Repo (The Henchmen MC Book 4) (9 page)

Pretty sure all three options were out for me, I lowered myself down at the table again and focused on drinking the rest of my water and ignoring the frazzled, electric sensation to every inch of my skin, most especially that of my sex.

I slanted my eyes to look at Repo, his back still to me, as he steadily chopped something on the cutting board. His shoulders seemed more tense than usual and the knife seemed to be slamming down with way more force than necessary to chop an onion. Not able to see his face, I couldn't tell if he was affected at all by the kiss that had pretty much just thrown my whole world off its axis.

I'd kissed plenty in my life.

I'd had sweet, gentle kisses and hard, demanding ones.

But never, as in ever, had I ever felt like someone had owned me with a kiss. But that was how I felt when Repo's lips were on mine; I felt owned. For the duration of it, there was nothing but him. The entire compound could have come in and started cheering and I wouldn't have noticed. He kissed like he was going off to war, like a dying man, like he was sure it would be his last and he wanted to make sure it was a good one.

"You alright, Ace?" Duke asked, walking in, his shirt sticking to him with sweat so I assumed he was coming in from his shift.

"What?" I asked, shaking my head a little.

"You alright?" he asked, snagging a mug off the counter and coming to sit across from me, grabbing the orange juice container and pouring himself some. "You're all spaced out."

"Oh, um," I said, chancing a look at Repo whose chopping had stopped. It had stopped because he had turned to look at me, brow raised, waiting to hear the next lie out of my mouth. "Yeah. I'm just all stuffy," I said, waving a hand dismissively.

"Yeah," Repo said, his lips twitching, "that must be it." With that, he went back to doing whatever the heck he was doing that required so much cutting.

"You back on tonight?" Duke asked, sitting back in his chair the way only men did: legs wide, upper back against the chair, the rest detached, chest puffed out slightly.

"Ah I don't see why..."

"No," Repo cut me off.

Both Duke and I looked over, but Repo wasn't facing us. "I'm better now," I pressed.

"For what? An hour? Don't get cocky, probie. We need men on guard who can stay conscious for their shift. Until we're sure that's you, you're grounded."

I straightened, opening my mouth to object when Duke's raised hand caught my eye. When I looked over, he shook his head at me. I didn't need all that man-training K put me through to know he was warning me to shut the fuck up before I said something to get myself kicked out. Knowing he was right and there was nothing I could do, I stood up fast enough for my chair to turn over, drawing Repo's attention. But he said nothing and I stormed out of the kitchen. I ignored the presence of Wolf and Vin in the great room and threw myself outside, tearing across the field until the fence stopped me. I turned to the tree, taking a deep breath and jumping up to grab the lowest branch, pulling myself up.

It was a weird habit I picked up after my grandmother took me in as a kid. Growing up in the city, there generally weren't many trees around, let alone ones strong enough to climb. But when my mom was in a mood and I couldn't take it anymore, I climbed out the window and took up the fire escape until I hit the roof of whatever apartment building we were living in at the time. At my grandmother's in Vermont, there weren't fire escapes. But there was still an adult on my case about something every once in a while and my desire to run away from it. Given that we lived in a little Victorian in the woods, there were plenty of old, sturdy trees around. So when my grandmother started in on me, I would go out in the yard and climb a tree, often not coming in until it was dark and my growling stomach made me finally come down and find food.

Maybe it was immature.

But, the fact of the matter was, I had no privacy anywhere else at the compound. Someone always seemed to be in their bunks. Or in Renny's case, his recliner. The great room was always packed. And we weren't supposed to leave without permission. I knew I'd never get that. So the only thing I could do was get up and above it all for a little bit. I needed time to calm down and get my head together. Seeing as I was apparently 'grounded' until I proved I wasn't some pansy-assed weakling, there was no reason for me to even be in the compound. Technically, if we weren't directly given a job to do, we were free to do whatever the hell we wanted as long as we stayed on the grounds. I was on the grounds. So no one could say shit about it.

So what if Repo kissed me? And so what if it rocked my world a little bit? It was a
kiss.
A kiss was nothing. We were both adults. We also both understood how things were. He had even said it was best that we ignored what was between us.

I needed to stop being such a girl about it.

It was nothing.

The only reason it happened was because he was on some mission to prove I wanted him. It was an ego thing. Which, the more I thought about it, the more angry I got. What a shitty thing to do. The jackass.

I had worked myself up into what I thought was a righteous anger by the time I heard a throat clearing beneath me, surprising me enough to make me jump and almost pitch forward before my hands slammed down to steady myself.

It was him.

Of course it was.

Who the hell else would it be?

"You done sulking, Maze?"

Oh, the bastard.

"I'm not sulking. I'm sitting up here so I don't rip your fucking head off."

Repo's brow raised but he didn't call me on the threat. "You're kinda cute when you're offended."

"You're kind of an asshole all the time." That was another lie. In general, he was actually a pretty nice guy. I mean he'd nursed me when I was sick. How many women could claim to have a guy do that for them?

Repo exhaled a loud sigh, shaking his head. "Well this asshole brought you some food," he said, waving a plate I hadn't noticed him holding outward. "So you can go ahead and sit up there and starve to prove some asinine point or you can hop down and get something in your stomach so you don't fucking pass out again."

"Did you cook for Duke, Renny, and the assholes too?" I asked, crossing my arms over my chest.

Repo shook his head, looking back over his shoulder for a minute before tilting his head to look up at me again. "Maze, can we just... fucking not do this? You're pissed at me. I get it. Hell, I probably deserve it. But do you really have to throw it in my face anytime I do something halfway decent?"

"Tell you what," I said, my words way harsher than they needed to be given that he was, yet again, being a good guy, "you keep your fucking hands off me and we won't have a problem."

"Fair enough," he said after a long pause as he bent to put the plate down on the ground before turning and walking away from me.

I gave it about two minutes after he disappeared inside the compound before I climbed down and dug into the freaking perfect, fluffy omelet stuffed with tomatoes, spinach, onions, mushrooms, bacon, and cheddar cheese.

So he was a gold-medal kisser, a caretaker, a verifiable badass biker, an all-around good guy... and he could cook?

Great.

That was just
fantastic.

Seven

Maze

Exactly one week later, The Henchmen were having some kind of giant BBQ. As such, the night before, the members got a real kick out of running all of us probates freaking ragged. We cleaned. We cooked. We set up tables. We ran to the food store. We stocked the back bar. We washed the sheets to all the beds because all the patched brothers knew they would be way too wasted to drive themselves home afterward.

By the time the darkness came down, we were bone tired. Moose and Fox had gone down to bed before anyone else could demand anything of them. I was still in the great room with a bottle of Pledge and the orders to make every single wood surface shiny enough to see a reflection in. This order came from some jackass named Murry who was old enough to be my grandfather and a real mean son of a bitch. But it was an order from a patched member and I had to do what I was told.

Cash, Wolf, Repo, and Reign were all gathered at the bar, sharing a round of beers and bullshitting when the back door flew open and Renny came in, his usually open and smiling face set in hard lines, his hands curled into fists at his sides.

Duke was on his heels, his hair free, his entire body practically sparking with anger. "We're not done, mother fucker," he shouted, the sound so unexpected and loud that I actually dropped the bottle of Pledge as I turned and pressed back against the wall just in time to see Renny whip around and land a right hook to Duke's jaw.

The patched members started hollering, clapping, smiling, cheering it on as Duke plowed into Renny bodily, sending them both flying, landing hard on the coffee table that gave way under their weight and crashed to the floor.

I just stood there completely dumbfounded.

From what I had seen over the past few weeks, Duke and Renny got along. Well, as well as anyone got along with Duke. He wasn't exactly the kind to sit around and crack jokes and bullshit. But he was friendly enough to me and Renny. I'd certainly never seen even a hint of animosity between the two of them.

But Duke was, quite plainly, pissed. It was in the tightness of his movements, the way he was holding nothing back despite outweighing Renny by a good fifty pounds of solid muscle. To his credit, Renny was fast and scrappy. He took his blows with grunts then slipped away before another could be landed. He looked a little bit like a punching bag, but he had gotten some good shots in himself which impressed the hell out of me.

They both crashed to the floor again, both fighting for dominance as they kept throwing furious fists.

I looked across the room to Repo who caught my eye and raised a brow. I held my arms up at my sides, a silent 'are you going to do anything about this?' To that, he only shook his head and turned back to watch the show.

Alright. So I knew it technically wasn't my place. First, because it was a source of entertainment for the patched members. Second, because it was really none of my business. And third because it was probably stupid to wade into a fight between two worthy opponents. But the fact of the matter was, I liked the both of them. They were good buffers between me and the douchebag brothers. I didn't want one of them heading to the hospital or getting kicked out over what I was sure was some nonsense.

I wiped my Pledge-greasy hands on my pant legs then moved over toward where they were still rolling around on the ground. Duke was on top, giving me a slight advantage as I moved behind him.

"Maze..." Repo's voice called out a warning to me.

Which I promptly ignored as I reached out, grabbed a handful of Duke's abundant hair and yanked viciously back. He came up ready to keep fighting. Before he even registered it was me, his hand was at my throat. He reminded me of a dog that way; he always went for the throat instinctively. I brought up both hands, grabbing his wrist and twisting until his hand loosened, taking the advantage and swinging it behind his back. It all happened in a matter of seconds and his body went slack as he saw through the red of his anger and realized it was me. At about the same time, Renny gained his feet and tried to charge again. Tried, because I slammed a hand into his solar plexis as he tried, cutting off his advance and knocking out his air. "Enough!" I growled, looking between them. "Enough," I said more quietly. "Now I can't stop you from fighting it out like boys, but I strongly suggest you talk it out like the fucking men you are instead," I snapped and Renny had the decency to look sheepish as he wiped blood from his lip.

Duke was still sparking with anger, but he just gave Renny a hard look and stormed out the back door. Renny gave me a shrug and went toward the bathroom to clean up. Me, well, I grabbed the Pledge and a rag lest I get lectured for leaving a mess, then did another thing that was totally not my place. I walked past the bar on my way to the hall, and mumbled just loud enough for Repo to hear, "Was that so fucking hard?"

"You just cost me fifty bucks, bitch," one of the older patched members called as I passed.

"That must suck for you," I said, sending him a sweet smile despite the bile rolling around in my belly. "Maybe next time you should put your money on a winner. In case the inflection there is lost on you, I meant
me
," I added with a chin lift before walking away.

I was sick, sick, sick of the shit in the compound.

It wasn't just the hard work. I could live with that. It wasn't even the sleep deprivation. My body was adjusting. It wasn't even Moose and Fox. They were jerks, but they were, for the most part, pretty predictable and easy to avoid.

No, mostly, my issue was with Repo.

See, since him dropping off the food beneath the tree, something had changed. I wasn't sure if it was because of my surly demand for him to keep his hands off me or what, but he went from being a good guy I could count on to at least be fair... to an outright asshole. He ran me ragged. He put me on patrol with Moose and Fox. He picked on everything I did, no matter how careful I was to make sure I did everything perfectly. He would invite all the guys to have a round with him while demanding I go cook them all food.