Evil’s Pact by Raven Dark

3

Back to White Springs

The four-hour ride passes in a blur. I watch the desert landscape whiz past us without really seeing it. The scorching sun beats down, but its heat seems to bounce off me as easily as any of Spider’s words have done since I woke up this morning. Once or twice, when we stop at a light, he squeezes my thigh or scritches my knee, but I don’t react, except to turn my head the other way on his back or vary the pressure of my knees on his thighs.

We stop at a gas station, and I wait in silence near the tanks.

“You gotta piss?” he asks me.

I shake my head, barely, and don’t meet his eyes. He puts the nozzle back beside me.

“Not talking to me, then?” His tone is completely casual, as if we’re a couple that’s just coming out of a big tiff.

I look away.

Spider puts himself deliberately in front of me, and without meeting his eyes, I can feel his gaze burning into me. Rat reaches for the nozzle, and Spider moves me aside to give him room, then slips his hands over my hips, around to my backside. He cups my butt cheeks, pressing me tightly to his powerful body, not caring about anyone who might be watching us.

“Silent treatment it is, then,” he rumbles in my ear. “We’ll see how long that lasts.”

Releasing me, he captures my wrist and pulls me back toward his bike.

Refusing to let him get to me, I swing onto the bike behind him, grasp him around the waist, and sit out the rest of the ride. He’s done enough damage to me, and I won’t let him do any more. I can’t escape, can’t run, and I’ll have to take whatever he does to me, but I won’t feel it. I won’t react.

Last night was too much. He cut too deep. There is a next step, but I don’t know what that is, and this—shutting down—is all I’m capable of right now.

Almost four hours after leaving Casper’s, we pull up at the White Springs clubhouse. I’ve drawn so far inward that I don’t even realize we’re in front of Pops’ until Spider’s motorcycle jerks to a stop.

He kills the engine and toes down the bike’s kickstand while the others pull up alongside him. Dragon swings off his ride, and a girl with the wildest head of crimson curls I’ve ever seen and breasts that look like they’ll topple her over bounds down the steps toward him.

Spider swings off and says something to me, but I don’t catch it. I’m too busy noticing Dragon capturing the woman in his arms with a growl.

“Hello, sweetness.” He lays a long, wet kiss on her, his tongue darting between her lips. Then he glances back at me. He must pick up on my anger, because he smirks and grabs a handful of the woman’s backside before sauntering into the clubhouse with his arm around her.

I shake my head, my heart shattering for Tequila, my insides squirming with dislike for the club’s leader. “Unbelievable.”

Spider’s snort of amusement rankles my nerves. I clench my jaw and stifle a cutting remark.

“Off you get, Judgy Pants,” he says, tugging on my hair lightly.

I don’t look at him and climb off the bike. Silent, giving him nothing.

He cocks his head at me, as if he finds my lack of interaction with him curious, and a smirk plays with his lips. Spider removes his helmet from my head and sets it down on the seat.

He shrugs as though my silence means nothing and grabs my hand, striding toward the front doors. He greets Dex and Scar and a few of the others, dragging me along as if pulling luggage behind him.

Irritation flickers, but I tamp it down, retreating further into myself, even deeper into this place he can’t reach.

“Spidy!”

Ben races down the stairs that lead to the second floor of the clubhouse, making a beeline for us.

“Hey, little man. Come here.” Spider scoops him up into his arms, setting him on his hip.

“Emma! You’re back!” Ben beams at me, looking relieved.

“Hey, tough guy.”

His smile gets broader. I swear his platinum blond hair looks longer. He also looks thinner, to the point where I wonder if Penny’s been having trouble getting him to eat.

“See? I told you she was fine,” Spider says to the boy. He hands Ben over to me, freeing him up to give Pops and a few of the others brotherly hugs.

“I knew he’d bring you back for me,” Ben tells me once I set him on my hip.

“Did you now?” Heck, why does this kid have to be so adorable?

Seeing the kid makes my heart swell with warmth, threatening to smash the ice fortress I’ve erected around it. Apparently, I can shut out the violent, psychopathic monster who ties me to his bed every night, but against this little rascal? I’m hopeless.

“Uh huh. I like your necklace.” He fiddles with the spider-shaped loop on the front of the collar, looking at it with an innocence only a child could see it with. “Hey, it’s a spider’s web.” His eyes fill with excitement. “Spider gave it to you, didn’t he?”

Oh, dear. I can practically see the expectations, the implications his mind is putting together. His obvious assumptions are heartbreaking when I know the truth, awakening desire for something I know isn’t possible.

Spider watches our exchange, his eyes dancing. Daring me to undermine Ben’s painfully innocent view of things.

My brain freezes, in full-on panic mode. How am I supposed to answer? A sharp bolt of hatred for Spider hits me, and I narrowly avoid it striking me in the heart.

“Ben, come here.” Jules comes over and gathers him in her arms, saving me from responding. “Mom’s awake for a while. Why don’t you go and see her and give Emma and Spider time to settle in?”

“Mkay. See you, Emma.” Ben runs off for the stairs.

“Thank you,” I say to Jules with a nervous laugh, accepting her hug with a close one in return.

“Yeah, you looked like you needed bailing out of that one.” She draws back with a glance at the collar. “He’s not wrong, though. Collar is stunning on you.”

“Can we not?” I beg in an undertone, looking over at Spider, who’s thankfully engrossed in a conversation with a massive guy he called Goliath.

She squeezes my shoulder with a nod. Girl’s got my back. Man, I missed her.

“How are you guys holding up?” I ask tentatively. “How’s Penny doing?”

Jules nods, indicating she gets what I’m alluding to. How are they coping with Gary still on the loose?

“We’re managing. Penny’s getting better. She still sleeps a lot, but her memory is starting to come back. She puts on a brave face. It’s hardest on Ben, though. He won’t eat, and he has horrible nightmares.”

“I can imagine.”

All my life, I’ve abhorred violence, and the darker aspects of the club usually scare the heck out of me, but knowing Gary’s effect on Penny and Ben, I have a sudden savage need for Spider to catch him and bring the full weight of the club down on him.

“I have a feeling he’ll be a little more himself with you here now, though,” Jules adds. “He’s been really worried about you. Kept begging Spider to bring you here.”

I almost do a double take. That can’t be why Spider brought me here, can it? The thought is annoyingly heartwarming. His bringing me along to soothe Ben’s fears or to allow me to spend time with the boy completely negates the image of him I need to hold on to. The image of him as an unfeeling monster.

Lord, I wish I could get this collar off.

“Well, it’s nice to be back here, anyway,” I tell her. I turn and catch Spider’s eye, and he comes over, slipping his arms around me, crushing me against him.

“Go,” he murmurs into my ear, nipping it. “Hang with the girls. Stay out of trouble.”

A thrill races down my spine at the warning in his voice, the way his shaft jerks against my belly in response to my closeness. I say nothing, turning away to follow a waiting Jules as if he’s had no effect on me. Spider seizes my wrist, hauling me back to him.

“I know what you’re doing,” he says as his fingers squeeze my nape hard.

“What?” I stare up at him, my breath quickening.

“This whole cold shoulder thing. You think if you freeze me out long enough, I’ll leave you alone. I’ll get bored and move on to another piece of ass.” He licks my ear, and my sex instantly aches, my walls threatening to crash down.

“It won’t work,” he growls, kissing his way along my neck. “I told you, I’m keeping you. This is your life. No matter how hard you try to shut down, I’ll open you up again. I’ll break you open so wide you won’t know how to close me out again. And then I’ll burn you to ash.”

Leaving me reeling, he releases me, swats me on the butt, and pushes me toward Jules. “Go, have your fun until I’m ready for you.”

My eyes pop and my mouth drops.

Wow. The man is unbelievable. It takes a superhuman effort not to whip around and smack him. So much for shutting down. My fists ball until my nails dig into my palms, and I hate knowing that he’s won. That he’s gotten to me.

Jules is staring at me, and then at Spider’s retreating back. I sigh and flash her a painful smile. She slips her arm around me and shakes her head. With her silence, she says everything I need her to say. That I can’t kill him, that I need to be strong, that I have a friend, and that I’m not alone.

“I don’t think I’ll ever be one of you guys,” I mutter.

“Why?”

“Because. If I was, I would handle him better. I’d yell at him or hit him or something. Instead, all I can do is walk away like a wimp.”

Jules rubs my back with a smile that’s filled with respect. “It takes a tougher woman to know when to walk away than to freak out on your man in front of his crew. You are more one of us than you think, girl.”

So I’m doing the right thing. Interesting. Since leaving the Colony, I’d promised myself I wouldn’t be a doormat. I’d have thought that walking away from Spider’s dig would make me weak, but now I can see how, in this case, the opposite is true. I feel like I’m still trying to get a handle on the MC lifestyle.

Jules steers me for the bar where Gin is serving up drinks. I get the same treatment from her as Jules gave me, including a rib-cracking hug and the same gushing over the collar. Until Jules gives a small shake of her head, at which point, Gin clears her throat and awkwardly changes the subject.

“Emma, come here,” Jules says, waving me towards the steps to the second floor. “I want to show you something.”

I follow her upstairs to her room. Inside, she shuts the door and goes to her dresser, pulling out a shopping bag.

“For you.” She holds the bag out.

I blink at her and take the bag slowly, taken aback. “What’s this?”

“A gift. Penny and I thought it was the least we could do.”

My face flushes. I open the bag and pull out the contents, gasping. “Oh, wow. Jules…”

I’m holding up a blue denim jacket. The material is faded and worn-looking, and it’s obviously been designed that way for stylistic effect. There’s an intricately detailed emblem on the back depicting a cluster of skulls interwoven with roses. The roses are deep, bright scarlet, purple, and pink. The jacket has a bad girl look I love.

“Those are Day of the Dead skulls,” Jules says with a smile when I look up at her. “We thought those colors would suit you.”

I run my fingers over the embroidered patch, my eyes welling up. “It’s beautiful.” I shake my head. “Jules, I can’t take this. I wouldn’t feel right wearing it.”

“Why?” She takes the jacket from me and spins me around, pushing my arms into it.

Because. Because wearing it implies I’m one of the girls. It implies I deserve the respect it’s clearly meant to impart. Because wearing it is so far from what I’m used to, I’d feel silly. Because Spider will probably laugh when he sees me in it, and that would be more than I could bear.

“Because I don’t deserve it. I’m not…” I face her. “Wait. Jules, Spider won’t allow this.”

She raises her brow, and my face heats, my insides squirming with embarrassment. I sound so cowed. “I just mean, when Gin lent me her shirt the last time we were here, he got mad. He told her not to give me anything. I don’t want you guys to get in trouble.”

She straightens the collar firmly, taking my shoulders. “You saved Penny’s and Ben’s lives, risking your own in the process. You’ve done the best thing for the club a woman can do. Besides, we figured if you’re going to be stuck with the club, you need to start looking the part. And as for Spider, I have a feeling he’ll allow this.”

“How can you know that?”

“I know him. Trust me.”

I blow out a breath and look at myself in the mirror. “Wow.” I finger the faded collar of the jacket with a grin, loving the tough look the jacket gives me. My parents would hate it, and that gives me a jolt of excitement.

A sense of belonging hits me with a shocking intensity, warming my blood and fortifying me with a strange sense of strength.

While it makes me uncomfortable that Jules has labeled me with hero status, the respect she and Penny just bestowed on me makes my heart feel full. I feel more at home in this club than I ever felt in the Colony. I’ve never experienced anything like it. It scares me a little.

“Thank you,” I say, squeezing her hand. “Really, this means more than you’ll ever know.”

I spend the next few hours hanging out with Penny and Jules. Gin joins us when her shift finishes. The barroom below us grows noisy with a party the men are apparently kicking off. Ben comes in later and sits on my lap until he drifts off. Penny starts to look worn out, so I tuck Ben in beside his mother and the girls and I say goodbye to Penny, letting her rest.

“What’s being done about Gary?” I whisper as Jules shuts her door softly.

“Nitro’s got some guys taking care of it,” Gin says. “You know how it is. They don’t tell us women much, but I heard Dex telling Penny Nitro’s got it handled.”

“Nitro?” I ask.

“The Los Angeles chapter’s prez,” Jules says, leading us toward the steps, her tone lowered.

“But what’s that mean, they have it ‘handled’?”

“It means,” Jules says emphatically, “that Nitro’s sent his men after him. It means—”

“I get the picture,” I say hurriedly, my stomach clenching. It means that the club is going to find him, and when they do, he’ll die. Club justice. The same club justice Spider doled out with those two Satan’s Bastards guys. The same justice he doled out when he blew my kidnapper’s face off.

I think maybe this is the moment it happened. This is the moment when my understanding of the club clicked in my head—and I mean it fully clicked.

This club—the Devil’s Outlaws—is a family, but it’s more than that. The MC is its own society, with its own authorities, its own rules. The understanding hits me with the weight of a battering ram, and I feel as if someone’s just turned a very bright light bulb on in my head. The moment is nearly earthshattering in its impact, and with it comes a hundred other realizations, like answers to questions I was only half aware I was asking.

“Uh, guys?” When the girls look at me, I take a breath. “You go on ahead. I need a minute.”

“You okay?” Jules asks.

“Oh, yeah, I’m fine.” I wave away their worries. “I just need a minute alone.”

They reluctantly leave. I make my way downstairs, but instead of heading to the bar, I find the bathroom off a secluded hall, the only area that isn’t filled with loud music, carousing men, and couples making out.

In the bathroom, I shut the door and push myself onto the counter, putting my head back, trying to adjust to the epiphany I’ve just had.

This is unreal. I feel as if my eyes have been opened. It’s as if the final piece of a large puzzle has just clicked into place, and I can see the picture that’s been trying to form in my head for weeks in full view.

Dragon and Dex’s roles, their titles—presidents—take on a whole new meaning, and with those, so too does Spider’s. If Dex and Dragon are rulers, two of many within the biker world, Spider is… What is he?

He’d said it’s his job to take care of threats to the club. He keeps people in line. If there is an analogous role in the outside world that fits, then it would be a cop, but one of those Wild West sheriff types. In Colony terms, he would be like one of David Gild’s patrol guards, elected to keep the members safe.

Considering the issues the club has with the police, the irony isn’t lost on me. He would find such a thing deeply offensive. I stifle a grin.

As these pieces begin to fit together in my mind, a sense of respect, understanding, and a frightening acceptance seeps into me. It feels as if the club has become a tangible thing, wrapping itself around me as effectively as the jacket Jules put on me. Strangely enough, this notion of the club as its own insulated society is something I understand well. The Colony is exactly the same thing—a complete social order that lives by its own albeit more brutal code.

That thought should scare me, have me wanting to run for the hills, but it doesn’t. Instead, I find solace in it.

Maybe I can’t accept the darkness in Spider. Maybe I can’t allow myself to embrace him, but whether I wanted it to or not, here and now, the club has made itself a part of me.

Just as Cap said it would.

I feel as if I’m aware of its presence inside me, even now, changing me. It’s changing me, and I want it to.

For a long moment, I sit there on the bathroom counter with my eyes closed, just letting myself be a part of it, and suddenly it doesn’t matter where I fit, or what I am within the club’s hierarchy. My place is with the Outlaws, and there is no undoing that.

Unfortunately, that does leave one glaring question. If these people are my family, and I belong with them, what does that mean for Spider and me? How do I make my home here when the man I belong to is a monster I don’t know how to accept?

I still don’t know how to answer that when I make my way into the noisy, packed barroom.

Instinctively, I look around for Spider, but I don’t see him.

“If you’re looking for your man, he’s out front,” Gin calls over from the bar where Pops is getting her a drink. “The guys are out there doing burnouts.”

“Burnouts?” I ask, joining her at the bar.

“Why don’t you go have a seat and I’ll get you a drink. We don’t need you tonight, so you can relax on the couches while Spider has his fun out there.”

Pops hands me a drink and I nod, heading for the couches. They’re full, a couple of guys taking the last seats, so I make my way toward a chair near the back wall, near a couple of pool tables, content to sit and watch the guys there play.

“You look bored, sweet thing. I’ll give you something to do,” a familiar lazy voice drawls behind me.

I spin around. Primer stumbles toward me. He clunks his mug down on the table near me, slopping the beer. His eyes rake me up and down. Lingering on my dark curls, fixating with an unpleasant leer on the curve of my breasts. “Nice juicy tits,” he slurs.

Unease crawls up my spine. Great. Out of all the guys here, I have to end up in his orbit?

He’s not powerfully built, but at a little over six feet, he still towers over me. The wiry muscles in his arms stand out under sleeves of tats. The tats are too colorful, one of them an unattractive Joker’s face. He probably thinks they look sexy, but instead they make him look ugly. The last time I was here, Spider laid claim to me for everyone in this clubhouse, including him to see, threatening to cut his junk off if he touched me. Why would he do something so stupid as to make a pass at me now?

“Back off, Primer,” I tell him, moving to step around him.

“That’s not how this works.” He leans in, forcing me to back up against the wall. I smell sour beer on his breath. “Someone’s neglected to teach you your place. I’ll be happy to train you how to use that bitch mouth of yours on a brother properly.”

What the fuck?

Then my eyes catch his, and my brows shoot up.

His pupils are huge, the blacks almost obliterating the grey of his eyes. It’s really freaking me out. He leans in with a strange slowness, as if he’s having trouble keeping upright.

Then it hits me. He’s high.

So high that he seems to have lost the sense to realize that he’s moving on what belongs to Spider, and no longer has the presence of mind to care that he’s asking for trouble.

Panic rushes through me.

Behind Primer to the left side of the room, Dragon’s looking right at us, with that red-headed woman in his lap, his hands palming her breasts. He’s watching with an entertained smile, sitting at a table without making any move to interfere, or to find Spider.

I might hate Spider most of the time, but now I latch onto the sense of ownership he has over me, letting it surround me like a shield. My hand goes to the collar around my neck as if in reflex.

“I said back off,” I snap, surprised at the waspishness in my tone. “You don’t want to—”

“Oh, fuck, do I ever. Get the fuck over here.” He grabs my hip and grinds me against him, ignoring my attempt to wriggle free.

“Stop—”

“Shut the fuck up.” His other hand seizes my breast and squeezes hard enough to make me wince.

I try to knee him in the groin, but he shoves me against the wall hard enough to rattle me, pushing his knee between mine.

Spider is nowhere to be seen, and Dragon looks on.

Fear takes hold, and I freeze, unable to think or breathe or react.

The sense of helplessness is reinforced by Dragon’s inaction. The head of the club, or one of them, sits there watching as if this is some entertaining show, and that realization leeches any fight out of me.

“Come on, you know you want it.” Primer’s voice filters through the jackhammering of my heart, sounding far away. “Let me show you how a real man fucks—”

Primer breaks off and lets out a pained yell.

I blink in confusion. One minute, he’s feeling me up and about to plant a beer-soaked kiss on me, and the next, his body is flying backward.

Primer slams into the floor a good three feet from me. Then Spider is standing between us, his huge frame a wall of leather and muscle.

“Spider…” My heart hammers, chest heaving, relief sweeping through me so intensely that my knees threaten to fold.

Without taking his eyes off Primer, Spider grabs me and shoves me toward Pip, Striker, and Jules who are standing off to the side. They must have come in with Spider from wherever he was. The entire clubhouse is watching, all eyes on us.

“Fuck off, Spider,” Primer shouts.

Spider closes in on him, a huge stalking predator. He looks suddenly terrifying, his blue eyes like blazing flames, his muscles rippling with anger. It strikes me that his fists are the size of boulders.

“Get up,” Spider orders, and his voice is a terrible, demonic growl.

Primer scrambles backward across the floor. “The fuck’s your problem, man?” he bellows, eyes wide with fear.

The smile that pulls at Spider’s mouth is dark and twisted and livid. I’ve never seen him look so scary in my life. It’s like I’m looking right at the monster, without the faintest hint of the man to hide him.

Spider lunges forward and seizes him by the front of his cut. I expect him to slam Primer against the bar behind him and put his arm under his throat like he did last time. Instead, with a growl—an actual animal’s growl—he slams Primer into the floor on his back. Then Spider is on him with his fist slamming into Primer’s face.

“No one,” he growls, and his fist hammers into Primer’s jaw, “no one”—thwack—“lays a hand on what’s mine.” Thwack.

“Ohh, you show him, Spidy,” Striker says.

There’s a crunch of bone and Primer howls. I cringe, and Jules puts me behind her as if she thinks I’m going to run off, or perhaps try to stop Spider from beating Primer into the floor.

Primer screams and thrashes, trying to get him off. “She’s just fucking pussy, man, what is wrong with you!”

Spider goes crazy, as if the words rile the monster within. His fists rain down hellfire on Primer, pummeling every inch of him.

“Spider, that’s enough,” Dragon orders. Dragon and Dex have hurried to the front of the crowd that’s now gathered to watch.

Apparently, Spider’s beatdown is going too far.

Spider doesn’t stop.

“Jesus Christ. Striker. Pip.” Dragon signals to Striker and Pip who both rush forward.

The next instant, the two of them are yanking Spider off of Primer, who’s lying on the floor alarmingly still, his face and chest covered in blood.

Striker and Pip drag Spider back toward the rear wall and push him up against it, the two of them looking like they’re using all their strength to hold him back, each one pressing hard on his shoulders.

“Get off me,” Spider growls, his great chest heaving, body twisting.

“No!” Striker pins him to the wall with all his strength. “You’ll kill him.”

“He deserves it, talking about her like she’s…” He huffs. “Mine… Fucker deserves it.”

“Spidy, fucking chill, man, we don’t need you killing a brother over her,” Striker says. “You hear me?”

Spider’s chest slows and he puts his head back. His eyes close, and I can practically see the mask of his slip back into place, the civilized, rational man reasserting himself over the savage beast within. He gives a jerky nod and relaxes.

Striker eases off, rubbing his shoulder as if to ground him.

Pip lets go of him, and he and Reaper make their way to Primer.

“Fucking Christ, Primer.” Dex nods to Striker and Pip. “Take him to Stitch.”

I turn my head to look at Dex and Dragon. Dragon’s watching Spider with a scowl that makes my stomach clench.

Pip and Reaper pick Primer up and cart him off down a hall.

The sounds of men talking and laughing resumes. It’s as if time was momentarily stopped, and now that the fight is over, time has restarted again, the clubhouse returning to business as usual.

I jerk my head away from the splatters of blood on the floor as if Primer is still there, his face beaten to a bloody pulp I can’t stand to look at.

“It’s okay,” Jules is saying, rubbing my back.

It takes me a minute to realize I’m shaking. I turn around, leaning on the bar, my knees weak.

“Come on,” Jules cajoles, “lets go sit—”

A large male hand clamps my shoulder and spins me around. Startled, I jump. “Hey... Oh. Spider.” I clutch my chest, my heart beating like a rabbit’s. “Heck, don’t do that.”

He fires a look at Jules and she backs away, as if leaving him to take over. When his eyes lock on me, the fiery look in them steals my breath.

“What did you think you were doing?” he growls in a low, dangerous voice.

I blink at him, so thrown by the question that it confuses me. “What?”

“You heard me. What did you think you were doing?”

I stare. The accusation in his tone is like a slap in the face. My jaw drops.

“Are you for real right now?” I hiss. “That vile jerk just cornered me. He would have done who knows what all to me, and you have the gall to—”

“Shut your fucking mouth, Emma.” Spider traps my chin between his fingers, and the possession in his hold is enough to silence me if his words are not. “Always getting yourself into trouble. What is it going to take for you to learn? You belong to me. Me, and no one else.”

Indignation bolts through me along with a bite of hatred for him.

Before I can say anything, Spider’s lips descend on mine. The kiss is so sudden, I jolt against him. I make an angry sound, and his lips clamp harder, his tongue thrusting in, silencing me.

Is he seriously doing this right now? I can feel everyone’s eyes on us, taking it all in.

My hands push hard at his chest, but his palm grips my nape, trapping me against him. His other hand captures both of my wrists, pinning them to his chest.

I try to bite at his lip and he growls into my mouth, tonguing me hard. It hits me exactly what he’s doing. This is not just a kiss. It’s a re-claiming of what is his for all to see. I should hate it, but instead, heat suffuses my every being, so intense my knees buckle.

Spider bites my lip, hard enough to draw blood. The pain goes right to my clit, making it throb. I make a small, helpless sound in my throat. He licks the blood away. His hand seizes my throat, as much of a collar as the spider-web of metal around my neck. I pant, my heart slamming against my ribs.

“Spider….” My voice is high and shaking.

“Shut the fuck up.” He grits the words out in my ear. “You need a reminder of who you belong to.” His voice is throaty with animalistic need that is frighteningly hot. “If I didn’t have shit to deal with right now, I’d put you over this fucking bar and pound myself into your ass right here.”

I want claw his eyes out. Accusation drips from every word. Unfortunately, the pressure of his fingers around my throat and the possession in his voice make every nerve in me tingle. He sounds like he could devour me, and I hate that on some level, I want him to.

“I own you,” he growls, licking my ear and then biting my lobe until I whimper. “You got that?”

There’s nothing I can do without making this worse. Besides, much as I hate him, and as much as watching him beat Primer like that scared the starch out of me, seeing it also made me feel oddly protected and owned.

And turned on.

His claiming me like this now feels horribly right somehow.

When I don’t answer him, his fingers tighten on my throat. “Do you understand me?”

My eyes close, humiliation running rampant. Everyone can see this…

“Yes,” I shake out.

Slowly, his hand slides from my throat, but his fingers stroke the collar and his eyes blaze hot. His heated palm rests against my chest, scalding my skin through my shirt, branding right into the scars he left on my chest with his blade weeks ago.

“I don’t want anyone’s fucking hands on you.” His voice is throaty but inflexible.

I let my anger burn away his effect on me. “I tried to fight him. What did you want me to do?”

Except I froze, and the awareness of that truth fills me with shame.

Spider’s mouth turns down, and an emotion I can’t name flickers in his eyes. His chest hitches. Then his expression hardens to a cold mask as if he’s mentally pushing something away. “I don’t ever want another goddamned man touching you.”

The statement is said with such inflexible hardness, such pure ownership that every ounce of my body heats. I should say something, but I can’t seem to get the words out, so I just glare up at him. Meeting him stare for stare.

“What…what did you want me to do?” I finally bite out at last.

His hand squeezes my nape, trapping me against him. He bends and buries his face in my hair, breathing deep. “After tonight, no one will touch you but me.”

“What—”

He releases me. “Stay here,” he orders. “Pops, keep an eye on her. Pip.” He looks around and finds Pip, who’s come back and striding toward him. The two of them make their way across the room toward a far-off table, leaving me staring after them, my thoughts spinning.

I go over the last few moments in my head. Did that really just happen? Did he just blame me for what Primer did? Shame stabs and anger seethes, my fists clenching tight.

I hate him so much.

“Hey.”

I jerk, turning to see Jules beside me. The sight of her makes me feel as if I’ve just been brought back down to earth, to a place I understand. She’s watching Spider with a look I can’t read, and it suddenly hits me that this woman gets him in a way I never will. An absurd jealousy pricks me for her having that connection to him, even though I know there’s nothing between them.

The feeling doesn’t make sense, but I can’t shut it off.

“Why do I feel like I’m never going to understand him?” I mutter.

“Don’t feel bad,” she says. “Spider and I have known each other all our lives. He’s like a brother to me, and half the time I don’t understand him.”

“Every time I get near him, I feel all wrong-footed. I never know what he’s going to say or do from one moment to the next. Why does he do that?”

She shrugs. “He’s a man. It’s in the job description.”

Behind me, Pops snorts.

In spite of myself, I laugh, too. If Spider makes me want to hate the club, Jules makes it hard not to love it a little.

I push myself onto a stool. Glancing back at Spider, a feeling of abandonment eats at me, and I stamp the emotion down savagely, letting loathing scour it away.

A few minutes later, Pip leans on the bar beside me.

“You okay?” he asks in a low voice.

I blink at him, unsure what to make of his concern. For weeks after Spider took me to Casper’s, I saw Pip as a young man who did Spider’s dirty work. A bodyguard of sorts, put on Emma Watch when Spider wasn’t around. He didn’t trust me, didn’t like me, saw me as the thief who betrayed the club. The conversation in Monica’s room had affirmed for me that things had changed between us in some unidentifiable way. He respects me on some level, but I didn’t think that extended to showing concern that I’m not even sure he’s allowed to show while Spider is sitting half a room away.

“I’m fine,” I mutter. “Just a little shaken. Primer… I don’t know what he would have done if…” I shake my head.

“Don’t worry. It won’t happen again.”

I look at him. How can he be so sure?

Pops is at the other end of the bar, and Pip goes to him, ordering two drinks. I stare at the wall behind the bar, following the neon lines of the bar’s name, Pops’ Place, stenciled beside the large wide-screen TV.

“Here.” Pip takes the seat next to me again and sets the drink down. It’s a shot glass filled with familiar amber liquid. “It’s Jack. To help take the edge off.”

I smile at the glass in spite of myself, remembering my discussion with Tequila about how I need to learn to throw a strong one back. I sigh and gulp the drink, shuddering as it burns its way down my throat and heats my blood with what is now a familiar buzz.

“Thanks,” I say, and I mean it.

He downs his own shot and gestures for Pops to pour him another. I shake my head when the old man offers me a second shot.

“You said it won’t happen again,” I say. “What Primer did? How can you know that?”

He shrugs. “Well… I just mean, everyone saw what Spider did to him.” He nods to the spot on the floor where Spider had beaten Primer unconscious.

Someone has wiped the blood away, but I can still picture Primer lying there, bloodied, his face a swollen mess. I shiver.

“Everyone will be too afraid to touch you now,” Pip adds.

He has a point. I still can’t wrap my head around the way Spider had reacted. He’d been crazed. He’d scared me, but it bothers me to realize watching him was also kind of hot. The lengths he’ll go to make sure no one touches me but him are unsettling, but part of me likes it.

How does that even make sense? I latch onto the accusation I’d heard in Spider’s voice. Fury rises up hotly and I let it drown out all else.

I turn my stool to face the wall behind the bar, and my head swims.

“Wow.” I give myself a shake. “The Jack must be getting to me.” One drink and my head is swimming. “I don’t know how these guys do it, throw back beer after beer all day.”

“You build up a tolerance.” Pip’s watching me closely.

“I have to use the bathroom.” I slide off the stool, and my stomach lurches. The floor blurs before my eyes. “Whoa. I don’t feel so good.”

Pip catches me by the arm.

I sway, and then I feel him catch me against him.

“Pip, what the…”

The world spins horribly.

“Sorry about this, Emma.” Pip lifts me into his arms.

The world goes black.