Page 23 of Savage Guardian

Hawk chuckled at her sass, clinking his bottle against her glass.

“I’ll drink to that,” they both said, sending them both into laughter.

Taking a seat on the stool, she and Hawk…talked. Nothing important, noteworthy, or life-altering. He talked about his club brothers and his training at the MMA gym. She talked about all she’d seen in Vegas so far. Hawk was witty, funny, and engaging. She could listen to him talk forever and ever, and when he laughed or smiled at something she said, her ovaries melted. She really could fall for him.

If only he weren’t interested in boning your sister.

When a popular rock song played through the speakers throughout the room, she smiled.

“See, that’s the music I expect a biker to listen to. Pantera. How in the world did you get into Aoibheal’s music?” she asked, desperate to know the answer. Of all the fan letters she’d read and all the praise and positive reviews she’d earned, none of them seemed as important to her as what Hawk would say.

She held her breath, waiting for him to finish swallowing the last swig of beer.

He dropped his gaze from her, leaning back. Raking his fingers through his slightly over long blond locks, he seemed reluctant to tell her. Was he embarrassed?

He cleared his throat then replied, “I was…err…spending some time with a…companion, and there was a laptop playing a Spotify playlist. I wasn’t paying attention to the music…untilSgiathan Bristestarted playing. It stopped me in my fucking tracks—like the breath left my body, my heart started pounding, and all I could do was find out who was singing, whose voice that was. I was…well, I was dumbstruck by the way the voice, lyrics, and music moved me. I knew I had to get every song she ever sang. I’ve been obsessed ever since, listening to her music on repeat. There isn’t a brother in this club who hasn’t given me shit about it, but I don’t give a fuck. We all got our vices. Mine just happens to be a woman with the voice of a goddamn angel. When Odin told me she was coming to town and wanted Savage Protection as her security detail, I knew it was my chance to meet the mystery that had been haunting my thoughts for almost two years.”

Stunned. Absolutely, cataclysmically, gut-wrenchingly shocked.Sgiathan Briste.Broken Wings. It was the song she’d written right after high school, when the weight of all she’s endured—bullying, living in Carrie’s shadow, loss of her mom, and the humiliation of having sex with Todd and then his gossiping about it with the whole school—finally collapsed on her. Her wings had been snapped, and she’d been desperate to learn to fly again. It was one of the biggest reasons she’s begun writing, producing, and releasing her music. She’d needed an outlet for all the pain, the hopes, the yearnings. And that song,Broken Wings, had been her first release.

“That song changed something fundamental…fuck—I don’t even know what I’m saying. Shit,” he swore, thrusting his fingers through his sexily unkempt hair.

That song…changed him? Oh, God.

No wonder he looked at Carrie like she was the best thing in the world. No wonder he smiled and flirted with her like she was already a foregone conclusion—because in his mind, in his heart, he was guarding the woman he’d been obsessing over for years. The woman who’d sung him a song that literally altered his life.

Hawk was in love with Aoibheal. And he believed the woman whose voice he’d fallen for was the beautiful Carrie. Not the plain, chubby, awkward Fae.

“Yeah, that’s a good song,” Fae croaked, swigging the last bit of her drink, suddenly wishing she was somewhere dark and quiet, where she could curl up and die.

No! You’re in an MC clubhouse, sitting and talking with a man biker fantasies are made of. So what if you don’t have a chance—you never did anyway. At least he’s nice to you. At least he’s easy to talk to. You can’t ask for more than that.

“You’re lucky to have discovered her music.” Was that her voice that sounded so flat?

Hawk grinned, his eyes turning silver with mischief. “Is it luck or is it Fate?”

Fae cocked her head, intrigued and wary about his question. “What’s the difference?”

“Luck is happenstance, something that happens because you were in the right place, right time. Fate…is destiny. It’s predestined to happen, like it was meant to be from the beginning of time.”

Her heart throbbed painfully in her chest, his words sinking in.

“You believe in Fate?” she whispered, the words difficult to push through the tightening in her chest. All her life, she’d believed that everything happened for a reason. Good or bad. Joy or pain. Happiness and grief. When her mother died, the only thing that kept her from falling apart was the belief that her mother’s death hadn’t been in vain—and she’d been right. Her mother’s donated organs were transplanted into two kids who’d been weeks away from death. Her mother’s death at thirty meant life for two kids who hadn’t even hit double digits. When Fae’s first boyfriend took her virginity and then blabbed to the whole school that she’d been gross and terrible in bed, certainly she’d cried and hidden in her room for a week, but Fate had determined that the same week, Todd got hit by a car, breaking his leg, and ending his high school football career. And…when she’d been casually singing along with the music playing over the outside speakers at the Pilot gas station, Fate had determined that Jimmy would be in the bay right next to hers, gassing up his Mercedes. He’d heard her, had begged her to sit and talk with him, and the rest had led her to that very moment, at the bar in an MC clubhouse, sitting next to a man she wished with all her heart would want her back.

But…Fate, apparently, was leading him right intoCarrie’sarms.

“I’m Scottish, of course I believe in Fate. It’s luck’s more attractive cousin, after all,” he teased, grinning.

After what only felt like a few minutes, she noticed that the large room had gained a few more people. Men were scattered through the large common area, nursing drinks at tables while they chatted and laughed. Loudly. Damn, she’d been so wrapped up in Hawk, she hadn’t even noticed that the other bikers had arrived.

A flash of color from the corner of her eye made her glance toward the door, where two scantily clad women were strutting in. Long-legged, big-boobed, and perfectly shaped, with makeup so heavy and eye-catching, they could be just stepping off the stage of a drag show.

So…those were club women. No wonder the men kept them around; they looked primed, cocked, and ready tobang. Hawk twisted in his seat, turning to look at where she was staring, unable to tear her eyes away.

The woman in front, the one with short, black hair, and dark blue lips that looked like a mix of Angelina Jolie and Steve Tyler, seemed to sense Hawk’s attention because her brown-eyed gaze snapped to him, a slow, predatory smile spreading over her face. In a blink, she was hurrying across the room toward them—him—on heels high enough to use a kabab skewers, and once Hawk was within reach, she leaped, and he caught, his thick arms wrapping around her like steel bands, his laughter filling Fae’s gut with a sourness.

Heat rising into her face, she turned back toward the bar and asked Preston where the bathrooms were, hoping to get her shit together. Sliding from the stool, she waved a thanks to the prospect, wanting to but failing to ignore the man’s pitying gaze as she hurried away.

It took far too much fucking work to peel Amelia off his lap, and send her on her way to another, willing brother for the night, but by the time he’d disengaged from the pouting club bitch, the stool beside him at the bar was empty.

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