There was no doubt in her mind he was as worried as Alena and Lana had been. “Did it occur to you that you should have discussed this with me before you brought me into the situation, Savage?” She turned around and tilted her chin at him, her gaze meeting his directly.
Savage didn’t look away from her. She knew he wouldn’t. His piercing blue eyes were back to glacier cold—that dense blue that was icy and could chill to the bone. She refused to back down.
“Yeah, baby, I thought about it for a long time, but I thought it would just make you more nervous. And I don’t know what this meet with the Diamondbacks is about. Not even Czar knows. We don’t have any idea what to expect. They called a meet recently in the middle of the night, so no witnesses. That didn’t go well. This time they wanted it in the full bar, with civilians, and on a night when the band was playing.” Savage stroked caresses in her hair. “We gotta get there, Seychelle.”
“Maybe we do, honey, but I need to know what you’re going to be doing while I’m singing, and where you are, so I’m not terrified something’s going to happen to you.” She refused to budge in spite of the hand he put on her back, urging her to move out the door.
His eyes went flat. They were already cold. “Baby, you worry about the other guy, not me. Now get your ass on my bike—we’ve got to go now. I want to know you can feel us in the back room. We have to set up.”
Seychelle went with him, her stomach churning. Their “honeymoon” period was coming to an abrupt end. She didn’t say a word as she took her place behind him on the bike. The night was foggy, as it often was on the coast, but just barely. She thought of it as a gray cloud enveloping them as they made their way to the bar. What had been something she’d been looking forward to was now a little frightening—and her temper was stirring.
The bar was up the road, just below Highway 1. Above the bar were the two apartments the club owned and rented out to Bannister and Delia. There was a large parking lot in front of the terraced landscaping that wrapped around the building. A narrow path led up to the highway through overgrown grass to one side of the property. The other side was by parts parking and landscaped.
Savage had known he was taking her into a dicey situation, and he had waited until the last minute to tell her. She was someone who had to process information. He knew that about her. Lana and Alena had cast doubts on her going on the run; in fact, she’d decided she’d just stay home while he went on it. She wasn’t going to take any chances of being the cause of Savage going to prison. And now this . . . Yeah, her temper was quite close to the surface.
By the time Savage parked the bike, Seychelle was seething. She smacked him in the back of the head as she got off, all but tossed the helmet to him and started walking toward the bar without him.
“Woman. You wait for me.”
That was a direct order. There was no doubt about it. That was Savage being the enforcer. She stopped in her tracks but didn’t turn around. Maybe it hadn’t been the best idea to smack the back of his head, but if she was going to be in trouble for it, she wished she’d put a little more effort into it.
She felt the heat of his body before he reached her. He was always so silent in the way he moved, like some great jungle cat stalking his prey. Her body gave a little shiver all on its own, responding to his aggression in spite of her own anger at him. He slung his arm possessively around her neck and pulled her in to the shelter of his body. He was solid muscle, a wall of sheer strength. When he locked her against him, she wasn’t going anywhere. She stood very still, waiting, trembling, but not with fear, more with a mixture of anger and anticipation.
“You have every right to have your nasty temper exploding right now, Seychelle. I fucked up. I should have listened to my instincts regarding you. I know your personality. You like to hear about things, even a little bit at a time, and then think it over. I was happy in that cottage with you and I didn’t want to leave. We were laughing every day. All night. The last thing I wanted to do was bring this mess up, especially when I didn’t know what we were walking into, but I should have.”
She turned to face him and he pulled her in close again, sliding one hand down her back to the curve of her bottom. “You’ve gotten so you like my hand or even occasionally the leather decorating your ass. And you’ve let me clamp your nipples a couple of times, and you enjoyed it. I was so wrapped up in you and me that I didn’t want anything else to interfere. I didn’t want to bring the outside into our world. What I did was wrong, and I’m fully aware of it.”