Page 10 of Savage

She stares at me through her tears and then scampers on her hands and knees into my lap. I stroke her hair and marvel that this is the second naked, broken chick I’ve comforted in my lap today. I’m beginning to feel like the fucking psychotic woman whisperer. Ivy sobs into my lap, clutching my jeans and leaving a wet patch from her tears. “What happened, baby?”

“Don’t leave me, Kick. Don’t replace me with her. I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll be whoever you want, but don’t replace me. Please? I’ll die without you.”

I stroke her hair and sigh. She doesn’t mean it. This is the comedown talking. It’s the same every time, only most of the time she calls medaddyand begs for me to put her over my knee to show her how much I really love her. I don’t say anything; how can I? By allowing her to behave this way, by taking her the way I do, by being the only brother who will care for her after I’ve fucked her senseless, I know I’ve enabled her behaviour. I’ve allowed it. Encouraged it. I’ve become her crutch.

The problem is that I’ve never seen Ivy as a long-term fixture. I’ve never looked at anyone butherthat way. It’s not my intention to replace Ivy with the woman in my bed; I don’t even know if the woman in my bed is going to be stable enough to endure a frigging conversation, let alone a lifetime in the MC. One thing’s for sure, though—if she can’t abide the life, she’s as dead as she was in that warehouse because there ain’t no way Prez is letting her leave this compound. I should have killed her. Instead, I’ve condemned her to a life of monsters, of turning to drugs to dull the pain. And while I didn’t do these things to Ivy, she came to the club of her own accord, I certainly haven’t helped her in any way. I gave her what she needed because it benefitted me. I could get my dick sucked and live out my wretched rape fantasies with someone who couldn’t get off any other way, but that’s not the same as helping her.

I sit on the worn carpet that reeks of years’ worth of soiled boots and smoke, and I rock her in my arms. I stroke her hair until she falls asleep, and then I scoop her up and tap on Tank’s door.

He opens it, a beer in one hand and an unimpressed look on his face. “What?”

“Can she sleep here?”

“If she’s finished fucking wailing like a little kid she can. I can’t do strung-out bitches with tears.”

“Don’t be a fuck-stick, man. She’s messed up.”

“She’s a drug addict, Kick. She might be better looking than the junkies you find on the street, but she’s still fucked every which way from Sunday if she doesn’t get a hit.”

“She means a lot to me, Tank.” I lay her down on the soiled covers and step back from the bed. “I don’t expect you to understand that shit, ’cause you’ve never cared about anyone but yourself—”

“I cared enough about you not to blow your head off when you said you’d gunned down our entire chapter of the Angels, didn’t I?”

I scrub at my beard. “I still haven’t worked out why that was. But yeah, I guess.”

“I get it, you have this hero complex with these bitches, but you gotta know when to cut your losses. She’s a great lay, but she’ll fuck with your head, brother. They all do. And neither one of these bitches is Lauren. We both know that.”

“I’m not fucking substituting,” I shout, and then I lower my voice when Ivy jolts in her sleep. “I know they’re not her. No one knows that more than me.”

“I’m just lookin’ out for you, brother.” He shakes his head and grins, pointing towards Ivy’s naked body. “You already got your hands full with this one. Another bitch in your bed isn’t going to help anyone.”

“Let me worry about who’s in my bed.”

He holds up his hands and flops down beside Ivy, slapping her bum. “She does have a fucking incredible arse, though.”

Tank unzips his fly and shoves his jeans down his legs. He climbs on top of her body, engulfing her tiny frame completely, as he spits on his dick and rubs himself between her arse cheeks. She arches back into him, high as a fucking kite and moaning—from the drugs or the attention on her starved little pussy, I’m not sure which.

“You gonna watch, brother? Or are you gonna get the fuck out?”

“Don’t kick her out this time, arsehole. Try being fuckin’ human for once.” I shake my head and retreat to my room.

Opening the door, I see she’s still asleep, so I deadbolt it behind me and set the keys on the table. I pick up a cup of cold, stale, black coffee and chug it down. It tastes like shit, so I screw the cap off a bottle of Jack and chase the black filth with the burn of amber. I set it back on the table while the familiar click of my gun being cocked echoes through my small room. I laugh.Fucking ballsy bitches make me hot.

“Hands in the air and turn around. Slowly,” the woman says through a scratchy throat. I do as she asks, mostly because I want to keep my spine intact, but also partly because bitches with guns are fucking hot, and I’m hard as a rock just thinking about the way she’s going to look with a pistol trained on me.

She’s been busy while I was out, rummaging through my drawers and finding a pair of loose tracksuit pants. They’re rolled at the waist, so much that it makes her look pregnant. That, combined with her crazy fucking cat lady hair and the filth covering her body, makes her look like a homeless person.

I smile and clasp my hands behind my head. Her eyes rove over me, taking in my size. She’s checking me for the arsenal I so obviously have stashed away in my fucking worn, faded jeans. She’s not checking me out and dreaming about me taking her rough and hard on my scratched-up dining table, but I still get a fucking boner out of having her eyes roam all over me.

“Pick up the keys, and open the door,” she commands.

“If you run, they’ll shoot you.”

“Pick up the fucking keys.”

I snatch up the keys and lob them at her, hard enough that she has to twist out of the way. She cries out as she does, proving to me that her ribs are definitely injured, maybe even cracked. I lunge at her. Shoving her back against the bed, I land on top of her, warding off her blows with one hand and squeezing her wrist with the other until she drops the gun on the floor.

“Get off me!” she screams.

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