Chasing Claire (Hells Saints Motorcycle Club) (29 page)

“There’s nothing back there.” She started to pull away from him. “There’s no knot. Just like I said.”

He pulled her back hard against him. “No? Put your arms around me again like that, baby. I’m sure I felt something.”

Then he pulled her off her feet and fully onto his chest. With amazing alacrity for a wounded man, Reno shifted Claire to his good side and moved his knee over her small body, successfully trapping her next to him on the bed.

“I’m wet,” she said exasperated as she struggled against him.

“Already, babe? I barely touched you.” Reno grinned at her.

Claire shook her head at him. “The way your moods have been swinging lately, I figure I have about a three-second turnaround time before you shove me off you and order me to go get you some Chinese food.”

Reno pressed her closer and began nuzzling the sensitive place on her neck.

“Have I been that bad?” he said softly against her.

“No,” she sighed into him. “You’ve been worse than that.”

His fingers on her back pressed and kneaded the tension out of her tight muscles.

He felt her go soft and still against him. “That feels so good, Reno. I guess I didn’t realize how tired I am.”

“I know I’ve been a pain in the ass, Claire. What you’ve done for me, the way you’ve been here, honey, it hasn’t gone unnoticed.”

Reno massaged her neck and shoulders for a while, then his hands drifted along to the sides of her breasts. The soft therapeutic massage had begun to turn into something else entirely. Reno felt himself go hard against his woman. It seemed like forever since he had been inside of her.

“Reno, your bandages,” Claire breathed when he pulled her body closer against his.

“Forget the bandages, baby.” Reno’s hand was inside her wet shirt moving up toward her swollen nipple.

“Your stitches are going to open,” she whispered.

“Forget about the stitches too. If they split, I’ll just have Jules sew me up again. It would make his day. You know how he loves to inflict pain.” Reno pressed warm soft kisses insistently on her neck, while he caught a nipple in between his thumb and forefinger. He tugged it gently just the way that he knew she liked it.

Claire stilled for a minute, and Reno took that advantage. He pulled the shirt over her head and reached back to release the clasp on her bra. Her breasts bounced free of the restraints, and he dipped his tongue over the large dusky tip of her nipple. When he felt her arch into his mouth, he moved his hand to grasp her heavy breast fully. Then he began to suckle her greedily, first one, then the other, then both. Reno’s hands left Claire’s breast to move firmly up her thighs and to skim over her denim shorts. With a practiced flick of his fingers, he had them unbuttoned and unzipped in no time at all. Then his touch moved lightly over the smooth branches of the willow tree inked into her flat stomach. Lovingly, he traced every branch and each finely drawn leaf. His callused fingers dipped
down past the trunk, and still lower to the intricately drawn, widespread roots. She felt so incredibly good, he could not get close enough to her.

He couldn’t hold back a small grunt of pain as he shifted onto her.

“Honey, let me,” Claire murmured.

She put her small hands on his shoulders and surprised him by pushing him down back onto the pillows.

She moved away from him quickly, arched her hips, and dragged her shorts and panties down. Then Claire bent over him, beautiful and naked.

She smiled shyly at him, but her eyes filled with a hunger that matched his own. She moved gently over him and pressed her small hands against his strong hip bones. In a careful move, Claire straddled Reno; when her breasts swung heavily over him, Reno almost shot his load like a horny teenager.

Claire took command and touched her soft mouth to Reno’s hard body. She trailed small tender kisses along the firm lines of his chest and down to his abdomen. She navigated easily past the carefully wrapped bandages. Then her mouth moved lower.

“Claire, you don’t have to . . .” A shot of pure pleasure ran through Reno and almost brought him off the bed.

Claire raised her beautiful blue eyes. “I want to, Reno,” she whispered in a voice that was husky with need.

The sound of that warm rasp was enough to make Reno’s head swim. Sensual waves of pleasure built and crashed over him again and again as Claire teased him with her tongue. She moved the wet, pink tip until it slid over the long, hard length of him. Swirling and darting, sucking and nibbling, she fed on the musky, salty, rich velvet of his skin.

And Claire took her time.

She moved her mouth over and over again, experimentally, each time taking more and more of him, taking him deeper and deeper. Reno willed himself to stay absolutely still, but he clutched at the bedsheet as if it were a lifeline and he was a dying man.

And a part of him was dying. The part that fed on vengeance. The part of him that yearned for bloodletting and violence, for pain and revenge. All of the nightmares and self-recriminations of the past few days were replaced with the purity of the now. Strains of pleasure shot through his veins in long molten threads and chased away the deadly iciness that Luisa’s attack had left him with.

Claire had pushed them all away, and had left him with this moment.

There was only her. There was only him. There was only love.

When he cried out to her in a rich deep moan, she edged back up his body like a sleek lioness. She looked deep into his eyes then put her mouth to his, catching his lower lip in small playful tugs. Then Claire pulled back quickly, arched her back and tossed her long beautiful hair.

Kaleidoscope.

Cracker Jack Surprise.

Brass Ring.

Reno lifted her in his arms and seated her fully on top of him. She felt so hot, so tight, so wet that it almost took his breath away. He slid his hands down to the soft skin at her hips and settled her deeper, rocking her, shifting her, loving her. He murmured his encouragement, and he felt her heat and flood with the friction the new position created. He watched her face as her eyes closed and a flush of pink crept over her. He felt her begin to tighten and build and suddenly her beautiful eyes were focused on his in an expression of lust and wonder.

“Reno,” she cried out to him.

“That’s it, baby. Let it go, let it go, Claire.” Reno ground deeper into her with a need as deep as her own.

When he felt her shudder and begin to pulse with release, he held her hips tight to him, and gave himself up to the wonder of her. The entire world stopped. The rumble of the pipes, the distant shouts of his brothers, the roar of engines, even the call of birds and hum of insects ceased to exist.

It was only Reno and Claire, and a kaleidoscope of light, hope, and love.

And life.

There was life.

With Claire by his side, there would always be life.

CHAPTER 47

T
ime moved on in an uneasy rhythm for a while after the shooting. Reno’s road to recovery continued to be rocky, but steady. Rocky because Reno continued to drive everyone around him absolutely crazy, and steady because each day he pushed himself to be the best that he could be.

In a gesture that was as shocking as it was unexpected, Dr. Charto gave me more than ample time to complete any classwork that I had missed. The rest of my professors followed suit, and I worked night and day to catch up.

I think everyone was grateful that things had turned out the way they had. But the day of the shooting had set off a chain of events that no one could have foreseen. While the local authorities of the towns involved hadn’t really cared too much about a few drug dealers being gunned down, it turned out that the feds had a real interest in who had taken out Luisa Sievas and why. There were no surveillance cameras anywhere on the city cemetery property, thank God, nor were there any witnesses to the shooting. However, it did not escape the authority’s notice that the four bodies and spent shells were all in close proximity to the headstone of Petey McCabe, the father of a foot soldier in the Hells Saints Brotherhood.

For a few weeks, the feds had been all over the club. The Escalade, with its smashed windshield, dented hood, and streams of blood splattered throughout, had been chopped as soon as it hit
the compound. Any attempt at questioning Dolly or Reno as to their whereabouts or involvement in the shooting had resulted in the club lawyering them both up and was quickly squashed. An early-morning search of the compound conducted by federal, state, and local authorities had revealed nothing. However, a few eyebrows were raised at the content of the clinic and a charge was levied against Jules for practicing medicine without a license. Within hours, Gianni came through with documentation that the clinic and all of its contents belonged to “his guy,” so those charges were dropped.

Under tremendous pressure from just about every organized club in the northeast, the Los Diablos was absorbed by the Almas Oscuras. The A.O. had just started their charter on the East Coast so the crew could patch over and become an integral part of the club’s organization. This allowed them to satisfy the edict passed down by the outlaw alliance and still maintain their dignity. Prosper and the other heads of the various crews were meeting behind locked doors more often than ever before, and most importantly, the uneasy peace had been maintained. Matters, at least for now, seemed to have worked out as best as they could have.

Everyone I loved was safe, alive, and reasonably happy.

Yeah, everyone I loved was reasonably happy.

Except for me.

In the aftermath of Reno’s recovery I found myself once again in the grip of nightmares and crippling fear. Because the closer that Reno and I got, the more I realized how very much I had to lose. There were still things that needed to be settled between us. There were things that needed to be said that could change everything.

And those things needed to be said by me.

I just couldn’t seem to find the courage to say them.

CHAPTER 48

I
t was a beautiful day. Warm and sultry with just a hint of a breeze. I had taken my last finals the day before and I was looking forward to the first free day I had had in a while. Glory had taken off early in the morning to attend a huge farmers market a few towns over so I had the house to myself. I had just finished putting in a load of laundry and was heading upstairs to put my bathing suit on and head out to the dock.

I heard the screen door slam shut and turned the corner to see Reno standing in the living room.

“Babe, we have to talk.”

I looked past him toward the driveway and saw the club van parked outside. I knew he wasn’t well enough to ride his Harley yet. I didn’t know what could be so important that it brought him over to the lake house in the utility van. But the thought of what it could be frightened me, and not just a little.

“Is everything okay?” My eyes swept his body. He looked just fine. Great, in fact. Reno still had some time to go before a full recovery, but there was a notable air of renewed health and strength about him recently that I was glad to see.

“That’s what I’m here to find out.” He nodded to the couch. “Have a seat, Claire.”

Reno waited until I sat down. He remained standing and looked
at me from across the room. Then he scrubbed his hand once over his face and sighed deeply.

“There’s something I have been meaning to say and I’ve been putting it off. But I don’t want to do that anymore. Not after the shit we’ve just been through. So I’m here today to say it.” Reno was not smiling.

I nodded and felt my mouth go dry.

“Baby, I know we’ve been through it. From the very beginning you and I have been riding a shit storm of bad luck, but the hell of it is, we always manage to get to a place where we find ourselves together again. And that’s the good part, that’s the fucking great part, yeah?”

“Yeah,” I said softly. “That’s the great part.”

“But the rest of it, I can’t do anymore.”

“Can’t do what anymore?” I felt sick.

“I can’t have you in my bed, on my bike, and in my goddamn head twenty-four hours a day and not have all of you. It’s just not enough for me. And it’s never gonna be enough.”

“I understand.” I nodded miserably. “And I’m sorry. I tried, Reno, but I’m just no good at this.” The words flew out of my mouth. I hadn’t known they were there until I said them.

“No good at what, Claire?” he asked.

“This.” And I waved my hand between us.

“
This
? I don’t understand what you are talking about.”

“Going the distance,” I answered him.

The room was closing in on me. I felt it coming on. Like a freight train. The awful truth. The truth that I had hidden from everyone, even from Raine.

“Tell me why, baby. You’ve got to tell me why that scares you, Claire,” Reno said quietly. “You hiding from me after everything that you’ve been through, that
we’ve
been through, I get it. But that shit is done. It’s over and we have got to find a way to move past it.
Because when we are together, it’s fucking perfect. You in my bed is
perfect
. Nothing has ever come close to that. Not for me and not for you. You know it and I know it. But for some reason that scares you, for some reason you get to a place where you start to forget all that, and if we don’t do something about it goddamn soon, then I’m going to start to forget that too. And that would be a real shame. That would be a real fucking shame. I have tried, baby, I really have tried, but for the life of me, Claire, I can’t figure out why you do it. I don’t know why you keep running from me. So me and you, we aren’t leaving this room until we figure that out. Then we decide to either move forward or let this thing between us go once and for all. But either way, babe, I have to know and you are going to tell me.”

Reno paused then and gave time for his words to reach me.

Then he said this: “I love you.”

I felt the flutter of my heart beat against my chest.

“I fucking love you, Claire. Loved you for a long time. Loved you from that first time I saw you. Loved you from the first time you came dancing down those damn steps and stood behind your sister trying to hide from me. And I want you. All of you. I want to go to bed holding you, and I want to wake up next to you. I want my ring on your finger and I want my babies in your belly.”