warn, feeling that old, familiar blanket of anger sweep over me. “You’re right about one thing: I am the president’s daughter. You forget sometimes that, despite your boys’ club bullshit, I know everything there is to know about club culture.” Our eyes meet, that sacrilegious heat burning between us. Hellfire, that’s what it is. Grainger is a demon, and I am the devil’s daughter. “You’re keeping a secret that could get me killed.”
“Something you’d best keep in mind before you go poking at bears.” He snatches my wrist and yanks me close, putting our faces near enough to kiss. It marvels me then, that he’d use the same animal in his metaphor that I’ve been using inside my own head. “My blood is one thing. A quick fuck is another. Don’t turn this into something that it isn’t.”
He releases me suddenly and takes off, pounding down the front steps and heading in the direction of the clubhouse. I chase after him, even though my bare feet bruise and bleed on the rocks and sticks and pine needles scattered across the lawn.
Abruptly, Grainger turns direction and disappears into the woods.
I pause briefly, one hand resting against the trunk of a tree. This is an invitation if I’ve ever seen one. And yet …
“Go.”
I didn’t hear anyone come up behind me and yet, there it is, that smooth, Southern drawl. I turn slowly, catching sight of Beast behind me. If he’d wanted to, he could’ve snapped my neck before I even realized he was there.
My future husband, the consummate killer.
“Go?” I repeat, trying to understand what it is, exactly, that he’s trying to tell me.
Beast looks past me, toward the shadows of the woods where Grainger just disappeared to.
“I’d prefer to have you to myself,” Beast tells me, and a chill goes down my spine. He’s so goddamn calm, almost disturbingly so. But, like I said, I’ve never been afraid of him. He doesn’t look at me the way he looks at everyone else, that is, like prey. He looks at me like one grizzly to another. Just two predators passing in the night. “I’m not a man that likes to share.”
I quirk a brow. It’s so weird, talking to him like this. We haven’t exactly had many scintillating conversations. Did he eat me out to the point that I thought I might die? Sure. Did he fuck me into the pavement? Yep. Did he see that pregnancy test I didn’t want to show him? You betcha. But talking? Nah, me and Beast don’t talk.
Except if we’re going to get married, we might need to start. Because—despite Grainger’s guesses to the contrary—that’s exactly what I’m going to do. Marry Beast. If this is the only way for me to join the club, by becoming a proper old lady, then I’ll do it, like venom inside the club’s veins.
Taking a backseat isn’t exactly in my blood; it isn’t what I want for my future, and it’s not what I’m taking. During my time with the mafia, I learned something. That is: I’m not afraid of anyone or anything.
Not Cat. Not Gaz. Not the Death by Daybreak Motorcycle Club. Not the Grey Wolfe Mafia.
I almost lie here. I almost let my anger dig her red, pointed claws into me and take hold. Tell Beast you picked him out of convenience, she hisses. But that isn’t true, not entirely.
“You were the most logical choice,” I tell him, ignoring his last words. “I’m not a man that likes to share.” Those words—and the matter-of-fact confidence contained in them—make me ache and burn and want in a way that I can’t quite explain.
