“If I don’t hold back, it’s too fucking much,” he snapped as I reached the door, getting to his feet like he’d plead with me to stay. “Lynn, it could completely screw you up. I told you I need to make it hurt, to deal out pain instead of taking it, to turn the fucking tables so I’m the one who doesn’t come out broken. But that means youdocome out broken. And call me a fucking asshole, but I don’t want to do that to someone I give a shit about.”
“You’re a fucking asshole,” I said, taking the opening he gave me. “And you underestimate me. You don’t know the darkness that lives in my head, Cobra. And you clearly don’t give a shit about howIfelt when we fucked.”
“I do,” he argued, raw and snappish. “Do you think I didn’t see every time you went back to that place? Do you think I didn’t see it fucking haunting you, Lynn, because I did.”
“And Ibeatit,” I shouted, shaking, overcome with a hundred different emotions. For a whole minute, everything had been perfect. Overwhelming, but perfect. “I fuckingwonthat fight, Cobra. The darkness tried to drown me, but I survived, and it feltgood.And you have the absolute fucking nerve to try and take that from me? To make me feel bad about what happened?”
He stood there, naked, staring, without words for the first time since we met.
“Fuck you, Cobra.”
I left him standing there and slammed the door behind myself, not particularly caring that people were probably sleeping.
“Damn, Lynn, bring the whole clubhouse down around us, why don’t you?” Devil snarked, immediately throwing up his hands when I spun to face him.
“Do you want a drink?” I asked, marching towards him, raising an eyebrow at the pile of laundry on the floor. Aww, I scared him so much he’d dropped his washing? Cute. “I want a drink.”
“Sure,” Devil agreed, running a hand through his dirty-blonde hair. “Do you want some pants first? And—I say this as your friend, who cares about both you and your reputation as a terrifier—maybe a shower?”
I stopped dead, my nostrils flaring. And that’s how I found out I had Cobra’s cum rolling down my thigh.
“Fine,” I sighed.
“I’ll grab a few beers and meet you in the gym,” he offered. It wouldn’t be the first time we’d worked out drunk, both critiquing each other’s form with various levels of scathing comments. It was different than spending time with Cobra or the girls, a strange combination of both. It helped that Devil loved to bitch and gossip about people, but never said anything deeply hurtful. He also overshared when he was drunk, which was fun. And if I wasn’t mistaken, the glossy sheen to his eyes meant he was already several drinks in.
“Why are you doing your washing while drunk?”
“Nothing better to do,” he muttered, surly. No, sad. Miserable even.
I groaned, and realised why he so easily agreed to a drink. “You want a heart-to-heart, don’t you?”
“Running into you was a sign, honestly,” he said, scooping his clothes off the floor. “I was going to throw my head in the washing machine and see if that helped.”
“Doubt it,” I said with a frown. I had my issues and Devil had his. Namely, his mate not knowing she was his mate and seeking comfort in the arms, and beds, of other men. And this motherfucker had sworn me to secrecy, so I couldn’t even tell her. “Fine,” I sighed. “Let me shower, then we’ll talk.”
Anything beat going back into Cobra’s room and facing my own problems.
18
Cobra
The sight of Lynn sitting on the glossy black tattoo chair with only black cotton knickers on made me flash back to the sight of her leaving my room a week ago, bare-legged, beautiful, and furious. With my cum on her thighs. I clenched my jaw to throttle a growl, which was a lot harder when I remembered I wasn’t the only one seeing Lynn like this.
Shade returned from where he’d had his back to Lynn as I hovered unnoticed in the doorway of the small, makeshift tattoo studio at the back of the clubhouse. I watched with barely-repressed rage as he smeared a clear gel on her thigh. The logical side of me knew this process well enough to recognise it as professional, platonic, and nothing even remotely sexual. The animal side of me said Shade was putting his hands on my woman, and those hands should be immediately removed from his body.
What a shame I only had three knives on my person, none of them big enough to handle that job.
“There,” he said in the ultra deep voice I always felt more than heard, washing his hands at the cramped sink. “That should—” He cut off when he caught sight of me. Shade was extremely perceptive, and more emotionally intelligent than most of us. In a single look, I bet he knew exactly what I was feeling, and why, and who for.
There were enough rumours about me and Lynn flying around the clubhouse that everyone thought we’d been fucking for months. Clearly, Shade decided the rumours were true, because he took a solid step away from Lynn, his eyes glued to me. Unsure how I was going to react.
“What the fuck areyoudoing here?” Lynn spat, breaking our intense stare-off.
“It’s a tattoo studio, asshole,” I replied, trying to crush the threat from my voice because it wasn’t for her. “Take a wild guess.”
“Well, fuck off somewhere else,” she said, true anger in her voice. It pierced my ribs and stabbed the fleshy organ behind them.
“He’s up next on my schedule,” Shade input, trying to soothe tempers. A futile attempt, but it was amusing to watch him try. “I can make him wait outside—”
