Fire Inside: A Chaos Novel (32 page)

“Where am I?” he repeated and when I still looked confused, he went on, “Right now, Lanie, where am I standing?”

It sifted through me what he meant and left warmth in its wake.

“At my back,” I answered softly.

“At your back, baby, now and always,” he replied, kissed my shoulder again, gave me a squeeze and another sexy grin. Then he let me go and walked away.

I looked at myself in the mirror.

And I felt better.

* * *

I wasn’t feeling better as I walked up the concrete stairs that led to Tyra’s office at Ride.

That feeling had worn off now that the time had come.

Tyra was the office manager at Ride and had been since before she and Tack got married. They’d met because she got hired there. That was, the weekend before she started work, she’d gone to what she thought was a company party but was really a Chaos hog roast blowout. Tack plied her with tequila and shrouded her with his hot guy, badass aura and she’d fallen in his bed and in love with him in one night.

Unfortunately, at the time, Tack just thought she was a piece of ass and made that clear to Ty-Ty. He also didn’t know she was his new office manager. When he found out, he tried to fire her, but she lost her mind. He woke up when she served up the Ty-Ty attitude and, from that point on, went balls to the wall to win her.

He succeeded.

The rest was history.

I was thinking this instead of re-rehearsing (for the seven thousandth time) what I was going to say when I opened the door and moved into Tyra’s office.

I got two big smiles.

Elvira was there.

This was good. Elvira might be crazy but she was also honest and loyal. Further, the woman was pathologically social but it wasn’t about not being alone or collecting all the friends she could get. It was just that she had a lot of goodness to give and she gave it without hesitation. I’d seen her make BFFs in a bar with a woman on the stool beside her that she’d never met and she broke the land speed record doing this. She was so infectious with her personality and so obviously someone you’d want to know.

Hop—right then I knew since he promised he would be—was in the Compound waiting for me to come to him after this was over. He figuratively had my back from afar.

Elvira being there meant she’d have it from up close.

“Hey,” I called as I closed the door behind me.

“Hey honey,” Ty-Ty called back.

“Get this,” Elvira announced in greeting. “After the big to-do with Tabby, now we’ve learned Hop’s got some bitch he’s nailin’ on the sly and the boys won’t say who she is.”

I stopped dead and blinked.

Oh God!

“What I want to know is, why it’s a secret,” Tyra said to Elvira. “I mean, I understand why Tab and Shy kept their secret, but why Hop? He isn’t a secretive guy.” She grinned. “I’m guessing she’s a librarian.”

Elvira threw her head back and laughed at the very idea of Hopper Kincaid and a librarian.

“Maybe a female cop,” Ty-Ty went on, her voice trembling with amusement. “The boys would
freak
if he was doing the nasty with a cop.”

Elvira, clearly finding this the height of amusement, which I did not, kept laughing.

“What we know is,” Tyra carried on, “she isn’t a stripper at Smithie’s, a cocktail waitress, again at Smithie’s, or one of those women who wears their tank tops cut off so it shows the bottom of their boobs while they stand on a podium with a new bike at shows and does the old, ‘you buy this bike, you might be able to lay a biker babe like me,’ gig.” Tyra’s dancing eyes came to me. “Hop’s usual biker babe of choice.”

My breath caught in my throat.

Elvira kept right on laughing.

“Though that’s good,” Ty-Ty unfortunately continued blabbing. “Biker babes like that get it when it comes to bikers like Hop.”

My stomach clenched.

What did that mean?

“Bikers like Hop?” Elvira, always one for juicy gossip, immediately quit laughing in order to hone in on this snippet and do what she always did. Draw it out.

“Yeah,” Tyra said. “He’s a good guy, I like him. Seriously, and I know it’s going to sound crazy because, well, I somehow feel like I shouldn’t but I just do. Maybe it’s because Tack likes him and respects him. Maybe it’s because I know he’s down with the brotherhood in a big way and he’d do anything for Tack, me, my boys. Maybe it’s just because he’s mellow and good to be around. Still, unlike the other guys, with Hop it’s a struggle.”

“That all sounds good,” Elvira noted. “Why is it a struggle?”

“Chaos stuff, biker stuff, stuff you have to get used to,” Ty-Ty lifted her hands and did air quotations, “in the life.”

“Like what?” Elvira pressed.

“Like stuff I’m not going to share with you because you have a big mouth,” Tyra replied and Elvira leaned back in affront.

“I do not!” she snapped, and that was a total lie but since I was freaking out, I didn’t make the scoffing noise I would normally make.

Tyra, however, wasn’t freaking out so she called her on it. “Girl, you totally do.”

Elvira leaned in. “Yeah, okay, I do but I keep it all in the family. I don’t run my mouth to people I shouldn’t run my mouth to and you know it, Tyra Allen. So, give.”

“Elvira—” Tyra started.

“Give, girl. You know, one, you’re gonna do it because you got a big mouth too and don’t you deny it and two, I’m not gonna let it go until you do and you know that too, so…
give
.”

Tyra studied her and it seemed neither of them noticed I was not moving and had not even come fully into the room.

“You have to promise to keep this tight,” Tyra warned, giving in as I knew she’d do because she did kind of have a big mouth.

“I work for a commando. I know how to keep shit tight,” Elvira shot back.

There it was. Confirmed. I knew it. Hawk was an actual commando.

I didn’t really register that because Tyra clearly took the “commando tight” declaration as indication she could share and spoke again.

And what she said tore me apart.

“Hop and I had a rocky beginning seeing as, when he was with Mitzi, I saw him in his bed in the Compound with a biker groupie bitch extraordinaire by the name of BeeBee.”

My vision went blurry.

“Holy crap,” Elvira breathed. “I always liked him. He’s a cool guy. And, never thought I would say this in my
whole
life, but that badass biker ’tache of his does things to my girl parts. I can’t believe this. He’s a cheater?”

Tyra nodded and the room started swaying.

“Tack says it’s none of his business or mine. Boys do what they do. Some of them are true to their old ladies, some of them are, well…” she shrugged, “not. It’s uncool but it’s part of the life. Actually, part of life since cheating isn’t limited to bikers, and Tack’s right, it really isn’t my business.”

I had the weird sensation of feeling I was going to pass out at the same time I was hyper-alert and concentrating on every word Ty-Ty said.

“Honestly,” she continued, “no offense to the sisterhood, but after all that went down and things got super ugly with Mitzi, Tack didn’t share any specifics but she came around and was totally a bitch, like, a Naomi bitch, so I have to admit, it was the one time in my life I kinda got it. Though he should have cut her loose before he nailed a biker groupie, especially one like BeeBee.”

“This is what I don’t get,” Elvira grumbled. “They wanna go lookin’, they want fresh meat, why don’t they cut us loose first? Why they gotta keep us on a string? I mean, haven’t these dudes seen
Fatal Attraction? Hope Floats
? That shit destroys a woman, both women involved, for God’s sake, and it isn’t like men don’t know it.”

“Is Tabby okay?” I blurted and both their heads swung my way.

“Pardon?” Tyra asked.

“I, well, sorry girls, but I don’t have a lot of time. I need to meet a client. Last minute meeting. But I wanted to stop by, Ty-Ty,” I looked at her and held all I was feeling in by the skin of my teeth. “See if Tab was okay with her Grandma and, you know, everything.”

“She’s good. They’re heading down for the funeral this weekend. The rest, well, the Club has drama then the Club smoothes out drama, and they tend not to screw around so that’s all good,” Tyra answered. Her eyes narrowed on me and I nodded. “Are you good?” she asked.

“Yeah, just, I have this client on my mind and, you know, blowout on Chaos, the whole thing with Tabby,” I lied. “But it’s good things are good.”

“Girl, you sure you’re good?” Elvira asked and I looked at her to see her eyes were also narrowed on me.

“I just, just…”

God, I had to get out of there.

I looked back to Tyra.

“You know Tack visited me?”

I saw my best friend’s body go still before she replied, “I know.”

“I, well, I’ve been thinking about that and I thought I was ready to, um… discuss things with you. So I kinda came here to do that, as well as, of course, checking on Tab. But, being here, I think I need a little more time. Just, I don’t know, a week or, uh… two.”

Her face changed, went soft, sweet, and last, immensely relieved.

She loved me.

She was worried about me.

She was happy I was there to talk things out.

So Ty-Ty.

At least that was a relief, a massive one I unfortunately couldn’t fully feel seeing as my heart was bleeding.

“You take all the time you need, honey. I’m always here,” she replied.

She always was. Why hadn’t I remembered that?

I nodded.

“Always,” she repeated and I nodded again.

“Me too, girl,” Elvira put in.

I looked at her. Her face was soft, sweet, and concerned.

She’d been worried about me too.

So Elvira.

I nodded at her too.

“I have to go,” I said hurriedly.

Both of them smiled at me.

My smile was shaky and I knew it, I knew they saw it but I didn’t have much strength left to hold back all I was feeling so I had to move on before I lost it.

I did this by turning and going out the door on a vague wave. My pumps clicked on the forecourt as I practically ran toward the Compound. I threw open the door, went through and saw Hop sitting on a stool at the curve of the bar. His eyes came right to me. He caught my expression and worry suffused his features.

He got off his chair and when I made it to him, he grabbed my hand and murmured, “My room.”

I nodded.

He led me to his room. I pulled my hand free and walked in three paces.

After he closed the door, he turned to me and took a step toward me.

I took a step back.

His brows shot together and his eyes studied my face.

“Jesus, fuck, it didn’t go good with Cherry?” he asked with disbelief.

“I know about BeeBee.”

I watched his body freeze.

There it was.

He’d done it.

He’d cheated on Mitzi with a woman named BeeBee.

God!

“We’re over,” I declared. “Over,” I repeated. “I do not fuck cheaters. I do not look at cheaters. I do not even breathe the same air,” I leaned into him and finished on a hiss, “
as cheaters.
I never want to see you again, Hop. I never want you to touch me again. As of now, you’ve ceased to exist.”

After I delivered that speech, I ran.

I ran out of his room, through the Compound and to my car.

The problem with this was that I knew he came after me.

He didn’t say a word but when I started up my car, I heard a Harley roar and I knew it was his. And when I drove, I saw him on his bike right behind me. And when I parked in my garage, he pulled into my back drive.

So when I hustled through my courtyard, opened the sliding glass door, I couldn’t close it because his hand was on it and I could feel the heat of his body at my back.

I gave up, rushed in and whirled on him, feeling, actually
feeling
myself coming apart at the seams.

He had
to go.

“You don’t get to be here, Hop. You
never
get to be here again,” I clipped.

“Cody isn’t mine.”

My body swayed from an unexpected blow landed so accurately, I had to put a foot back to catch me so I wouldn’t fall.

“Yeah,” he growled, not missing my reaction.

“Oh my God,” I breathed.

“Yeah,” he growled again. “I didn’t know that fucked up shit when I fucked BeeBee and yeah, woman, I fucked BeeBee, but Tyra sharin’ that shit is
uncool.
She doesn’t know why I did it, she doesn’t know where I was at in my head when I did it, she doesn’t know shit, and she isn’t entitled to know shit because it’s none of her goddamned business.”

“Hop—” I tried to break in but failed.

He was angry, furious. His rage filled the room, making it hard to breathe.

And he was on a roll.

“But before I’m done with you, you’re gonna know it all.”

Before he was done with me?

“We were on a break, Mitzi and me,” he shared. “I didn’t know it was a break then. I thought it was over. Before that happened, she got pregnant with Cody and she didn’t let me touch her. Barely even fuckin’ looked at me. Tried everything, she didn’t let me in. She gave me a son, or I thought she gave me a son. Didn’t know, at the time, he wasn’t mine. Then she had him, I was over the goddamned moon, and she
still
froze me out. Worse than before, far worse. For me, I had a son, he was fuckin’ perfect, I was goddamned beside myself and my woman? She freezes me out? I couldn’t take it. Tried. Failed. Packed my shit. Got out. I’d had enough. Years of that shit. Years of tryin’ to break through. It wasn’t an easy decision. Molly, so fuckin’ little, Cody, just a baby, but I couldn’t take one more day of her fucked up shit. So I left.”

“Honey—”

“Shut it, woman. You bought this, take it.”

I snapped my mouth shut.

Hop glowered at me a moment before he continued.

“I was stayin’ at the Compound, lookin’ for a place. BeeBee was available. I hadn’t had a lay in nearly a fuckin’ year so I took advantage. None of Tyra’s business why. Tack’s. Yours. Anyone’s. I got off. It wasn’t good. It didn’t suck. What it was was a onetime gig, a man fuckin’ available gash with no strings. I was a free agent so why the fuck not?”