Riding Dirty by Abriella Blake Page A

He felt the back of his neck prickle and turned to find himself the subject of an interested third party. Dolce offered him a cold grin and raised an eyebrow, the message clear. The last thing Bronson needed was more trouble brewing, so he cleared his throat and stepped away from the dame. “Besides, maybe I should remind both of us that you’re with Dolce now anyway.”
    It was a thin excuse. He’d hooked up with Lola since their breakup and since Dolce. Not that he’d felt great about it. Still, he couldn’t quite admit why he wasn’t in the mood today.
    Lola rolled her eyes. “Dolce’s not you, baby.”
    Bronson met Lola’s eyes and saw the flicker of pain and disappointment. There he went, hurting her more. Evidently the band-aid he’d tried to slap over their history wasn’t fixing a thing. His soul was bound up in this club in more ways than one and he was starting to think he’d never finish paying his dues.
    Automatically, he felt himself glance over to where Rowan stood. “Actually,” he found himself saying, “I could use your help with something. See the blonde? She’s a new friend of the club, a business partner. We’re starting a project tonight and we’ve got to give her a little makeover, some nice dresses, you know, get her looking expensive. Dolce will tell you what you need to know. Think you and some of the girls could take her downtown this afternoon, keep an eye on her, pick out some things?”
    Lola nodded, pouting.
    “A’ight, see you then. I gotta go.”
    Many curious biker eyes were on the blonde as they watched their Sergeant at Arms introduce her to Dolce, Smiley and Luther before he protectively hustled her out of the clubhouse. No one stared more openly than Lola. Her burning gaze almost bored a hole through the door long after they left. Her fixation was not lost on Dolce.
    “Business partner,” she muttered to herself. “Give me a break.”
    Her dark thoughts were on Bronson and the new girl long after they disappeared down the road on his Harley in a roar of sun, smoke and steel.

CHAPTER FIVE

    Outside, the cheery June sun seemed to make the air above Lockala Pines Motor Home Park shimmer and ripple with tangible heat. With her nose pressed against the grimy, dusty window in the living room side of her parent’s trailer, Lacy Thomas was daydreaming. She could almost picture the tiny green fairies she liked to imagine zipping around on warm spring days in Lockhart, stirring up the atmosphere before causing the crescendo of a late afternoon thunderstorm. Maybe there would be rain later today. It would match her energy a lot better than the spring sunshine.
    Even though those silly fairies were pretend and she was probably way too old now to think about them now, they were her best and only friends. Lacy wasn’t quite a normal fourteen year old. She’d grown up in isolation and illness, and spent most of her time in her own company. Whenever she found herself feeling lonesome, Lacy couldn’t help but indulge in her flights of fancy.
    Imagination had always been her secret weapon, a skill her big sister had taught her to use to enrich their drab reality. Right now, despite the crackling energy and silence of the afternoon, she could close her eyes and populate her world with her favorite fantasy creatures somersaulting through the low-slung tree branches over her mobile home, waving their magic wands and giggling together. She had named them and created elaborate stories about them when she was younger—the Lost Fairy Kingdom Chronicles of Lockhart, she had called it.
    In her stories, the graceful Fairy Queen Arrowlace had fought against the evil human lumber company that was destroying Lockhart’s beautiful longleaf pine, hickory and oak trees, foiling their schemes through clever trickery and help of her handsome fairy Prince Ponce, the valiant wild animals, and two golden-haired human sisters who could understand the fairy language.
    Not the most original title or