Hawk headed to the bar and I turned back to Gwen and declared, “He’s the second love of my life.”

Elvira and LaTanya both burst out laughing again but Gwen’s slightly hazy eyes grew more than slightly dreamy and she whispered, “He’s the only love of mine.”

I liked that for her. She was gorgeous, definitely. But she was also very funny and really sweet. If I was still classifying, she’d be a firm eleven. She deserved a dangerous hot guy. Totally.

“I like that for you,” I whispered back, she focused on me (kind of) and smiled.

“Think Hawk’s in the mood to move so you got ‘em, suck ‘em back,” Elvira ordered then did as she told us to do and slammed back half a cosmo. After, she put her glass down and declared, “He gets back, Hawk on the move, we gotta be ready to roll.”

I took her direction, quickly sucking back the rest of my cosmo. Hawk was a commando and although gorgeous, definitely scary. If he was in the mood to move, I wasn’t going to give him any lip.

He came back while we were all getting up and snatching our purses. Being awesome and becoming even more awesome, he pulled both Gwen and my chairs out as we pushed up.

A gentleman.

Totally the second love of my life.

Once I gained my feet and ascertained my legs were going to support me, I looked up at Hawk. “How much do I owe you for the tab?”

“On me,” he replied.

“No, really, I had four cosmos. How much –?”

His black eyes focused on me and I shut up.

“On me,” he repeated firmly.

“Okey dokey,” I muttered.

He grinned.

My nipples started tingling.

Then he kept talking. “You get to the truck, got a folder for you.”

I blinked up at him.

Then I asked, “Pardon?”

“Melbamae and Lulamae Hanover?”

I felt my lips part but I didn’t reply.

I didn’t need to reply, he read my face.

“Sent a man, he had a word. Did some diggin’, created a file. They give you shit, which would surprise the fuck outta me if they do, my man reported he was thorough, then you turn that file over to your attorney and you’re golden. Yeah?”

I pressed my lips together so I wouldn’t burst into drunken tears.

He was sweet.

“Mara?” he called then prompted, “Yeah?”

“I’ll make you one of my barbeque chicken pizzas,” I blurted and that was when I got his smile.

And it was a nice smile.

A really nice one.

He had two dimples.

Two!

Holy cow.

Gwen who was standing beside him, her arm tucked through his, leaned around him and told me, “Cabe’s body is his temple. You want to give payback, buy him a big vat of protein powder or a coupon for a lifetime supply of cottage cheese.” She grinned. “But I’ll take the pizza.”

“You’re on,” I whispered then I looked up at Hawk. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Hawk’s deep, attractive voice replied quietly.

Yep. So totally the second love of my life.

“Yo!” Elvira called. “We goin’ or can I order another cocktail?”

Hawk’s gaze sliced to her and I bit my lip.

Elvira raised her brows. Hawk shook his head.

Then he started walking.

Without a word, the girl gang teetered behind him and Gwen.

We were ten feet from the door when my purse rang. In my inebriated state, I slowed and clumsily pulled my phone out of my purse. I slowed more when I saw on the display it said, “Mitch calling.”

I took the call and put my phone to my ear.

“Hey honey,” I answered.

“Hey sweetheart,” he replied and I got a heart flutter, breasts swelling, legs tingling and nipples hardening all at once. “Done here. I’ll swing by Club and get you.”

I shook my head and put my hand to the door that had swung closed behind LaTanya.

“Hawk just showed. I’m walking out the door now,” I pushed it opened, stopping and looking out into the parking lot to locate the others and I saw they were well ahead of me. I started to hasten my step as I walked out the door and went on, “And I’m walking to his truck all by myself.”

Mitch’s voice was trembling with laughter when he asked, “You’re what?”

“I’m walking…”

I trailed off and stopped walking when I heard the screeching of tires close. My head turned to see a car coming into the parking lot at high speed. This shocked me but it also alarmed me because it appeared it was coming right at me. Vaguely, I heard the roar of motorcycles, not one but several. But this didn’t register because seeing that car racing toward me, I didn’t think of anything but getting out of the way.

So I got out of the way, drunk and running on high heels which, by the way, was not easy.

The car came to a screeching halt while curving and cutting me off so I had to stop too as I heard Hawk’s voice shout, “Mara! This way. Run!”

One of the doors to the car opened, a man came out, he was big and scarier than Hawk but not in a good way and I pivoted on my foot and started running toward Hawk.

Another car was coming in at high speed from the other direction. It cut me off from Hawk who was running toward me and I awkwardly had to take last minute evasive maneuvers. My ankle turned, I wobbled and I threw both my arms out to stop myself from going down. My heart was racing, my adrenalin pumping and my mind was blank of anything but surprise and fear.

Then suddenly from out of nowhere there were motorcycles everywhere.

Everywhere.

Shooting through the two cars, all through the parking lot and, as I continued to stagger, one shot right toward me.

Before I could avoid it, I was hooked at the waist by something strong and solid and couldn’t hold back my, “Oof!”

Then my ass was planted in front of the rider.

“Hold on,” a gravelly voice ordered.

“I –”

“Hold the fuck on!” the gravelly voice barked.

Even as we kept cruising, I turned to face him, my arms sliding around his middle. His arm around me went back to the bike handle and he must have given it some gas because we shot out of the parking lot.

Oh God.

What was happening?

“What’s happening?” I asked.

“Keep quiet and stay calm. You’re safe,” he answered as, from my vantage point of looking over his shoulder behind us I saw the rest of the motorcycles line up behind ours.

“Safe? Safe from what? Who are you?” I asked and tipped my head back to see a strong jaw, a partial view of a goatee and longish dark hair curling around a muscled neck and his ear.

“I’m Tack.”

Oh boy.

“President of a biker gang Tack?”

His chin tipped down slightly but not enough for me to get a good look at him before his eyes went back to the road and he muttered, “See Lawson’s told you about me.”

“Uh –” I started.

He cut me off. “Motorcycle club.”

“What?” I asked.

“Chaos isn’t a gang. It’s a club.”

From the firm tone of his gravelly voice sounding over the roar of the motorcycle I noted that, clearly, this was an important distinction.

Right.

“Um…sorry,” I murmured.

“Just keep quiet and hold on,” he ordered and I thought this was good advice seeing as I’d never been on a motorcycle. I also didn’t know you could ride on a motorcycle like this. It didn’t feel very safe though he seemed in command.

Still, probably better if he had nothing to concentrate on but the road and making sure we didn’t crash and die since neither of us were wearing helmets.

We roared onto Speer Boulevard then we turned and roared up University Boulevard then another turn and down we roared on Alameda then another turn and more roaring down Broadway and then we turned into the enormous forecourt of a mechanic’s garage.

He parked in front of a long rectangular building and all the bikes roared in beside us like they practiced this formation often and they were the motorcycle equivalent of the Air Force Thunderbirds.

It was then that I realized somewhere along the way I’d lost my phone and purse.

And I’d been talking to Mitch when it all happened.

“Oh no,” I whispered, staring at Tack’s neck.

“Hop off, chestnut.”

I blinked and looked up at him to see his shadowed face looking down at me.

“What?”

“Can’t get off until you let me go and get off so hop off, chestnut.”

“Chestnut?”

“Your hair,” he grunted. “Now hop…off.”

And it was then I noticed that I still had my arms tight around him. Considering his tone was becoming impatient, I felt it prudent at that juncture to let him go and hop off. So I did that and stood unsteadily beside his bike while his brethren closed ranks.

He threw his leg off, grabbed my hand and started walking with wide strides toward the rectangular building taking me with him.

“Um…Mr., uh…Tack –”

“Just Tack,” he interrupted, not breaking stride and dragging me toward the door to the building.

“Right, uh…Tack. I lost my phone. I was on a call to my boyfriend, um –”

He pushed open the door at the same time he twisted his neck and ordered, “Dog, call Lawson. Tell him we got his woman at the compound and she’s safe.”

He knew who I was?

“You know who I am?” I asked as he dragged me into what looked kind of like the rec room of a house except a lot bigger and decorated in shades of seedy bar.

“Make it my business to know everything worth knowin’ in Denver,” he muttered, stopped and stopped me with a tug on my hand.

And since the lights were on I saw him.

Wow.

I’d had a lifetime of rough, gruff men like him visiting my Mom’s trailer and even some of them coming in to visit me in my room. Therefore, I was not big on rough, gruff men who required haircuts and needed to carve out some time to trim their facial hair.

But he was different.

He had some silver in his unruly black hair. He also had visible tattoos and lots of them. Further, he had fabulous bone structure, a dominant brow, a strong jaw. His goatee was long at the chin but for some reason I liked it and I figured this reason was because he wore it well. He had lines radiating from the sides of his eyes and they were extremely attractive.

And he had very, very blue eyes.

“You’re dangerous hot too but a different kind,” I blurted, unfortunately still drunk regardless of the drama I found myself involved in.

His eyes narrowed on me, his head tilted to the side then his goatee moved as both ends of his mouth tipped up slightly.

Oh yes. Dangerous hot.

He turned his head to the boys who followed us in and ordered, “Lockdown Ride. Eyes on the perimeter. No one gets in except Delgado and Lawson.”

On that, he started walking while dragging me behind him again. He took me around a bar to a hallway that had lots of doors off of it.

“Do you know what’s going on?” I asked as he dragged me.

“You know Grigori Lescheva?” he asked back.

Russian mob.

I felt my stomach clench.

Oh boy.

This could not be good.

“I know of him,” I answered as he pushed open a door.

Then he turned on a light and I saw it was a bedroom, a very untidy one.

He pulled me in, stopped us and looked down at me. “Well, he knows you.”

Fantastic.

Tack wasn’t done.

“He also knows your cousin was talkin’ with the DA.”

Damn.

Tack kept going.

“And he also knows you recently had a sit down with him.”

Shit.

“Uh…” I mumbled, unable to wrap my head around this.

“And last, he knows you got a connection with that shit for brains Otis Pierson.”

Shit!

“I barely know Otis,” I told Tack. “I just kind of work with him. And I think he’s creepy.”

“Might be so but Lescheva’s got a problem, he’s comprehensive about solvin’ it.”

That really didn’t sound good.

“Are you saying that he thinks I’m part of his problem?” I asked.

“I’m sayin’ that you got a connection with two people who are bein’ serious pains in his ass. He’s made note ‘a that and when he sweeps up a mess, he’s thorough.”

I stared up at him and whispered, “That’s insane.”

“Chestnut, this guy’s Russian mob. Not one of them is right in the head.”

This was probably true.

“How are you involved in this?” I asked.

“Your cousin and Pierson are bein’ a pain in Lescheva’s ass, he’s a pain in mine,” Tack answered but didn’t elucidate further.