CHAPTER ONE
Gracie
“Shit,” I murmured, looking down at the ice sculpture’s penis in my hand. Why, oh why, did I have to throw my hands out when someone knocked into me?
“Oh, no! I’m so sorry!” one of the servers said. Pretty and blonde, her cupid’s bow mouth opened in a pouty O. “Is that his…”
I stared down at the severed member in my palm, already starting to melt from my body heat.
Okay.
Alright.
This wasn’t a complete catastrophe.
Yet.
There was still time to… reattach the castrated erection to the almost comically chiseled ice man.
“Damn, the fuck the guy do to you?” a familiar voice asked, making me look up to spot Perish (yes, that was his real name) standing in the doorway to the barn. As wide as the space was, Perish seemed to swallow it up. He was massive. And, likely, as chiseled as the ice guy. More, probably.
Also… he did not belong here.
At my first ‘Back to the Streets’ party. Basically, a divorce party. The theme? Penises. Penises everywhere. In decor form. And cake form. And cup form. Hard ones. Flaccid ones. Circumcised ones. Natural ones. My Aunt Peyton and cousin Billy would be absolutely delighted. Though would likely gripe about the lack of vaginal representation.
The penis fell from my hand back onto, thankfully, a small tray of pebble ice that allowed it to not shatter and stop actively melting.
“Perish,” I said, feeling my cheeks heat as I looked to the side of him, where a ‘Pin the Junk on the Hunk’ poster of a naked muscular man was hung. A table full of various penises waiting to be chosen sat to the side of it. “What are you doing here?”
“Always knew you were a closet badass. Didn’t know you had it in you to cut a man’s dick off, though.”
A strange sensation moved through my chest at those words. Like Pop Rocks. A dozen little explosions.
Because, yes, damnit, Iwasa badass. But because I wasn’t as outwardly kick-butt like Hope, Vi, and various other members of my extended family, people tended to underestimate me.
It was kind of nice for someone—especially someone I knew so casually—to see that.
“I can’t believe I broke it,” I admitted, moving closer to him. “Is something wrong? Is there a club issue?”
While things were relatively tame for a long time, I knew from growing up inside the club that safety could be ripped away with little warning. That all our lives could be changed in an instant.
“Is everyone okay?” I asked, my mind already going to worst-case scenarios. I had dozens and dozens of loved ones at risk. Each as dear to me as the last.
I glanced past Perish (no easy feat) to see if there were other men waiting around, gazes scanning the sprawling grounds of the event venue.
I knew from experience that if one of the bikers showed up with a whole protection detail, then that things were bad-bad. Like… everyone going up to Hailstorm for safety bad.
As much as I actually loved our little trips up to the paramilitary camp on the hill—especially since Chris started to make changes to warm the place up a bit—it was spring; my event calendar was absolutely packed. I wasn’t going to have a weekend off until after Halloween.
And, well, it was important. This was my first year of officially being in business after years of dreaming about it. I couldn’t be flaking. Not even for some life-or-death biker thing.
“Everyone’s fine,” he said, brows furrowed as he looked down, likely finally registering my panic—and the reason for it. “Yeah, no. I’m not here for club shit. Grassis got an issue.”
“Oh.Oh,” I added, what he was saying registering. Because, yeah, this might have been the premiere event venue in the whole state. It was also a mafia front to launder their money. It was easy to forget that sometimes, no matter how many times I’d been here for various parties I’d planned.
“Nah, not like that. Nut sedge.”
“Is that some kind of code?” I asked, pressing my clipboard—yes, it was pink and covered in cutesy vinyl stickers—to my chest.
