I always assumed Bambi understood how Bronco would never hand over control of the club to Wyatt. Or that the other founding members wouldn’t follow my cousin. He’s too rude, and these men feel entitled to a certain level of respect. They fought and bled to offer us this comfortable community. A little ass-kissing is expected, but Wyatt owns an explosive temper and a big fat mouth. People thought his shit was adorable when he was little. During family or club functions, he’d start cursing and making threats. People laughed at his temper because he was small and powerless. Now, he’s all grown up, and it’s no longer funny.
But maybe I’ve read the club’s vibe wrong. Bronco and Rooster saved Wyatt’s ass when I was beating it, but they didn’t do shit when it looked like I would lose. Lowell and Anders are outside, babying Bambi rather than in here with their women and my mom. Has the tide turned against me? Was it always going that way, or did something change?
Suddenly, ditching Elko with Monroe no longer feels like such a wild choice.
MONROE
After the fight, Conor nurses more than a mild concussion. I sense him working shit out, plotting maybe. Though he’s difficult to read, I get the feeling he wants to leave the party.
But I insist we stay. Not for the free food and booze or to shake our asses on the dance floor. We can’t leave because that’s what certain assholes want.
“Never give your enemies anything to celebrate,” Uncle Clive would tell his sons.
Sitting at another table are my enemies—Wyatt, Taryn, and DeAnna. They want to leave but refuse to back down to me. Wyatt’s face is all fucked up with his eyes nearly swollen shut. DeAnna whines about her broken nose. Taryn nurses her wounds by sucking on a beer bottle. Bambi and Rooster sit with them. There is a silent understanding that they deserve to be here while I don’t.
Well, fuck that shit! Lowell Sinema helped build this club. Conor’s father was a founding member, too. Barbie helps run the trucking business and gives Bronco plenty of input. I learn this last fact once the booze hits her system, and she tells me three times.
Barbie and Conor are Executioners royalty. No way should they back down. Besides, I have no interest in bowing to those assholes. Even in Minton, I hated backing down, which is why I had to run. If I stuck around, pushing and poking at Clive, he would have needed to end me.
Many of the people currently around me are probably dangerous, too. The kind of power the Executioners possess doesn’t come from asking nicely. They’re violent people, and I could die here just as easily as in Minton.
But I’m not afraid of them. Clive was a real, flesh-and-blood threat to me. These people feel like extras in a show I’m not sure I plan to finish.
“We should get back home,” Lowell says, appearing next to Topanga.
Instantly, I decide to dance. Sure, some of it is my need to play a teenager pissed at her daddy. However, I also like the song “Long Cool Woman (In a Black Dress)” playing over the speakers.
I ask a bored Pixie if she wants to dance. Conor is too busy pretending as if his head doesn’t hurt.
Anders smiles at the sight of his woman and me walking to the empty dance floor. Pixie sways—hippie-style—to the music. I shake my ass—stripper-style—next to her. We’re in our own worlds, and I’m fairly certain neither of us is actually moving to the beat.
Despite my terrible dancing, Conor wears a smile. His bedroom eyes remind me of how easily he’ll remove my dress soon.
Even with a pounding headache, he joins me on the dance floor. His hands go straight to my ass and remain there while we sway to “Is This Love.”
“Yes,” he says and carefully kisses my battered lips with his busted ones.
“All day long,” I murmur before our tongues make speaking impossible.
Nearby, Pixie climbs Anders, who doesn’t really dance as much as hold her like a kid and sway back and forth. Somehow, all this lovey-dovey stuff doesn’t get the rest of the party onto the dance floor. No one even dry humps in a corner. Then again, maybe the horny ones already left.
“Not to interrupt,” Topanga interrupts two songs later. “But we’re heading to Bronco’s house for a nightcap. Barbie is joining us. Are you two coming?”
Conor pries his gaze away from me and says, “We’ll be over when we finish making the room jealous.”
A grinning Topanga hurries to join her fleeing husband. Watching them go, I pout despite my pained lips.
“My father doesn’t like me,” I mutter.
“I’m not sure mine liked me, either,” Conor says, too buzzed on pain pills to lie. “He thought I was soft.”
“You are soft,” I say, sliding my fingers inside his shirt through the openings between the shirt buttons. “Hot too.”
“This party is dying. Even the giant and his hippie honey are bailing,” Conor says and tilts his head toward where the couple disappears out the door. “Why don’t we head to my house? We’ll grind out a few hard orgasms before joining the gang at Bronco’s. Then, we’ll return to my house and fuck more. Afterward, we’ll watch a movie and then fool around in the Jacuzzi tub. Finally, we’ll sleep.”
“I stopped listening at the ‘hard orgasms’ part, but, yeah, sure. I’ll go wherever you go.”
“Promise?” he asks, suddenly overly serious.
Conor’s intensity forces the music and people to fall away. There’s only him and me.
“When I find someone special,” I tell him, “they imprint on my heart. I love them so completely that I never feel right again without them. You imprinted on my heart right away. No other man exists. I’ll go wherever you want and live however you need to live.”
“The universe knew its shit when it whispered in my ear about you,” he says and smiles softly.
“The universe spoke to you, and you called dibs on me as if I was the last slice of pizza,” I mutter, giving him grief because he’s still hiding his feelings behind that cool-guy exterior.
“I like how you were going to bang all the guys in the club if I didn’t,” he says, sneering at me.
“I would have sucked so much cock,” I growl, trying hard to bug out my eyes, but my head hurts too much to make the look work.
“Stop,” he whines, giving up on his overly macho routine. “You’re making my dick sad.”
“Well, let’s go to your house and find a use for its tears.”
“That sounds gross,” he teases as I return to the table where my heels hide under a chair.
“Give me a break. I headbutted a shit weasel today. That’s gonna leave a mark.”
Conor slides an arm around my shoulders and guides me away from the now empty dance floor. Everyone except the staff has left. We’re the dipshits holding up their cleaning process.
“Are you safe to drive?” I ask Conor as we walk outside to his lone Harley in the parking lot.
“Fuck no. But you can’t walk three blocks in heels.”
“Can’t you push the motorcycle while carrying me on your back?” I ask and smack his fine ass.
“Sure, on an average day, I’m fucking Superman. But I got a brain owie and need to be babied.”