Soul Ties (Club Ties #4) (12 page)

Muscles bulged on his thighs and his abs rippled in ways no man’s humanly should. She dragged her gaze to his face and found he wore the same satisfied smirk.

He stooped to pick up her top and placed it into her hands. As she dressed, his focus licked over her from head to toe. Only after she’d splashed her face and tried to arrange her hair into less of a bird’s nest did she meet his gaze in the mirror.

“You’re not even going to ask where we’re going?” His mouth still quirked at one corner.

“No. I trust you.” Besides, anyplace was better than here.

She stopped. In a few short days she’d gone from feeling total solace in her club, and now she couldn’t put enough distance between her and the four walls—and people—she loved.

Releasing a ragged breath, she turned for the door. He followed behind, not bothering to make it appear they weren’t leaving the bathroom together.

“I just…need to grab my phone,” she said, pausing at her bedroom.

He stopped her with a hand on her arm. “Let me go in.”

Relief bubbled up. He knew how difficult it was for her to face her room. How had he become more attuned to her than anyone ever had been? Connall didn’t push, which in turn melted her. When he was at her side, the nightmare wasn’t so enormous.

He went into her room and came out with her things. She slid her arms into the buttery leather jacket and pocketed her phone.

Connall’s eyes were dark and for once, she wondered if he might be seeing ghosts too. She skimmed her knuckles over his jaw, hoping to give him comfort. He caught her hand and led her into the club.

The room went silent as everyone noticed their joined hands. She waited for questions or accusations about her betraying O’Dovey, but none came.

“Yo momma’s so stupid, she took a ruler to bed to see how long she slept,” Rocket intoned to loud laughter.

Apparently they’d walked in on a yo-momma joke-off, because another MC guy picked up immediately.

“Hey, Doc, yo momma’s so hairy, Bigfoot took a picture of her.”

Connall’s smile didn’t reach his eyes. It was a show for his brothers. When they reached the bar, he stopped before Ace. “We’ll be back in the morning.”

Ace scanned each of them as if analyzing their chemistry. Finally he pushed out a breath and nodded. “I’ll let Jamison know if he asks.” He reached behind the bar and came out with a stack of money, which he held out to Connall. “This should cover all the supplies.”

Connall wadded the cash in his fist. With Sarah in tow, he strode out. At some point it had rained, and everything dripped. When they reached his bike, she dragged him around to look at him.

“This looks bad.”

“What?” he asked.

“This.” She raised their linked hands and pitched her voice low. “A newcomer makes a blatant show of leaving with me the same week O’Dovey disappears?”

“I don’t give a damn.” He released her hand and pulled a towel from the saddlebag. He wiped off the leather seat and helmet before giving it to her. She stared at the Hell’s Sons’ symbol on the front of the helmet and swallowed a huge amount of guilt.

“I hate this,” she murmured but put it on.

“I know, Sweetheart. Just trust me, okay? Let’s go have some fun.”

It seemed pretty unlikely they would, but she silently got on his bike and wrapped her arms around his waist. With her nose pressed to the broad spot between his shoulders and the scents of man and exhaust in her nose, she let some of the tension leave her.

The open road always thrilled her. She turned her face up to the sky and reveled in the freedom. The rain clouds were parting, but once in a while, a drop wet her face. She grinned and licked one off her lips.

Connall went into a curve leading into Heller’s Gap, and she threw out her arms. He glanced over his shoulder and this time his smile reached his eyes. He quickly looked back at the road, but she held the pose, letting the wind dance over her skin and flutter her clothes. Connall rested his warm hand on her thigh, anchoring her to the moment.

Maybe she really could get through this. A mistake had been made, but it was for self-preservation. The guys would have expected their old ladies to do the same. No Hell’s Son put up with women or children being hurt.

She eased her arms around Connall again and ran her nose over his shirt. The soft scrubs material wasn’t what she was used to, but at the moment, it comforted her.

“Where are we going?” she asked at last.

His chest rumbled. “Now you want to know.”

Before long she recognized the landscape just as his house came into view. He pulled into the gravel drive and cut the engine. “I need to change.”

She glanced down at his shoes as he swung his leg over the bike. The plastic shoes still amused the hell out of her. But now that she knew more about him, they were sort of sexy.

“I’ll stay here,” she told him and tipped her face to the sky again. It only took a few minutes for him to emerge from the house in low-slung, worn jeans and a Hell’s Sons T-shirt. As he put his arms into his leather cut, her mouth dried out. She dropped her gaze over his sculpted body.

“Keep looking at me like that and we won’t be going anywhere.”

“Sounds good to me.” She bit her lower lip, burning for the hunky biker doctor already.

“If we don’t, there won’t be a Fourth of July celebration.”

“Oh, we don’t need party supplies or fireworks to celebrate in the club. We can party pretty hard on a Wednesday night.”

He laughed, and the dark curtains that had closed around them seemed to part a little more. “We need to take my truck. More room for hauling.” He held out his key fob and the garage door opened to reveal a shiny black, tricked-out truck. Sarah got off the bike and removed the helmet.

He got on the bike with a move that slayed her self-control. She wanted to climb him like a tree. Then he walked the bike into the garage.

When she was seated in the truck with him, she touched several controls. The dash looked like a jet panel. “What’s this do?”

“Push it.” He threw her a look.

Music filled the cab, and she sat back against the leather seat with a smile. Maybe she really could get through this difficult time. The world wasn’t all fear, blackness, and blood.

They drove back into the city in a comfortable silence. She admired the world through fresh raindrops and let her mind wander to better times.

They stopped in an alley. Connall gave her the chin-nod. “Stay here.”

“I’ve been here before.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Don’t tell me they’ve used you for other missions.”

A dark thrill rippled through her. His tone said he cared if she was put in danger. She shook her head. “I asked for that mission to get the duffle.”

“I know.”

“The club didn’t send me here either.”

“Then you can tell me later what you’ve been doing in a back alley at an illegal contraband dealer’s.” Connall walked up to the back door. He rapped it twice and a black-haired guy came out with a box. Even if she’d never visited the place, she’d been around the club long enough to know these were illegal weapons.

Money changed hands. Connall said something to the man that made him take a step back. Then her lover came back to the truck, his big body rolling with every step and his arms bulging around the weight of the box.

Juggling the box to one arm, he opened the door. Then he held up a huge, thick rocket that looked as though it would launch a thousand feet into the sky.

“Fireworks?”

“A few. The rest is…well, you know. You any good at lighting these, Sweetheart?”

“I can’t say I’m good at it, but I know a little.” The Fourth of July was her favorite holiday. As a child, the occasion had meant being allowed to stay up late. Now loud music and great food always kept her up all night long. Watching fireworks was the best, but she mostly loved just unwinding with her club family. One of the guys had rigged an old motorcycle frame like a mechanical bull and she’d won the competition on it several years in a row.

He settled the box in the back seat and tossed a blanket over it. In the recesses of her mind, she wondered what else he’d used that blanket to conceal. Connall West wasn’t all he appeared. He was too clever in the art of hiding the truth. If he hadn’t been smart enough to remove O’Dovey’s phone before—

She stopped the thought before it totally formed. “Where to now?”

“Grocery store. This many people will want to eat.”

“I should have known I’d be the one stuck with the shopping.”

He edged out of the alley into a dirty side street where a group of hookers congregated. They waved and one thumped the truck with a hand as they passed, but Connall paid them no mind.

When he gave her a sidelong glance, she waited for him to say something about the down-and-outs in their town, but instead he asked, “Don’t you enjoy the things you do around the club?”

She twitched a shoulder. “I don’t know. It’s okay.”

“I hear discontent. Tell me, Sweetheart, what did you dream of being when you were five?”

She blinked at him. The raindrops fragmented the sunlight, highlighting the scruff of hair on his jaw. It didn’t take her long to search her memories. “I wanted to be a club girl. To ride on the back of somebody’s bike and be loved so much he’d kill for me.”

Her throat closed up.

Connall was silent for several minutes. Finally, he said, “And now?”

She pushed out a sigh. Running her fingers through her hair didn’t give her any more answers. “I don’t honestly know.”

“What do you like to do? What are your hobbies?”

“I like to cook. The guys don’t often mention the touches I put on the food, but I see them gobble it, and I feel good. I enjoy organizing the other girls and creating a comfortable place for all of us.”

Reaching across the cab, he planted a hand on her thigh. The warmth seeped through her jeans and permeated her skin. “Those are important things. Not many can do them.”

“I don’t know about that. Women have been housewives for thousands of years.”

“What do you think is one of the most important jobs I have?” He drove with the traffic, obeying all the rules and even waving at a police officer as they passed him.

“Probably knowing medicines?” she ventured.

“Nope. I can prescribe dozens of pills and people might not trust in me enough to take them. Why do you suppose they do?”

She shook her head, unable to answer.

“Because I take care of them. I make them comfortable—with the hospital staff, their surroundings, and even me. It’s no different from what you do.”

She considered his words. “I still don’t buy it, but I’d like to think about it more.”

He squeezed her leg.

“Did Jamison give you a list?” she asked.

“No, he said you’d know what to get.” He pulled into a parking space and turned off the truck. Neither of them made a move to get out.

At last she met his gaze, her insides churning between happiness to be at his side and despair for all they were hiding behind mundane trips to the supermarket.

“Thank you for coming for me, Connall.”

His eyes were brighter, almost electrified from within. Cupping her nape, he pulled her across the console and stamped her lips with his—hard. “I said I’d do anything to keep you out of the fires. Didn’t you believe me? C’mon.”

Without waiting for her answer, he got out of the truck. She circled it and put her hand in his outstretched one. As they walked into the market, several women turned to eye him. He never spared a single one a glance. He guided her through the aisles with a proprietorial hand on her lower back.

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Shopping with Sarah offered Connall a strange sort of contentment. One he wasn’t sure he deserved. When she stood on tiptoe to reach items and talked under her breath about ingredients for homemade barbecue, he found it impossible to dwell on anything bad in his life.

All the gastrointestinal infections, gangrenous appendixes, and severed fingers faded away, and he was left with a beautiful woman and a shopping cart with a creaking wheel.

He kicked it, and she laughed. “Watch it. The townspeople will be waiting for a Hell’s Son to pull a gun on that cart.”

“Not true. The club has a good rapport with the people.”

“Yeah, but they watch us closely. We do things they wouldn’t agree with if they knew.”

He waved a hand of dismissal. “Ah hell, it’s like the church ladies talking badly about the one young wife in the group because they think she’ll lure their husbands into the confessional and make them lick her pussy.”

Tilting her head, she examined a couple items on the shelf, comparing prices. “I see what you mean, but Connall?”

“Yeah?”

“Church ladies?” She gave a mock shudder of horror and added a couple items to the shopping cart. When they reached the fresh ingredients, she oohed and awed over deep red tomatoes and fat mushrooms.

He hefted a couple honeydew melons into his hands and weighed them as if they were breasts. She smacked him with a zucchini. “Put those down. What if one of your patients sees you?”

“Sweetheart, they’d be more shocked about my patches and tats than me fondling a couple melons.” He rolled the fruits back into the produce bin and gave her a wink.

“Do you ever worry people won’t want a biker dude treating them?”

“Not many will place my patches on the good doctor’s body. I—” Shouts interrupted his words. They both turned to see a man slump forward. He seemed to fold in slow motion, buckling in small increments until he landed flat on his face.

She gasped. Connall took off.

“My father! He was fine but he said his head hurt really bad all of a sudden,” a woman who looked around forty cried.

Connall hit his knees and assessed the man. Brain aneurysm was written all over his case, but he had to gather all the information before making a diagnosis. “Ma’am, call 911,” he told the daughter.

“What are you doing to him?” She didn’t do as he said but thrust her fingers into her hair and pulled.

Sarah sprang to action. She made the call as Connall loosened the man’s collar. The minute he pressed he man’s eyelids up with his thumb, he saw what he’d feared— dilated pupils.