Inflamed: A Shadow Riders MC (46 page)

“Mia,” he hollered out again.

"Yeah, I'm in here," I finally said.

"Where?"

"The kitchen." I bent down a little lower to peek on each shelf, but even as I moved stuff around, I couldn't seem to manage in finding a single bottle of sauce of any kind.

"
Dayum
," I heard coming up from behind me. I released my grip on the door and turned around to River and his almost glacial expression as he leaned against the frame. "That's the best goddamn sight I think I've seen all fuckin' night."

"My ass?"

"Yep. Just fuckin' perfect. Like just about every other goddamn thing about you, doll. Fuckin’ perfect."

I should've been offended by at least the first part of what he said and how he said it. I should've been. I almost hated that I wasn't if only because of the second part of that sentence.

Almost
.

"What are you doing back here so early?" I asked as I moved off to the side and crossed my arms. "Not enough '
pussy
' to go around out there tonight?"

"There was plenty. Just none of which I'd been lookin' for." His eyes roamed across every inch of my body as he removed his jacket and placed it around a chair at the table. What he wanted from me was clear; how he wanted me to respond to it, not so much. "Either way, I told you I hadn't planned to be out there late tonight,” he said. “I just needed to make myself known to Prez and the Dragons. He and the others can handle those motherfuckers and whatever bitch they brought with 'em."

"I guess."

He made a face at me and knit his brows. "You disappointed I'm back this soon, doll?"

"No. Should I be?"

"Not on my account, babe, no." He walked over to the fridge and grabbed onto the door. "Were you lookin' to get somethin' outta here?"

"I was looking around for a bottle of hot sauce, but--"

His eyes went from one side of the kitchen to the other and he grimaced. "Hot sauce for what?"

"My popcorn on the counter over there."

He peeked over my shoulder and nodded. "Huh. Yeah, I thought I could smell that shit burnin’ after I told Trucker to bounce and before I came inside."

“It’s not burnt,” I muttered.

"Shit smells pretty goddamn burnt to me, babe." He chuckled and reached his hand inside the fridge to pull out a beer. "You put hot sauce on it? For what? To try and muzzle the smell?"

"I put hot sauce on it because it needs something other than what it's got, which is not a whole hell of a lot."

"So what you're sayin' is that you were lookin' for some more spice tonight?" he asked, cracking the cap on the bottle.

I felt the double meaning behind his words and cleared my throat to keep from reacting the way I wanted. "Yeah, sure, something like that.” I gently shoved him out of the way of the fridge and once I finally managed to find the hot sauce, I yanked it from the shelf and closed the door.

I went back over to my bowl and he moved in beside me while drinking back more of his beer. "I can't believe you're really puttin' that shit on there," he said.

"Maybe if you tried some, you'd actually like it."

"I don't need to try that shit to know I won't like it, doll."

I slammed the bottle down on the counter and looked up at him.

He leaned his head and frowned. "What?"

"You don't need to
try something
to know you won't
like it
? How do you even live your life not trying anything and just staying away from absolutely every single thing that could actually be good for you or make it better, just because you
know
that you won't like it? That doesn't even make any sense. You've never had a dog before, do you already know you don't like them? You've never had chicken inside a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, do you know already that you won't like that either? It's like you're just afraid of something different and so far out of your comfort zone--"

"I ain't afraid of shit, babe."

"Yes, you are, I think that's pretty much been made clear."

He opened his hand and pointed toward the bowl. "Is this shit about a goddamn bowl of popcorn with some fuckin' hot sauce?!"

"No, it's not just about the 'goddamn popcorn' or the hot sauce, River, it's about everything --
and
the popcorn. You're afraid of what it'd be like to actually take a chance to
live
. You're so afraid of actually moving forward to something better that you're just letting all the good in life pass you by; not to mention, continuing to do the same old things will get you nothing but the exact same results time and time again. I mean, is this all you want for the rest of your life, beer, bitches, clubs, booze, bikes and sex with women you don't care about and who don't care about you?"

"What the fuck is wrong with just havin' that for a lifetime?" he asked.

"Nothing," I replied. "Nothing is wrong with it if that's all you really hope to have in life. Is it?" He clinched his teeth and I saw the muscles in his jaw tighten as he shook his head. "Don't you want more? Don't you want to be happy?" Slowly, his eyes dropped from my face and he nodded. "Then
what
do you
want
to make it that way, River? Please, just tell me what it is because I...” I stopped to swallow and for a second closed my eyes to keep my brain steady and my thoughts flowing clearly. “I feel like I'm going crazy in not hearing it, so just tell me."

He straightened his back and tightened his hand around the center of his beer. The sweat from the bottle dripped between his fingers, but he didn't even flinch, nor did he take his eyes off of my body. God, he wanted me. I could feel it right down between the center of my thighs, he wanted me just as badly as I wanted him settled there.

"Please, River," I said, moving further into his space, "just tell me what you want. At the very least, just admit it to yourself."

He sucked in the air surrounding us and stared straight into my eyes. "I want..." He paused and sat his bottle down on the counter beside me. "To end this goddamn conversation, and to go to sleep. That'd make me pretty fuckin' happy."

"Would it?" I asked.

"Fuck yeah, it would."

He had shut down on me just as I felt myself finally making a way past that electric fence around his heart.

He backed out of the kitchen and headed down the hall to his bedroom and slammed the door shut and locked it. I threw the rest of his beer into the trash and reached into the bowl for some of my popcorn. But before throwing that first piece into my mouth, I stopped to think.

Damn it, I knew what I wanted. I knew
exactly
what I wanted and had for a long damn time now, and I knew that he wanted it too, maybe even longer than me, maybe even more. And there was no way in hell that I was going to let him or his pigheaded bullshit continue to get in the way of either of us getting exactly what we both wanted, needed, and frankly deserved from each other.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

I marched down the hallway to his bedroom and threw my fist into the door a few times. "River," I called out. When I didn't get an immediate answer from him, I knocked again. "River, I know that you're in there, it's not as if you can actually climb out of one of your windows or walk out here without me seeing you first." I waited again and folded my arms. "Please just open the damn door."

I waited even longer this time and just as I raised my hand to knock again, the door swung back and there he was, standing right in front of me and staring into my eyes while wearing his jeans and... not much else.

Oh boy
.

"Can I help you with somethin'?" he asked before crossing to the other side of the room and turning from me, only to showcase that beautifully sculpted and deliciously molded...
back
.

His actual, literal back because my God, the man's back, just like the rest of his entire body was enough to make my knees buckle from beneath me. There was no doubt that I had felt completely crazy for even lusting over it (
as well as that delicious hawk tattoo with wings that stretched from one end of his shoulder to the other, while the edge of its feet dipped down in the middle and just a few inches above his perfectly shaped ass
), but it was just so ridiculously mesmerizing that I couldn’t help myself despite trying. Smooth, tanned and strong; no wonder he had no problem carrying me from the club to my car and then from my car and into my house that day. The longer I stared at it, the more I just wanted to sink my fingernails into it... and my teeth.

"Doll," he shot back at me over his shoulder, then turned on his heel. "What the hell do you want?"

"I, um..." My eyes darted across those colorful tattoos covering each arm, down to the soft, barely there hairs on his chest, then back up to his perfectly chiseled face and all around again. The longer I looked at him, the dizzier, hotter and more breathless I became. It was without a shadow of a doubt that this man, with or without clothes, was absolutely, stunningly
beautiful
. And not just beautiful, but excruciatingly handsome in a way that it almost hurt me to stare at him, if you can somehow manage to even be both at the same damn time. But he was, and aside from everything else, it made my entire body ache for him that much more than it ever had before that exact moment. "I....” I stopped and swallowed hard again. “What the hell do
you
want, River?"

"What?"

"You were about to tell me what you wanted out there and then you stopped. I want to know what it was before you got all surly on me and came in here to sulk."

He shook his head. "Nothin'."

"Don't bullshit me," I snapped. "God, I am so tired of this. Just tell me what the hell you were going to say, already! I know that there was something and it wasn't the shit that came out of your mouth. For whatever reason, you got spooked and ran back here like some kind of--"

"What?" He glared.

"Almost like a child," I responded. "The look you gave me right before taking off was the same one you had on your face right before you bolted after giving me this monitor" -- I reached inside my shirt to show him the charm -- "disguised as a necklace at the club." I lifted it from around my neck and placed it on the table, then closed the door behind myself and leaned back against it.

He opened his hands and shoved his brows together. "What the fuck are you doin'?"

"I'm waiting," I said. "I'm just
waiting
River, like what I've been doing for so long now, almost too long. I'm just
waiting
for you to stop walking away from me and to finally,
finally
tell me what it is that you were going to say."

He grinded his teeth, locked his jaw and shook his head. "Why are you so goddamn anxious to hear it?"

"Why are you so goddamn anxious to keep it from me like it's some kind of giant secret?"

"It's not a secret, babe," he said. "Believe that shit."

"When you hold something in and refuse to tell another person about it, it's a secret, River. Whether other people think they know what the truth is or not. Until it comes straight from you, it's still a secret--"

He groaned. "Jesus Christ. Bitch, you are too goddamn exhausting for me more often than not, you know that?"

My brows flinched, and my first instinct was to throw it back in his face right along with the head of my fist. Instead I calmly took in a deep breath and nodded. "I know it," I said. "I know it very much. But River?” I moved away from the door and walked to the center of the room where he stood. "Don’t ever call me a bitch again. Okay?"

He narrowed his eyes and tilted his head. "What?"

"I said don't ever call me a bitch again. I absolutely
hate
when you use that word to describe women, especially me. I know that it's typical 'biker lingo' for you and the others and I've only made reference to you saying it once before for that very reason, but not anymore, not when we're...
like this
. I don't deserve to be called that word by anyone, but especially not by you, even if I start acting like one."

He thought about what I said, really seemed to think about it for a good few minutes, and took a step back. "Alright," he said. He tossed his shirt into the dirty clothes hamper across the room and lowered his hands to either side of his hips. His brows arched and his lips twitched as if he was trying to hide a smile from me. "So what the fuck should I call you instead?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. Woman, maybe? Or how about by my actual name? That seems to work out pretty well too."

His eyes rotated between my face and breasts, and he smirked. "Mia."

"What?"

He chuckled. "I was callin' you out by your 'actual' name, babe." His eyes slid back up to mine and suddenly I felt like a tasty, midnight snack that he was just waiting to unwrap and sink his teeth into.

"Oh." Every bit of anger I had was suddenly flushed from my system with just those words and that all too desirable look in his eyes. The fact that he could so easily do something like this to me made me almost hate how much I wanted him. "Thank you. I like the way my name sounds when you say it like that."