Hostage (Predators MC #3)

“
D
o you take sugar
?” Penni waved a packet of sugar in the air.

“Yes, please.” Grace opened a drawer next to her, looking for a spoon. “Why do you only have plastic silverware?”

Penni opened the package of sugar into the coffee cup in front of her then handed it to her friend. “I keep meaning to buy some more silverware. For some reason, they keep disappearing.” She poured herself a cup of coffee, leaving it black, as she watched Grace take a sip, wincing at the strong flavor. “Sorry. I like my coffee strong.”

“Now I know why you’re always so hyper.”

“I’m hyper without it. The coffee just makes it worse. I appreciate that you didn’t mind working here today instead of the office. I hate the smell of fresh paint. The building owners promised it should be finished by tomorrow, so we can go back to the office on Monday.” The owners were in the process of renovating the building, and the smell of the fresh paint had given her a persistent headache. Thankfully, that part of the renovations was almost over.

“No problem. It’s a nice change of pace. I brought my laptop to go over the venues for the tour dates.”

As tour manager of Mouth2Mouth, it was Penni’s job to set the tour schedule. Grace had proven invaluable as Penni’s assistant, handling the office when she went on tour with the group.

“Let me grab my laptop, and we can work at the kitchen table. I’ll be right back.” Penni went into her living room then carried her laptop back into the kitchen seconds later. She came to a stop when she saw Grace about to open the sliding door to her backyard.

“Don’t go out there!” Penni rushed forward, shutting the door quickly and locking it.

Grace stared at her, open-mouthed at her reaction. “Sorry. It’s really pretty outside, so I thought it would be nice to work in the fresh air.”

“I would love to; except, we wouldn’t get much work done if we went out there.” Penni pointed out the clear door. “Look at the bushes.”

She loved working in the backyard on the days when the weather was warm. It was small with a little table and chairs that had comfortable cushions. It had a five-foot stone wall that created privacy from her neighbors with a hedge of bushes in front. The bushes were what she was pointing at now. It didn’t take Grace long to see the problem.

“Good grief! How many of them are there?”

“I don’t want to know. I’m not going out there to count the mean fuckers.” Penni eyed the innocuous bushes that were very pretty … until you noticed the large amount of bees flying in and out of the greenery.

“Kill them,” Grace advised.

“I thought of that; believe me. The last time I got stung, I notified the landlord. I should have stayed in my apartment,” Penni admitted glumly, eyeing the bees that prevented her from going outside to indulge in her favorite pastimes of sunbathing or reading, which were the reasons she had decided to rent the house.

“So why didn’t he take care of it?”

“Did you know bees are becoming extinct?”

Grace shook her head. “No.”

“Neither did I. The exterminator my landlord hired notified Fish and Wildlife. Now, not only can I not kill them, but I have to put up with them another couple of weeks until they move the colony. The University is going to take them to a spot where they can be researched.”

“That’s a bummer.”

“No shit,” Penni replied caustically. Any sympathy she’d had for the bee population had disappeared after the first couple of stings.

Grace laughed, shaking her head at Penni. “They’ll be gone in a few weeks. Then you’ll have your backyard back. Look on the bright side; they’re a hell of a deterrent for burglars.”

Penni shook off her ill humor, mentally throwing her negative thoughts into the air. It was a habit she had developed for when she found herself focusing on only negative thoughts. She hated to be in a bad mood. Her brother Shade had that covered. He was in a perpetual bad mood. Well, he had been before he’d married her bestie, Lily.

“I don’t need bees for protection. I can take care of myself,” Penni boasted. She was sure she could handle any situation. Besides, her brother was an enforcer for The Last Riders, and he had taught her how to defend herself as soon as her mother had bought her first bra for her.

“Don’t jinx yourself,” Grace warned.

“I don’t believe in luck.” Penni felt the chill of foreboding going down her spine. Shrugging it off, she also threw that out into the air. “Let’s get to work before that badass husband of yours comes back to pick you up.”

Penni settled down to work, forgetting about Grace’s warning. It was a warning that would come back to haunt her.

* * *

“
I
’ll take a Café Mistro
,” Penni placed her order, reaching into her wallet to pull out her money.

“I have it.” A ten-dollar bill passed in front of her toward the waiting cashier.

Penni snatched the money out of the cashier’s hand and handed it back to the man she absolutely loathed with every fiber of her being.

“Thanks, but I can pay for myself,” Penni snapped at Jackal.

The enforcer for the Predators MC narrowed his eyes at her angrily, but Penni refused to be afraid of his intimidating glare.

Determined to ignore him, she handed the cashier the money to pay for her coffee then moved to the side to wait for her order.

“I was only trying to be nice.” Jackal shook his head at the cashier, who took his order, before moving to stand next to Penni.

Penni rolled her eyes. “Your idea of nice and mine differ. You can pretend to be nice all you want, but I know you’re an asshole, remember?” She knew the enforcer hated it when she reminded him of the time he had kidnapped her, holding her hostage until The Last Riders had returned one of the Predators who had been taken prisoner. She had been forced to spend several days alone with Jackal on the road from Queen City to Treepoint, Kentucky. The jerk had made the swap for one of the Predators in front of both clubs.

“How long are you going to hold that against me?”

“Um … let me think a minute … until Hell freezes over.”

Jackal’s lips tightened at her sarcasm. “You’re not even giving me a chance.”

“No, I’m not. You’re a freaking caveman, manhandling me every opportunity you get; you kiss Ice’s ass; and every man, woman, and child in Queen City is afraid of you.”

“Except you?”

“No, I’m not afraid of you.” Penni moved sideways, trying to distance herself from the biker.

His scarred face, which could never be described as handsome even by his mother, became even angrier, only to be smoothed out and replaced by a twisted smile that Penni assumed was his attempt at being charming.

Her name was called, so moving forward, she took her coffee from the busy waitress. When she turned to leave, she found Jackal standing in her way.

“That’s good, because I don’t want you afraid of me. You should come out with me sometime, give me a chance to show you that we could have some fun together.”

Penni almost choked on her sip of coffee. “Some fun together? You mean, riding around town on your motorcycle then going back to your room at the clubhouse for a night filled with sex? That kind of fun?”

He had the audacity to shrug. “Sounds fun to me.”

“I would rather become a nun than have sex with you.”

Penni stepped around him and was two steps away from him when she heard his snide comment.

“You don’t have to be such a fucking bitch.”

Fury coursed through her bloodstream. She hated the B-word. Whenever men didn’t like something a woman had to say, it always seemed to fly right out of their mouths.

Deliberately pasting a seductive smile on her lips, she turned back toward him. “I’ll tell you what, Jackal,” she purred, which warned him she was up to something. “I’m busy tonight, but tomorrow night, I’ll leave my backdoor unlocked. If you can make it, I’m all yours.”

Jackal’s eyes narrowed on her, wondering what the catch was. “You serious?”

“Oh, yes, I’m deadly serious.” She masked her aversion to him, stepping closer. Then she placed a kiss on the corner of his mouth, letting her tongue flick out briefly before quickly withdrawing.

“Why not the front door?”

“I don’t want my neighbors to know I’m dating the most feared man in Queen City.” She fed his already overblown ego, knowing he couldn’t resist.

“What time?”

Penni almost rolled her eyes again. Men’s egos were their weakest spot and a woman’s greatest weapon.

“Any time after six.”

She was leaving for the next Mouth2Mouth concert at five, so that gave her plenty of time to be far from home before he arrived.

“I’ll be there.” Jackal gave her another twisted smile, holding the door open for her.

Penni’s conscious kicked in as she headed toward her car, which hadn’t been parked at the curb when she had entered, nor had the other two bikers who were waiting on Jackal with his bike.

“Dammit,” Penni swore. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t send a man deliberately to his death, no matter how much she detested him. She needed to learn to control her temper, mentally throwing her antagonism into the wind.

She was about to go back and tell Jackal she had been joking when her cell phone rang. Juggling her coffee and purse, she grabbed her cell phone from the depths of the huge bag, hearing the motorcycles roar to life behind her.

“What’s up, Grace?”

“The executive officer of the arena in California called, Erick Dunaway … He said he didn’t receive the signed contracts you faxed to him, and if he doesn’t have them in ten minutes, he’s rebooking.”

“Dammit, I know I sent them. I’m on my way.” Penni disconnected the call, hurrying to her car.

By the time her key went into the ignition, she had a niggling feeling she had forgotten something important. Had she forgotten to send the contracts?

Oh, well, she would be at her office in five. It wasn’t like it was a mistake that couldn’t be fixed.