“I know.” When you got arrested you were on your own. If you disappeared, the gang figured you were either in jail or dead. No one bothered to check up on you. You were family as long as you were in the gang. If you left, you were history. End of story.
“So are you back for good?”
“Maybe.”
“Interested in rejoining the club?”
“Maybe.”
Bo nodded. “So that means yes.”
Rick smiled over the rim of the beer bottle. “Maybe.”
Bo laughed. “You’re such a dick. I’ll have my people check you out. Make sure you’ve been where you say you’ve been. Not that I don’t trust you . . .”
“But nobody gets into the Hellraisers—or back in—without being investigated. I know.” And that’s why Grange had set up a phony background for him, including a drug bust in Chicago and the prison record he’d just told Bo about. If there was one thing the Hellraisers loved, it was a badass with a reputation. And Rick wanted to make sure he had the rep to ease back in. Which was probably why Senator Vargas was pissing himself over his daughter’s involvement with the gang. Not exactly a club filled with choirboys. If Rick had a daughter riding with the Hellraisers, he wouldn’t be too happy about it, either. Not that he was ever going to get married and have a kid. But if he did, he sure as hell wouldn’t allow her to run with a group like this.
“In the meantime, you can ride with us. Background check should only take a day or so. If you want back in, that is.”
“I might. What are the Hellraisers into these days?”
“Mostly trouble.”
Rick laughed. “Just my kind of action.” He figured it would be easy to get back in the gang again, especially with Bo at the helm. Now he’d just have to find Ava Vargas and get close enough to her to figure out her angle.
Ava Vargas stared at herself in the mirror of her bedroom.
“I don’t think leather is a good look for me.” She turned this way and that, unused to seeing herself decked head to toe in leather jacket, chaps, and boots.
“Are you kidding? You’re hot.” Lacey came into the bedroom and studied Ava, then shook her head. “I’d kill for boobs like yours.”
“These things are what I’m afraid of. Does this top really have to be so . . . tight?” She plucked at the clingy spandex that seemed to want to mold to her br**sts and outline them like the neon signs on the Vegas Strip. Her br**sts were large enough. She didn’t need to advertise their existence.
“All the girls wear their tops like that. Trust me, you’ll fit right in.”
That’s what Ava was going for, wasn’t it? To fit into this biker gang that her best friend Lacey had immersed herself in for the past year. The one that had ripped Lacey away from school, that had changed her best friend’s life, her personality, everything.
A year ago, Lacey had been a graduate student. She and Ava had done everything together. But then Lacey had met a biker and had all but disappeared from Ava’s life. Lacey had quit school and become a biker babe, spending all her time riding with her boyfriend. Even worse than that, she’d become a slacker, and that wasn’t Lacey at all.
And Ava would know, because she and Lacey had been friends since kindergarten. They knew everything about each other. They’d been in each other’s classes all through school, and room-mates in college. After they’d gotten their undergraduate degrees, they’d shared an apartment while they’d studied for their master’s degrees. And that’s when Ava had lost Lacey to the biker world.
Ava had completed her master’s this year. Lacey indicated zero interest in going back to school, saying she was “over it.”
There was something just not right about that. Was this biker gang some kind of cult? And had Lacey drank the Kool-Aid? With Lacey so out of touch and unwilling to communicate about this new lifestyle other than waxing poetic about the new guy in her life and singing the praises of life riding on the back of a Harley, Ava figured the only way to find out what was going on in Lacey’s life was to join it.
So she’d started hanging out at the biker joints over the past couple months—especially since it was the only way she could spend time with Lacey. She’d meet her at bars and clubs that catered to the bikers. She didn’t see anything unusual going on there, other than beer, pool, smoking, and just general mayhem. Still, Ava wasn’t convinced. Because the Lacey she saw there was so . . . different from the one she’d always known.
She had to make sure Lacey was safe, that the decisions she was making were from her own free will. And right now, Ava just wasn’t certain that was the case. She was a little suspicious of Lacey’s boyfriend, because as soon as Lacey had started up with this gang, she had packed up and moved out of their apartment, telling Ava that life in the biker gang was nomadic and it didn’t seem fair to stay in the apartment with Ava. She’d suggested Ava find another roommate. Cold, harsh . . . cutting ties just like that.
And that wasn’t like Lacey at all. Lacey was warm, family-oriented, and friendly. They’d been thick as thieves since childhood.
Ava didn’t want another roommate. She didn’t need one, could certainly afford the place on her own.
She wanted her old friend back. Or at least she needed to know that Lacey was okay, that the decisions she made were her own. Because whenever she saw Lacey—infrequently as that was—there was just something not quite right about her friend. Something in her eyes . . .
Which was why she stood in front of the mirror decked out in a skintight top, body-hugging jeans, and leather.
“I’ll fit right in, huh?”
Lacey giggled and threw herself on Ava’s bed. “Well, at least physically. It’s a unique lifestyle, Ava. It might take some getting used to. It’s not all five-star hotels and room service.”
Ava glared at Lacey in the mirror. “I’m hardly spoiled, Lace.”
Lacey rolled her eyes. “Please. Senator’s daughter. Only the finest schools. And the idea of sawdust and peanuts on the floor, not to mention spilled beer, probably makes you want to faint. Look at this place. No knickknacks or art on the walls.” Lacey ran her finger over the bare tabletop next to the bed. “Not even a speck of dust. You have no clutter. You’re a clean freak.”