Blood & Rust (Lock & Key #4) (48 page)

My head buzzed. I was light-headed, floating, soaring at a higher altitude than ever before. I was being pushed out of the airplane. Scared out of my wits, exhilarated, intoxicated. Did I even have a parachute?

Who cares?

I relished the warm taste of him, his scent—sunlight and fresh air, his strong body holding me tight, and I held on for the ride of my life.

Parachute be damned.

“All I fucking want is you,” his voice rasped.

He took one of my hands and cupped it over the solid length of his erection, and my breath hitched, my eyes finding his burning ones.

“You got me here, baby. You did that,” he whispered against my lips, his words burning right through my flesh.

He ignited me in another kiss. My legs shook, and I pressed myself back into the brick wall in a supreme effort to remain standing.

His hands went to my breasts, roughly kneading them together. “So fucking sexy, Tania. Wanna bury my dick in these tits.”

I let out a cry and tugged on his hair, bringing his mouth crashing down on mine again. My pelvis ground against his. My trembling body flooded with liquid heat. Every nerve ending tingled with hypersensitivity. The desire to give him all of me was intense. The girl inside me jumped up and down, like when I was a kid and I’d gone to a carnival with my family and had finally won the stuffed animal prize I’d had my eyes on all day.

I got it. Me. I won.

“Butler, you in there? Bro, got a situation. Need you out front!” Kicker’s voice boomed on the other side of the door we’d left ajar.

My hands gripped the taut, ropy muscles of Butler’s arms.

“Shit!” he muttered against my skin.

He adjusted my blouse, and his brows drew together as he gave me one last heavy look, my stomach knotting under the weight of it. I ran my fingers through his unruly hair, and he reached over and pushed open the door. “What’s up, Kick?”

Kicker shifted his weight on his pointy black cowboy boots. “Sorry, man. Finger’s here. He’s looking for Tania.”

I lurched forward, breaking our connection, and Butler’s jaw clenched. I pulled open the door wider, the hallway light engulfing us.

“What does he want?” I asked.

Kicker’s dark eyebrows shot up, a smirk on his handsome face. “You.”

Both men stared at me, dousing me with cold water. I squared my shoulders as I moved through the door.

Butler grabbed my elbow, pulling me back. “What the fuck?”

“I won’t know what’s going on until I talk to him, will I?”

“What the hell is going on between the two of you?” he spit out.

“I need to talk to him.”

Butler tilted his head. “God forbid we keep him waiting. He comes calling, you go running.”

“Guys”—Kicker shifted his weight, a hand running over his dark goatee—“you want me to tell him I can’t find you? That you took off?”

Butler’s glittering eyes remained on me. He braced for my response. I braced to give it.

“If he came here to find me, it must be important,” I said.

“Really?”

“Yes, really. And I need to find out what it is.”

Butler grimaced, raising his hands in the air. “Who am I to stop you?”

“Don’t do this, please.”

“Oh,
I’m
not the one
doing
here,” Butler shot back.

“It’s not what you think.”

“I’m thinking a hell of a lot of things, Tania.”

“Bro!” Kicker’s insistent voice cut between us.

“I can’t explain it to you now,” I said, glancing at Kicker. “But Finger has never lied to me, cheated me, or steered me wrong. He doesn’t do things without a purpose. I trust him.”

A sneer lashed Butler’s face, his lips curling. “That sounds like a long, thick history.”

“Are you coming with me?”

“What? Me?” he bit out.

“Can’t you trust me here?”

“Ah, I should trust you, but you can’t tell me, right? Can’t tell me about whatever you and him have had going on or not going on for years now?” His voice grew sharper and sharper.

I let out a breath, my eyes darting down the hallway.

“You can’t get into it now, but will you ever?” Butler asked.

“I’d like to. I will.”

“Well, that’s real sweet.”

“Butler, for him to come here looking for me, something must be wrong. Something he needs me to help him with.”

He leaned into me. “You’d better not keep the big man waiting then. I’ll bet you never have.” His rough whisper grated on my skin.

I turned and strode down the hallway, my chest loaded down with bricks. The bricks ripped from the wall he had just had me up against.

Goddamn it
.

“B!” Kicker hollered. “Hey!”

Behind me exploded the splintering crash of glass and a thousand black curses.

FINGER’S LEGS WERE PLANTED WIDE
, his nostrils flaring, his storm-filled eyes on Tania, as she charged toward him.

She came to a stop in front of him. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

A muscle along his jaw flexed. “Where’ve you been? I’ve been calling, but you don’t answer.”

“I’ve been here most of the night. I wasn’t paying too much attention to my phone. Sorry.”

His harsh gaze landed on me, the lines of his face tightening even more.

“Finger! Are you going to tell me what’s going on, or are we going to stand here all night?” Tania asked, glancing over at me.

He hooked her upper arm and tugged her past our table to the bar. Grace and Alicia stared at them, none too happy.

“Hey! What the hell are you doing?” I tracked after them. “Let go of her!”

Finger pinned me with a ferocious glare. “Get the fuck out of my face!”

“Butler, it’s okay. Really—” Tania said.

“The hell it is. I said, let go of her!”

“You stay out of my business!” Finger growled.

“She still your business? She’s—”

“Please, Butler! Please!”

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do,” I said.

“Tania, what’s going on?” Grace appeared at my side.

“I need to hear Finger out. That’s all,” Tania said.

“That’s all,” I said, my tone bitter, mocking. “I’ve been down this road before, and I ain’t doing it again.”

Grace stiffened, Tania glancing at her.

“Have at it.” I raised my chin. “I’m out.”

Tania’s eyes widened and she looked away. Was it shock or hurt? The black slime of self-loathing spewed through my veins.

“Let’s go,” Finger said, his voice curt, harsh.

The pounding against my skull intensified at the tone of his demand. Boner came up on the other side of me, the press of his shoulder against mine keeping me from launching myself at Finger, from getting his hand off her arm.

Biff, the owner of the Roadhouse, got in my face. “Take it off my property. Now. You men know the fucking rules. Years now.”

“We’re leaving.” Finger dragged Tania away.

Away from me.

The woman I had lost myself in moments ago—the feel of her, the taste of her, the promise of her—just the two of us in a stifling dark room off a hall in an old bar, yet it had felt like total fucking paradise. I could still feel her short breaths hot on my chest, her eager hands pressing into my body, urging me, wanting from me.

Wanting me.

One minute, Finger and I have a solid business relationship, seeing eye to eye, and now, here he was, getting in my face over the woman I wanted.

He had killed Jump, and I had helped him kill Reich, so he could gain more power in his club. We had a hold on each other.

And he had some sort of hold on Tania. The one woman who meant more to me than anything. The woman who had claimed my heart, claimed me, body and soul.

“Are you okay?” Grace touched my arm.

My head fell forward, and I let out a laugh. The bitter irony of Grace being the one to ask me that question right at this moment was not lost on me.

My shoulders dropped. “I am done with this shit. So fucking done.”

“I don’t know what’s going on between them,” she said. “And I’ve been wishing I did for a while now.”

I tore my eyes away from Finger and Tania exiting the Roadhouse. The two of them were probably charging toward his bike.

Toward fuck knows what.

I ran a hand down my face. “Obviously, it’s something, Grace. She’s never told you?”

My hands rifled through my pockets.
Where are those fucking smokes when I need them?
I shouldn’t be smoking at all, but fuck it. I needed something, and I needed it right the fuck now.

“When we saw you in Nebraska at the Flames’ clubhouse, they seemed to know each other already,” Grace said.

Damn it. Fucking empty.
I crumpled plastic and paper in my fist.

“I’d picked up on that, too.”

“She seemed uncomfortable though. I asked her about it on the drive home, but she managed to avoid answering although she admitted they’d had something in the past, a long time ago, but I never knew about it. Then, when he was here at the club the last time, she again refused to discuss it.”

“I don’t know, Grace. Maybe he’s got something on her and he’s holding it over her head? Then again, she acts like she owes him, like he’s a priority for her.”

“She doesn’t seem afraid of him or threatened though, right?”

“True. One of the few.”

“Whatever it is, they seem pretty comfortable—if that’s the right word.”

I winced. “I don’t know if that makes me feel any better.”

“Me either. She never talks about him, and I figure if she’s not talking about it, that either means it’s really fucked up, or there’s some sort of secret involved. In any case, she’s extremely loyal, Butler. Whatever it is, she won’t just share for the hell of it. With any of us.”

I exhaled deeply. Tania’s fierce loyalty was one of the things I loved about her.

Loved?

Is that why my heart felt like it was going through the shredder, and the only things keeping me standing were my ribs, my legs, and denial?

“I got the sense that she has a deeper connection with Finger than she does with that husband of hers,” I muttered. “Or is that just my crazy talking?”

Grace glanced up at me. “No, it’s not crazy. That’s what worries me.”

A bond. Finger and Tania shared some kind of important bond.

“Grace.” Lock stood over his old lady from behind, his arm sliding across her chest, pulling her close to his.

Did Finger and Tania share a bond the same way Grace and Lock had from the very beginning?

Getting involved with Tania, getting attached to her, would only be more of the same disappointment, disillusionment, destruction.

Grace laced her hand in her old man’s. “We’ve got to go. If anything comes up, let me know, okay?”

“Yeah, sure.” I raised my chin at Lock. “Good night.”

He nodded at me, and the two of them took off, their arms around each other’s waists.

I stared after them.

It was meant to be for some of us, not all of us though. No, not all of us. I had accepted that fact at Caitlyn’s funeral. I had accepted that fact last year after the debacle of me and Grace as I’d ridden off into my black sunset.
It
would never happen for me again.
It
wasn’t in my cards, my stars, my whatever the fuck. That was why agreeing to be with Nina had made sense. Because all that just did not fucking matter anymore. Because I’d finally accepted the message I had been given by fate.

Then, Tania had happened and blown that theory to bits.

And here I was, burning.

Burning.

Burning.

I was such a fucking idiot. Still.

Tania was now scarred with an angry red wound on her chest. The red weals would fade, but the marks would remain forever.

That fucking F.

Failure.

Fuck-up.

Finger.

She was permanently marked from my failure to protect her. And marked with a souvenir of her connection to him. Whatever kind of connection it was, it definitely was something.

That light-headedness kicked in, my breath shortening, the skin across my forehead and down my neck tingling with a cold sweat. I wiped at my damp upper lip.

“You okay?” Kicker laid a hand on my shoulder.