Ride Me Hard: A Biker Romance Serial (The Devil's Host Motorcycle Club Book 1) Read online

  My heart pounds against my ribs again, frantic and desperate. What else does he feel like doing? “Did you miss the part where he’s a cop?”

  Because reminding him he’s assaulted an officer of the law and has nothing left to lose is a brilliant idea. I gulp at my own stupidity.

  “No. But if he’s clean, I’m a fucking choir boy. I’m sure he won’t want to answer any uncomfortable questions about tonight.”

  He’s got a point, but my stomach twists at the possible blowback. Wade and Jimmy are friends. One word from Wade and Jimmy will eighty-six my job faster than yesterday’s special. I scramble for an escape. We were attacked on the way to the parking lot. A stranger. He probably thought I had the night’s deposit in my purse. It’s not far from the truth. It could work. And Wade would seem like a hero. He probably wouldn’t argue the details. “I need to call him an ambulance. If I tell you where you might find Harry, will you leave? Please. I won’t tell the police anything about you. I promise.”

  My voice breaks. I promise? God, could I be more pathetic?

  He tips my chin up farther until it’s uncomfortable to hold the position. I wince and resist the urge to pull free. I need him to trust me. Worse, I want him to like me. As much as he tells me not to thank him, not to get romantic ideas…I wonder.

  He smirks. “So, he gets to be a hero?”

  And there it is again. Does he want to be the hero? That wounded smirk is a sliver of hope, that maybe this big bad man likes being good sometimes. Wants it, like something forbidden and sweet. Like cake. Like me. “What? No. I just…I’m trying to help us both out here. We can both get what we want, can’t we?”

  “I think so.” His smirk curls into a genuine smile, one that raises the hair on the back of my neck.

  Regret flickers in my belly. I remember that my security comes with a price. “Are you going to hurt Harry?”

  “Not if he has Dev’s money. But judging by the way he ran off tonight, that might be an issue. If you’re worried about him, I might let you plead for his life. You’re pretty on your knees. We could do this again.”

  My cheeks heat with arousal and shame as I realize how I must look; face streaked with tears, skirt rucked up almost to my hips, lips inches from his crotch.

  Wade’s unconscious body between us. Shit. I need to get him out of here before Wade wakes up and my terrible plan falls apart.

  “But I won’t be—” And then it hits me. He’s going to take me with him, and I’m not one-hundred percent sure I don’t want to go.

  His grip on my chin eases into a caress, and I shiver. His touch is almost tender, swiping away my tears with his thumb. “There’s a smart girl. But I’m not a complete monster. I’ll bring you back here in a few days, sooner if Harry has the money. You’ll only be a little worse for wear, unless you like it rough.”

  Do I? My lips twitch to say no, to protest, but my body has other ideas.

  I shouldn’t trust him. I should scream and run and break my ankle trying to get away. Instead I turn my face into his palm like a kitten looking to be petted.

  I was worried about him having nothing to lose, but really I’m the one with nothing to lose. Dead-end job, dead-end apartment, dead-end family…I might as well climb on the back of his bike and see where he takes me.

  Chapter Four

  In my skirt and heels, I’m not exactly sure how to climb onto the back of his bike. Not without flashing my panties or possibly knocking into something I’m not supposed to touch.

  I’m not supposed to touch any of this. Not the bike. Not him. I don’t even know his name.

  Not that it matters. We aren’t going to be friends. He isn’t going to ask about my day and rub my feet. He’s going to… I shake my head against the filthy thoughts shimmering just beneath the surface. Me with my legs spread, him tearing down my…

  I take a step toward the bike and hesitate. It’s more like a mountain than a bike anyway. A sleek metal mountain, with chrome peaks and flat black valleys.

  “What do I—How do I—”

  And then he’s behind me, arms like tree trunks at my back and under my ass. I am falling and flying and so warm in his embrace as he lifts me up. Bereft when he plants me on the leather seat instead of bending me over it.

  “What’s your name? Should I even ask that? I shouldn’t.”

  He laughs, skimming his fingers down my leg, catching on my nylons, trailing sparks in the wake of his touch. He plucks at the thin material and opens up a run in my dime-store hose.

  “Noah.”

  It’s like a match strike. The sound of the rip, the drag of his calluses over my bare skin. Jagged and sharp and so damn hot. I reach behind me and wrap my hands around the metal bar that seems to exist for just such a purpose. So I can have something to hold on to while he makes me explode by wriggling his rough little finger against a patch of skin just above my knee.

  The bastard.

  He keeps his head down, and I pretend he doesn’t know what he’s doing to me, what I’m feeling as he grips my ankle and plants my foot on a little spoke. His hot breath puffs against my outer thigh. Oh, he knows. “You put your feet here.”

  I find a matching spoke on the left side and center myself on the seat. He studies me for a moment, his careful gaze more efficient than a stroke. It sends a rush of blood to my cheeks and my nipples and lower, making me pink and full. Exposed. I duck my chin, trying to hide the worst of my blush.

  He grabs the helmet and lifts it toward me. Oh God, he’s going to put the big heavy thing over my head and I’m not going to be able to see or hear anything. Fear slithers in my belly and up into my throat. I forget all about hiding my blush. Hiding anything. I cry out. “Wait—No—”

  “Shhh…” He smooths my hair back with one hand and cups my cheek. “I’m making plans for your face too, sweetheart, and they don’t include seeing it smashed on the highway.”

  So he’s going to take care of me. At least for now.

  He catches my lower lip with his thumb and tugs it down just a little. Not enough to expose my teeth, but enough to let me know his plans for my face include my mouth. I know this dance. On some terrible reflex my tongue darts out, and I taste the mineral salt of him. Copper and stone. Electric. He feels it too; I know it. Like licking a battery.

  He sucks in a breath, and I bow toward him as if he’s drawing me in for air. Sucking me down, because he is. With his touch and his grunts and the way he looks at me. He skims down my neck, over my shoulders and my arms, until he’s crowding me completely. Almost hugging me. He grips my wrist and presses his face to my ear. A sharp pleasure-pain pierces my earlobe. He bit me. His teeth drag over delicate flesh. The wet heat of his mouth raises goose bumps. I gasp.

  I want him to do it again. And again. And lower. I want to smell the musk and motor oil and old leather scent that clings to his body, and feel his rough stubble scrape over my belly. I want—I jerk without letting go of the bar.

  “Your hands?” He nuzzles into my ear on the question. And I can only nod. Mind racing. My hands. Yes. My hands. What should I do with my hands? “They go around my waist. Try to keep ’em off my dick while I’m driving.”

  Shock, shame, arousal—I am dizzy and denied.

  He slips the helmet over my head, and everything goes dark. My world is quiet and still until he settles on the bike in front of me. I wrap my arms around him and carefully link my fingers together just above his belt buckle, anchoring myself to his body.

  There is panic in this darkness, but it pulses between my legs and mingles with the vibration from the engine. It soothes as it savages.

  Noah.

  I realize I never told him where to find Harry and he never asked.

  I have no idea where he’s taking me or what he’s planning to do with me when we get there.

  Oh, but I hope.

  Chapter Five

  I sit on the back of the bike with my eyes closed long after he’s gotten off. I’m in no hurry to find out where we are or
what will happen next. We could be at some seedy bar or a meth lab or worse—the middle of nowhere. My brain says that would be worse, but my heart flutters like it might be the best thing ever. A secluded spot…just the two of us. I don’t even care. It’s all out of my control, and for the first time in a long time I feel free. Which is stupid since I am possibly the most not-free I’ve ever been.

  Snap. “Off.”

  It takes me a second to register that the noise I heard was fingers snapping, that those fingers must belong to Noah, and that he’d commanded me off his bike like an unruly pet. A fresh burst of indignity courses through me, and I slip off the leather seat, tearing at the helmet as I go. A gust of cool night air raises goose bumps along my sweat-damp neck.

  Noah smirks at my graceless dismount, and I swallow my anger. I’m too busy taking in the familiar street behind him, houses like salt boxes stacked beside each other with little strips of scraggly grass between them. I hop over the cracks in the driveway beneath our feet every single day. I know if I turn around, I’ll see the weathered steps that lead up to my garage apartment.

  “Is this some kind of joke? You drove me home? How the hell do you even know where I live?” My heart thumps heavy in my chest, and I’m not sure if what I’m feeling is panic that he knew where I lived all along or disappointment that he hasn’t whisked me away…yet. There’s that dangerous hope—spurring me on, turning the sharp twist of dread into a caress.

  “Sweetheart, I’m an enforcer for the Devil’s Host. I didn’t roll up on Harry without knowing exactly what I was walking into tonight, right down to what color panties Jimmy prefers you girls wear under your new uniforms.”

  “So why didn’t you just wait out back for Harry?”

  “I needed to know what he’d do if I came for him like a man. It doesn’t matter anymore if he’s got Dev’s money or not…he ran. He can’t be trusted. Now I’ll track him like an animal.”

  The fire in my belly turns to ice as my worst fears for Harry are confirmed, and I whisper, “I didn’t run.”

  His lip curls up into a crooked smile that makes my knees wobble even though I’m scared. His eyes flash mischief and something else, something that in another man I might think was regret. “You haven’t been given the opportunity.”

  His hand darts out, and then—crack—my ass is hot. Pain, heat, pleasure—they’re all mixed up together, and I can hardly believe it. I reach back to cup the assaulted cheek, to soothe and protect it. To hold that feeling in for as long as I can.

  He laughs. “Now go on home, little girl. It’s past your bedtime, and I’ve got work to do that I’m sure you don’t have the stomach for.”

  I should feel relief, but all I feel is hurt. “You were going to take me home all along, weren’t you? All that big bad was an act?”

  “Big and bad is who I am, Star. That’s the job description. I like watching you squirm, but fuck, this just…seems like the right thing to do. Don’t test me.”

  “Do you always do the right thing?” I hold my breath, waiting for the answer.

  “Almost never.”

  I take a step forward and touch my fingertips to the belt buckle I’d been holding on to during our ride. I want it to burn me, but it doesn’t. “What if I want you to chase me?”

  “I promise you don’t. And sweetheart, what you want doesn’t factor into this equation.”

  I wonder if what he wants factors in at all. I slip my hand below his belt buckle and skim my palm over the erection straining against his jeans. I know what he wants.

  He clamps a hand over mine, stilling it, and his breath fans hot against my ear. “You’re playing with matches.”

  “I’m playing with you.”

  And then his lips are on mine. He licks into my mouth like a brush fire, hot and crazy, and I can barely stay standing. Tongue and teeth and rough hands pushing up under my skirt. I’d spread for him right here in the driveway, let him burn me to the ground until I’m nothing but a smudge of ash on the pavement.

  The kiss doesn’t slow down or taper off; it just stops. He yanks back and leaves me reeling. “Now’s your chance, Star.”

  Dizzy, I touch my hand to my buzzing mouth like it might anchor me. “My what?”

  His eyes look darker, lust drunk and heavy-lidded. A lazy predator. He doesn’t smile. He bares his teeth.

  “Run.”

  Whatever that thing is that makes animals head for high ground an hour before an earthquake, I don’t have it. I don’t get out of danger early, ever. But my fight-or-flight response works on overdrive, finely honed by years of disasters. I stumble backward to get away before he’s finished curling his tongue into the n sound. I fucking run.

  But my feet and my back hurt, and the adrenaline from the incident with Officer Wade is wearing off. Was that really only half an hour ago? Not even. Doesn’t matter. I kick off my heels. The hose are ruined anyway. Ripped open in a way no amount of nail polish could ever fix. I’m pretty sure I’m ruined.

  My palms leave sweaty blotches on the trunk of my landlord’s ancient Caddy when I push off to dart toward my steps, and then my legs are out from under me. Two hot bolts zing from the heels of my hands up to my elbows. My palms take the brunt of the fall, which seems fitting since they’re to blame. A choked sound startles me, and I realize it’s coming from my throat. From me. I’m making this muffled keening noise and crying a little bit, and he hasn’t even moved.

  I’m crab crawling backward across the driveway, totally overwhelmed, operating completely on instinct, and Noah’s a damn statue. Just as cold. Just as beautiful.

  He ran. He can’t be trusted.

  Noah’s words from before tumble up to the surface of my churning thoughts, and I freeze. I don’t want to run away from him, even if I should. Even if he’s telling me to do just that. I already know he wants me, but I want him to trust me—to need me. That thought terrifies me, and I mentally revise my desires. Who could need me? I just want him to fuck me. That’s all.

  Maybe I don’t have enough sense to come in out of the rain. Maybe that’s why I’m waitressing in East Dead End and saving my money by shoving singles and fives into a Folgers can instead of a bank account. Maybe every awful thing anyone has ever said about me is true. Stupid girl. Fucking tramp. Lazy bitch.

  I don’t care. None of that matters or makes me…me. I’m exhausted, and Noah’s mouth on mine is better than ten cups of coffee.

  He crosses the driveway in a few long strides, bends over and scoops me up. “That was some half-assed running.”

  His voice is rough velvet, and I want to wrap it around me like a blanket. I press my face into his chest instead and hope he doesn’t care that my wet cheeks are soaking his leather. “My heart wasn’t in it.”

  “Anything else I tell you to do, you fucking do it.” It’s almost a plea, and I wonder for a second if, beneath his marble surface, he’s feeling half as desperate as I am.

  Desperate or not. Command or plea. Either way, I know he means it. And I mean it too when I nod in agreement. I’ll do anything he asks me to do except run away from him. Not because he’s good and kind and carrying me to the safety of my apartment. But because he’s none of those things and he’s doing it anyway.

  He carries me up the rickety steps, and I don’t even flinch when he kicks the door in instead of asking me for the keys. It seems perfectly natural. Right even. Why would he use keys like a normal person?

  The faint wet-dog scent of my threadbare carpet greets us. Home sweet home. No candle, powder, or spray can ever really cover it. Usually I’d feel shame having someone smell the filth I live in, but not with Noah. That seems right too.

  We can wallow together.

  “Behind the curtain.” I point toward the beaded curtain that separates my sleeping area from the rest of the living space.

  He grunts and takes me to bed.

  At least my sheets are clean. That’s my last coherent thought before he climbs in after me and presses the length of his body
against mine. Lining us up so we are mouth to mouth. His fingers slide into my hair, and I sigh at the massaging touch, moan at the pinch and pull when he tangles it up into his fist. He works his other hand between us, trailing it up my inner thigh, opening the run further, finding his way to the soaked center of my panties and shoving them aside. I’m so wet I can hear the slipping noises as he invades me with blunt fingers. Teasing, searching and plunging. I buck against him, arching off the bed at the pleasure building sharp and sweet where his thumb is circling my clit.

  My palms still sting where I scraped them, but I grab fistfuls of blanket anyway because I have to hold on to something. This is nothing like the lazy touch I use to bring myself to an easy finish. Or the fumbling pluck of so many other lovers, searching—and missing—as if my pleasure is difficult to find. I don’t have to shift my hips and guide him. He’s going to make me come hard and fast in seconds with nothing but his thumb and forefinger. Like he wrote my fucking manual. Easy as cake.

  And I’d hate him for wringing these feelings from my body so easily if they weren’t so damn delicious.

  He licks at my mouth again, and it’s so much more than kissing. It’s tasting—teasing. “Star?”

  “Yes, yes.” I pant against him. All I can say is yes. Yeses that mean finish me off, fuck me, do what you want. Yes. My whole world is spinning in the palm of his hand right now, beyond wet and past ready.

  “If we do this. If I fuck you. If I take you with me…”

  “If…?”

  He scrapes his stubble over my cheek, abrading me. Marking me. The edge of orgasm shimmers just beyond my reach, pinpricks of light through dark water. If. If. If. I am drowning and breathing and—

  “You’re mine.”

  He pulls me taut like a bowstring, and I snap, pleasure radiating out in waves. “Oh God. I think I’m coming.”

  “If you’re thinking, you’re not coming.” He thumbs my clit harder, cruel strokes that have me jerking against him. “You wouldn’t be my old lady; this isn’t about love. This is about survival. Understand?”