Page 27 of Lady Sings the Blues

The men around us chuckle and, or, low whistle. “Don’t have a coat closet, but I got a bed in back.”

“You do?”

“All patched-in members do. A place to crash after a party. Keep the men from drinkin’ and drivin’.”

“Or getting caught by their old ladies while they’re screwing their pieces,” I add.

“That too.”

This is all so much to take in. I kind of forget myself when the first fewpiecestrickle in. “Honestly Mark, how are we going to make long distance work when you’ve got all these available women shaking their tits in your face every night? How long are you going to be able to resist?” I know there have to be better old lady candidates for him. More roll with the punches, what happens in the clubhouse stays in the clubhouse. That’s not me.

“Excuse us, gentlemen.” Mark grabs my hand pulling me along behind him. He sets our empty bottles on the bar and says in response to us leaving. “I have to explain some things to Elise.”

“Looks like she’s about to get accustomed,” Chaos calls out.

And then he’s leading me down that back hallway, a hallway I can’t even chance a look at because my eyes stay glued to my feet making sure they hit every step so I don’t stumble from the way he’s hurrying. And then we’re in his club space. I expect, I don’t know what I expect. A personal man cave, maybe. His room, though, is just that, a room. A bed. No window. A closet. Even somewhat…tidy. Queen size bed. Not the king he has back at his place. Still, it takes up almost the entirety of the room. Night stands on both side of the bed and one long six drawer dresser across from the bed appear to be the only furniture. Then there’s a thin hollow wooden door, and I know it’s hollow because of the hole in the center of it just big enough to match a burly man’s fist.

“Closet,” he says in response to me eyeing the door. Then he tips his chin toward the only other door aside from the one we just came through. “Bathroom.” Good to know he’s got his own bathroom, because I wouldn’t even want to consider stepping foot in a public toilet in a motorcycle compound.Eww…Gives me the willies just thinking about it.

But discussing public MC toilets is not why we came in here and he’s being patient. I’ve noticed over the past few days Mark’s patience runs dry pretty quickly.

I look at him, leaning his backside against the edge of the dresser, his feet crossed at the ankles and his arms crossed over his chest.Whelp, time to do this.“Did I embarrass you again out there?” I ask, trying to avoid direct eye contact without looking like I’m avoiding direct eye contact. “Because I really didn’t mean to. That’s actually the last thing I want.”

“No. You didn’t embarrass me.” His voice gets soft as he snags my shirt with a hooked finger, bringing me to stand toe to toe in front of him. In this awkward stance my knees have nowhere to go except pressed against his thighs. And I fall forward, my cheek to his chest, my arms wrap around his waist to pad the fall. “But whatdoyou want?” he asks me in the sexiest voice I’ve ever heard come from a man aimed at me. Movie star sexy. Smooth and rich as melted chocolate, there’s no other way to describe how it sounds, coating my body in delicious decadence.

Despite hiscoated in melted chocolate come hithertone, it’s in this moment, while we’re standing pressed together, my cheek resting against the name patch on his cut. Breathing in the smell of worn leather, his arms holding me like I matter. It’s this moment when I’m able to listen to that flutter in my chest reminding me why after knowing each other for such a short amount of time, why I want to try. “For you to be happy, that’s what I want. But there are so many rules that I’m just not use to or necessarily comfortable with. Maybe your kind of happy and my kind of happy, aren’t the same happy.”

“Darlin’,” There it is, that voice again. “You’re theonlyone. And you don’t have to learn it all in one day. And you don’t have to accept them all either. We’ll go over them as they come up. You’ll tell me the ones you can live with and the ones you absolutely can’t. Not won’t, though. Can’t. Got me?”

My arms around his waist turn from holding me in place to a full-blown hug. Yes, I hug him and not in a sexy way, either. We’ll deal with his melted chocolate in a minute, after I kiss my maybe onto his cheek.

“What about when we’re apart? I don’t like to share. That’s a can’t. I’m serious.”

Mark holds my stare as he gently strokes his finger along my collarbone. He muddles my mind when he touches me like that. Which, I’m sure is his goal.

Minute’s up. But he’s apparently not up for talking. If I thought the finger strokes were good, that’s nothing compared to the other stuff he unleashes next.

Time for melty chocolate again. And let me say, Mark’s melty chocolate other stuff is what my father should have warned me about as a teenager. Of course Logan was still pretty much a boy so it’s not really fair to compare, but his stuff can’t hold a candle to the other stuff Mark lavishes on me.

Um…wow.

I’ve never been with a man with a beard before him. Mark’s the first, and I have to say, I love it. The hair, although coarser than on his head, is still soft and tickles everywhere it touches my skin. The fact that he has my skin so heated elevates, intensifies each sensation, keeping that chocolate melty. I bite down gently on the bulging vein running down the length of his neck, the one bulging because he’s so turned on right now, too.

We’re not even in the bed, but he shifted to pin me up against the wall next to the dresser. Yet another first, as I’ve never been taken against a wall before. I’m aching for him, and at the same time not sure my legs will hold me.

He touches, caresses. He rubs and grinds.

I prickle, pins and needles.

Mark just keeps upping his game. I thought what we’d done this morning after George and Margo left was extraterrestrial. The shower, cosmic. But as his kisses intensify, I can’t imagine anything better in existence. I can’t remember wanting anything more than to feel him inside me again. I think he’s about to give it to me. And I’m so ready. The grinding. Oh lord, the grinding. We’re both still mostly clothed. Only our shirts gone, all other sensations coming from those miracle-making fingers. And it’s so intense to feel him everywhere, expanding my universe. Until I don’t.

Mark quits kissing me. “I can’t do this,” he says with his lips still pressing against mine.

I’m shocked, aching for this to happen. “Did I do something wrong?” I panic.

“No. No baby girl. I just can’t do it here. Not with my brothers in the other room.”

“I need you.” I whine and pant all in one breath.

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