Vipers Rule Read online

  “Tals, I can’t afford—”

  “It’s yours. First month’s insurance is paid—it’s registered under your name.”

  “Tals . . .”

  “For the kids,” he said roughly. “Don’t fuck it up.”

  She smiled gently, then touched his cheek like a mother would. Like his mother used to. “You’re a good boy, Tals. Now try to take your own advice.”

  He couldn’t help it—he laughed.

  * * *

  He had another three-hour ride back to Skulls Creek—he’d miss the party at the clubhouse, but hell, he didn’t care. Every night could be a party for him, if he wanted it to be.

  But it was a new year, and things felt different. He wasn’t really sure why. Maybe because Cage was back with Vipers, but nothing had changed within the South Carolina city itself.

  He dialed his brother’s number now, then pulled the flatbed onto the highway as it rang.

  He and Tenn had grown up on what was most definitely the wrong side of the tracks in Skulls. But now there really wasn’t a wrong side—just an MC side. Skulls was thriving. There wasn’t violence or squalor, in no small part due to Preacher taking over Vipers. Still, they worked hard to keep out of trouble, mainly in the form of drug-pushing MCs, and Tals knew most of the Skulls community didn’t fully understand or appreciate the Vipers’ role in that.

  Preach always said he didn’t give a shit, but being treated like he was a criminal definitely got to him.

  Tals had been looked on as one for as long as he could remember, but he’d also always gotten a lot of interest from the women of Skulls. And the Army. And Vipers. Havoc too. And Havoc allowed him to indulge in stealing and racing cars without bringing the law into Skulls or on Vipers.

  Vipers relied on vigilante justice. Old-fashioned, but very effective.

  “Happy New Year, brother.” Tenn’s voice sounded muffled . . . and slightly drunk. And Tenn rarely drank, so Tals wasn’t sure if this was a good sign or not. “You out celebrating?”

  “I was. Then I caught a job.”

  “Never ends, right?” Tenn went quiet, but there was obviously a party going on in the background.

  “How’d you spend your night?”

  “Threw a party for the guys who weren’t working,” Tenn said. “They invited some friends—it got bigger than I thought. Sometimes I forget how young these guys are.”

  “Not too young for you,” Tals said.

  “Yeah.” Tenn’s voice had that far-off quality to it, but true to form, he shook himself out of it before he got too maudlin. “Love you, bro. Be safe.”

  “Love you, Tenn—be safe.”

  It was the same every time. Just because they didn’t live in the same house anymore didn’t mean they weren’t as close. It’d been painful when Tenn moved away—Tals swore he felt it physically. Having Cage gone for months had left Tals hanging in the wind, and even though Bear had been there to steady him, it hadn’t been easy.

  No matter how much he tried to fill the space, it never worked.

  “I’ll change that this year.” He wasn’t sure how. Maybe he’d give more women a chance—fuck the one-night stands. Try to open his horizons and look for a real old lady.

  The whole one-night-stand shit hadn’t ever been that easy for him—the mechanics were, because orgasms were never bad, as was finding willing women. But if he added up all the one-night stands—and fuck, that could take a long time—he’d realize something was missing.

  Hell, he didn’t even have to add them up to know that. It was a space he’d never filled, a hole in his heart that never healed. As much as he tried to wall it up, compartmentalize it, he could never separate it for long.

  New Year’s Eve always made him think of Maddie . . . no matter what he did since then, what country he was in, whether he was partying, stone-cold sober, in the desert, fighting another MC member or stealing a car, Tals could no more not think about Maddie on New Year’s Eve than he could stop breathing.

  Chapter 2

  The battle cry of “Happy New Year!” echoed all around her, ringing through the air amid the clink of champagne glasses and cheers. Maddie held up her glass of champagne and forced a smile.

  Maddie Wells had done that so much tonight her face hurt, but at this point it was plastered on. Still was when her husband—Hugh Montgomery—sidled up to her and announced, “Maddie, life of the party—and the most gorgeous woman in the room, as usual.”

  In actuality, she wasn’t the life of the party, and Hugh always threw in the part about her looks. At this point, it rang hollow. She smiled at him, noted the attention they were receiving, aware of the flashbulbs popping in their faces.

  Hugh posed, the way he always did.

  She couldn’t wait to kick her heels off and get out of this room, this building. She was far more comfortable behind the scenes. She never needed the credit. It wasn’t about that. But lately she’d begun to overshadow the work.

  Maybe she should’ve expected it, since she married a man who owned the company where she’d been climbing the ladder for ten years. But Hugh had been pulling her into the spotlight, no matter how much she protested.

  Tonight was another example. Suddenly, she was the subject of photographs and nonstop speculation. The more Hugh paraded her out to the press, so seemingly proud . . . the wider the chasm grew between them. She hadn’t realized that it was irreparably broken, or at least had refused to admit it to herself until last month . . .

  She left a charity dinner hours early to meet him upstate—eschewing the car he’d sent for her in favor of a rental. It wasn’t what she’d pick for herself but rather a staid sedan, but she was in control and alone. Wind in her hair, singing, tank top and jeans—she was in high school again. Not the happiest of times and yet, somehow, at her worst moments, she came back again and again to that time. Mistakes. Regrets. Recriminations.

  She opened the door, prepared to have a nice dinner with Hugh . . . and ended up surprising him and his other woman. One of them, anyway.

  On paper they were the perfect couple, the up-and-coming marketing exec—who did everything from picking the new lines to meeting with buyers—falls in love with the CFO of the entire company. Obviously, real life had nothing on paper; real life trumped paper. In fact, real life was a tall, thin redheaded model who trampled over it with her stilettos. And a blonde who fit the same pattern. And, Maddie was sure, if she did some digging, she’d find more—all, of course, of the “she didn’t mean anything to me” variety, according to Hugh. Which was bullshit.

  “It meant something to me!” she’d told him quietly, and then she’d taken off her ring calmly, surprising herself with her restraint. She’d placed it on the small table between them.

  And then she’d picked up a vase of flowers and thrown it at his head. When he managed to duck—just in time—she picked up anything else she could find and continued blindly throwing until she was tired and he’d locked himself in his bathroom.

  Then she’d packed, thrown what she could into large wheeled bags, emptied out her makeup and jewelry (only pieces she’d bought herself) and then she’d called for her own car.

  “I don’t want anything from you,” she’d told him before she’d moved herself into a hotel.

  He stared at her oddly, the hurt in his voice apparent when he said, “You never did.”

  You never did.

  God, that truth hit her right between the eyes. She had to take some of the blame for this failed relationship, and her part in it had her far more upset than his part. Which was, of course, a symptom of the larger problem surrounding their marriage.

  Maybe I’m not meant to be married. Or in a relationship. Because she was very much married to her work . . . or at least, she had been, until she’d started feeling restless and unfulfilled last year, in a way she hadn’t been able to articulate or explain. It hung over her like a cloud, until it began to weigh her down.

  She’d actually begun to call in sick to work, som
ething she hadn’t done in . . .

  Something she hadn’t ever done, not even when she had been sick. And that’s when the rumors started. No matter how often she denied them to well-meaning friends, no matter how many times she and Hugh stepped out together over the past month in their just-for-show moments—because he’d asked her to stay in New York through the end of the season and this New Year’s Eve Charity Ball the company hosted every year, and she’d complied. She’d put her wedding ring back on. She’d even moved back into their penthouse, and he’d moved into the guest bedroom, or else people would definitely talk. In the meantime, Hugh promised the divorce wouldn’t be contentious. It would remain private, and they’d issue a joint statement.

  He’d had no idea she’d already been planning on resigning.

  “I’ve done more than my share for charity,” she murmured to Hugh now, pretended to brush his lapel when really, she was dropping her wedding ring in the pocket with his boutonniere. “Don’t call, don’t write, unless it’s through your lawyer.”

  On the way out, Maddie passed by Lettie, a woman who, if not exactly a friend, was someone she’d come up alongside in this company. She knew, better than anyone, that Maddie hadn’t slept her way to the top. She was trustworthy. Maddie felt guilty for not telling her that, effective tonight, she was resigning from the company, but at the moment, Lettie’s focus was firmly elsewhere.

  “Who’s that?” Maddie couldn’t help but ask, since Lettie had locked eyes with a handsome man decidedly underdressed for the occasion—and looking damned good making that statement in a leather jacket and jeans.

  “Who cares?” Lettie murmured, not tearing her gaze from the man. He smiled at her, motioned to the balcony. In return, she nodded and began walking his way.

  Maddie pulled her back. “You can’t be serious.”

  “I’m very serious. And very single. Don’t worry—I’ll keep it PG on the balcony. These corporate stiffs couldn’t handle it.”

  “Last time I looked, you were corporate.”

  “Thanks for not calling me a stiff.” Lettie glanced at her, slightly flushed with alcohol. “What’s the problem? You never had a bad-boy phase?”

  She said, “No,” quickly. Too quickly, since her mind had already gone straight to Tals, as it had more than ever this past month, like she knew her fate was sealed and she was actively avoiding thinking about it until the very last moment.

  For them it had always been about fate.

  “You should never, ever play poker. I don’t know how you made it so far in the corporate world, the way you let all your emotions show on your face.”

  “I do not,” Maddie protested. In truth, she always had, but she’d been better at it before last month. Now she found herself unable to care about the career—the life—she’d so carefully built for herself. Around herself, like impenetrable walls. She’d escaped the family gates, but she’d gated herself in, just the same.

  Lettie seemed to have forgotten about her own bad boy and was now firmly focused on Maddie. “And you’re lying about the bad-boy phase.”

  “I never acted on it. Big difference.” Another partial lie about that long-ago New Year’s celebration.

  “And that’s the problem. You’re with all these high-powered guys who’re too selfish to care about anything in the bedroom but themselves,” Lettie pointed out.

  Instead of reminding Lettie that she was married (and wasn’t that the biggest irony, that she couldn’t even get the words out any longer?), Maddie asked, “And bad boys don’t do that?’

  “Oh honey, no, they don’t.”

  She thought about Tals . . . the way the girls in school used to preen when he came around on his bike. The way she used to as well—secretly, though. Because she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction. “Go for it, Lettie. Have fun for both of us.”

  “You don’t have to tell me twice.” Lettie made her way to the balcony, and Maddie watched her as the elevator doors closed, effectively cutting her off from the world that had been hers for ten years, and coveted by her for many before that.

  Her car was already waiting at the valet station. She’d left instructions for it to be pulled around at 12:30 a.m. sharp. It was packed and ready, and she got in, ball gown and all, kicked her heels off and took off in her Mustang GT.

  She always bought Mustangs, and they were always some variation on cherry red, like the one Tals had stolen. She hadn’t liked the color much when she’d gotten it. After Tals had driven it, though, she swore something happened to the damned car. It was almost supercharged, like it remembered him and wanted to be driven the way he’d driven it.

  Which was ridiculous. And didn’t stop her thinking it every single time.

  And didn’t stop her from buying this car again. Vintage model, though. Like that would make it so different.

  “Time to turn the brain off, Maddie,” she told herself out loud as she cranked the radio up and barreled onto the highway, the car revving, like it was telling her to get her shit together and enjoy the ride.

  She gripped the wheel with her buttery-soft leather fingerless racing gloves—in bright red—and she systematically unpinned her hair so it hung loosely, tumbling over her shoulders. It got warmer the farther south she drove, and she opened the windows at one point so her hair whipped around her shoulders as she pushed the speed limits.

  When she’d first planned on quitting her job and moving out—and on from Hugh—she hadn’t been sure of her destination. Not at first. But then “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around” came on the radio when she was on the way to their house upstate after leaving the New Year’s Eve party . . . and she promptly turned the car around and headed to Jessamine—aka Skulls Creek, South Carolina.

  If anyone had told her before now that she’d be escaping back to her family home, she’d have laughed. Now she couldn’t think of a better place to go, although it was less about her family and more about the man the song reminded her of: Tals Garrity.

  You don’t even know if he’s still in Skulls Creek.

  No, that wasn’t true at all. She did know. Grams had brought him up in their last few conversations, almost like she might’ve predicted this would happen. Like she somehow knew that, no matter how hard she tried to not follow in her mother’s footsteps, Maddie had some of that flightiness, that irresponsibility in her that she’d fought so hard to banish. And maybe she did somehow know that her soon-to-be ex-husband was cheating on her.

  Because Maddie herself had no goddamned clue. Then again, she’d been working so hard over the past years, it was a wonder she knew his name. So was her marriage everything she’d thought it would be? Definitely not. Had she thought Hugh would cheat on her?

  Never. She knew he was in the company of young, beautiful women all the time, but for her, marriage was forever. She’d told him that when he’d proposed, and as a child of divorce himself, he’d agreed.

  So much for that.

  She hadn’t smiled like this in at least a month, starting with the day she’d discovered her ex was sleeping around with everybody in his path. She wasn’t sure if it would’ve been better had it been one woman for an extended period of time instead of the constant stream of women, all younger than she’d been when they’d first met.

  She was five years older and wiser . . . and obviously wilder, if taking off like this was any indication. And ten hours later, she was almost . . . home.

  Her childhood home. Right now she was homeless, almost a guest in her own life.

  She turned the radio up in response, a Stevie Nicks song coming on when she needed it most. She sang along with it, her voice a throaty rasp into the wind. She wasn’t the best singer, but music had always brought her more comfort than anything.

  She was free, and it was New Year’s. If that wasn’t fate, she didn’t know what was.

  Chapter 3

  It was close to four in the morning and Tals was on the final stretch to Skulls Creek. As he rounded a sharp turn on the highway, he saw
taillights in front of him—taillights to a Ford Mustang GT he’d always been partial to. When he saw the back tire rock, his hands tight- ened, because he knew what was about to happen, and he watched helplessly as the tire blew, making the car fishtail like crazy.

  It was lucky it happened on a quiet highway. Also lucky that whoever was behind the wheel knew how to handle the car, because it quickly stabilized, slowed and pulled to the side of the road.

  Tals followed, drove past the car slowly in order to pull ahead of it, in case it needed to be loaded onto the flatbed. He glanced at the disabled car as he went past. “Lookin’ for Love” came on the radio as he recognized the driver. He braked—hard. Stared. Cursed his luck and wondered if the gods were up there laughing their asses off at him.

  Because talk about all the wrong places.

  Because Maddie Wells. Of all the women he could possibly run across—and there could be a hell of a lot of them, and many of them would no doubt want to hit him with the tire iron, even though he’d never made any of them promises—why did it have to be the only one who’d ever had his heart?

  She’d had it, and he wasn’t even sure she’d realized it. What he did know was that she’d never wanted it, and one-sided relationships were the worst. Especially those that had been going on in his head and were still painfully fresh memories in his mind some thirteen years later.

  He chalked it up to youth. Hormones. The fact that teenagers were dramatic as fuck.

  So what was his excuse now, when his heart was beating out of his chest and his dick had started to harden.

  I wonder if she smells the same . . . like citrus and gardenias? Like heaven?

  He wasn’t getting close enough to her—or to heaven—to find out.

  What got him out of the car was what usually did—he had nothing to lose. Nothing he hadn’t already lost. But before he could walk toward her, he noted the text from Bear, asking where he was.