"Come sit, Cor," Kendall urged, patting the ground in front of my full length mirror. I sat cross-legged and she settled down behind me and started brushing my hair while chatting about the night ahead. I let out a sigh and tried to calm my nerves. Her babbling was soothing in its own way. I did my very best to let my worried thoughts slip away as I got lost in her talking. Lily sat next to us, texting and adding in a comment every now and then.
"It's gonna be such a good night," Kendall declared. She put her hands on my shoulders and leaned forward to give me a girly smooch on the cheek.
"Get off me, you clown," I said as I laughed and pushed her away.
She pinned me down and started planting kisses all over my face. "This is what all the boys are going to be like tonight!" she cackled. "‘C'mere, girl, gimme some sugar."
I giggled helplessly below her. "That's what I'm worried about," I admitted once the onslaught of kisses eased.
Kendall settled back onto her heels and looked at me with her head tilted sideways. "That's the fun, though," she said. "Right, Lily? Chime in here."
Lily flipped her hair and took my hand in hers. She looked oddly concerned. "Of course! Kendall's totally right, Cor. You look beautiful. It'll be fun. Come on," she said, rising to her feet, "let's go have a couple shots to get the night started."
Just as she started to tug me upright, I saw my phone start vibrating on the floor in front of me. I could see the caller name lighting up the screen: Daddy.
"One sec," I told Lily and Kendall, who both stood over me. "Y'all go ahead. I'll be right there. Just gotta talk to my dad real quick."
They looked at each other and shrugged, then left to go pour drinks in the kitchen. As soon as the door had shut behind them, I picked up my phone. "Hi, Daddy," I said.
"Hey, sweetness, what's up?"
"Nothin', just getting ready to go out. Lily and Kendall are over."
"Hmm," he growled.
I hated when he did that. There was always something more to his wordless noises than he liked to explain. "What?" I snapped. I felt annoyed out of nowhere. I was all of the sudden so sick of trying to decipher each of his "Hmm's" from the next. "Just say what you want to say."
"Be careful tonight, Corinne. That's all."
"Yeah? Why tonight? What's so damn important about tonight?" The irritation was surging through me now, flushing my skin with heat and adrenaline. I didn't know where it had come from, but it refused to be ignored.
"You know that I can't tell you details, darling," he said. He sounded genuinely apologetic, but I wasn't having any of it.
"I'm eighteen years old, Daddy, and I'm so tired of these vague warnings all the time. Either tell me what's going on, or don't bother calling at all." My eyes were narrowed to slits. I looked at myself in the morning and saw my face twisted into an ugly mask of anger.
"Hmm," he growled again, his voice a low, static rumble over the phone connection.
"Ugh!" I yelped, and I threw the phone across the room. Without bothering to see if he was still on the line, I stood up and marched to the kitchen.
Eighteen years of being a biker's daughter felt like it all came crashing down on me in one second. And not just any biker's daughter, but the daughter of the president of the Inked Angels MC. I couldn't be worried about my life every damn second, especially not when he wouldn't ever even tell me what I was supposed to be worried about. I couldn't even begin to count the number of times we'd had conversations exactly like the one we'd just had, where he told me to be careful but refused to tell me why or how. Sure, maybe he thought he was protecting me or my ‘innocence' by sparing me from the details, but what he was doing even more than that was driving me crazy one phone call at a time. Screw that. I was eighteen years old now and I could have fun with my friends without worrying that I was on the verge of getting scooped up by a rival gang. I was going to a club, not a damn biker bar. Daddy could worry about his own problems.
The anger washed away all my insecurity and hesitation as I strode into the kitchen. Lily and Kendall gave me raised eyebrows as I walked in, but I ignored them.
"Everything okay?" Lily ventured.
"Let's take some shots," I ordered. They looked at each other again, but they could tell I wasn't screwing around.
"Here," Kendall said, pushing a full shot glass into my hand.
Without waiting for them to join me with drinks of their own, I ripped it down. The vodka burned in the back of my throat and the pit of my stomach, but it immediately dulled the edge of my anger. I smiled. "You guys were totally right. Tonight is going to be so much fun."
They smiled along with me, and we poured the next shot.
# # #
The music was blasting so loud I could feel my teeth clattering together at the back of my mouth. Lights were swirling and pulsing, bathing the whole vast interior in crazy neon colors. The Enigma was an otherworldly place that seemed like it obeyed its own sets of rules and the laws of physics and normal social behavior had been thrown completely out of the window.
In spite of all that, though, I was actually having an awesome time. Kendall, Lily, and I were in front of the DJ booth, laughing and dancing and generally enjoying ourselves so much. We'd drank the perfect amount before leaving my house. I felt the alcohol running through my veins. It gave me a warm glow. I just couldn't stop smiling, and when I swung my hips to the music, I couldn't help but feel sexy. It was a wild, unusual feeling for me, but I was enjoying it anyways.
The music reached a thundering crescendo. Bass blared through the towering speaker stacks. My feet were starting to ache in my high heels, but it was easy to ignore the pain and focus instead on dancing and giggling with my friends.
I closed my eyes and spun slowly to the pulse of the music. I felt so free. I didn't even have words for how good it had felt to ignore my dad's silly, ominous warnings. What could go wrong? This was a club full of normal people. It wasn't like a horde of men on motorcycles were about to come careening in here to kidnap me and hold me for ransom or anything so ridiculous. What was he even worried about?
I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned back around. I saw two handsome men flanking us. Both were tall and tanned, with nicely groomed beards and shirts open at the throat to reveal brawny, smooth chests. Lily leaned over and shouted in my ear.
"These guys want us to come to their table! They have bottle service, and their friend wants to meet you!" She pulled back and looked at me. Her eyes were glistening with buzzed happiness.
I shrugged and smiled. The men grinned back and offered their arms to us. We wove through the crowd towards a raised booth a few dozen yards away. They helped us up to the table and gestured for us to sit down on the plush leather couch.
I settled down between Lily and Kendall and crossed my legs. Sweat was shining lightly on my forehead and my pulse was thudding at my rib cage, but I was too high on the night to care. I smiled across the table separating us from the three men on the other side.
"I'm James," said one of the ones who'd approached us.
"Santiago," said the other. "And this is our friend, Chris." We shook hands with all three of them. They were devastatingly handsome. Up here, away from the hubbub of the dancefloor, I could see even more clearly how good looking they were. Each of them had perfect, pearly white teeth, and their clothing was obviously very expensive. They looked like rich playboys. Not my type on a normal night, but with alcohol flowing through my system and the music rattling rational thoughts out of my brain, I figured, why not?
"Can we get you ladies a drink?" James offered.
"Yes, before we die of thirst!" Kendall quipped jokingly. Everyone laughed, and he reached forward to pluck a bottle of premium vodka from a silver ice bucket on the table. Santiago and Chris lined up a row of glasses and James poured stiff drinks in all of them, then distributed one to each of us.
"To new friends and good times," Chris said, holding his glass up in the air. We all touched rims and took a big sip. My smile deepened another satisfied notch.
Life was good.
Chapter 3
Croak
Carla's eyes were like bright spotlights in the darkness of the supply closet we'd stumbled into. I threw her into the room and pulled the door almost all the way closed behind me. Taking two big strides for her, I reached my hands out until they found her hips. When they'd made contact, I wrenched her towards me and leaned over to devour her mouth with a sloppy kiss.
Breaking away, I locked my eyes on hers. The light filtering in through the crack in the door was just enough to illuminate the outline of her face. I could see her lips parted with hunger. She laid a hand on my chest and slid it down over my pecs, my biceps, my abs. "Big, strong biker type, aren't you?" she asked teasingly.
"You don't even know the half of it." I picked her up and wrapped her legs behind me as I swept back down to shove my tongue between her teeth. She let out a soft whimper. I started to grind my hips against hers. The warmth of her pussy was tangible even through the layers of clothing that still separated us. Her breasts pressed against my chest were hot and heavy.