Damon:A Bad Boy MC Romance Novel(9)

"Okay," he said with a shrug. "Everyone has their own truths. Your truth  is that I'm crazy, or I'm lying. My truth is that I look into your  eyes, and I see a good woman. I see a woman I like. And I see a woman  who's not ready to come home, and could use a little more time with the  highway beneath her tires. I'm not going to make you come, Tricia, but  the invitation stands."

Get your mind out of the gutter, weirdo, Tricia scolded herself as the  words ‘make you come' triggered something inside her that had nothing to  do with the conversation at hand. As though reading her thoughts,  Damon's smile widened and he shook his head while looking down at his  feet.

Tricia opened her mouth, meaning to refuse. She meant it with every  ounce of sense and sanity in her heart. She meant it with all her  loyalty to her friends, all her desire to be normal again. Hours later,  she would wonder if she ever really meant to refuse at all. Because what  came out of her mouth was not a refusal at all.

"Can I DJ?"

He smiled.

"You can have a two-hour trial period," he said, winking. "But I reserve the right to make requests."





7





Damon drove her to the storage unit first. The day was dying quickly,  but the delay was fine with him. He waited while she cursed her way  through the boxes, finally emerging with a cardboard box overflowing  with clothes, her sleeping bag on the bottom.

"It's only about a week and a half, two weeks, that we'll be gone," he  said. "We can get to Miami in five days, tops. We'll be there a few, and  then four or five days back."

"Yeah," Tricia said, looking at him blankly. "I know. That's why we have  to go to Ricky's still. The rest of my clothes are there."

"The rest of them?" Damon said through his grin, eying the size of the box. She met his look with one of her own.

"Hey, it was your idea, Kerouac," she quipped. "Just because you can  wear one pair of socks a week doesn't mean we're all so blessed."

"Alright, alright," Damon said. "We'll stop at Ricky's."

"We'd have to anyway," Tricia mused, closing the trunk and moving around to the passenger side. "I need to leave a note."

"You're not going to tell her  –  them  –  in person? Or at least call?" Damon asked.

"No," Tricia said, shaking her head and clicking her seatbelt in place.  "It'll be easier this way. I don't want to have to...explain."

"I can understand that," Damon said, thinking of his own silence. He  hadn't told his brothers or sisters where he was going. Or that he was  going at all. That would require telling them why. It would take a  conversation he wasn't ready to have. When it was all over, when it was  all done with, then he could tell everything.

The drive to Ricky's was short. Damon waited outside, leaning against  the car door, as Tricia vanished inside. He wondered if she would have  second thoughts. He half hoped she would. He had spent the past hour  tuning out the better, bigger part of him. But now it was starting to  seep in. When the door opened and she reappeared, he felt his heart  slowing to a crawl as his stomach sank down, pre-emptive regret flooding  his senses.

Why am I dragging her into this, he thought, watching her haul a duffel  bag into the trunk. What the hell am I doing? She doesn't need to get  involved in this shit after everything she's been through …

But then she smiled at him, slamming the trunk closed, and he knew why he was dragging her into it.

Because he was selfish, and he wanted her near him.

He wasn't being his best self, and he wasn't sure how it would all end if he was alone.         

     



 

Then bring Kennick, or Cristov, or Mina, or someone who wasn't just  thrown into one of the worst shit shows a human can endure, he thought.

But for all the strength and steadiness he drew from his family, Tricia offered him something different. Something more.

Damon had always been the sort who could read a person quickly. And he'd  only met Tricia once before he knew she was one of those women. The  sort who could silence his demons with one glance, who could draw the  best out of him like water being drawn from a well. Around her, he felt  like putting his life on the line to protect her. Hell, he had put his  life on the line to protect her.

And when you found a woman like that, you didn't let her go easily.

The night they'd met, she'd been about as broken down as a woman could  be, and she was about to suffer even more. But through all the pain and  confusion in her eyes, he'd seen her truer self, and he'd made up his  mind to try and know it intimately.

How could you get any more intimate than a road trip?

And she'd said yes.

She was either as crazy as she'd claimed he was, willing to go off with a  near-stranger (albeit, one who'd killed a man for her) for an  indefinite amount of time, or she felt the same thing he did, and was  wise enough to take a chance on it.

But you shouldn't even be thinking about a woman, that voice spoke up  again. Are you forgetting what this is all about? Are you forgetting  about the man in Miami? Are you forgetting about everything that brought  you to this  –  everything you need to put to rest? This is no time to  let your heart loose. This is not the season where a young man's fancy  should turn to thoughts of love.

But it was too late now. She was there, at the passenger side, watching  him watch her. He realized an inappropriate amount of time had passed  since they'd been standing there.

"Having second thoughts?" she asked, eyebrows raised, half a smile on  her face. "I promise, I'm a really good DJ. No girly songs."

Yes, I'm having second thoughts, I'm sorry, you need to stay here, get  your shit out of the trunk and I'll drive you back to Ricky's apartment,  he thought.

"No," he said, unlocking the car doors with a beep. "Let's make some  miles. Did you tell Ricky where we were going, in your note?"

"Oh," Tricia said, backing away from the door. "No, I'm so stupid, I forgot. I'll just … "

"Don't worry about it," Damon said, relieved. "She'll figure it out. Let's go."





8





Jenner's stomach coiled, on instinct, as the door shook. Heavy fists banging from the other side. One hell of an alarm clock.

"Wakey wakey fuckface," the voice came, sardonic and cruel. "Time to lick the bowls clean."

Jenner groaned, his immediate fear replaced by a sense of drudgery. How  many months had it been now, since he'd become the Steel Dragons' bitch?  He didn't care to even try to remember. For all he knew, it would go on  like this for the rest of his life.

As long as it's not the first month again, he told himself, rising from  the uncomfortable cot that served as his bed. Anything but that …

His body still bore the scars of that month. Between the beatings and  the sleep deprivation and the hunger, he'd been broken down to his  littlest parts, his smallest self. It had taken a month before his  tormenters finally decided that he didn't have anything to give them,  that the confession they wanted wasn't coming. So he'd been promoted to  janitor at the clubhouse. Cleaning vomit and piss and shit from the  toilets, scrubbing floors, washing dishes. All while wearing a pink,  frilly apron.

This was so far from what he'd intended, it might as well have been an alternate universe.

He'd gone to the Steel Dragons hoping they could help him take down the  Volanis brothers. He'd told them about how Cristov ran the gypsy's  marijuana business, dealing their homegrown organics to the locals. If  the Steel Dragons came in, took over, wresting the profits away, it  might instill doubt about the Volanis' ability to run the kumpania.

And, for a while, it seemed like it might actually work. Jenner did some  things he was less than proud of, but it seemed like the Steel Dragons  had the upper hand. Cristov and his brothers were scared and clueless.  Caught like mice in a trap.

And then it had all gone to absolute shit. The Steel Dragons had screwed  up, kidnapped the wrong girl, and Cristov's little girlfriend had known  just where to find them. Big, burly, macho-man Damon had killed one of  the club's highest-ranking members. Another man had gotten a bullet to  his gut, and a third had been caught trying to run from the scene, and  ended up talking like a teenage girl at a sleep-over.         

     



 

And somehow, the Steel Dragons had it in their heads that it was all  Jenner's fault. That he'd set them up. That he had some vendetta against  them, or some reason to want them taken down. And they planned to make  him pay.

Now, he had his own private room at the club, a scar across his face,  and a pink apron. They never let him out of their sight. The door to his  room was locked from the outside at all times, and there was no window.  They let him out to clean up, and then it was right back in once his  day's work was done. They fed him, gave him water, and let him shower  once a week  –  all under constant surveillance.