Page 168 of Tempting Fate

Three months later

Spinning around on my barstool to face my club brothers, I snap, “How long has she been actin’ like this?”

“Jesus, Venom. She’s having fuckin’ fun. You should try it sometime.” Toker snickers at the look on my face, then he clinks his beer bottle against Isaiah’s. “You owe me fifty.”

“Why? He hasn’t done anythin’ yet.”

“He will. Shit’s gonna blow tonight. I can feel it.”

When they start to bicker like a pair of old women over their latest bet, I swing my back to them. I’ve avoided the compound for three months. Done my best to pretend Lily doesn’t fill my every waking thought. Tried to ignore the way the brothers in the east coast chapters snicker every time I turn down a cut slut.

Nothing’s worked.

I can’t move on.

Lily is embedded in every atom of my being.

Not being with her is eating me alive.

Since I arrived back in Perth two days ago for Isaiah’s patching-in ceremony, I haven’t laid eyes on her. No one will tell me a thing about her. Sander flipped me the bird and peeled out of the compound in his sports car when I tried to approach him yesterday. He hasn’t set foot in the club since. My biker brothers pretend they can’t hear me whenever I say her name. Slash acts like he’s going to pound my face in when I try to talk to him about anything other than the plans we’re hatching with the Blackards. Toker just laughs at me. Even Fret refuses to divulge the most basic of information about her.

Seems like everyone has accepted that we’re over.

Except me.

My life is a fucking mess, and I’m living on a wing and a prayer as I work to fix it before time runs out. The sole salvation on the horizon at the moment is that Brutus hasn’t brought his business proposal to church for a vote in my absence. None of Joseph’s goons have raided the compound again, either. My president, the turncoat that he is, has kept his end of the bargain.

I’ve broken our deal once. The only mercy is that no one seems to know about my lapse with Lily at the penthouse after Apollo’s concert. I imagine she wasn’t too keen to tell anyone about it after I left her lying half-naked on a table on the balcony and disappeared. Isaiah caught me in Apollo’s bedroom, but he didn’t seem to put two and two together.

For now, it needs to stay hidden.

I’ve reached an uneasy truce with Brutus. My plans with the Blackards are only weeks away from bearing fruit. The Perth chapter has settled into a new norm. Our president still refuses to explain to anyone why he set Joker and Honey loose, so everyone remains wary of him, which works in my favour. Despite that, he retains his president’s patch, and I still sit by his side on the rare occasion I’m in the city during church.

Brutus’ face has healed, but he’s kept the bandages. Not sure why. Just know that on the few instances we’ve found ourselves alone together, I’ve smirked at him until his face has filled with rage.

Justice isn’t swift.

Not in the biker world.

It’s important to grab the sweet moments when they pop up along the way.

Speaking of sweet, my gaze is drawn back to the blonde woman I’ve been trying to ignore all night. I take a sip of my beer to disguise the growl that rumbles through my chest when I see what she’s up to now, spluttering when the bitter liquid goes down the wrong way.

“Careful you don’t choke,” Slash tells me as he pounds me on the back.

Too hard.

Deliberately so.

Glaring at him over my shoulder, I warn him in a low voice. “Keep goin’. I’m more than happy to break ya nose a second time.”

Slash brushes his middle finger along the scar that splits his eyebrow, then peers over my shoulder. As a new song starts playing, malice enters his gaze, and he licks his lips before he drawls, “Damn… every fucker in here’s gonna chub up watchin’ this.”

Although I know he’s baiting me, my attention immediately flicks back to Lily.

He’s not wrong, though.

She’s gyrating on top of the bar. Nadia’s up there with her. Dancing to a song by one of the bands that supported Apologies to Medusa. “Adrenalize,” I think it’s called. Whatever the name of the song, she’s rocking the shit out of it. Eyes closed. Feeling the lyrics. Tits bouncing in the strappy bra-like contraption she’s trying to pass off as a top.

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