“Why don’t you go help the other women and make me some of that lemonade of yours? No one makes it as good as you, girl.” Duke stood and grabbed my hand, giving it a gentle squeeze before practically pulling me out of the room. Out in the hall he stopped and practically shoved me in the direction of the kitchen. “He’s not for you, Willa.”
“Wh-why not?” I whispered, trying to look around him into the office. My heart was begging for just one more glimpse of the scary yet beautiful beast inside. Less than ten minutes. That was all it took and I was infatuated.
“He’s older than you,” Duke began and I snorted. I knew for a fact that Tasha had been screwing around with men in their thirties when she was just fifteen. No one but our mother had had a problem with that. I was just a few months away from my eighteenth birthday and still a freaking virgin. And Spider didn’t look all that older than me. Maybe early twenties, definitely younger than Raider. “He belongs to a different MC. Not even in our charter…”
“It’s your charter, Daddy. I don’t have anything to do with this MC,” I reminded me.
Duke let out a frustrated sigh. “Just take my word on it, girl. Stay clear of the Angel’s Halo boys, and especially Spider.”
If only I had heeded his warning…
Chapter 2
Willa
I knew there was a reason I hadn’t spoken to my sister in years. It had just slipped my mind in my excitement to see her and my father. Now, as I stood at the kitchen sink, I was remembering with disgusted clarity.
Tasha was a psychotic bitch.
I hadn’t seen her at all the day before. She had been locked up in her room with the other Angel’s Halo guy and hadn’t even come out to eat dinner last night. Really, all I had been worried about was having to listen to her and sexy maniac still going at it like rabbits. Thankfully there hadn’t been any banging on the walls all night long.
As I waited on the coffee to brew I let my eyes skim over my sister. We didn’t look alike, not even a little. I took after our mother, from the color of my long, dark hair to the gray of my eyes. At just five-foot-one, I was equal in height to my mom as well as just as curvy. Tasha on the other hand looked like the female version of our father. That wasn’t bad, because my sister was beautiful. But she had wider than normal shoulders, small breasts, and little to no ass. Her hair was a long mass of red curls that I knew she had enhanced with some over the counter product. I don’t care how good our genes were, there was no way her glossy hair was that red naturally. Her face was gorgeous. Big brown eyes, pouty mouth, and small slightly upturned nose. Her jaw was soft, very feminine.
It was the hate glaring back at me through those brown eyes that reminded me that my sister wasn’t exactly stable when it came to our relationship as sisters. I knew what it was, what had made her hate me so much. Our mother. Clara Blackstone had made no secret of how she felt about her oldest daughter. Mom had always said that she sensed something dark in her child and couldn’t bring herself to truly love her. I had always thought that was sad… And yeah, really creepy.
Yet even as she was distancing herself from one daughter, she had been pulling the other—me—as close as possible. I was the light to Tasha’s dark, or so our mother would always say. I’d hated to be compared to my sister in such a way. Honestly I wasn’t an angel. I’d had my share of sin. Smoking before school with friends—something I had hated and had only done once. Drinking with friends at parties—getting so drunk I was scared to go home until I was completely over my hangover. Making out with boys and letting them get further than I should. The guys at school all thought I was a teasing slut because I hadn’t let any of them take my v-card even though I’d let them get pretty far. Of course they hadn’t because I hadn’t felt anything other than a mild fascination with the whole thing. If they could have made me mindless with passion I would have spread my legs for them without even blinking.
From the time I could remember, Clara was comparing me to my sister. Tasha could do nothing right. I could do no wrong. That was how it had been with our father too, only he hadn’t rubbed it in Tasha’s face like our mother had. I loved my mother, but she had always seemed so heartless when it came to Tasha and that just wasn’t normal. How do you hate your own child?
“How is the old bag?”
I sighed. I couldn’t blame Tasha for calling our mom names, but that didn’t mean it didn’t bother me. I loved Clara, and I wanted to love Tasha too. “Mom has been having some health issues.” It was possibly the only reason she had let me come to Vegas. She didn’t want me around to see her going through the chemotherapy that the doctors insisted that she needed. “Stage two breast cancer. But she won’t let the doctors operate.”
Tasha didn’t even flinch when I told her that our mother had cancer, while I had cried for two solid days when Clara had finally broken the news to me. “I don’t think I would want some quack hacking on my tits either,” she said, taking a long swallow of her screwdriver, the only thing she was having for breakfast.
“The cancer could come back if she doesn’t have the surgery,” I told her. “The doctors all said that even though it’s only stage two, even with the chemo this cancer is so aggressive that it’s likely to spread unless they do the double mastectomy.”
She shrugged. “Oh well. Let me know when she finally kicks the bucket. I’ll open the champagne and toast to that.”
I turned around, unable to look at her a moment longer. Maybe our mother had been hard on Tasha, but Clara was still her mother—the woman who had brought her into the world. Didn’t she feel even a little compassion?
Thankfully the coffee was done and I poured myself a huge mug before adding just a little sugar. Picking it up along with the slice of toast I’d made earlier, I walked away without another word to Tasha, who was now on her second screwdriver of the morning.
I dropped down onto one of the long sofas in the living area. Two other women were already sitting on another sofa, looking a little hung over. They weren’t the ones from the day before who I had helped make dinner with, and these two looked even less welcoming than the two from yesterday had. So I kept my eyes on the television that was turned to some local news channel and finished my small breakfast.
It was more than half an hour before the guys started coming downstairs. My father’s crew were all grumpy this early in the morning—eleven thirty. When someone spoke to someone else all they got were grumbled answers that were unintelligible to me. I tried not to get excited every time someone’s door would open on the second floor, but my heart wouldn’t listen to me. All I wanted was just a glimpse of him, or so I kept telling myself. A small glimpse and I would be happy for the rest of the day.
Raider appeared to be blurry eyed as he came downstairs. He didn’t go immediately to the kitchen like the other men did. Instead he just flopped down on the closest sofa and closed his eyes again. I laughed because it had been my sofa he had landed on. “Rough night?” I teased.
“Shit. I’m never drinking moonshine with your father ever again,” he mumbled. “Gonna be feeling this for a few days.”
“Sounds like a good plan,” I said with a grin.
“It’s too early to be awake.”
“It’s nearly noon.” I’d been up since seven, gone for a run and then showered before coming back down for something to eat.
“See? Early.” He yawned. “I own a bar, sweetheart. I’m usually not even crawling into bed until dawn. Noon is not a time of the day I see often.”
“A bar?” That made sense to me. It probably worked out great for him. In the little time that I had known him I had realized fast that Raider was a man-whore in the worst way. The two women from the day before had been all over him after dinner last night. I’d seen him leave with one and half an hour later he’d come back for the other one. Gross.
“Hannigans’.” He yawned again, slumping a little lower on the sofa. “My brothers and I own and run it. When my sister is old enough she will too.”
/> Raider looked like he wanted to sit there and go back to sleep. The nice thing to do would have been to let him. But he was the only person that seemed willing to talk to me and I was starving for conversation. “How old is she?”
“Raven?” He cracked an eye open and yawned again. “She just turned sixteen a few weeks ago. How old are you?”
I shrugged. “I’ll be eighteen soon.”
That had his eyes opening wide and he sat up straighter. “Seventeen?” I nodded, because he seemed like he needed the confirmation. He groaned and rubbed his hands over his face. “Damn it.”
I laughed. “Is it that bad?”
“It could be.” He dropped his hands and sighed. “It is what it is, I guess. I’ll have to let him know.”
“Let who know?” I asked, but Raider stood, avoiding my question. “Hey,” I called after him. “Him who?”
“See you later, Willa.” He called over his shoulder. “Stay out of trouble and away from my men.”
I glared after him. “Asshole.”
“Heard that.” He chuckled, but I just shot the finger at his back.
Spider
I hated runs like this.
We weren’t moving anything. Weren’t selling anything. Just sitting around, fact finding. Working on an internal issue within another MC. We were here until it was deemed officially over, and who knew how long that shit could take.
The Red Dragons had a rat and it was our job to sniff him out and then take care of the problem. I had done this only once before, and of course Bash had been with me at the time. It had lasted three weeks and we’d ended up offing three of that MC’s crew. Hawk had been with us then, though. Not Raider.
I wasn’t a fan of Raider.
It wasn’t that I didn’t respect him. I did. I respected everyone in my club; they were my family, especially the Hannigan siblings. Raider… He just didn’t have the balls for something like this, in my opinion. Seriously, you needed to be ruthless when it came to this kind of thing and in the Hannigan family I would put Raider at the bottom when it came to ruthless. Jet was at the top of the list followed by Hawk, Colt and then Raider. And if you really wanted my opinion I would toss Raven in there between Jet and Hawk. Even at sixteen that female was merciless when it came to certain things, and yeah that was smoking hot to me.
That Raider had told me I couldn’t even look at Willa Blackstone yet he was always sniffing around The Red Dragons’ president’s daughter? Yeah, that in no way made me less of a fan. Nope.
Fuck, who was I kidding? I had loved that shithead like a brother until he’d pulled rank, ordered me to stay away from Willa—because Duke Blackstone had said so—and then started sticking to her like glue. He was lucky I didn’t want to face Bash’s beating or I’d have already stomped the fucktard.
It had been five days since Willa had arrived and I had bent over backward to keep my distance from her. But my resolve was fading fast and I was going to give in. Especially when she looked at me through those deliciously long eyelashes with those stormy gray eyes. She had tried to get my attention countless times, and when I had point-blank ignored her she had gotten hurt.
I didn’t like the look on her face when she was hurting.
That look that had been on her face this morning when I had just walked by after she had spoken to me. I’d been gutted ever since and my mood was dark by the time we pulled our bikes into The Red Dragons’ compound parking lot. We were no closer to finding the rat than we had been when we had first arrived. No one knew why we were here except for Duke, and while some of the MC here knew Bash, they also knew what his job inside of Angel’s Halo was. Enforcers only showed up when shit was about to hit the fan and so everyone had clammed up. Bash was the most feared enforcer on the West Coast; no one wanted to have to face him for punishment.
They needn’t have worried though. Bash and I weren’t here to kick ass—unless it was to beat information out of someone. We were here to take care of the situation. End it once and for all. That didn’t require leaving the rat broken and bloody. Just dead. Fists weren’t going to be involved.
Beside me Bash got off his own hog. Raider was already halfway to the front door of the compound. I should have been too. The Nevada heat was scorching and I was anxious to get inside to the AC. But even as I started to get off my hog something from the corner of my eye caught my attention and held on.
Turning my head, I saw Willa running down the side street. Dressed in a pink tank top and white running shorts that barely covered that perfectly round ass of hers, she would have made a dead man sit up and pay attention. Her long dark hair was pulled back into a tight ponytail and swayed with each step she took. Her shirt was covered in sweat and I wondered how long she had been out here at it. In this heat? She was going to get heatstroke if she wasn’t careful.
Raider disappeared into the compound, but Bash, noticing my hesitation, followed my gaze. Shaking his dark head he turned to look at me. “She could get you killed, man.” It wasn’t a warning, just a statement. We both knew the rules. President of an MC said hands off, that meant hands off. Or face the consequences. Bash was struggling with that rule just as much as I was right now.
A week before we had come on this run Raven had told Bash she wanted to be his. The only thing that had stopped Bash hadn’t been the hands off rule, but Raven’s age. No way did Bash do jailbait. Even if it was killing him. He was fucking everything in sight to get that female out of his system and nothing was working. Not even a full day of depraved, sick sex with Tasha Blackstone.
When I didn’t say anything my friend just sighed. “I’ve got your back, brother,” he assured me before walking into the compound without a backward glance.
I waited until the door was shut behind Bash before taking off down the side street I had seen Willa heading. The heat was beating down on me and my shirt was glued to me under my cut. If I was this hot and uncomfortable how must she be feeling?
At the end of the street I found Willa stopped, bent over and sucking in deep breaths. She had her earbuds in so when I tapped her on the shoulder she nearly jumped out of her skin. Her gray eyes were wary as she gazed up. “Hey.”
“It’s a hundred and ten out here, Willa. Don’t you think you should wait until the sun goes down?” Her face was flushed, sweat rolling off of her. I wanted to lick it all away. “You could get heatstroke or something out here. And what about sunscreen? You’re burning.” I clasped her hand in mine gently so I could inspect her red arms better. She was burning and that just pissed me off. Her skin was perfect, porcelain.
She pulled her arm free. “It was either go for a run or murder my own sister. I’d rather face the heat than a jail cell.”
I grimaced at the mention of Tasha. It was no secret that Tasha did nothing but goad Willa. Taunting her every chance she got. It was childish and Willa showed who the more mature of the two sisters was by ignoring Tasha. For the most part. Tasha could try the patience of a saint and no mere mortal could hold on forever. Willa would snap before long, and no one would blame her. That was exactly what Tasha wanted, for Willa to throw the first punch.
And then all hell would break loose. Tasha was a nasty piece of work. She played dirty, fucked dirty, and fought dirty. I’d end up in a jail cell myself if Tasha hurt Willa.
“Come hang out in my room, then.” I found myself offering. “Tasha won’t bother you in there.”
Her eyes widened, her mouth gaping open. I’d surprised her big time. “Are you feeling well? This morning you wouldn’t even speak to me. Now you’re offering to spend time with me? Of your own free will or is my father making you do it?”
I snorted. “Baby, your dad would shoot me dead if he found out I wanted you in my room.”
“So why the change of heart?” she asked, one brow cocked as she turned her head to watch me.
I thrust my hands into the pockets of my jeans and shrugged. “We can talk about that later. So do you want to hang out or not? I’ve got some DVDs in my
room. A few of my favorite movies. We could watch them.”
She just stood there for a long while and I was starting to second guess my decision to talk to her at all when she finally nodded her head. “I need to shower first. Leave your door cracked and I’ll come over when I’m done.”
“Don’t let anyone see you. I’m not supposed to even look at you, Willa…”
Stormy gray eyes narrowed. “So that’s why? My dad doesn’t want you near me?” I blew out a frustrated breath and nodded. Her face relaxed and she smiled. “Okay, then. This is our secret.”
I was a dead man.
Chapter 3
Spider
I needed a shower in the worst way.
Since getting to Vegas it felt like I was showering every time I came inside from the heat. I took my time, making sure I wouldn’t embarrass myself by being alone with Willa for a long period of time. It was her face I saw as I closed my eyes and stroked myself. Jaw clenched I tried to contain the groan that was shredding my throat to be released.
I’d left my door cracked open, but thought I would have had more time to get dressed before she came to me. So when I walked out of the bathroom with just a towel around my waist I was surprised to see her sitting on the edge of my bed with my collection of favorite movies spread out around her.
“Hey, this is my favorite!” She raised her head with the DVD of The Boondock Saints in her hand. When her gray eyes saw my damp, bare chest she turned a pretty shade of pink but didn’t look away.
It didn’t seem to matter that I had just gotten off in the shower. My body had gone rock hard as soon as I’d seen her. The towel around me tented outward, letting her see just how affected I was by her nearness. But if I was expecting her to be embarrassed by my reaction to her, I was completely wrong—and it only made my body harder with need for her.
As her gaze skimmed over me, caressing me with those storm cloud eyes, I reacted as if she had physically touched me. My breathing turned into harsh pants as I stood there and let her look to her heart’s content. I nearly groaned out loud when her tongue snuck out of her bee stung mouth and licked her bottom lip while her eyes drank in the sight of water glistening off my abdomen. When she got to the towel and saw how affected I was, she made a little mewling sound in the back of her throat and finally looked away.