“Probably reading a romantasy.” I shrug and then laugh at the confusion filtering across his face.
“What’s that?” His brow puckers. I want to tell him so badly that if he wants to snag someone younger, he needs to know what we are into these days.
“It’s romance and fantasy together in a book.” Looking at him, I see the appeal some girls may see. I mean, if I were into a good time and not a long time, I wouldn’t hesitate. He’s not worried about me being jailbait — not at all. The devilish cleft in his chin is a distraction. Not sure why the insidious thought creeps in at this moment. I scan the crowd briefly. Snake is nowhere to be seen. Maybe he left with one of his manyadmirers, I muse trying not to let hurt sting my heart. We are what we are. My man is something he will never be.
“What’s going on here?” Another guy sidles over. It’s the same guy who made the rude comment earlier, Hector.
“Thinking of getting a tat. Wassup?” Pedro seems to swell in the face of the newcomer encroaching on his hard work. There is no chill on his face. Arms crossed, he steps in front of me, blocking the rider’s view.
Hector has an awful rep in the club. Several women have come back from dates with him bruised in the worst way.
I don’t know why he feels so emboldened all of a sudden. Even if Angel, who I now realize must have left with Ezekiel-Jane and his second, are not present. Stepping to anyone deemed untouchable and protected by the el patron is a death sentence.
“So, you’re claiming Snake’s girl?” Hector snarls, ducking around to look at me with a lascivious smirk, I call dibs next. We all see how he’s been running through bitches lately. Seems like your time is up, sweetheart.” A mean, nasty chuckle erupts from him for all of five seconds before Pedro plants him a facer.
“Motherfucker —” he roars. “Over a piece of ass ran through by Angel’s fuckboy?” he shouts. “She ain’t nothing.” Hate-filled eyes shoot daggers at me as he whips out a blade, charging so hard at Pedro, who planted in front of me.
Hector barrels into him so fast I barely have time to get out of the way before they crash into the table.
Heavy bodies smash into the wood and the wall. Sturdy legs splinter. One catches me in the thigh, making me stumble back onto the floor.
Sprawled beside them, I can’t help but be impressed when Pedro starts wailing on Hector’s ravaged face. I know it’s going to end in death. A split second before it happens, I see a flash right before Hector buries a knife into Pedro’s armpit. Bloodpours from the wound. It’s a killing wound. His body slumps in seconds. Shoving the rider off, he turns his vicious gaze to me.
“I’m claiming you, bi?—”
Three shots ring out. Hector’s brain-matter paints the wall behind me.
Silence drops around the clubhouse like a veil. The heavy thud of boots pounds coming toward me until gleaming biker boots come into my line of sight. They pivot, and then several more shots make Hector’s dead body jerk.
“H-he didn’t touch her Snake.” Someone from Rudy’s crew complains. “He was going to claim her, since you don’t want her no more.”
“I guess I answered that question, no?” Snake asks, meeting every eye in the room at large. Lifting my face, I regard the dark menace emanating from every pore of his tension-filled body.
A strong, calloused hand reaches down to me. “Saban, come.”
Chapter Four
SNATCHED
SABAN
“This is all my fault.” I whisper to Easy, thinking back to the night Snake killed Hector. The tension in el Diablo exploded to an all-time high after Snake put my would-be rapist down like the dog he was. Rudy’s crew has been gunning for me ever since. The discord in the el Diablo between the old crew and the newer members is more apparent daily.
You’d think they’d be more concerned about the dirty way Hector knifed Pedro instead of trying to blame Snake and me for it. Hector deserved what he got. Pedro didn’t. I don’t feel bad about what happened to Hector. Somehow, the blame is on me for the whole way it played out.
“All I was doing was setting up for tattoos.” I tried explaining to Snake later.
“You were told to go the fuck home,” he seethed. His bitter words vivisected me as I stood in the kitchen the next morning after he shoved a bowl of oatmeal across the table for me to eat before he left for the day.
“I’m not a child.” Tipping my chin up, I met his stern glare over the pecan and raisin ladened porridge he’d sprinkled with my favorite cinnamon sugar.
“Yet, I keep having to pull you out of shit like you are one.” Scorn dripping from his words like venom as he pulled on his cut and stormed out.
The distance between us has only grown since then, and it’s no more clearer than at the clubhouse.
Yesterday, I finally had the chance to do Padre’s tattoo. He also had some of his own ideas of what he’d like to see, but the design ended up pretty cool, with the skull resting on rose petals. He kept the rosary and the cross, though. I’d just finished when Snake strolled in with Bianca, a biker chick, a badass one at that. One of the old heads, not part of Rudy’s crew, left her widowed. She’d stepped in like a boss, taking his position instead of hooking up with another rider. Though not an official member, she commands respect among the crew. She got her CDL and took over her old man’s route like it was nothing. Nobody fucks with her. She, like Ellie and the twin-cousins, is like one of the guys. They ride with them, drink, take lovers just like the men, except she isn’t a patched member.
After throwing him a wink, she saunters over to the bar and starts chatting it up with Ellie. Ellie’s eyes met mine with sympathy before making her friend a frothy coffee. Ellie has a personal rule of not serving alcohol before noon to ensure peace and stability. Of course, some grumbled, but with Snake’s enforcement, no one dares gainsay her.
