Page 45 of I am Dressed in Sin (Death by Daybreak MC 2)
I go deliberately slow, taking my time as I drag the material up my legs.
“If I were marrying Gidget, no other man would dare touch her.” Grainger looks right at me as he says the words, and I realize how true that is, one of the unspoken reasons why I didn’t pick him that night. Beast is practical when he needs to be; Cade is not.
I’m picking pine needles out of my hair when I walk into the clubhouse. Doesn’t matter. Can the men walking past tell that I just fucked their sergeant-at-arms in the woods? If they can, they keep that shit to themselves.
They don’t look at me too closely, don’t ogle me or catcall or whistle. They never did before, too afraid of Cat’s wrath. Now, with Beast as my soon-to-be husband, they’re even more wary of making the wrong move around me.
As I’m heading down the hall toward my father’s office, I run right into Amber. Almost literally. She’s giggling as she exits one of the dorm rooms, knocking her shoulder into mine accidentally.
Amber Clearwater, one of the most famous and notorious groupies to ever take up residence in the clubhouse. In her early thirties, she’s one of the prettiest women I’ve ever seen. Glowing blond hair that waves gently around her doll-like face. Her mouth is pouty, but free from fillers, unlike some of the other girls. She smiles when she sees me, tucking some of that frothing golden hair behind an ear.
For someone who’s been professionally fucking bikers for the better part of six years, she seems remarkably fresh and upbeat. She’s always, always, always wanted to join the ranks of the club wives, privy to their shopping trips and girls’ weekends, their private parties and all the drugs, alcohol, and fuckboys that come with it.
“Girl,” she says, reaching out to take my shoulders. I give her hands a quick look, silently voicing my disapproval at being touched. My skin is still dancing with sparks from Grainger’s rough grasp, and my cunt is throbbing in dual parts soreness and need. There are only four people on this planet who are allowed to touch me right now; Amber is not one of them. “Three months. I can’t believe you’re still alive.”
She’s not the first person to voice that sentiment. Not sure anyone in the club save those four horse-fucks thought I was still kicking—even Cat seemed shocked.
“That’s me. Like a cockroach. Impossible to kill.”
The joke falls flat for Amber, but her smile only fades for a second before she’s giving me a knowing look.
“Beast, huh?” she asks, and I can see that news has spread quickly. Not a surprise. Cat will have done that on purpose, let it leak through the ranks of the club, just to make sure that every asshole in it knows that I’m now ‘leashed’, a proper club wife. It takes a gargantuan amount of effort for me to retain a pleasant expression on my face.
I think about Grey’s words to me—basically his last words—before the ceremony.
“It’s a wedding, not a war.”
Somehow, this feels like a bit of both.
“What about Beast?” I ask, trying not to be annoyed with Amber. I don’t hate any of the club’s groupies. They make me sad, for the most part. The majority of them are very pretty girls with very ugly pasts who have nowhere else to go, girls like Nellie. Coming here, getting a solid, safe place to sleep, a chance to party and drink and smoke, it’s worth the fucking for them. They have a right to say no to any man, but then they have to leave the clubhouse. Most come here with the hopes of finding a husband, someone to keep them when the world threw them away.
Amber lifts her hand up, as if in explanation, and I see the yellow diamond glinting on her ring finger. The blood drains from my face so quickly that I feel faint, and I have to actually reach up and put a hand on the wall to steady myself.
No.
No, please, I can’t deal with that today.
Crown’s asked Amber to marry him? After all this time? I can barely breathe. Did my choosing Beast spur him to make a decision he’s been putting off for years?
“I’m engaged,” Amber tells me excitedly, her voice bubbly and full of fantasy. She should know by now what being a part of the club is really like. But if she’s still here, she must like it the way Nellie does. Likes her place in the DBD web, just a filament, a strand, but never a spider. She has no power to spin her own threads.
“Congratulations.” The word is wooden, almost caustic. Amber notices and blinks dark lashes in surprise, regaining her composure quickly. “If you’ll excuse me …” I start, intending to move past her.
