AllFreeNovel
Share Us
____________
Lori
I open my eyes and realize for the first time since the death of my friend, I’ve slept a dreamless sleep. And for longer than two hours at a time. When I wiggle into the warmth surrounding me, I realize why I slept so well. Lying under me is a big, tattooed biker that looks like he could break a man with just a thought.
I wait but he doesn’t say anything, and his breathing never changes. Finding him still asleep, my eyes take all of him in and my hand can’t help but trail over his big body tracing the dark lines inked onto his body with my fingertips. What stories do all of these pictures and images tell?
“You keep touching me and I’m not going to be responsible for what happens, princess.”
I yelp and jerk my hand away. My eyes go to his and sure enough, his are open and staring down at me. How long has he been awake? The whole time?
He snatches my hand before it gets too far away and pulls it back to his chest. He places it in the middle and traps it under his. “Like what you see, sweetheart?”
I pull away from him as much as he will let me. “You know how you look. You know you’re beautiful.”
He laughs and rolls so that he is on top. “Men aren’t supposed to be beautiful, darlin’.”
“You know what I mean, sexy, handsome, hot as hell. I’m not going to stroke your ego and tell you how when you already know.”
He leans forward and nuzzles my neck, “Princess, my ego isn’t the thing I want you to stroke.” His mouth trails to my shoulder and higher giving me open-mouthed kisses and then a nip on my earlobe.
The sharp sudden pain makes me yelp again. This time he’s there when my mouth opens in surprise, taking my breath when he places his lips over mine. He duels with my tongue, dancing with my own until he pulls back and looks down at me again.
“We need to go, or your little pussy is getting fucked into next week.”
His words have my eyes growing big and round as he gets up and I realize he’s not wearing much, and the front of his boxers are tented. He’s pulling out something from a bag when I come out of the bathroom.
“You want to go to the entertainment night, tonight?”
“What does that mean? Entertainment night?” He explains it’s a time for the whole club to come together and some people play games or darts, some shoot pool, some just drink, some go off and have ‘private’ entertainment. It’s basically a time for everyone in the club to join together, “Um…maybe.”
He gives me a look and I break.
“Yes, okay. I want to know what it is and see what is going on, alright.”
He laughs as he pulls me closer and holds up a vest very similar but smaller than his own. I wore one like it yesterday but never took the time to really stare at it before I took it off and forgot about it. He holds this one up and shows me what the back says. And I feel my blood run cold. On the back is the club name and insignia but the wording is what stops me and makes my stomach roll. Property of Odin. Did the other one say that as well? Did I go around my reception with his claim all over me?
“Wear this.”
“No.” He cocks his brow and I square my shoulders. “I’m not property and I never will be.”
“Listen Princess,” I realize any comment he might make with the words ‘listen princess’ at the beginning isn’t going to make me happy, “the vest is used to keep women safe from men that would see the woman as a free agent, someone they can flirt with, or even go further with. In this world, asking isn’t always a priority and everyone in this club - and town - needs to understand that if something happens to you, they are going to have to deal with me. Wear the damned vest.”
I eyeball the thing again as he hands it over, not taking it from him yet again.
“You see this?” He holds my hand up to show me the ring he put on my left hand when he ‘married’ me. “This is the same fucking thing as this.” He holds up the vest.
“Only this is bigger and tells people I’ll kill them if they fuck with you. It protects you. It keeps you safe when I’m not with you. Now put the damned thing on.”
My eyes bounce between the ring on my finger and the vest he is holding out to me. I eventually take it and reluctantly put it on. I spend the day with some of the ladies at the club -other ‘old ladies’- and explore the place I now call home, I guess. At the end of the day, Odin shows up and takes me to the front of the club again where the ‘entertainment’ is supposed to happen.
When we get there a woman is up on a stage working a pole and putting on a show. I stiffen and pull away from him. Or at least try to pull away from him. He keeps his grip on me and pulls me over to a dark corner where an oversized chair sits.
I hiss at him, “I thought you said your ‘club’ didn’t do shit like this.”
He pulls me down into his lap even though I remain stiff and unhappy. The hurt that he lied to me goes deeper than just being fibbed to. He realizes how I feel about women being forced to do shit like that and yet he didn’t even try to hide it. It’s like what we talked about before means nothing at all.
I try not to look over at the woman moving like a serpent around the shiny gold pole. She’s good but that is beside the point. Is this his idea of ‘entertainment’? Who the hell did I marry and how could I misjudge someone so badly? The sense of betrayal sits heavy and hot in my chest until I think I might explode from it.
