Dauntless (Sons of Templar MC) (24 page)

* * *

“
W
hat the fuck
, bro?” Gage protested as Lucky grabbed the sweetbutt on Gage’s lap and deposited her on the floor. She scowled at him but knew better than to say anything in protest. All the girls gave him a wide berth since they’d found Becky.

He knew he scared them. He didn’t give a shit. Plus, he had no fuckin’ plans of getting anywhere near them for whatever remained of his life.

He clutched Gage by the collar. “Why the fuck have you been hangin’ around Becky?” he clipped, barely restraining his urge to punch the fucker. He’d shelve that urge. It’d come in handy.

Gage regarded him with that icy, empty stare that was the motherfucker’s default. “She tell you?” he asked mildly.

He clutched his cut tighter. “I’m asking you,” he clipped. He had been beyond furious when Becky had refused to tell him why. Not at her; fuck, not even at Gage. He trusted his brother. Even now, his anger wasn’t really being directed at the right place. He was furious at himself for being unable to swallow this fuckin’ dragon, this white-hot rage that simmered every minute of every day.

“You’re askin’ the wrong person,” Gage replied.

Lucky got in his face. “That’s my woman,” he said quietly, dangerously.

Gage nodded. “Yeah, and she’s a good one too. Which is why I’m not betrayin’ her fuckin’ trust.” He shook Lucky off with ease. “Frankly, I’m insulted you think I’d try shit on with her. Not because she’s your woman, but because of the shit she’s been through. She ain’t ready for that shit. Not from me. Not from you. Even I got fuckin’ boundaries.”

On that, he turned his back on Lucky and tagged the girl who’d been hovering on the edge of their conversation, disappearing down the hallway.

Lucky stared after them.

Fuck.

He was more fucked-up than fuckin’ Gage.
Gage.

That thought chilled him to the bone. But that didn’t stop him from plannin’ on seeing Becky. Nothing would, short of a bullet to the brain.

“
S
he wears
her strength and darkness equally well. The girl has always been half goddess, half hell.”

-Nikita Gill

I stared at the building, my nails biting into my palms so hard I was pretty sure I’d draw blood if they weren’t bitten to nothing.

“You’re sure you want to go in there?” Gage asked.

I didn’t look at him, just nodded.

“Interesting choice,” he said, staring at the script above the double doors.

My gaze snapped to him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

He met my eyes, his cold and calculating stare giving nothing away. “It’s meant to mean interesting choice,” he said evenly. “Not many women would go back to this after what you went through.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not ‘many women,’” I said, gathering my bag and my confidence.

“I’m aware of that,” he muttered.

Gage and I had established a rather unconventional friendship. Though it was a stretch to call it a friendship. Could people really be friends with sharks? That’s what he was—a predator. Something vital was missing from him. I’m guessing what the junk took away.

That’s why I felt so at ease in his company. Something vital was missing from me too.

And he hadn’t even fluttered an eyelash when I’d requested he drop me here on the way back from our meeting.

“I’ll be here when you’re done,” he told me as I opened the door.

I turned my head. “You don’t have to stay. I can walk.” The prospect of walking out in the open, clean air had my chest feeling tight, that didn’t matter. I had to do this shit at some time. I couldn’t be afraid of the big wide world forever.

“I’ll be here when you’re done,” he repeated.

I rolled my eyes. “Bloody bikers,” I muttered as I climbed out and shut the door.

Yeah, bloody bikers. In the week since our confrontation, Gabriel made good on his promise. He was there, at Rosie’s, every single day. Not for long, and he didn’t even come in, though I knew he wanted to. Come in and try to save me from it all.

But he didn’t.

It was as if he sensed that trying to save me would be the very thing to destroy me, that being in his presence for more than a handful of minutes was a mixture of torture and ecstasy I was only just mentally competent enough to handle.

So that’s all he gave me.

Those minutes were too much and not enough all at the same time. Mostly he asked how I was doing; told me to eat more; gave me the long, soulful, demon-filled stare; and left. Showing me what had changed about him.

Everything.

And what had changed about how I felt for him.

Nothing.

The previous morning, it changed.

“I made a mistake,” he said, jaw hard. The outburst came out of the blue, but the impact of the words hit me hard. So hard I was happy I stayed upright.

“A mistake?” I repeated. “Yeah, that tee with those jeans? Not cute.” I shook my head at him, trying to hide behind the bravado that served me so well in the past.

His gaze tattooed my soul. “I tried to make you mine. Tried to play by a book that was already written. Written for somebody else.” He stepped forward, clasping my hands in his and I let him. Despite the ice that settled under his grasp, the dirt that sank in, I let him. His touch was pain, but I feared the absence of it may be agony. “That’s where I fucked up. Rules for trying to win you, trying to make you mine, aren’t in any book ever written. ’Cause you ain’t one in a million, firefly—you’re one in a lifetime. I thought I could make you mine, make you belong to me. I didn’t see that you don’t belong to anyone but yourself. That’s why I could never grasp you in two hands… before.” His eyes flickered with demons before he chased them away. “Now I intend to keep you in my arms for good. And not as something that I own, that I possess, but that you give me. As a gorgeous, chaotic soul, with warrior’s eyes and a fuckin’ saint’s heart. I can’t possess your chaos, but I can let it possess me.” He lifted my hand up to his lips. “And it does. Every inch.”

Then he stepped back and walked away.

Fucking walked away.

I’d stood there like an idiot, shivering at the loss of his touch and the icy grasp of the flashbacks that came with it.

So that’s when I made the decision that brought me here. Gabriel, and his words, and his fucking soulful stare drenched in sorrow.

I kept my back straight and my steps purposeful as I crossed the parking lot. Tried to tell myself I wasn’t going to freak out.

Fake it till you make it.

Which was what I did when I walked through the doors and passed my old place of employment. I purposefully averted my gaze from the stage in the middle of the room.

I wasn’t ready for that just yet.

It was empty, eerily so.

“Bex,” a low voice rumbled.

I almost crawled up the wall until I saw the owner of that voice.

Cade’s expression was how I imagined a ranger might approach a wild horse—cautious, ready for it to bolt. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.”

I straightened my spine. “You didn’t scare me,” I lied.

He gave me a contemplating look before nodding, then gestured to a seat at the bar.

I sat down. He sat beside me. “How you doin’?” he asked, his voice softer than I ever imagined he’d be capable of. I didn’t exactly know the biker ‘prez’ except in passing when I’d worked here. He’d technically been my boss, since the club owned this place and he was in charge of the club.

But since I’d become employed, Gabriel seemed to magically take over the running of this place, namely making sure the patrons didn’t get within breathing distance of me. Killed my tips, but they paid well so I hadn’t complained.

Obviously he didn’t run the place anymore, which was a huge fucking relief. When I’d told Rosie my plans, she had looked at me sideways for just a second before putting me in touch with Cade.

“I’m fine,” I lied, glancing anywhere but his kind yet hard eyes.

He nodded again.

“I want my job back,” I blurted, wanting to do away with any talk of my current state of mind.

The only change in his expression was a slight raise of his brows. “Thought that might be the case.”

I drummed my fingers on the bar, mostly to distract me from my unease, from the constant itch.

“You sure you’re up to it?”

I narrowed my eyes. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

He regarded me. “Yeah. It won’t go down well. With him.”

I stopped drumming. “Yeah, well, it’s a good thing this has nothing to do with him.”

“Babe, it has everything to do with him.”

I gave him my best level stare. “Nope. I know you guys take this ownership thing pretty fucking seriously, despite the women’s protests, but this woman”—I pointed to myself—“isn’t owned by anyone, not even Gabriel. Especially not Gabriel. Men have been in control of what they do with my body, and I didn’t like it. Not one bit.”

I ignored Cade’s flinch.

“So I’m here, controlling what I’m doing with my own body. Me. No one else. And if you won’t give me my job back, I’ll go somewhere else.”

I made to stand up, though my threat was empty. I didn’t have anywhere else to go. I had no money, and there wasn’t exactly a plethora of strip clubs within spitting distance. I sure as shit wasn’t going back to Carlos’s. I couldn’t, even if I were deranged enough to go back to the employer who had me kidnapped and raped—and trust me, I wasn’t. I heard he dropped off the face of the earth and the club had burned down to ashes not a day after this one had.

Faulty wiring was the official story.

Cade’s hand on mine stopped me. I flinched as his skin came into contact with mine and he clocked my reaction immediately, taking his tattooed hand away.

I let out a breath.

“You can have your job back,” he said quietly. “If that’s what you want.”

“It’s what I want.”

He stood and I did my best not to fucking freak out at his size and the way he towered over me.

I managed. Just.

“We’re opening again on Friday. You up for that?”

I didn’t miss the way his gaze flickered down my body. He was taking in my tight jeans and equally tight cropped Henley. Not in a male way—I was pretty sure all women were invisible to him except his hot wife—but in a way like he was mentally calculating if this physical form could hold itself up on stage.

I’d put on weight. Not a lot but enough to hide my protruding bones. And my most important assets for this job, my tits and ass, were full and healthy, so he had nothing to worry about.

Friday was two days away. I was so not up for that. “Yep.” I hitched my bag on my shoulder. “All good if I come tomorrow to practice?”

He nodded. “Cadence will be here.”

Cadence was the manager of the dancers and a bitch.

We got on famously, despite her having screwed Gabriel.

She’d even visited Rosie’s a week before. She brought tequila and flowers, and a Glock.

Like Rosie, she was insane.

I nodded. “Awesome. Well, I’ll see you. Say hey to the wife from me.” I went to leave his presence and this fucking place. It was making my skin itch like nothing else.

“We’ll get them.” His voice was a low boom.

I froze but didn’t turn.

“They’re gonna pay for what they did, I’ll promise you that,” he continued.

I sucked in a breath and then kept walking.

Yeah, they’d pay. I just hoped I got to make them do so.

* * *

I
’d been practicing
my routine for two days straight, and every inch of my body screamed in protest at the abuse I was putting it through.

Stripping, despite what people thought, wasn’t just gyrating on stage and shedding your self-respect along with your clothes.

It was hard, really fucking hard on your body. There was a reason housewives and idiots who drank green juice started doing it for workout purposes.

And my body had been abused and battered in the most brutal of ways for three weeks. Not as bad as my mind, but still not good. Add to that one month of doing not much at rehab and even less at Rosie’s apart from serial killer marathons. It was safe to say I was rusty.

I wasn’t bad, but I wasn’t good.

Plus, my body hadn’t exactly recovered and it pissed me right off that I landed on my ass when I tried moves that used to be a piece of cake…before.

Just another thing those assholes had ruined.

I was sitting on the stage, my feet hanging off it, trailing the new wood. It was all new, thanks to the fire that had been started the day mine went out. But I could feel the skeletons underneath it. It was where Lily almost died, where Gabriel almost died.

My throat started to close up.

“Here,” a voice interrupted my thoughts, thankfully, and a bottle of water was shaken in front of my face.

I glanced up at Cadence and took it. “Thanks.”

She hoisted herself up to sit beside me. “You sure you’re up to this?” She nodded to the pole.

I narrowed my eyes at her. “Don’t I look up to it?”

“No,” she said bluntly. “Don’t get me wrong, I dig the hair and you’re still better than half the girls here, but you’re runnin’ on half a tank, babe. Understandable, considering what you went through. It’s heavy shit. You think this is the right place for you after…?”

“After I was kidnapped by my ex-employer and fed drugs while they did unseemly things to me for three weeks?” I finished for her, my voice sharp.

She didn’t flinch as I expected her to. Most people didn’t do well with being confronted by ugly reality, but Cadence looked like she’d seen enough ugly reality to be jaded by my world, which scared me slightly.

“Yeah,” she agreed.

I shrugged. “This is where I want to be. The only place I feel like I can be. As crappy as my old job used to be, when I was on stage, I had a sort of power, you know? Before I fucked myself up on drugs. I didn’t exactly love the reality of it, but being on stage is….” I searched for the word.

“Freeing?” she finished for me.

I nodded. “Exactly.”

She didn’t press, didn’t try to dig deeper and have a big heart-to-heart, which I fricking loved. “Okay then. That’s all I need to hear. You do what you gotta do.” She jumped back down onto the floor. “It’s good to have you back.”

I smiled at her. “It’s good to be back.”

It wasn’t.

It wasn’t
good
to be anywhere right now. But I figured if I faked it for long enough it would be.

“You,” a very masculine and very angry male voice echoed through the empty club.

Both Cadence and I whipped our heads to the red-faced, bald-headed, tattooed biker stomping boots in our direction.

“Angry male approaching is my cue to leave,” Cadence declared, leaving just as Gabriel made it to us.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” he clipped.

I scowled at him. “Hello to you too.”

He snatched my arm and hoisted me to the floor, then began to drag me towards the door.

His hand on my bare arm immediately drenched my body in ice. The dirt came to the surface and I struggled to get free. “What are you doing?” I shouted. “Let me go.”