Night After Night (Night Riders Motorcycle Club Book 1) (10 page)

CHAPTER TWELVE

Pulling his gun from his holster, Eric aimed below a cruel grin, and he licked his lips as Grace trembled and Lauren stayed in his gaze.

“Looks like the boys haven’t been doing such a good job keeping you sluts in check,” he said. “Letting you just wander all around camp like it’s nothing.”

Grace cowered against her back, and Lauren shifted her eyes to the other man that strolled to Eric’s side. He looked as mean as Eric. Maybe meaner, and when she saw the snarling dog etched on the back of his leather jacket, she knew that he was a Demon Dog.

And Lauren’s breath intensified at the thought of what they would do to them.

“So… so what’s the deal?” Lauren asked in a quivering voice. “You throw in with them because the Night Riders won’t have you anymore?”

Eric roared with laughter, and the Demon Dog was quick to join in.

“Listen to this one!” Eric said. “Looks like she got the lay of the land real quick.”

He stepped closer, and Lauren flinched when he tried to touch her cheek.

“But Blake has nothing on me, babe,” Eric said. “And we’re gonna really rock your world. This one, too.” Before Lauren could stop him, Eric seized Grace by her hair, and she went wild when he tore her robe away leaving her naked in the moonlight. “See?” Eric said as he turned her frantic body towards the other man. “Trimmed and ready for whatever you want.”

The Demon Dog pulled a razor from his pocket, and as the memory of Callie’s tale of the opposing crew suddenly burned bright in her brain, Lauren charged forward and took hold of Eric’s shoulders. “Don’t you fucking touch her!” Lauren screamed. “Leave her-”

She was silenced by the feel of his fist smacking into her middle, and Lauren doubled over in agony. Hardly able to lift her head, her soul cracked at the sight of Grace’s body being hauled away. Struggling to come up with some way to help her, to save her, Lauren’s thoughts turned to her own fate when the Demon Dog grabbed her arms and started to drag her through the sand.

“Let me go,” Lauren moaned. “You can’t–”

“Listen to the lady!”

Lauren’s body fell to the sand, and she was slightly relieved when the hands of the Demon Dog left her body. Peering through her hair, she saw a bare-chested Blake with his own gun drawn. Paul was at his side, and Lauren watched him lock eyes with Grace.

“Paul…” Grace murmured.

“Let her go,” Paul said in a thick voice. “I paid for her fair and square, Eric.”

Eric licked his lips and moaned into her trembling neck. He ran his rough hands up and down her naked sides, and he pressed his fingers between her legs. “I want these bitches,” Eric said. “So does my new crew. So you better–”

Blake cut him off with a sharp shot. Lauren screamed and pressed her hands to her ears as the Demon Dog that had held of her fell to the ground, his face a mass of blood and brains.

“Jesus Christ!” Crawling away from the scene, she paused when she felt Eric’s gun pushing into the back of her head.

“You think you won’t pay for that?” Eric said. “You’re a dumber than you look, Blake.”

Lauren went still, and she thought that this would be her end. She should have tried to run sooner, and she wanted to find Blake’s eyes one last time. But he failed to meet her gaze, and he narrowed his stare around Eric.

“No dumber than you,” Blake hissed. “Now you got two choices. Go back empty-handed and see what that gets you, or I can just kill you right here and now. I’m down with the latter, but you let her go, and see me generous”

The barrel of the gun started to shake against her hair and Lauren seized the opportunity to take Grace by the arm and fall into the cold sand.

“Stupid sluts!” A shot rang out from Eric’s gun.

Lauren covered Grace with her body, and she saw Blake and Paul duck in unison. He was ready to fire again when the Night Riders recovered quickly, and they aimed their guns right at Eric’s chest.

“We’ll do you right here, right now,” Blake said.

“No.” Paul stepped forward, casting a quick glance at Grace. Eric was still ready to shoot, but Paul showed no fear as he lunged forward.

“Kill me right now,” Paul challenged.

“No, please!” Grace cried as Lauren held her closer.

“And then Blake will blow your fucking head off. What’s it gonna be, coward? Die right here, right now, or maybe you live to fight another day.”

With Grace still in her arms, Lauren could barely suppress a satisfied smile as Eric looked at Blake and started to back off. He stepped over the fallen Demon Dog and mounted his bike. “This isn’t over,” Eric spat.

“Never said that it was,” Paul said.

Eric sped off into the night, and when his headlights disappeared, Paul shifted gears and fell to the girls’ side. “Are you okay?” he asked.

Lauren expected Grace to burst into tears, but she calmed when Paul held her and covered her with his jacket. “I am now,” she assured him.

Lifting her off the ground, he pressed her close to his chest and snorted at the sight of Blake’s most recent kill bleeding out on the sand. “I’ll get someone to clean that up,” Paul promised. “Take care of her.”

They were gone, and Lauren trembled at the sight of the smoking gun in Blake’s hands. “You killed him,” she said in a flat tone.

“I’d kill anyone that tries to touch you.”

He held out his hand, and she accepted his grasp. As soon as he had her off the ground, Blake leaned close to kiss her, but Lauren cracked her palm across his face, and her eyes turned to ice as he stared at her in shock.

“What the–?”

“I can’t do this,” Lauren said. “You’re a killer, and you’ve kidnapped me. I… I have a life to get back to. I won’t… I won’t let you keep me–”

Blake silenced her with a swift kiss. Lauren tried to push him away, the sound of the gunshot and the image of murdered man at the forefront of her mind.

He’s brutal. I have to get away from him. I can’t… I…

Her thoughts turned to the heat of his kiss as his tongue swirled down her throat.  Blake wrapped her in his arms and dragged her closer to his chest. Without wanting to or knowing how it was even possible, Lauren went limp in his embrace, and when she finally kissed him, she felt his mouth curve into a smile that only intensified when he pulled away and stared hard into her eyes.

“You want to go?” he asked as he cocked his eyebrow. “I’ll drive you out of camp myself.”

“Good,” Lauren said. “Then right–”

His hand suddenly surrounded her wrist, and he pulled her close once again. “But know this,” Blake said. “I can’t keep you safe out there. And I can’t…I don’t…” He draped his arm over her back, and his moist kiss met her ear, his whisper drizzling into her veins. “I don’t want you to go,” he said. “I need you here. And you want to be here, too.”

She stated to melt in his arms, and her body went limp as he carried her way from the corpse, other Night Riders rushing to attention to conceal his crime.

“Don’t tell me otherwise,” he said. “Don’t lie.”

Back in his bed, Lauren was stiff in his hold, and she looked to his eyes, his tattoos, the scars that broke through his skin. “How can you be doing this to me?” she moaned. “I shouldn’t want to stay.”

“But you do,” he said. “Because you know that this is right.”

Kissing her hard, Lauren finally brought her arms around his neck, and as their lips parted, she sighed into his chest. “Yes,” Lauren admitted. “Don’t know why. I… I just wanted to see what else was out there–”

“And now you know.”

Claiming her mouth again, he pressed his hand between her legs, and his finger slipped into her body. Moaning around his lips, she reached down to her thighs and pressed his hand deeper.

“This is crazy,” she whispered. “Before…right before you did what you did, I was thinking of ways to leave.”

His face darkened, but when she didn’t break away from his hold, Blake brought his brow to hers, and he kissed her neck.

“And now?” he asked.

He was a killer. He was her captor. But he had kept her safe, and he promised to keep doing nothing but. And when his fingers grazed against her cunt… “Right now, I’m not thinking of running.”

Pulling off his pants, Blake tore her clothes away and settled inside her. “Good,” he said. “Don’t ever think about that again.”

He began a slow, smooth stroke against the space of her wet walls, and Lauren felt her body sinking deeper into the mattress as he pushed his palms into her shoulders.

“Not thinking about running now, are you?”

Not now. Maybe never again. She forgot her parents and Drew; she forgot the body being buried in the desert. Stretching towards him, Lauren wrapped her arms around his taut torso, and she rested her head against his chest. “No,” she whispered. “I’m not.”

Blake’s cock swirled and pushed inside her, and Lauren touched his face with a sure hand.

“Take care of me,” she whispered.

He kissed her lips lightly, and his cock moved deeper. “Always,” he promised. “Forever.”

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CHAPTER ONE

Lauren Nichols stirred in her sleep. In her dreamscape, she saw the rapidly fading image of a road stretching behind her for miles, and she had the sensation of moving away from something that she couldn’t name. For the slightest of seconds, she caught the sight of her mother reaching for her with a soft, sad smile and open arms. Something told Lauren that she should move towards the waiting embrace. But as soon as her feet hit the asphalt, her head whipped over her shoulder and she saw the lines of a broad muscular back mounted on a chopper, speeding off into the opposing distance. Her lips tried to form the name
Blake
, but only a silent scream hit the air. Blake didn’t stop; he simply hit the gas harder. As Lauren watched him disappear over the horizon, she sank to the road. The sand-swept gravel did not break her descent; she was falling deeper, deeper still, her hands flailing wildly as she tried to reach for something, for anything, for Blake…

She gasped as she sat up with a start, ragged breath shaking throughout her heaving chest as she wiped her hands across her perspiring face. It took her a few minutes to remember where she was and how she had gotten here.

I was going… I was starting out on a trip. And my car broke down. A truck? Someone… two men…

In a great rush, everything came back. Her capture, the auction, and the seemingly unimpeachable declaration that her life was no longer her own. Shifting her head over her shoulder, her eyes lingered on Blake’s lean form as he lay at her side, his body still as he was lost in his own dream.

And his words came crashing back to her brain.

I paid good money for you.

The thought of that still made her shiver, and a small voice in the back of her head told her that she should take this chance while he was out cold and try to make her way back to some place resembling civilization. But she had tried that once before, and it had nearly been the end of her. And Grace. Only Blake’s intervention had kept her safe, and he told her that he couldn’t be that if she left his protection. The man was far from all-powerful, and Lauren briefly contemplated attempting to make another run for it…

Not thinking about running now, are you?

How could she when the memory of his cock swirling inside her still pulsed between her legs? He was doing things to her that she never thought were possible, especially if she had stayed at home and instantly linked her life to Drew’s.

Drew
.

By now he had to know that something was wrong. Had he already set out in a bid to find out where she was or if she was still alive? The idea of him possibly charging to her rescue should have buoyed her spirits, brought tears to her eyes, a smile to her face.
Something
. But as she pictured his blonde figure in pursuit of her whereabouts, she felt a numbing cold settle across her heart. Was it resignation to her new fate? Or was it the sudden realization that she didn’t care one way or the other if she never laid eyes on him again?

One thing was certain as her thoughts raced in every direction. Drew never would have known how to handle a gun, much less Eric and the Demon Dogs that had every intention of carrying her and Grace to a darker camp. It was Blake who knew how to fire the fatal shot, and as the cracking sound echoed in her brain, it was swiftly followed by his words when she practically begged for his continued protection.

Always. Forever.

Lauren fell back to her side, and her fingers traced the lines of his sleeping face. Held deep in the bosom of sleep, it was nothing to mistake him for an angel. His cheeks were firm and fine, and a warm stream of sensuous air passed through his parted lips. She rested her fingers there, and she was on the verge of kissing him to consciousness. The need to feel him throbbing inside her again trumped any doubts or memories of her past life, but she stopped short of pressing her mouth to his.

She liked watching him sleep. She liked looking at him; period. No. She wasn’t going anywhere. Not when the Demon Dogs might come back at any second in search of a pound or more of his flesh. If Drew was really out there, if her family somehow found her… Lauren would deal with that then.

But for now…

Blake’s eyes fluttered open, and Lauren bit down on her lip at the return of his blue gaze. As the realization of her presence seemed to register in his mind, Lauren’s mouth curved into a smile, and she delicately brought her hands to his face.

“You’re up,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

Reaching for her hand, Blake took her hand and clutched it tightly. She sighed at the feel of his palm pressing into hers, and Blake simply tightened his hold as he dragged her fingers closer to the smooth lines of his chest.

“What were you doing?” he asked. “Were you watching me?”

Lauren nodded into his skin and nuzzled her nose against his pecs.

“You looked so good,” she confessed in a muffled voice. “I like it.”

“Do you?” he asked. “Is that all you like?”

He pushed his fingers under her chin and lifted her face to his. The warmth lingered in his eyes as he ran his fingers through her hair and brought his lips to her eyes. Her eyelids shut as she absorbed the heat of his soft kisses, and when she could see again, his face seemed harder. The shift should have scared her. There was a time not so long in the past when it nearly did. But now, as she shook her head and grazed her fingers down his hard sides, her hands finding hip muscles that protruded from the place so near to his tight abs, she peered at him and cuddled closer to his body.

“I like other things,” she confessed in a whisper. “Lots of other things.”

“Oh yeah?” he asked, the call to rise bubbling across his tongue. Lauren’s hand drifted down his thighs, and she found his cock primed and poised to tear into her wet and waiting flesh. Blake pushed her into the sheets, and he pressed his knees to her thighs as the tip of his hard cock teased the edges of her expectant mound.

“Beg me.”

Lauren let out a light laugh, and danced her nails up his arms. “Are we doing that again?”

She started to take his hands in hers when Blake seized her wrists and pushed her back into the bed. Gasping at the feel of his hands capturing were she lay, she was forced into his stare, and Blake held her fast as he poised his cock on the precipice of her pussy.

“If it’s what I want, then yes,” he said. “Say the words, Lauren.”

She needed the feel of him back inside her. God help her. But Lauren pushed her lips together and stayed silent.

“So you’re still playing it like that?” he asked. “Come on, Lauren.”

He pushed close to her neck, and Lauren stretched forward to meet the feel of his mouth. She longed for him just take her in his arms. But Blake kept Lauren entrapped in his hands, and she was unable to suppress a whimper as he licked her naval and narrowed his gaze to her captive eyes.

“We can play games,” Blake said. “Truth be told, I like having fun with you.”

It sounded crude, but when he followed his words with a soft kiss to her breasts, Lauren moaned around the feel of his lips, and she arched her body closer to his mouth.

“I get that,” Lauren said. “So—”

Blake flipped her to her back. For a second, she shuddered at the thought that she could no longer read his face and hope for even a hint of his intentions. And yet, the not knowing sent a wave of anticipation coursing through her veins.

How can I really be this girl? I should fight and scream and do everything for my freedom.

But she wanted something far sweeter.

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