BLAMELESS: MC Biker Romance (Black Thorns, #3) (16 page)

“That’s seriously a thing? I mean, that is just…uh…really sexist and caveman-like.”

He laughs. “I get why you and Rox are friends now. You sound just like her when the two of us hooked up. Fact of the matter is, it is what it is, yeah?”

I decide not to harp on about it. After all, my goal here is to be able to stay with Zeb.

“So, I can stay?”

He leans against the wall beside the bed and blows out a breath. “You sure you want that? Nobody’s gonna blame you if you don’t. Doc’s doing a real fast detox. It ain’t gonna be pretty, Sarah. The dose Jase shot him up with was…a lot. Gonna be some nasty shit to be ‘round.”

“I don’t care,” I end up blurting out, really forcefully. “He asked me not to go, so I’m not going to.”

He pushes off the wall and lays his hand gently on my shoulder. “All right. But
I’m
gonna be here, too. I been through this with him before. Gonna need that tonight.” He walks past me and crosses to the door. “Just gotta fill the boys in and let ‘em know he’s gonna be okay, before they end up breaking down the door.”

Chapter 18

~Runner~

I open my eyes slowly.

First thing I notice is the pain jackhammering through my head. Feels like a hangover, but way worse.

It’s hot. Really hot. I’m sweating.

I realize I’m in bed. I reach for the covers to rip ‘em off me and that’s when I see it ain’t just the covers over me.

Sarah’s draped over me, her soft blonde hair fanned out over my chest. She’s asleep. And fully dressed. What’s that all ‘bout? Why’s she in my bed and not naked? Don’t seem like me.

Somebody clears their throat and I turn my head to my left.

Ax is sitting in a chair next to my bed. What the hell’s going on?

I take in the scene all ‘round me and it starts coming back to me.

I shake my head at him and murmur, “Nah. Tell me it didn’t happen, Ax. Weren’t real, right? Just a nightmare?”

The look of devastation in his eyes tells me it were as real as it gets. He don’t even gotta say the words.

I look ‘round, tryin’ to get my bearings.

“How long I been out?”

“All night. Most of the morning.”

Ah fuck. I know what that means. Rapid detox. “You let her stay for that?”

“You asked her to. She wouldn’t leave you. Been holed up in this room, not leaving your bedside.”

I bring my hand to my face. “Fuck.”

Never wanted her to see nothing like this. Never wanted an angel like her to see me in no messed up state. She’s better than all this bullshit.

I clench my fists and bury my face in ‘em.

“She cares ‘bout you, Runner,” he says, laying his hand on my shoulder.

I lift my head and tell him, “I need a drink.”

“Not yet,” he says, in that stern Prez-tone of his. The tone that nobody dares to argue with.

But I guess I’m still messed in the head, cuz I shrug my shoulder outta his grip and hiss at him, “Fuck you.”

I ease Sarah off me and climb outta the bed.

As soon as my left foot touches the floor, Ax is there, his arms ‘round me, supporting my weight. “You gotta rest longer, Runner. You ain’t in no state to be walking ‘round.”

“Need to take a piss, all right?” I snap at him.

He don’t react. And that ain’t like him, the guy with the crazed short temper. I get it right away. He’s pitying me. I try to wrestle outta his hold, but he’s got a fucking vice grip on me. “Let go. I’m fine.”

“Just let me help you, for fuck’s sakes, Runner.”

“I’m
fine
. Let go!”

He does and I pull away, making my way over to the bathroom door over on the other side of the room. “Get her outta here.”

“That ain’t what you really want.”

“Don’t tell me what I want, Ax. Get her outta here. Don’t want her seeing no more of this bullshit. She’s already seen way too much.”

“She’s under club protection.”

“What?” I ask, turning ‘round to look at him.

“You don’t remember?”

I pinch the bridge of my nose. My headache’s getting worse by the second and him talking ain’t helping it. “Remember, what? You get how screwed up I were, yeah? What the hell you think I’m gonna be remembering shit for? You seen me that way before. You know how it works.”

“You claimed her, Runner.”

I did
what?

My eyes dart to Sarah, sleeping on my bed. So looks real peaceful when she’s sleeping. She’s sprawled out over the whole bed, just like every time I’ve slept next to her. She don’t stay on one side. Nah, she spreads out all over me. I never liked that shit ‘til she came along. Now, I’ve already started looking forward to it, waking up to find her body all over mine, her thick blonde hair all mussed up, and those sleepy eyes of hers, first thing in the morning. So…innocent.

But, a guy like me? Do I really deserve that? A woman like her? A
good
woman like her?

I might not remember what the hell happened
after
Jase shot me up, but my memory’s fine with all the shit that went down before that. I remember her holding a goddamn gun in her hand and tryin’ to shoot at the guys coming at us inside the safe house. Jesus. A short time in my world and she’s holding a goddamn gun?
That’s
what I bring to her. And, unlike the whores I usually screw ‘round with, Sarah ain’t built for that bullshit.

She don’t belong in my world.

Sweet and angelic don’t mesh with rough and dirty. And that’s what I am.

“You wanna take it back?”

Ax’s voice pulls me outta my thoughts. But I don’t look at him. Can’t take my eyes off
her
.

“What?” I got no idea what he’s getting at.

“Claiming her? You wanna take it back? You were outta it and—”

“What
she
say when I said it?”

He laughs as he tells me, “Something ‘bout it being sexist.”

Figures.

But then he goes on, “She were determined ‘bout not leaving you. Knew you needed her.”

I blow out a breath and slump against the wall. “She ain’t Rox, Ax.”

“I know, brother.”

“She’s a goddamn angel. Way too innocent.”

“You been treating her that way?”

I scrub my hand over my face roughly. “Can’t be no other way when I’m with her. Ain’t even a question.”

“What’s the problem then?”

“This!” I snap. I gesture angrily to myself. “Me!”

“You ain’t that guy no more. Jase shot you up. You didn’t do it to yourself. Ain’t the same, Runner.” He strides over to me, “You feel me?”

I can see by the look in his eyes and the fierce growl in his voice, just how much he wants that to be true. He
needs
it to be true. He were there last time ‘round when I were pulling myself outta it and fighting to get clean. He don’t want me going through it again, no more than I do. Thing is, don’t matter one bit that somebody else shot me up. Why? Cuz, that high still hit me. That addictive, better-than-anything rush. Don’t even matter how my body reacted so badly to it. I ain’t gonna remember the puking up soon. Only the high it gave me.

Guess I take too long answering, cuz he gets in my face and tells me, “You’re gonna see somebody.”

He means therapy.

“Can’t,” I say.

He grabs my arm. “Runner!”

“Therapy’s for addicts, Ax! You get that? You sending me there’s like saying I
am
one of ‘em again.”

“That ain’t what—”

“Fuck
off
! Just drop it. I’m recovered, okay? Have been for twenty years! I’m recovered!
Recovered
!”

I’m screaming so loud, it wakes Sarah up. I see her lift her head and look our way, all confused and wondering what the hell’s going on.

Ax goes to say something more, cuz he’s a stubborn bastard, but I stop him, fisting my hand in his cut. I glare up at him and growl low, so Sarah don’t hear, “I got this, so I’m warning you now. Stay outta it. When it comes to this, I don’t care that you’re Prez, or if you’re the fucking King of everything, I’ll
make
you stay outta it, if I gotta. Last warning, Ax.
You
feel
me?
”

Before he can get another word out, that I know will push me over the edge, I let go of him and walk into the bathroom, slamming the door behind me.

The second it shuts and I lean against it, I notice my hands are shaking wildly.

I slide down the door and bury my face in ‘em.

Fucking hell.

Chapter 19

~Sarah~

I’ve been staying at the Black Thorns MC clubhouse for a few days now. Ax and Zeb explained to me that I’m under
club protection
. The club has taken on the responsibility of protecting me from Eddie and his people. I didn’t understand why the club would care so much until Zeb explained it’s because he
claimed
me. It makes me something like club property, I believe. I really don’t like the sound of that degrading and extremely sexist explanation. It sounds completely archaic and…odd. But, on the other hand, I know it’s coming from a good place.

Zeb making a claim on me seems to mean I am
his
. His woman. But I really don’t know whether he did that just so I could stay here and obtain club protection, or whether he actually feels that way. Does he really want me as his? We still haven’t talked about any of it. I have no idea where we stand.

In fact, I’ve barely seen him at all.

I’m not staying with him in his room. At Zeb’s request, Ax had one of the prospects set up another room for me that’s situated at the opposite end of the clubhouse to Zeb’s room. Zeb and I haven’t even touched one another since we sat down to dinner at the safe house several days ago. I really don’t know what to make of it. He seemed really into this thing between us while we were at the safe house.

But it had just been the two of us then, cut off from the rest of the world and in our own little bubble. Maybe now we’re back to cold, hard reality, the appeal of
us
has worn off for him. It’s crossed my mind several times that he might be pushing me away. I can’t be certain, because he hasn’t been himself.

Ever since his brother shot him up that night, he hasn’t been the man I’ve come to know.

He’s been antsy, irritable and distant.

Apparently, one of the major jobs he does with the club is fixing up old bikes in a used bike shop in downtown Reirdon Falls. It’s become clear that he has a reputation for being really skilled at it. Ax has banned him from leaving the clubhouse, because
he’s
under club protection too from Jase and locked down. So, he’s been spending most of every day holed up in the garage attached to the clubhouse, working on some bikes there that a couple of the prospects brought up from the shop in town. Outside of that, he gravitates to the bar for the remaining hours of the day and drinks himself into a stupor.

I’ve just been trying to give him some space for a while and busying myself cooking for the boys, something which they’ve been very appreciative of. Men and their food…it really is the way to their hearts, that’s for sure. They’ve all been very friendly towards me since the first meal I cooked for them a few days ago. Some of them have been hanging out with me as well. Grit, Mullet, Dealer and Sin have been sitting with me a lot whenever they have time. Smiter has been my most constant companion, though.

I’m sitting with him right now in the lounge area, watching the evening news on the flat screen TV they had installed a couple of weeks back. I just finished a video call with my staff at
Sarah’s Place.
Seeing as though I can’t be there in person, that was the next best thing. Thankfully, everything is running smoothly at the diner. At least that’s one positive thing I’ve got going for me in amongst all this hell of being stuck in a strange place with people I barely know and Eddie’s threat hanging over me.

Unfortunately, Rox hasn’t come into the clubhouse at all, because of Ax calling the lockdown thing. No significant others of the members are allowed inside right now. Smiter explained to me that it’s because the club, itself, is a target as well. When one member is targeted—in this case, Zeb—because he’s a member of a club, the entire thing is put in the firing line.

The evening news breaks for commercials and I eye Smiter lounging on the couch opposite the armchair I’m relaxing in. “Off to see Halle tonight?” I ask, to make conversation. I’m not going to lie; this entire situation has been making me very antsy. I can’t go to work at my diner, I can’t leave the clubhouse. And Zeb—the one person I do know—barely being around me at all, is not helping things.

“Nah. Not tonight.”

“How come?” I ask, without thinking. Wow, that sounded really nosey.