Claimed By My Outlaw Stepbrother

Chapter 5

SIENNA.

I didn’t stop to think at all. I just moved as fast as I could as I heard the heavy sound of Big Raymond’s boots already shaking the floorboards in the hallway. I knew the President of the Iron Reapers noticed every little thing, so one single mistake tonight could ruin everything for me. I climbed onto the mattress, even though the fabric still smelled a little like the blood Boxer had left on the corner. I forced my bare legs under the covers anyway and pulled the dark fabric up to my chest, holding the hem tight with my fingers while I leaned my back against the wooden headboard. My heart was beating so hard it felt like it might jump right out of my ribs, but I kept my face cold and steady so no one would see how scared I really was.

Gage didn’t waste a second either. He kicked Boxer’s limp leg completely out of sight under the bed, threw his heavy tool-wrench into the dark corner of the closet, and sat down right beside me on the edge of the mattress. He didn’t pull away. Instead he leaned back and stretched his big tattooed arm across the headboard behind my neck. The heat coming off his broad shoulders felt like a warm furnace in the small room, and the strong smell of his skin, tobacco, and sweat filled my nose until it was almost hard to breathe. It felt like he was marking me as his before the club leaders even walked through the door, and that thought made my stomach twist with both fear and something warmer I didn’t want to name.

The broken bedroom door was shoved open with a harsh scrape, and Big Raymond Cross stepped into the doorway, his huge body blocking the light from the hallway. His black leather vest was covered in dirt from the road, and his weathered face looked dark and hard like stone. Behind him stood three older club members with their hands resting on the guns at their belts. Raymond’s sharp gray eyes, the exact same color as Gage’s, moved around the room right away. They looked at the broken glass on the floor, the smashed pieces of the desk chair, and the younger man who was still groaning face-down in the corner. Finally those eyes landed on the bed where Gage and I sat under the dark sheets.

“What the hell happened here, Vandal?” Raymond asked in a deep voice that made the glass pieces on the floor seem to rattle.

“The Jacks tried to test the claim, President,” Gage said in a calm, low voice. He didn’t move his arm from behind my neck. His fingers slowly played with a loose piece of my blonde hair, making the lie look natural even though his whole body stayed stiff as iron. “Creed sent two of his young guys through the north fence while the club was locked down. They thought they could take my woman from my own room to force a deal on the garage.”

Raymond walked into the room, his heavy boots crunching the glass into fine white powder. He stopped at the foot of the bed and looked down at me.

“Is that the truth, girl? My ex-wife Vera says you only got to this compound today. She says you’re his step-sibling.”

I didn’t flinch under the President’s hard stare. I lifted my chin and kept my blue eyes steady while I held the sheets even tighter. I was a mechanic who had spent years working with dangerous tools and hard metal, so I wasn’t going to break just because an old biker tried to scare me.

“Vera doesn’t know everything about my life, Raymond,” I said, keeping my voice steady and clear. “Gage and I met a long time ago, before she ever married my father. I’m not a step-sibling under this roof. I’m his Old Lady. And if your club can’t keep Creed Vance’s people from breaking my bedroom glass, I guess I'll have to start protecting myself my way.”

A heavy silence filled the room. Jax stood by the door with a pale face, holding his breath while he waited to see what the President would do. Then a slow, hard smile crossed Big Raymond’s face. He let out a deep, humorless laugh that shook his chest.

“She’s got the Reapers’ iron in her jaw, Vandal,” Raymond said as he turned to look at the older members in the hallway. “Get this Jacks trash out of here. Throw them over the south border line with a message for Creed. Tell him the property claim is real. If even one of their people crosses this fence again, the treaty will be nullified and the agreement squashed.”

The older members moved quickly. They dragged the groaning younger man and Boxer’s limp body out of the bedroom, their heavy boots thumping down the wooden stairs. Raymond turned back to Gage, and his smile disappeared as his gray eyes turned cold again.

“The Jacks are going to watch this house from the ridge, boy. If they see even one hint that this claim is a lie to dodge a debt, the whole club will turn on you. Keep her locked in this room until the books are clear.”

“I won't let her out of my sight, President,” Gage answered in a low growl.

Raymond nodded once, turned around, and walked out into the hallway. His heavy footsteps faded down the stairs until the front gate of the compound rattled shut in the distance.

The second the house went completely quiet, I twisted out from under Gage’s big arm. I shoved the dark covers away and swung my legs off the mattress. My breathing was fast and shaky as the fear and adrenaline started to fade. I stood up on the wooden floor and turned to face him, still holding my iron wrench tight in my hand.

“They’re gone,” I said, my chest rising and falling hard under my gray work tank top. “The others are gone, and your father believes the lie. Move your boots to the floor, Vandal. Our deal still stands.”

Gage didn’t stand up. He leaned back against the headboard and lit a fresh cigarette with a steady hand. He blew a long, slow stream of gray smoke toward the ceiling, and his gray eyes locked onto me with a dark, open hunger that made the air in the room feel tight and heavy.

Then he stood up and went down to the floor without a word.

I climbed back into the big bed alone and pulled the sheets up to my chin. The room was freezing because of the broken balcony glass, but the space between us still felt hot and hard to breathe in. I stayed still and stared at the ceiling for minutes until the steady, heavy sound of Gage’s breathing on the floor just a few feet away began to filter into my ears.

I was officially trapped inside his bedroom, and the line between staying alive and giving in was already starting to blur. The cold night air kept whistling through the shattered glass of the balcony doors, but the heat inside the room stayed thick. I sat up against the wooden headboard with my fingers still holding the edge of the dark sheets tight against my collarbone while my eyes stayed fixed on the floor at the foot of the bed as I watched Gage where he lay flat on the hard wooden floorboards. He had folded his black leather club vest and put it under his head like a rough pillow, and his big tattooed arms were crossed tightly over his chest. He looked like a dark mountain in the shadows of the bedroom. He wasn’t moving, but I knew he wasn’t asleep. The steady, heavy rhythm of his breathing was the loudest sound in the cold room, cutting straight through the quiet house.

Every time I shifted my weight on the mattress, the springs made a tiny, sharp creak. And every single time it happened, I saw Gage’s broad shoulders go completely stiff on the floor below me. The closeness was almost too much. For four long years I had forced myself to forget the nameless stranger with the grease-stained hands from that desert lake party. I had buried the memory of his mouth against my neck and the raw, breathless heat of his truck bed under years of studying, long work shifts, and heavy mechanical labor. I had pulled myself up by my own strength so I would never have to depend on an outlaw.

Now I was trapped inside his four walls, using his very name as a shield to keep a rival gang from destroying my life.

“I am not his property,” I told myself firmly, my jaw setting hard as I stared into the darkness. “I am here to protect my garage and survive the Jacks. That is it.”