Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 64917 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 325(@200wpm)___ 260(@250wpm)___ 216(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64917 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 325(@200wpm)___ 260(@250wpm)___ 216(@300wpm)
Everything was too loud, too close, too much—and weirdly, for a second, I liked it. Nobody was pretending. Nobody smoothed themselves down into something polite. If they wanted a drink, they got it. If they wanted attention, they commanded it. If they laughed, it was loud. If they swore, it rattled the light fixtures. It should’ve been vulgar. Instead, it felt like… honesty.
“Gonzo.” A man with a scar through his eyebrow clapped him on the shoulder. “You back in one piece.”
“Always,” Gonzo said, and the corner of his mouth tipped in what passed for a smile.
The man looked at me. He paused studying me. “You her?”
I opened my mouth, then closed it, because what was I supposed to say? Who was her? Me? I’m the college girl who can’t stop answering his calls. Gonzo saved me. I felt like a fool.
“She’s with me,” Gonzo explained without actually answering, and let his fingers settle light at my hip. It wasn’t possessive. It landed like a promise. “IvaLeigh, this is Pull.” He gave me a smirk, a nod, and passed on by.
There weren’t pleasantries exchanged of nice to meet you. Those words people shared but didn’t mean.
At the bar, a woman with violet hair handed me a beer without asking what I wanted. “On the house,” she winked. “First time in? Pace yourself. And don’t drink the jar even if someone dares you—that’s the pepper shine, it’ll have you seeing colors that don’t exist.”
“Pepper shine?” I repeated, because apparently that was a thing. Sure we lived in the mountains of North Carolina which some consider the home of moonshine, that didn’t mean I was well-versed in these things.
She laughed. “Trust me, rookie.” Her rings clinked against the glass as she slid it closer. “I’m Kate.”
“IvaLeigh,” I replied, feeling overwhelmed by all of the noise and experiences going on around me.
“Pretty,” she decided, and moved on, already shouting for limes while she shoulder-checked a guy who reached for a bottle without asking.
Across the room, a jukebox lost an argument with someone’s playlist and surrendered to a guitar riff that made the floor vibrate. A woman with sleeve tattoos and a scalp undercut used a marker to scrawl something obscene across a man’s chest while her friend howled.
I clung to the bottle Kim had given me, the wet glass sweating against my palm. If I focused on the cold, I could breathe. I tipped it back and took a swallow I didn’t taste.
“You good?” Gonzo asked, low enough for only me.
I nodded, which was a lie and also somehow true. I felt spread open, vulnerable in a way and weirdly seen and understood, accepted even. The two emotions fought inside me.
He bent, his mouth almost at my ear. “We can leave whenever you want.”
“I don’t,” I said before my brain caught up to my mouth.
“All right,” he said, like it didn’t surprise him at all.
We did a circle around. Brothers greeted him with the kind of simple, weighty respect that told me exactly who he was here. Some introduced themselves to me—Shanks, Disciple, Clutch, Chain, Nails—names that sounded like tools until you saw the men wearing them. The questions were light—school, classes, was I having fun—but underneath I worried if they had questions they weren’t asking. Who was I to Gonzo? Well, if that wasn’t the question plaguing me as well. Maybe that was the thing, I had questions without answers and it wasn’t them but me.
I found I breathed better with his hand at my back. That scared me a little.
Looking around, taking it all in, this wasn’t what I expected at a biker party. Sure there were some over-the-top things like the woman in a cherry-red dress grinding on a man’s lap while he massaged her breasts making me wonder if she was going to orgasm right here. Or the man with a mohawk that dropped to his knees to scoop another woman up, dropping her thighs over his shoulders while diving face first into her vagina. She was riding his face like a wild woman on a rodeo bronco. Ten seconds flat she was crying out in ecstasy. A prospect refilled waters without being asked. The way everyone moved together was magic. People looked out for each other in the way they breathed. Everything felt automatic. Consent lived here in a rough language: it looked like a chin lift, a hand withdrawn, a laugh that turned real or didn’t. Everyone seemed fluent in unspoken words between them.
I relaxed enough to let the corners of my mouth lift. That’s when she approached just as Gonzo stepped away to go talk to someone he called Tower.
She had Barbie-blonde hair and the kind of dress you had to be brave to wear. Lips painted perfect murder-red. Eyes narrowed like she could see weakness. “Hey,” she said sweetly, which somehow felt like an insult.