Oliver (Inked Menace MC 2) (6 page)

8
Chapter Eight

Once Amara was done giving her statement to the police, Oliver drove her back to the clubhouse where she’d changed clothes and donned her attire to take the train to New York City.

“What a day,” she said to Maura, who tapped her foot in the doorway.

“So I’ve heard. Save any kitties or doggies too?”

Amara stopped throwing stuff into her bag and glared at her sister. “Not like I wanted to take a bloody swim today in the cold water.”

“Oh, bless your heart.”

“Don’t you ‘oh bless your heart me,’ you evil cow. It’s not like you would have let that little girl drown. The others either.”

“Nah, I would have saved her too, if I could have. But the heat from the cops sucks. They’re gonna be sniffing around, asking questions.”

“Why?”

She shrugged. “It’s what they do. You’re a foreigner and they’re going to want to take a closer look.”

“I hope not.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“Well it’s not like I can go back in time, so…” She let the sentence trail off and slammed her feet into her tall boots. She wore black jeans, a studded leather belt, red v-neck t-shirt, and had braided her hair off her face. “Okay, I’m ready.”

“For a night on the town, yeah.”

“What?” Amara glanced down. She was comfortable, and wasn’t that point of travel?

“Nothing. Thankfully there’re all sorts of…weird people in New York City, so no one will pay us any mind.”

Those words made Amara clench her fists and punch her sister in the arm. “I suppose what you have on is better?” She eyeballed her sister’s breezy skirt and fitted shirt with matching cardigan. She had brown leather sandals on. Sandals!

“Hell no, but,” she leaned in closer, forcing her sister to meet her halfway in a conspiratorial manner, “it’s much easier access for fucking on a train.”

At that, Amara laughed and looped her arm through her sister’s, then tugged her down the hall toward the front door, sort of wishing she’d worn a skirt too.

The men whistled as they walked out of the door into the cool evening air. Amara slung her leather jacket over her arm and tugged her purse up her shoulder as Oliver walked closer and gave her a once over.

“You look delicious,” he said.

“Thanks, you clean up nice as well.”

And he did. He wore dark jeans, faded leather boots, a solid leather belt, a distressed, painted on t-shirt, and carried a black nylon windbreaker. “What, no leather without colors?” Amara said, glancing at the jacket.

He gave her a boyish grin, barely showing his teeth, which accentuated his cheek bones. “I’ve got plenty, sweetheart, don’t you worry about that.” His hair was tied back in a low ponytail, and his streaked locks now reached the middle of his back.

She shook her head to clear the thoughts of running her fingers through those colors. Hammer leaned against his bike and wagged his brows at her sister, who made a show of exaggerating her hips as she walked toward him and stepped between his open legs.

“God, do they ever quit with the PDA?”

“Hmm?” Oliver said and closed his eyes for a second before opening them and staring at her with those wicked blues. “You say something?”

“I think we’ve all gone mad,” she said and walked to her bike, which someone, most likely a prospect, had cleaned, shined, and fixed during the day. “Maura,” she called, and waited for her sister to answer.

“What?”

“How the bloody hell are you going to ride in a damn skirt without looking like a tool?”

In answer, her sister pulled out a pair of slinky black leggings from her mammoth purse and slid them on under her skirt, then tugged the fabric down and stepped out. “There,” she said and did a cat-walk turn. “Happy?” She shoved her skirt into her bag, then placed her purse in her saddlebag.

“Do you two always bicker like this?” Oliver said and slid a leg over his bike and donned his helmet.

“No, not all the time.”
Sometimes we sleep
, she thought.

“Most of the time?”

Amara chuckled, put on her helmet, and slid onto the bike and pushed up the stand. The bike purred to life beneath her and at the rumble between her thighs, she instantly regretted not having an orgasm in over three days. The ache only intensified as they drove in pairs to the train station, Maura and Hammer leading the way, and Oliver grinning like the Cheshire cat next to her, like he knew her secret torment.

Amara had never been on an American train, and she wasn’t too impressed. The food cart was abysmal, but her rolling stomach wasn’t lending itself much to food anyway, and her sister and Patrick kept making trips to the bathroom…together.

“Seriously. What are they? Rabbits or fucking lions.”

“Sounds like you’re jealous,” Oliver whispered in her ear and ran a hand up her thigh. They were seated and alone in the car. Not many travelers at that time of night.

“Why did we change plans?”

His hand crept further up her leg and he gently brushed the pads of his fingers over her jeans in small circular motions, angling closer to her sex. Amara held her breath once he was an inch away and waited for him to touch her, her pussy throbbing with desire, and just being near him set her panties on fire.

“Didn’t want to leave the bikes unmanned overnight in the city. One of the prospects drove the cage and will park in a garage close to the lab, then he’ll take the train home tonight.”

Amara didn’t like being kept out of the loop, but she supposed her ordeal that afternoon didn’t leave much room for hashing out recon plans. She’d spent most of it talking with police, and then waited at the hospital to see if the little girl would make it.

“Where’s your head right now?”

It took a moment for his words to resonate, and it was then she noticed his hand had stopped its slow perusal of her leg. She waved her hand. “At the hospital, thinking about the day.”

“Here, let me take the edge off for you,” he said and licked her ear lobe with his sinfully decadent tongue. He didn’t give her time to answer or think.

The world melted away until the only thing Amara was aware of was the scent of her arousal mixed with Oliver’s earthy aroma and the firm pressure from his hand pressing against the nub of her jeans. If her body had an axis, she’d be tilted sideways, awash in pleasure and basking in the glow of sensual bliss.

Words floated through the erotic haze. “…Can’t wait to get my cock nestled into this tight pussy and have my mouth lapping your juices as you scream my name. Damn, I want you so bad.”

He rubbed two fingers hard and fast over her pants, the friction causing delicious sparks to shoot from her sex to her toes and back up to her brain.

In the distance she heard laughter, voices, the clinking of glasses, but nothing deterred her focus on climbing higher and higher toward the ultimate goal of desire. Oliver bit her neck, pressed his entire palm firm against her pussy, and stars broke across her closed eyes as wave after wave of pleasure stole her breath and made sound cease.

Gooseflesh broke through her skin as his rough breathing tickled her arm and the side of her face. On instinct she turned her face, opened her mouth, and met his warm lips with long, slow licks. Her hands moved of their own accord, roaming over his muscular chest and lower, down into the waistband of his jeans. She tugged his belt away from his abdomen so she could slide her hands down further, and she stroked his erection over his boxers and smiled when he groaned and lifted his hips.

“God, my skin is on fire. Touch me, woman.”

The gravelly tone made her insides clench. Amara shifted his boxers to free his cock, the skin rigid and soft, and she grasped his thick length and started to caress up and down in time with her tongue dancing in and out of his mouth.

“For the love of…” Amara heard her sister say. “There’s a bathroom right over there for this level of…”

Amara refused to open her eyes or still her hands, and Oliver showed no sign of wanting her to stop, not if his rapid hip shifting was any indication.

“Are you even listening to me?”

The scuff of feet moving closer popped onto Amara’s radar, but she ignored her sister. Now was just not the time.

Maura said in a furious whisper, “There are people here. For fuck’s sake, Amara, use your head!”

Amara broke free of Oliver’s sinful mouth and looked up and to the right at her sister. “I’m in the process of giving a rather good hand job, so sod off.”

In the seat diagonally across from them, Hammer shook his head and laughed, a lightness to his face that came from, well, coming. Something the man beneath her hand needed just as badly. If she were wise, she’d take him to the bathroom and shag him rotten, but that required… more, and this was what she was willingly offering.

Hammer reached and snagged her sister’s hand. “Come here, Maura. Leave ‘em alone.”

“Fine,” she hissed, raising a fist and shaking it in their direction, then retreated, leaving Amara and Oliver to their indecent debauchery.

Oliver cupped her face and slid his large hands to the back of her head. He stared into her eyes and she lost all her remaining common sense. She glanced down and bit the inside of her cheek. It was late, and she wanted to feel. So she unzipped his jeans while staring back into his eyes, sprung his impressive cock free from its cotton restraint, then lowered her face to slip his dick into her mouth.

His hands clenched her hair, his nails digging into her scalp as she worked him hard and fast, just like he’d done to her. She hallowed her cheeks and sucked, then took him down her throat, thwarting the gag reflex by breathing through her nose and loosening her jaw. As she bobbed up and down, his incoherent grunts and moans of pleasure were music to her ears.

“I’m gonna come, baby. So close,” he groaned, and slammed his head back against the seat, his hips moving of their own accord, the veins of his forearms popping with exertion.

Amara maneuvered her hand to cup his balls, where she stroked and fondled in time with her sucking. Oliver stilled, then a torrent of curses and prayers spilled from his lips as he came in jets flowing down her throat in warm spurts. Amara swallowed every last drop, milking him dry and leaving him wet and sated.

She pulled up, and Oliver grabbed her face and kissed her, the violent passion gone, replaced by tenderness. “That was amazing. Best blow job ever.”

A smile hit Amara’s face as his words made her beam with happiness. “You weren’t too bad yourself,” she said as he put his cock away and zipped his jeans, then stretched his legs out in front of him.

She rested her head on his shoulder for a time, then caught her sister’s disgruntled look across the way. Amara nudged Oliver and they both stuck their tongues out at her at the same time, causing her to shake her head and groan in disgust.

Oliver and Amara giggled like teenagers who’d just been caught by their parents and weren’t sure whether to laugh or bolt.

9
Chapter Nine

Penn Station was a labyrinth of working class, peddlers, homeless, and unique individuals. Nobody looked twice at them as they walked through, passing food courts, restaurants, and shops.

“I’d kill for some bloody tea,” Amara noted as they passed another chain coffee house.

“Well, you’ll get an opportunity for bloodshed soon, darlin’,” Hammer said from her left hand side as he breezed up and grabbed Maura by the waist, lifted her high into the air and planted a huge kiss right on her lips, making her squeal like a child at a carnival.

“We can stop and get you something to drink, dear,” Oliver said and stopped walking to wave toward the brightly lit store with a line of customers waiting for their caffeine or sugar fix.

Amara sighed and said, “Tea doesn’t always mean tea.”

Oliver raised a brow at her haughty attitude.

“What? It doesn’t. Tea means supper, or dinner, usually. I'm fucking starving.”

Maura and Hammer halted and glanced at them with their collective ears to the ground, listening to their conversation.

“You two, hungry?”

They shrugged in unison. “We could eat.”

“This one’s,” Oliver made air quotes and thumbed in her direction, “bloody starving.” He hunched over and exaggerated his tongue when he said it.

Amara quietly chuckled and shook her head at him as she breezed past his warm body. “That was a bad impression of me, mate.” On the way by she leaned in close to his neck and inhaled, smirking when he shivered.

They grabbed sandwiches to go, and each downed a large caffeinated beverage. Amara had iced coffee, much to Oliver’s bemusement.

“We drink coffee as much as we do tea, love.”

“Learn something new everyday. So it’s not like on television then?”

“Not so much. We’re not all prim and proper, speaking in the Queen’s English. There’re different regions and dialects depending on where you’re from. There is a range of accents and slang.”

“Cool. I’d love to visit one day. Sounds intriguing.”

Their future wasn’t set in any kind of stone, so she let the comment pass and changed the subject. “The lab isn’t far from here, what’s our game plan?”

A few benches waited ahead, and after some quick maneuvering through the throngs of people, they sat huddled together, just another group out for a night in the big city.

“LexCorp is just down that street,” Hammer said and tilted his chin to the right. “Let’s walk by and people watch. See what the lay of the land is.”

“Okay. We’ll follow behind you, just two couples out for a night on the town.”

They stood and Oliver slung his arm around her shoulder and kissed her cheek. “Time to see what we’re dealing with.”

It didn’t take long to reach the address, only when they got to the front of the building, it wasn’t what they were expecting. LexCorp was on a busy side street, but appeared abandoned. For all intents and purposes. “This is a dummy corporation? A bogus operation?” Oliver said, clenching his fists, a tick to his jaw.

“Don’t jump to conclusions too soon. We all know looks can be deceiving,” Hammer offered and raised a pointed brow at their small group.

As Amara peered at the dilapidated sign and rusted door, she admitted, if only to herself, that she was disappointed. There was a narrow alleyway adjacent to the building with a few metal doors on one side of the concrete wall.

“I’m going to go check the doors,” Amara said and marched down the dank sidewalk filled with rubbish and cracked plaster. The scents were long since stale: urine mixed with tobacco, rotten or spoiled meat, and the toxic chemicals most laboratories used and a potent mix that Amara would never forget.

“See if the door opens,” Oliver said from behind her. She didn’t falter at his silent stalking. Instead, she reached out and went to turn the handle, but froze as a dozen memories hit her at once.

Panic seized her in a tight fist, her limbs locked in place, and sweat rolled down her forehead then slid into her eyes, mixing with the salty tears pooling and burning in her sockets. The mantra she clung to like a lifeline wrapped around her fragile psyche and she repeated,
They will pay. They will pay. They will pay
. With every word, Amara gained control until her leopard jumped to the forefront of her thoughts and chuffed with all her might.

Amara fought through the haze and lunged at the handle, freeing herself from the mental prison of her captured memories.

The door creaked as Amara yanked the steel with her full strength and tore it from its hinges. She set it aside and called, “It’s open,” to no one in particular, instead choosing to stare at the ground while she gained her composure back.

“So I see,” Oliver quipped and slapped her ass as he went by and ducked into the workshop owned by LexCorp.

Hammer and her sister jogged down the narrow passageway and then entered the building. Maura poked her face out and said, “Move your ass, noodle.”

“Stop calling me that!”

“Well, with the way you’re standing out there with a blank stare tells me something of your mental aptitude.”

Amara seethed. “You’re such a rude cow.”

“And you’re a bloody hen. Now shake that tail-feather.”

The air inside was rank, and small rooms were littered with trash, old tables, remnants of blood, and shredded papers as if someone had left in a hurry.

“There’s nothing here. Come on, we should go,” Hammer called out as each one of them searched a room.

Amara’s senses amplified now that the sun had set and darkness reigned over the sky. Energy buzzed through her system and her sight sharpened, her hearing heightened, and her olfactory senses picked up dozens of markers she’d have to process and analyze later.

“Hang on,” she yelled, as a high-pitched sound dove into her head and she clutched her hands to her brain. Then it stopped, and the ringing in her ears made her shake her head. “Did anyone else hear that?” she hollered, and inhaled shallow breaths through her mouth. At the moment, she’d rather taste the stench than memorize it.

“Yeah,” the others called out.

“What the fuck was it?” Oliver said and stumbled into the center of the largest room just as Amara walked through the far doorway. Hammer and Maura joined them, their guards up, eyes scrutinizing the space looking for traps.

“If I were to guess,” Amara said in a clipped voice, “I’d say it was an alarm of some kind, perhaps alerting them to our presence.”

“Doesn’t seem like anyone’s been here in a long time.”

“I learned a long time ago, never discount fanatics.”

“Is that what we’re dealing with?” Maura asked and moved closer to Hammer until their arms touched and they laced their fingers together.

Amara shook her head. “Worse. They’re extremists posing as brainy nerds using people to further their own sick agendas.”

Oliver blew out a breath and ran a hand through his hair, which had come undone to hang in long waves down his back. “What do they want?”

Amara hung her head and blocked the horrific torment and maniacal glee in which the scientists had pried her open to study her genetics. “Eternal life, I expect, though they didn’t exactly fill me in on their grand plans while they ripped me apart to watch me humpty myself back together again.”

Oliver snapped his lips closed and said, “Sorry I asked.”

Anger whipped through Amara. Anger at the people who’d taken her, anger at herself for being so weak and helpless she couldn’t stop them, and anger at Oliver for being so fucking charming and caring and sexy. Anger at her sister and Hammer for being in love when she was so fucking broken she wasn’t even sure she’d be capable of connecting with another, ever. Long, sharp claws extended from the skin in between her fingers, and she released the torrent of pent up emotions at the walls, ground, desks, and anything else that was in her sight. A haze of red washed over her vision and instead of fighting it like she usually did, she unleashed.

The others backed up and pressed themselves against the wall, but in her rage Amara still heard Oliver ask if they should try and stop her from destroying the warehouse and alerting the police to their breaking and entering.

“Leave her alone, she needs to get this out or she won’t be able to heal.”

All the wrath she’d stuffed down, swallowed whole, and chewed on for almost a year reared to the surface, firing her skin so hot she wondered if anyone did touch her, if they’d burn into ashes. For a good ten minutes Amara went to town on the place where mad scientists probably did the same to others that they’d done to her. For all of them, for herself, or for the others yet to come, Amara destroyed their place and left a note that they were coming for them scratched into the walls.

All of them. And they’d better run.

Hunting and chasing were much more fun when the prey ran and smelled of fear. It was the humans’ turn to taste the distress. Revenge, as they say, was a dish best served cold.

She glanced at their small party and thought,
and with friends.