PROLOGUE
A gray, wet mist envelopes me when I pull up my bike outside Iris O’Connor’s house. Clutch, the vice president of my motorcycle club, Iron Outlaws, kills the engine of his bike nearby.
“Go get ’em, pretty boy,” he says, grabbing a cigarette from his pocket.
I flip him the bird as I drag my hungover ass off my bike. “Just envious your face doesn’t get as much pussy as mine.”
He taps the ash onto the ground. “Face and dick get plenty.”
Yesterday we put our old president, Camelot, in the ground, and gave him a send-off worthy of the Vikings. Uther “King” Hills, his son, had been an easy vote to replace him.
Me? I drank until I could forget that a club member I swore to protect got taken out on the highway and was killed on his bike.
Hours later, we’d found out the accident had been a hit. King’s twin sister Gwen had shown up, cool as fuck, after over a decade in hiding, spinning a story so wild, it’s hard to believe.
I saw the way Clutch had been looking at Gwen. Track, one of our older members, told me they used to be friends before she left. He’s a lucky fucker if he ends up tapping that ass.
“You coming?” I ask.
“Sure.” He climbs off his bike, as hungover as I am, and follows me.
The most crucial piece of information we’ve learned since Gwen’s arrival is that there was a witness, Iris O’Connor. As sergeant at arms, I failed to protect King’s dad on that stretch of highway. His loss is not the only weight I carry. What happened two years ago in Afghanistan is the worst of it. But I’m going find who the fuck caused the accident that killed him and make them pay.
As I lead the way up Iris’s path, I yank my long, thick blond hair off my face and secure it with an elastic.
“You look hot, rock star.”
I glance back over my shoulder at him and flip the bird in his direction again. “Just using what God gave me.”
I knock firmly, and we wait.
There’s no answer.
Clutch pops around the back to see what he can find. Meanwhile, I step back and look up at the upstairs windows.
“You see anything?” I shout.
He reappears, wiping the rain from his face. “No. We should probably head out and come back later.”
As we turn to head back to our bikes, a young woman in a bright yellow raincoat over a vest and shorts hurries onto the driveway and runs up the steps to the porch with two shopping bags. “Can I help you?” she asks, pulling her hood down.
All I can see are the greenest eyes. So green they almost don’t look real. Framed with brown curls, she has the look of one of those porcelain dolls my gran used to collect. She’s young, and freckles make her look younger. Mid-twenties, maybe a decade younger than me.
The absolute opposite of my type, yet one look at her, and it’s like I was hit by a truck. The thought of which brings me back to why I’m there.
“Iris?” I ask.
“Yeah, who's asking?” There’s a hint of an Irish accent. A soft lilt that seems to resonate at a frequency my dick appreciates.
I hold out my hand. “I’m Tyler, ma’am. Sorry to just show up on your porch, but we didn’t have any other way to contact you.”
She shakes my hand, her tiny one in my big one, and I can’t help but check out her tight rack, small but pert. Everything about her says utterly breakable. Petite. Fragile.
I want to pack her up and take her home and . . . fuck me. Focus.
Clutch huffs out a laugh behind me.
Iris raises an eyebrow. “And what exactly did you need to contact me for?”
I drop down two steps so we can make eye contact a little easier. I have her beat by at least a foot. “A member of our club was involved in an accident, and the police told us you were a witness. We just have some questions we ain’t getting answers to yet.”
Iris stiffens. “Can’t you just talk to the police? I gave them everything I know.”
“We’re not here to cause you any trouble,” Clutch says, trying to reassure her when I seem to lose the ability to speak. I’m normally better at communicating with women. With my tongue on their pussy, I’m a certified genius. “We’re glad you got safe and called the police. It’s just they aren’t very forthcoming about information.”
She lets out a breath, but the sheen of tears is apparent in her eyes. “I don’t like talking about it. It was . . . traumatic.”
“Shit, I’m sorry.” I place a hand on her shoulder. “We still haven’t been told what happened beyond he was hit by a truck. Anything you could give us?”
Iris sits down on the porch steps as the rain abruptly stops. “I was driving behind a truck, on the opposite side of the road to your friend. The truck was ahead of me. It was going too fast. Then it appeared to just lose control. It swerved onto the other side of the road then back again. I thought it was going to topple over, so I braked. When it came back onto my side of the road, I didn’t see your friend anymore. Then I saw bits of the bike and him spat out from beneath the wheels and . . . Shit. Shit.” She swiped the tears from beneath her eyes. “He went under every wheel. Him, his bike. Sparks were flying everywhere as the remains of his bike were dragged along the highway. He . . .”
Iris puts her head in her hands, and I stroke the top of her head, offering some kind of comfort. I have those kinds of memories in my head. They creep up on me. I envy her for being able to let her feelings out like that.
I look at Clutch, and he nods. He needs me to push. So, I sit next to her on the porch step and slip my arm over her shoulder, tugging her into my side, and she lets me.
“Easy, Iris,” I say softly. “Did you see who was driving?”
My question seems to shake her out of her feelings, and she slips from beneath my arm. “Not at the scene. But I caught up to the truck later. Black hair, at a guess Central American. Red plaid shirt with a black leather thing like yours.”
“A cut?” Clutch asks, gesturing to his own.
“If that’s what that is, then yeah. A black leather cut.” A car backfires down the road, the sound bringing back memories I’d rather not think about, but we all look down the street.
Call it instinct, training, and an uncanny awareness of my surroundings, but I know we are in trouble before I hear the first shot fire.
I grab Iris’s hand, pull her into my arms, and then shove her toward Clutch, who catches her. They roll between the two houses as I pull my weapon.
I aim at the windshield, then the tires. It’s hard to stay behind Iris’s car on her driveway as I aim.
I need to keep Clutch and Iris safe until we can get out of there.
Bullets hit their car, and Iris’s fence.
I hear Iris cry out and empty my clip in fury.
“We need to get out of here, in case they turn around and head back,” Clutch says. “We’ll call for an ambulance on the way.”
I look at her, blood coming from a wound on her thigh. “We can’t just leave her, you fucker.”
“How bad is it?” Clutch asks her. She’s gasping for breath, those eyes glazed over in shock until they connect with mine.
“Just get me . . . medical help,” she gasps.