CRASH: An Evil Dead MC Story (The Outlaw Series) (26 page)

His palm was hot when it slid against her bare back as he guided her
down the hall. The large size of his hand at the small of her back reminded her
how much bigger he was than she. Made her feel small, feminine and protected.

“Don’t get skittish on me now.” Crash spoke low in her ear, and the
touch of his hand at her back became firmer as if he thought she might try to
run and he had no intention of letting that happen. She wouldn’t let him think
she was afraid. He’d said he’d be with her every minute. Promised her, even.
And she didn’t want him to think she was young and naïve. She moved with him,
obeying his guiding hand urging her forward. “Can you hear it? The music?”

They’d been in Cole’s room long enough that the vibe of the party had
shifted. It had a darker, more erotic feel now. The lighting was dimmer, someone
had turned on a strobe light down there, and the driving beat of the bass
seemed to throb through her, the pulsations reminiscent of the very act of sex
itself. She paused at the top of the stairs. Taking in the scene below her. She
could make out two women dancing on a small raised dais that she hadn’t noticed
before in the corner. They weren’t completely naked, yet, but they were close.

Shannon swallowed, jerking her gaze away. But there wasn’t any place
safe for her gaze to land. There were more circulating among the crowd, some
giving lap dances, others rubbing up against some of the brothers.

She looked up at Crash. “You won’t let anything happen that I don’t
want, right?”

“Got my word, Princess.”

She felt Crash’s warm hand close over hers, and he tugged her down the
stairs and through the crowd toward a table in the back of the room where Cole
and Red Dog were sitting. They passed a pool table where one of the girls was
bent over backwards while a man was doing a belly shot off her or perhaps it
was something else they were doing. Shannon just saw a lot of naked skin and
tried to avert her eyes.

They passed a few other women rubbing up against the men. One girl was
giving Green a lap dance, her naked body writhing against him. Shannon glimpsed
the sparkle of jewelry dangling from the girl’s pierced nipples that jiggled as
Green smacked her ass.

Shannon looked away in mortification. This was beyond her experience.
These were men who had probably had a lot of women, apparently not just in a
bed, but across pool tables, up against walls, and God knew where else. She
felt overwhelmed by it all and was about to demand Crash take her home when he
arrived at the high-top table in a dimly lit corner where Cole and Red Dog sat.
And then the two men were staring at her.

Cole grinned. “You hangin’ in there, sweetheart?”

Crash sat down on a bar stool and pulled her to stand between his spread
knees, her back to his chest. He answered Cole’s question before she could.
“She’s fine.”

Cole signaled to one of the prospects, and a few moments later a rum and
cola was set before her. The men were drinking Tequila shots.

Crash had one forearm on the table, his right hand riding lightly on her
bare hip. She jumped slightly as his hand squeezed. “Relax,” he murmured close
to her ear. “I won’t bite.”

“Relax? Easy for you to say,” she replied.

He chuckled. She felt the warmth of his breath on her neck, and heat
radiating off his body to her bare back. She trembled in response.

“Sorry about earlier, darlin’,” Red Dog apologized.

“She knows the score, it won’t happen again, Dog,” Crash interjected
tersely.

“No, I’m the one who should apologize. It’s not my business. Crash made
that clear. I had no right to interfere on Mary’s account,” Shannon stated.

“Now you’re really making me feel lower than a snake,” Red Dog muttered.

“Enough of this shit. Let’s drink to letting it slide.” Cole lifted the
bottle, pouring a round of shots. He paused over the fourth shot-glass, looking
over at Shannon. “Gonna join us, Shannon?”

Biting her lip, she nodded, feeling compelled to accept even though
shots weren’t really her thing. They all lifted their glasses. She did as well.
Cole looked at her and instructed, “Gotta down it in one quick gulp now, babe.”

She nodded and downed it with the rest of them. The men all slammed
their glasses down on the table. Shannon almost dropped hers. Holy crap! Fire
exploded in her throat and mouth. She could feel it burning all the way down,
and she started coughing.

Cole winked at her as her eyes started to water, and Crash signaled to
one of the prospects. A moment later a glass of water was set down in front of
her. She practically chugged the whole glass.

“You okay, Princess?” Crash asked, leaning down to her ear.

She nodded and gasped out, “Holy moly.”

The table burst out in laughter. Cole lifted the bottle. “Ready for
another?”

She waived it off. “No. God, no.”

“You sure? Second one goes down easier,” Cole promised, trying to tempt
her.

Crash pushed the rum and cola in front of her. “Maybe you should just
stick to this.”

Red Dog looked over at Shannon. “You did me a favor tonight, girl. I
shoulda run Rosalie off months ago. She’s a freaking nut-bag!”

Cole and Crash tried to smoother their laughter.

They drank several more drinks, and before she knew it, Shannon was
starting to feel the effects of the alcohol.

Green wandered over trying to scoot in next to Shannon, but Crash put a
stop to that by giving him a hard shove to the shoulder and sending him
stumbling. At the same time, Crash’s arm encircled her low on her hips with a
possessiveness as he pulled her back against him. There was a decisive quality
to his shielding actions. The male protecting his female. It struck something
deeply feminine in her that was unmistakably and intensely drawn to the
masculinity of him. She’d never felt safer than she did with this man who was
so opposite of everything she’d thought her ideal man would be. The rightness
of having his arms around her drifted through her as the alcohol mellowed her.

“Hey, man, just trying to be friendly,” Green complained, drunkenly.

“Get lost before I beat your face in,” Crash suggested gruffly.

After he stumbled off, Shannon
turned her face enough to speak against Crash’s jaw.
“I thought you
weren’t going to fight.”

He nuzzled her ear, growling with a low and sexy rumble, “Yeah? Do I get
a reward for getting through the night without killing someone?”

She was corralled between his spread thighs as he sat on the barstool.
Lifting one hand, she rubbed her palm over his thigh. “Maybe, if you earn it.”

His arms tightened around her, his laughter rumbling through her. “I
like you like this,” he murmured against her ear. “Relaxed and tipsy and
teasing. Sexy as fuck.”

The show was going on all around them with strippers dancing throughout
the place, but none of it was getting her as hot as Crash’s voice whispering in
her ear.

His mouth was suddenly on her neck, just below her ear, and then he was
trailing kisses along to the curve of her shoulder. The tip of his tongue
sliding over her skin before his mouth closed on her neck and sucked, gently at
first, and then firmer. She felt her skin flush, and her breathing quickened.
Dear God, it wasn’t fair how he could do this to her with just the touch of his
mouth. Shannon trembled and felt his hold tighten. He was starting to have such
an effect on her. She knew it was dangerous, letting herself fall for a man
like him, but the feelings his touch was enticing out of her were starting to
overwhelm her.

One of the girls danced up to their table, she shimmied and gyrated, her
tiny G-string stuffed full of bills. Rather than lavishing attention on the men
at the table, she zeroed in on Shannon. She reached out her hands, and taking
Shannon’s hands, she tugged, trying to pull her from her place. “Come on,
sugar. Dance with me.”

Shannon pulled back, reluctant. Crash leaned in, his mouth brushing her
ear. “Go. I want you to. Let her teach you a few moves. You can show them to me
later.”

Maybe it was the shot she’d had. Maybe it was the sound of his deep
voice in her ear telling her he wanted her to do this. Telling, not asking.
Maybe it was his warm hands on her bare hips already easing her forward. She
didn’t know, but she suddenly found herself being pulled forward a few steps
from the table. And then the girl was moving, instructing Shannon. Soon she was
moving to the music, her eyes drifting closed, feeling the beat of the music
pulsing through her. Her hips undulating, her arms reaching sinuously over her head.

Crash watched, hypnotized by the fluid, graceful movements of her lithe
body. Rolling. Rippling. Swaying. He couldn’t take his eyes from the curve of
her hips as they slowly twisted, rotating right, and then left. His eyes were
drawn to the sparkling rhinestone that dangled and swung from her belly button.
He longed to drop to his knees at her feet and put his mouth on that belly. And
he knew the vision of how she was moving for him would haunt his dreams and
play front and center in every jerk-off fantasy he had from now on.

He’d been hard since he’d first seen her walk through the door. And now,
here she was, shocking the shit out of him by actually going along with the fun
and dancing for him. Life around her was never dull.

Cole reached over shoving a five dollar bill in the waistband at her hip,
and it snapped Crash out of his daze. Without conscious thought, he slipped two
fingers in the back of Shannon’s leather halter and pulled tight, tugging her
back into his hard body. “Show’s over.”

“Crash!” Shannon baulked.

He yanked the bill from her waistband, and flung it back at Cole.

“Hey, that’s mine. I earned it!” Shannon protested, laughing, trying to
snatch it back.

“You sure did, babe,” Cole agreed with a grin and a wink.

Crash pulled her back. “What the hell, you looking for a new
profession?”

“You wanted me to dance. What’s your problem?”

“My problem is you having a little fun is one thing. Guys starting to
shove money down your pants is another.”

She laughed. “Spoil sport.”

Cole pretended to glare at Crash. “Well since you just sucked all the
fun out of it, I’m getting another drink.” He got up and headed toward the bar,
pausing just long enough to brush a kiss to the top of Shannon’s head and then
lean in and whisper, “That was awesome, hot-stuff.”

Crash jerked his head at Red Dog, indicating he wanted him to give them
some time alone. Red Dog got up and followed Cole.

Shannon took another sip of her drink and looked around the crowded
room.

Crash stroked his thumb slowly up and down the curve of her waist, his
eyes falling to the sexy line of her shoulder blades bared to him. He wanted to
lick his tongue along her spine and watch her shudder in reaction. Instead, he
lowered his head to the curve of her neck and inhaled. She smelled amazing, her
intoxicating, provocative scent filling his head and enflaming his desire
further.

At the touch of his mouth along her shoulder, she twisted her head to
him, and her palm reached up and captured the side of his face, holding him
close. She pressed a soft kiss to the side of his throat, and he growled,
“That’s nice, baby. Do it again.”

She did.

He pressed kisses along her shoulder. “You smell so fucking good.” One
of his palms slid down over her hip to her ass, and he squeezed.

His hand on her bottom was so damn erotic. Crash was changing everything
she thought she knew about herself in just a week. He stood behind her, his
eyes following her every move. Her skin flushed with a tingling warmth
everywhere his eyes strayed. She couldn’t stop herself from responding to his
every look, his every touch.

Her back against his chest, she could feel his hard cock prodding her
backside, letting her know just how much he was effected by her as well.

She couldn’t stop herself from melting into Crash’s chest. She was warm from
the alcohol and feeling her power as a woman. It made her want to entice him,
to tempt him to touch her, so she writhed against him.

His response was quick, his big hands suddenly closing roughly over her
breasts as he spoke in her ear. “You trying to stir me up? Hmm? Trying to
provoke me, Princess? Be careful what you wish for, because you just might get
it.”

Wolf sat at a table, watching the entertainment. Every time he let his
gaze stray to the left, Crash had his hands all over Shannon, touching and
cuddling. Jealousy clawed at Wolf’s gut, especially with Crystal flirting with
those two new buddies of Crash’s at the far end of the bar, looking sexy as
hell in that little black dress and acting like Wolf didn’t fucking exist.

If that’s the way she wanted to play it that was fucking fine with him.
Wolf could have any one of Sonny’s girls sitting in his lap with a crook of his
finger. Picking up his beer, he downed the rest of it, his eyes straying back
to Crystal. A moment later, he was slamming the bottle back down on the table,
and before he could stop himself, he was out of his chair and heading towards
her.