RIDING DIRTY (Steel Titans MC Book 4) by Franca Storm (ebook voice reader .txt) 📕

there with me, her reaction confirming that she’d felt it just as much as I had.

But then it was gone, just like it’d never been and she stepped back, putting distance between us. “It was just some good sex.”

“Yeah? That’s it?”

She folded her arms across her chest. “That’s it.”

Lies. With a shake of my head, I turned away and headed for the bedroom door.

“Where are you going? Don’t go off sulking. We need to figure out our strategies to deal with Freeman and Nolan.”

I stopped short just before the door. She was pushing and fucking pushing. Blowing me off then bringing that lashing tongue of hers out again after my warning about her disrespect last night.

“Keep your emotions in check, all right, Slade? We’ve got more important things to deal with.”

That was it!

With a snarl, I spun around and stormed back to her. “You need to get a grip before it bites you in the ass. You think you’re above it all, you ain’t. You want proof, this is it.” I grasped her arms and gestured to the scarring there. “You let the situation get to you, get personal. Emotion overtook logic. You were reckless, your typical cautiousness falling to the wayside. This was your slipup. It won’t be the only one. Trust me on that.”

She jerked from my hold and seethed, “Maybe you’re another.”

I jolted.

Fuck. That was brutal.

Vicious.

Ruthless.

I didn’t even know where the hell to take that.

So, I didn’t.

I just turned away without a word and walked the fuck out.

14

~Willa~

 

I’D MISSED THE MARK.

Again.

I cringed as I examined the three stationary targets secured to the tree trunks in the distance. They were all mostly still intact. I’d unloaded two rounds from my Beretta, yet they had barely taken a direct hit, let alone anything resembling a kill shot.

“Shit,” I groused, as I put the safety back on, then shoved my gun into the holster at my right hip.

I was off my game.

And it was the worst time for it.

I was supposed to be gearing up for a battle on two fronts. Yet, here I was having a ridiculous amount of trouble just trying to take down a bunch of fixed targets.

Fucking Slade. It was him. I’d kidded myself into believing that giving into the sexual tension between us and screwing him would have killed it completely.

Instead, it’d made everything worse.

It was because the connection between us wasn’t only borne from sexual need and desire. It was soul deep, on a level, and boasting an intensity, that I’d never come close to experiencing before. Honestly, I didn’t know what the hell to do about it, or with it. So, I’d lashed out. Brutally.

The look on Slade’s face just before he’d bolted from the room had cut right through me.

I’d heard the front door slam and I’d worried that I hadn’t just driven him from the room, but away from the safehouse as well. I’d thought he’d decided to take off. Fortunately, good sense had won out for him this time and he’d just gone for a walk through the surrounding forest, keeping close enough to the property line that I knew he wasn’t taking off, just taking a breather. I knew all of that, because I’d taken precautions. There was no such thing as paranoia or over-preparedness in my line of work. It was survival, plain and simple.

Slade was a flight risk. Not just because of what had happened a few hours ago, but because he wasn’t the type of person who could handle being benched very well. He was a ticking timebomb in that respect. Also, he’d gone off half-cocked with his whole ill-advised attempted takedown on Adrian Nolan, so it was just smart to assume that it could easily happen again. So I’d put safeguards in place. One of them was the ability to track him wherever he went. The first night we’d come here, right after he’d gone to take a shower, I’d taken the opportunity to plant a tracker in his motorcycle boot. I’d also made the decision not to have his bike transported up here. It was still parked in the lot of that cheap, shitty motel he’d been staying at.

I shook my head to myself. Maybe it was better this way, with this wall between us. I’d thought that tearing that down would have made it easier for us to work together, all the harshness and defensiveness falling away. But I’d made a mistake. Letting him in threatened to undermine me, my stability, my levelheadedness, and my conviction. He’d hit a nerve with all his talk about my situation, his warnings about what will happen if I don’t call it quits.

It was because I knew he was right.

I was holding on by the skin of my teeth.

Whenever I closed my eyes, blood, death, and pain took hold of me. I couldn’t relax, couldn’t let my guard down. Last night had been the first time in ages and that had invited disastrous complications.

But, at the same time, I was good at what I did. Hell, I was the best. Maybe, I was also a little bit addicted to it. The adrenaline rush. Kicking ass. The power I lauded over people, the control I wielded. The fact that I made a difference and helped people.

What the hell would I do in its place? Where would I be without Shadow? I knew that I couldn’t just walk and delve into retirement. I had to be something, someone. I couldn’t stand the idea of being… nothing.

One thing at a time.

I had two very complicated missions ahead of me.

I needed to keep my eye on the ball, then and only then would I deal with everything else.

I pulled my phone from the back pocket of my jeans. I’d been waiting on a call for a while now. I had been firing off shots for the last hour, so it was possible I hadn’t heard the notification come in. As I swiped open my phone, I saw