“Maybe this isn’t a good time,” Claire said. “My cell phone number is on the card.”

  Kurt picked up the card and stuffed it in his pants. “We’ll be in touch.” He didn’t know that… couldn’t know that. But she’d let it lie for now. She was not going to let her regular customers see her arguing with him.

  Claire reached across the bar to touch Allison’s hand. “We’ll be back. We care about you.” Then, she smiled at Kurt, and the women joined their men in the back. The whole swarm left the bar. Kurt stayed, of course.

  “Why don’t you run and see if you can catch up with them?” Allison asked.

  “Why would I do that?”

  “You belong with them,” she answered.

  Finally, he got angry, his expression turning to stone. “I belong with you. I’ll wait here.”

  Chapter Four

  When she and Kurt got home, the dogs ran to him to be petted. Ungrateful little creatures. He might have had the sweeter disposition, but she fed them and put a roof over their heads. Typical males, sticking together like that. She’d go get out the snake, and all the mammals could feed themselves. In fact, maybe having Squirm draped over her shoulders could convince them all to leave her the hell alone.

  Allison went to the tank, pulled open the screen, and lifted Squirm out. He was such a gorgeous creature and never asked anything of her except an occasional dead mouse she’d thawed from her stash in the freezer. Then, she took him into the living room, sat on the couch, and used the remote to turn on the TV. News. Something bleak to match her mood.

  Kurt watched her enter and sat on the armchair only a few feet away from her. “I’m not afraid of that animal.”

  “You seemed a little shocked this morning.”

  “It took a little getting used to,” he said. “The same way you’re treating me.”

  “I’m letting you stay here, aren’t I?”

  “As you pointed out, I could go to the others.”

  Ouch. He could. No doubt, they’d be happy to have him. Her life could go back to normal. But he and his talents in sex had made normal unacceptable. “Do you want to go?”

  “I thought I made it clear I didn’t. Not without you.”

  “I don’t know why you’re so stubborn about that.” For chrissake, Kurt had just shown up the night before. She’d taken care of the dog he’d found, and she’d continue to keep him. Now Kurt had someplace else to go, he could do that. He could be with his own kind. “I don’t need you, you know.”

  He stuck his hands out. “Give me the snake.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you’re holding it like a shield against me.” He moved his hands closer to her. “Give me the snake.” At least, that might be entertaining. Allison handed Squirm over to him. Squirm was a relaxed sort and didn’t react to the fact Kurt had no idea how to hold him but left part of him dangling.

  “For heaven’s sake.” Allison caught the dangling part. “Snakes have spines, you know.” She carefully draped Squirm around Kurt’s shoulders. Kurt stroked Squirm tentatively. She could forgive him. Handling a reptile for the first time was pretty awkward for everyone. Eventually, the two of them settled down.

  “For starters, why don’t you tell me why you won’t get on a motorcycle?” he said.

  “I have a history.”

  “So you’ve said.” Kurt turned the TV off. “I want to hear it.”

  “You’re a pushy character.”

  Squirm chose that moment to make a U-turn with his upper body and thrust his face almost into Kurt’s. Kurt’s startled reaction was so precious Allison had to laugh. Snake and human stared at each other for a couple of seconds and then Squirm decided the back of Kurt’s neck was more interesting. “Does he do that all the time?” Kurt asked.

  “You never know what a snake is going to do.”

  Kurt stroked Squirm some more. “He feels sort of… good.”

  “He’s sweeter than most people I know.”

  “Okay, the story,” he said.

  He wasn’t going to give up, although her history shouldn’t have meant a damned thing to him. Maybe once he’d listened, he’d let up on her. “I was young and stupid. I thought the new guys in Dad’s bar were cool. Their attention to me, physically, made me feel like a grown-up woman.”

  “They preyed on a young girl?”

  “You’ve seen them in action.”

  “Like that Dutch person?” he said.

  “They’re not all that bad.” She hesitated for a moment. How to find the words that would explain her dumb mistakes? “I finally settled on Steve. I thought he was the best looking with all his tats, and he had a ginormous bike.”

  Jerome moseyed over to her. Dogs knew when people were upset and would come to comfort them. So she scratched him behind his floppy velvet ear. “Dad was a good guy, but he was pretty strict, and I was at the age where parents seem like dictators. When he told me I couldn’t ride on Steve’s bike -- or anyone else’s -- I figured I’d do exactly that.”

  “And your father couldn’t watch you all the time,” he said.

  She kept scratching Jerome’s ear. Jerome didn’t seem to mind. “Dad was working in the bar one night, and Mom had fallen asleep in front of the TV. On this exact couch. So I crept out. I had to walk a few blocks so the roar of the bike wouldn’t wake her up. Steve was waiting for me there.”

  Her mind flashed back to that night. Steve had been parked under a streetlight. He’d looked so big. So dangerous. So fucking hot. “I had my first orgasm with a man that night.”

  “You’d never had a climax?” he asked. “Were you a virgin?”

  “I’d messed around with boys from school. Sweet kids, but they had no idea what they were doing. And I had toys, so I knew what an orgasm was. I just hadn’t had one with a lover… until Steve.”

  He didn’t say anything but stroked Squirm some more.

  “Man, I was in love. You know how you pronounce it like a multi-syllable word. Lu-Uhv. The real deal. My whole heart. I would have laid down my life for that asshole.” And she’d told him she’d felt that way, and he’d laughed. “I thought I was finally a woman.”

  “How old were you?”

  “Nineteen. Sex was a whole new world of fun for me after that.”

  “No wonder you thought you loved him,” Kurt said.

  Allison held out her hands. “Give me Squirm. I’ll go make us something to eat.”

  “Not when I just learned to love snakes,” he said. “Finish your story.”

  “I didn’t get home until almost dawn. Mom and Dad were both awake waiting for me.” Even as a stupid nineteen-year-old, she’d recognized how cruel that had been to them. “Dad wouldn’t listen to my excuses. He ordered me not to see Steve ever. Mom made sure she didn’t fall asleep on the couch again. I couldn’t sneak out anymore.”

  “But that didn’t end it.”

  “Steve asked me to move in with him. I was old enough, so I just left home,” she said. “Mom cried, but she made me promise if I ever needed help I’d come back.”

  Allison hesitated. She’d have to get the next out without crying. Her tears weren’t the point. What she’d done to her parents was. She didn’t deserve any pity, least of all from herself. She took a breath. “I never saw them alive again.”

  “Ach, mein Schatz.” He sat on the couch next to her and took her in his arms. They ended up sharing Squirm, and Jerome did his best to climb up on her other side.

  “The years I spent with Steve were a blur. I did some cooking. No housework. We drank, smoked, snorted, downed pills. But the biggest high was riding on his bike, especially loaded to the point where he could have killed us both. Flying down the highway with my head buzzing with some substance or other. Stupid, stupid, stupid.”

  “It would never be that way with me,” Kurt said.

  “I know you mean that, but you can’t really know,” she said. “They tell you in rehab to avoid the situations where you used to use. I haven’t been on a bike since I got clean.”

  “I see.”

  “I trust you, Kurt. I don’t trust myself.” He looked honestly perplexed at that, his brow furrowing, but he didn’t try to argue with her. Too damned reasonable. If he came out with a bunch of platitudes, Allison could tell him he was full of shit. She could argue with him and stomp off to bed, leaving Kurt to sleep on the couch. But he’d listened and hadn’t tried to intrude. Just too fucking nice.

  “You know… um…” He hesitated. “Maybe I shouldn’t mention it.”

  Allison ought to leave it at that, but her damned curiosity always got the better of her. “Spit it out.”

  “Lauren’s Jake told me she’d just gotten out of rehab when he first shifted and became her lover.”

  “He’s one of the Mannhofs, and she’s his rider?”

  “Yes.” Again he seemed worried about saying more. “Maybe if you talked to her, you could understand how he helped her.”

  “Maybe.”

  “We have their address. We could both go there in your car.”

  “It’s late, and I haven’t had anything much to eat since lunch. Let’s put Squirm away, and I’ll scramble some eggs.” She got up, and Jerome did as well, whining. “All right, all right. I’ll feed you, too.”

  They all went into the kitchen. Brutus woke up enough to slap his tail against the floor, and Mimi and Doc stretched and jumped down from their perch to see what treats they might get. Her whole menagerie, except for the rabbits, which lived outside. Kurt belonged here now. What in hell was she going to do to change that?

  * * *

  The next afternoon, Allison found herself driving to a house large enough to hold ten people to meet a bunch of strangers, five of them men who could shift from man to motorcycle and five women who rode them. If she could believe what they’d said. But then, the man sitting beside her in the passenger seat appeared to be able to do what the other men did. She’d only seen him do it twice, but it had been pretty damned convincing.

  The GPS on her phone led her out of the city into a more affluent neighborhood. The sort of place her customers would call snooty. They went past enormous houses set back from the road with impeccable lawns leading up to landscaped gardens. Gorgeous and way out of her price range. Her old car with a few scrapes and dents did not fit in. Neither did she.

  Eventually, they went up a long drive to one of the mansions, and she turned off the engine, hit the brake, and climbed out. The perfume of some kind of flowers filled the air as she craned her neck to gaze from the entryway up several floors. “Servants’ quarters on the top?”

  “I doubt they have servants. They just rented it for a little while.”

  “To come visit us?”

  “That’s what the others told me,” he answered.

  “Well, then, I guess we’d better go in.”

  Before they could knock on the door, it flew open, and the one named Charley came out and threw her arms around Allison. “I knew you’d show up. You can ride with us.”

  Allison eased out of Charley’s embrace. “I came to say hi.”

  “We can do that first. Come on in.” Allison and Kurt followed Charley into an impressive front hallway. The ceiling soared several stories above the ground floor with polished banisters at the different levels. The marble floor was cool under her feet. “Hey, you guys,” Charley called. “Allison’s here.”

  The women emerged from various places. Some on the second floor and others from the back of the house. All were dressed in the black leathers they’d worn at the bar. Charley, too, although Allison hadn’t noticed that before.

  “If you’re busy, we can come back another time,” Allison said. Kurt put his palm at the small of her back. A reassuring touch but one that also said the time to be here was now.

  “Don’t be silly,” Claire said. “We can always make time for you.”

  “You don’t even know me.” Or what she’d done in her past.

  “Doesn’t matter,” Claire said. “Klaus Mannhof chose you. That’s all we need to know.”

  “Thanks,” Allison said. Kurt took her hand. Part reassurance, part reminder why they’d come. “I was wondering if I could talk to Lauren for a bit.”

  Lauren leaned on the upper banister and glanced down at them. “Me?”

  “If you don’t mind,” Allison said.

  “You guys go ahead,” Claire said. “Our ride can wait.”

  While Lauren descended the stairs, the rest of the women disappeared. Lauren led Allison into a side area, a sort of sitting room.

  Kurt held back. “I’ll go find the other Mannhofs.”

  Allison almost stopped him. This had been his idea, after all. But then she let him go with a wave. This really had to be a one-on-one. Lauren indicated an overstuffed chair. “Would you like some coffee or tea?”

  “I’m fine.” Instead of the chair, Allison took a seat by some bay windows and waited for Lauren to join her. Cozier this way. Now she just had to find the courage to fulfill the purpose of this trip. “I understand you’d just come from rehab when you met Jake.”

  “I’m not ashamed of it,” Lauren said. “Although I’d known Jake as a motorcycle for a while before that. I’d even talked to him when I’d thought he was a machine.”

  “So you already felt a connection with him.”

  “Odd, but I did.”

  “I didn’t with Kurt. He just showed up at my bar and asked for my help with a problem that turned out to be an abandoned dog.” The dog part seemed like more than a coincidence. “As if he knew I took in strays.”

  “Klaus had probably told him.”

  “Maybe someone should tell Klaus to mind his own business,” Allison said.

  Lauren laughed. “I doubt he’d listen. But that isn’t why you wanted to talk to me, is it?”

  Out with it. “I was in rehab, too. Kurt -- no, Kurt and I -- thought it might help if I talked to you about that.”

  “You’re clean now, right?”

  “Oh, sure,” Allison answered. “Five years.”

  “Congratulations. It hasn’t been that long for me.”

  “The problem is…” She stared outside for a bit at all the beauty around her. She didn’t need it, really. Her backyard was her own slice of heaven. But she might just need these women if she and Kurt were to form a permanent relationship, and she had no plans to let him go. “I got hooked on drugs dating a biker guy. We’d get high and go for rides.”

  Lauren frowned. “That’s dangerous.”

  “I think that’s one reason I loved it so much. I was a stupid, self-destructive kid.”

  “So was I,” Lauren said.

  “And Jake helped you get sober?”

  “I was just out of rehab when I met him as a person. I thought I’d wrecked my relationship with my family, so I couldn’t go to them. Instead, I went back to the place where I’d had my downfall.”

  “That doesn’t sound good.”

  “It wasn’t. I don’t know what would have happened to me if the motorcycle I’d been talking to for months hadn’t suddenly turned into a man.”

  “I’ve been sober for five years without Kurt. He’s a sweet guy.” And ridiculously good in bed, but she wasn’t going to share that. “But I don’t need him to stay clean.”

  Lauren placed her hand on Allison’s. “Then, you need him for something else.”

  “I dunno. Maybe.”

  “Claire needed Will to learn how to live with love. Charley had to get over a horrible sexual assault. Rae had to learn to stand up for herself and others, and Megan had to tame her love of danger,” Lauren said. “Klaus always has a reason to give someone one of his creations.”

  “Who is this Klaus person?”

  “The guys know him. He’s kind of a force for good masquerading as a motorcycle maker.”

  “Not completely human, huh?”

  “Who knows?” Lauren shrugged.

  “Well, he made a mistake with me. I can’t ride a motorcycle. It’s like going back to the scene of my crime. Not safe.”

  “Well, you have one for life. He loves you.”

  “Wait a minute.” Allison held up her hand. “We just met.”

  “He was created for you.”

  “So he says.” When she took in strays she made a commitment to care for them for the rest of their lives. But that meant feeding and housing them and necessary trips to a vet. None of that included loving another human being. It sure as hell didn’t include riding on a motorcycle again… ever. “I never agreed to any of this.”

  “You have a problem, then. You have a Mannhof who is devoted to you. To be with him… really with him… you need to embrace both sides of him,” Lauren said. “He needs you as much as you need him.”

  “But I don’t --”

  “-- sorry, Allison. You do or you wouldn’t have him.” Lauren rubbed her back. “It’s your job to figure out what you want to do with your life. Kurt will help you if you let him.”

  What she wanted to do with her life. No small order that. She wanted her parents back so she could show them she’d turned out okay after all. But was she truly okay, or was she only pretending? Did she really want to spend the rest of her days serving drunken bikers at Smokey’s? Or was she only doing it to atone for her parents’ deaths? And why did she feel in her gut that she’d killed them?

  Kurt reappeared at the doorway. “The others are ready to go on a ride.”

  “I’ve been keeping them.” Lauren squeezed Allison’s hand before she got to her feet. “Think about what I said.”

  “How could I avoid it?”

  Lauren paused at the threshold. “We’ll be gone for a while. You have the run of the place. Enjoy it.”

  Then she left. Kurt entered the room and stood several feet away from Allison. “Did talking to her help?”

  “Not sure it helped. It raised a bunch of questions.” He stuffed his hands in his back pockets and nodded. “You’d really like to be with them, wouldn’t you?” she asked.

  “It doesn’t matter.” He avoided her gaze when he said it. It did matter, but there wasn’t much she could do about it. One thing might make him happy to have stayed behind, though, and Lauren had rather pointedly told them they’d be alone for a while.