“He should be here in a couple of minutes.” My head snapped up. The guy who I had been talking to came back down the hallway he had wandered to with his phone in his hand. “He’s on the way back from the club. You wanna wait here or in his room?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but I didn’t actually have one. I really wanted to run out of here and never look back, but this was my last resort. I didn’t know who else to ask for help.
The guy shook his head and chuckled. “Tell you what. Playboy normally comes in the back door. Give it ten minutes and then go knock on his door, yeah?”
I blinked and nodded. “Uh, if you think that’s best.”
The guy shook his head. “I think it’s best for you, doll. You look like you’re about to puke all over the floor.”
I gulped and tried to quell my rolling stomach. “I’m fine. I just need to talk to Playboy.”
The guy looked me up and down. “You ain’t his type, doll. You sure it’s Playboy you’re looking for?”
That was the name Billie Jean had mentioned. She said Playboy had bailed her out of a couple of dicey situations before. I had a feeling she was in a dicey situation right now, and Playboy needed to help me bail her out. I nodded again. “I need to talk to Playboy.”
The guy tipped his head to the side. “And you can’t tell me your name?”
I looked around the clubhouse. I had never been inside an MC clubhouse before, and the only knowledge I had about them was from TV shows. A bar took up the whole length of one wall, and there were ten stools in front of it. There was a large pool table in the center of the space, and six round tables with chairs sat scattered around the room. A large TV hung on the wall, and two guys were sitting on a large leather couch watching some action movie.
When I had knocked on the front door, no one had answered, and I stood out there for ten minutes before I gathered enough courage to try the door handle. I was sort of surprised when it opened easily, but the three guys who were on the other side of the door looked even more surprised.
The two on the couch hadn’t talked to me, but I could feel them watching me the whole time. The guy who had been talking to me asked me my name, but I never told him.
“Raelyn,” I croaked. “My name is Raelyn.”
The guy nodded. “Six-Gun.”
I tipped my head to the side and tried to figure out what that meant. “Uh, come again?” What an odd thing to say after someone told you their name.
“The name is Six-Gun, doll.”
“Oh,” I gasped. I was dumb and forgot that most bikers didn’t go by their real names. Hence why I was looking for a guy called Playboy. “That’s, uh, sweet?”
Jesus. I pressed my palm to my forehead and wished I had the power to rewind time and take back the word “sweet.” How is the name Six-Gun sweet, Raelyn?
“Uh, never been called that before, but I guess I’ll take it.” Six-Gun twisted around and looked down the hallway he had just walked from. “Sounds like Playboy is back. You can head back to his room.”
That was a hell of a lot faster than ten minutes. I had walked in ready to ask Playboy for help, but when he wasn’t here right away, I retreated back to being a coward who wasn’t ready to talk to him. “It’s only been three minutes.” If that. Did the guy break the speed of the light to get here?
“You can either go back there on your own terms or I can guarantee he’ll be out here in a minute trying to figure out what you want.”
Well. This was a dilemma. I could wait for him or I could go back there. “Uh, which door is his?”
Yeah, I would much rather talk to him without three other guys listening.
“Head down the hallway, hang a left, and he’s the second door on the left.”
I nodded stiffly and willed my feet to move. My legs shifted woodenly, and I’m sure I looked like a nutcracker walking toward Playboy’s room.
I heard muffled laughter, but I didn’t look back at Six-Gun. If I did, I was likely to make a run for the front door. I made it to the end of the hallway and turned to the left. I passed the first door on the left and then stopped in front of the second door.
I raised my fist, knocked lightly on the door, and waited.
Three seconds passed before the door swung open and my eyes fell on the most beautiful rugged man I had ever seen. Normally, rugged and beautiful didn’t go together, but those were the two exact words I would use to describe Playboy.
Beautiful.
Rugged.
His eyes traveled over me, but mine were doing the same to him.
He wasn’t seeing much by looking at me, but I was getting one heck of an eye full.
Distressed jeans encased his legs, and black boots adorned his feet. His black shirt pulled taut across his chest, and the left sleeve was rolled up with what I assumed was a pack of cigarettes wrapped in it.
Dark ink swirled around his forearm and traveled up into his sleeve, and my fingers itched to pull up the fabric to see the tattoo. His arms were muscled and tanned from being out in the sun, and his neck showed another hit of ink. I wondered if it connected to the ink on his arm. Tattoos had never really been my thing, but seeing Playboy made me rethink my opposition to them.
His jawline looked like it had been chiseled from stone and sprinkled with stubble.
Mustache.
The man had a mustache, and I had never seen something sexier in my life. My nether regions gave a slight ache at the thought of feeling the stubbly hair between my legs.
Focus, Raelyn. I hadn’t even spoken one word to the guy, and I was already imaging what his mouth would feel like on me. If this was any indication, I could see why he got the road name of Playboy.
“I heard you were looking for me, darlin’.”
My eyes snapped to his, and I realized he had ended his perusal of me way before I had finished gaping at him. “I, uh, well, yeah.”
Real smooth. From the moment I had left my house and driven to the clubhouse, I had been confident and determined to convince Playboy to help me. I wasn’t going to take no for an answer. Now, it seemed like I couldn’t string a complete and coherent sentence together.
“I think you’re at a little bit of an advantage seeing as you know my name but I don’t have a clue what yours is.”
Even his voice was rugged and beautiful. How? How was that freaking possible? And, of course he wouldn’t know my name, let alone even know I existed. Playboy was the type of man who would never, in a million years, look my way, let alone know my name.
“Uh, Raelyn. Well, some people call me Rae, but I’m Raelyn. You can call me Raelyn. Raelyn.” He could also call me Rain Man. I cringed and turned to look back down the hallway. I took a deep breath and forced my gaze to return to Playboy. “My name is Raelyn, and I need to talk to you.” There, that was what I intended to say all along. I needed the past thirty seconds to be erased so I could start over.
“Don’t know how much we have to talk about when I’ve never met you before, darlin'.”
The endearment rolled off his lips too easily, and I knew he wasn’t calling me anything special.
“If you let me in, I can explain.”
He eyed me closely. “Even if you explain, I don’t know what the hell you think I can do for you.”