Claiming Celia

Celia

“Don’t mind Grave—he’s harmless for all that he is scary... He’s just a man with a few skeletons in his closet.”

Silver’s words ring through my head as I slowly push myself up off the table.

Those stormy eyes are pinned to me, striking at my resolve to not throw myself at him and ride him into the sunset—no. A hurricane.

Looking into eyes like that while in the throes of pleasure must be a lot more intense of a feeling than gazing at the sinking sun.

There would be lightning as his hands caressed me. Thunder as he groaned. And both at once as he shuddered beneath me and filled my pussy with his cum.

I wonder if a man’s secrets could have anything to do with him devouring you with one look.

A voice breaks the heated stare between us before I can ponder the thought further.

I stand straight and nod at the bikers who thanked me for breakfast. All the while, Grave’s stormy eyes follow my every movement, even as I walk out of the room.

I pass Morrigan in the kitchen and smile, receiving a dazzling one in return.

She’s actually quite sweet compared to the stern person she was for the majority of my interview.

But I get it, and I think it was mostly because she cares so much about the club.

This morning, we talked while preparing the food and serving up plates. She told me a little bit about the motorcycle club—the Reapers and what they do.

Basically, what I discerned is that they ride motorcycles and fuck. Occasionally, they take trips to other clubs for rallies and social things like that.

While she talked, I wondered if any of it applied to stormy eyes. For some reason, the thought made me uncomfortable—sad, even. Something I should not feel at all.

Morrigan is the club president’s wife. They’ve been together since high school and a part of the club for about as long. She would know a lot about Grave, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask about him.

I carefully balance six plates on my arms and take them out to the other club members. They thank me, and when I look up, I once again meet intense eyes.

I have half a mind to approach Grave. To end this constant staring match. To initiate what I know would be the best sex of my life.

“Celia?” Morrigan calls from where she stands behind her husband. “Come here. The prez wants to introduce you to the club.”

I nod, and as I walk, I brush past Grave. My hip presses into him, and for a small second, I hesitate to continue forward.

The littlest touch and experience of his warmth affects me beyond reason. But Morrigan is my anchor to reality.

If she or the others weren’t here... I’d probably be all over him, begging him to do all kinds of wicked things that are so not meant for the eyes or ears of the others.

“Prez,” Morrigan addresses. “This is our newest member of the staff. The one and only Celia.”

I shake his hand, returning a silent nod. He then turns to his wife and whispers something. She waves a hand in the air afterward, flagging someone down behind me.

Silver’s shoulder brushes against mine a second later. “How can I serve you?” he jokes.

“Celia needs a club name,” she tells him. “Since you’re more of a wordsmith, we’re leaving that to you.” She gracefully slides into her husband’s lap, losing my attention once he starts kissing her.

“A name,” Silver muses. “So you’re in.”

I shrug. “It would seem so.”

“Exciting,” he smiles. His head tilts to the side then, and his whiskey-colored eyes focus on me. “Celia… Seal… Cece—”

I grimace at that nickname and shake my head instantly.

He chuckles. “This could take a while. Usually, I have more time for this with the prospects. Trial time and all. No worries, I’ve got this… Maybe.”

“Do your worst,” I laugh.

He rattles off more butchered fragments of my name and some random ones.

“Hmm, I know… Sissy?” he suggests at last. By the satisfaction in his expression, I can tell he’s only being half-sarcastic.

I decide it’s far better than Cece or the others and nod my approval.

He grins and leans over to whisper into the prez’s ear, then he hooks an arm around my shoulder.

He whistles once and gains the room’s attention. Including gray eyes that bore into me fiercer than ever.

“Give it up for the new old lady!” Silver hollers, pulling me even closer.

Some of the guys nod in my direction, and others yell suggestive things that have me red-faced.

Removing his lips from his wife, the prez announces to the crowd, “We’ve just hired Sissy here. So if you see her hanging around the clubhouse, don’t eat her alive.”

There are more cheers, and Morrigan picks then to rise from her husband’s lap and take my hand. I let out a breath of relief once the kitchen door swings closed behind us.

“Sorry about that,” she laughs. “They’re a rowdy bunch, that’s for sure.”

“I can tell. I’ll get used to it.” I smile.

“I hope so,” she teases and then rubs her tired eyes. “As much as I’d love to send you home, knowing how much I want to go and take a nap, we’ll have to stick around.

“The ranking patches have to go over some things, and we have got to keep stuffing them with coffee—especially Switch. That one has some easy triggers.”

She smiles at me serenely despite the bags under her eyes and asks, “I hope you don’t mind?”

In this moment, she appears utterly exhausted. The kind of exhaustion that takes you off your feet before long.

“I’m fine,” I admit. “Do you need to go? You look like you could use the rest.” I walk around the kitchen counter and sit with her.

Sighing dreamily, she divulges, “Rest is somewhat out of the question right now. Konrad is going to be sucked into club business, and…we’re trying to have a baby.”

A genuine smile stretches her lips, only to dip into a frown precisely after.

I take her hand in mine because it’s obvious she needs the comfort to continue. “I’m worried about him right now,” she confesses.

“He’s the club’s President, and it’s really important to him—to both of us. He’d lay his life down if it meant saving a member.”

Her frown deepens, and her next words catch me off-guard. “It’s just that club business isn’t always safe. I don’t know what I’d do if I lost Konrad.”

My grip on her hand tightens. “Don’t let that fear distract you from right now. I’m sure he will be just fine. You should be worrying about you.

“All this stress can’t be good for someone trying to have a baby.”

“Maybe I’m already pregnant,” she laughs, rolling her eyes.

Once Morrigan’s spirits rise a little higher, we start picking up the kitchen, and time passes us by quickly.

A prospect she pointed out earlier—the same one from the parking lot this morning, who’s essentially every club member’s bitch until he earns his patch—walks in.

He carries a large stack of plastic plates and drops them into the trash as we’re finishing up.

Morrigan laughs at his obvious frustration and dons her purse and coat. “I’m going to head home for a little while,” she says to me. “Do you mind sticking around until the meeting’s over?

“Those guys wouldn’t know what to do with an empty glass, and to be frank, I’m afraid the kitchen will be on fire the second they’re alone here.”

I laugh and nod my head. “I have absolutely nothing else to do, so I would love to stick around.”

She pauses as she’s about to leave and turns my way. “You said you were staying at the hotel in town, right? We have extra rooms here—you should take one.

“That place will get expensive before long.”

My eyes widen in shock, and though I don’t hate the idea, I start to protest because it doesn’t seem right.

But my determined boss speaks before I can. “Rent free! Count it as a job perk—like working on a cruise ship or something. Wait! Requirement.”

Her blue eyes dazzle with triumph, and she smirks at her cleverness.

Without the hotel room expenses, I’ll have a lot more cash to work with and put toward my future here. I can’t ignore that blaring fact. So, I sigh in mock defeat and reply, “Okay, I’ll move in.”

Squealing her delight, Morrigan embraces me in a tight hug. “Have Slayer help you get your stuff and show you around,” she orders once she pulls back. “I’ll see you later.”

After she leaves, I finish up with the kitchen and then dig through my purse on the counter in search of my phone.

I may not have been a social person in Portland—at all—but I did have family there. Family being my cousin, who is probably pissed at me for up and leaving like I did.

I check my notifications, seeing no missed calls or messages. Some of the tension in my body fades.

I bought a new phone simply because I couldn’t take the chance that my stalker might track my old one.

If there had been a single notification from another number, I would have been on the next flight out of the state.

Blowing out a breath of relief, I dial the number I remember by heart and am not shocked when the ring lasts just seconds before my cousin answers.

“Celia fucking Greyson,” she hisses through the line.

I hold back a laugh and exclaim, “Tootsie!”

She groans in disgust. “I still hate that fucking name. And you’re trying to distract me!”

I chew my lip and think about where to start explaining from—if I even need to. My cousin has a way of knowing things. It’s something to do with her job.

I have no idea what it is though. She could be a detective for all I know.

“I, uh, I’m not in Portland anymore…,” I tell her shyly, unsure of what her reaction will be.

“No kidding,” she snorts. “I showed up at your apartment yesterday, and that fucking prick boyfriend of yours—”

My chest hitches. “What? Oh, my god, what did you say to him? Does he know where I am?”

Say no. Good god, just say no.

My heart pounds in tune with the rapid pulse in my veins.

Until I remember that no one knows where I am except for me.

It’s too bad the damage is done. I can hear my cousin’s angry breathing already.

“What the hell is going on, Celia?” she growls. “Did he hurt you?”

I wince and struggle to find my next words. It doesn’t matter how I spin the story because, at the end of the day, the truth is plain to see. I was hurt.

Orion started out the same as any other guy: sweet, tentative. Until it went over the top—when the obsessing started; the stalking; the controlling.

The day that I had enough and tried to end things with him, he went truly crazy and tried to drag me to some country where god knows what would’ve happened.

I knew then that there wasn’t going to be an easy end to our relationship. He was insane, and if he is still hanging around my old apartment, chances are, he hasn’t changed a damn bit.

“Celia, do you need help?” Gertrude asks lightly.

Footsteps thunder down the hall as one of the guys approaches the kitchen. I turn around and watch the doorway with helpless anxiety creeping in on me.

“I’m fine,” I tell my cousin—and myself. “I’ve got it handled. Thank you for looking out for me, Toots.”

“Are you sure?” she demands. “I have friends, Celia. We can kick his ass for you, or you can even come stay with us. We’re some badass bi—”

I tune out her words because standing in the doorway is the hulking form attached to those steely eyes.

In his right hand is the coffee pitcher Morrigan brought out earlier, and the used cups in the other.

“I hope I’m not interrupting,” he says gruffly, putting the cups in the trash and walking over to the sink.

“You know what? Where are you?” Gertrude cuts in on the phone. “You’re not at your apartment, obviously, and I don’t recognize your phone’s area code.”

I’m unable to divert my attention when Grave shrugs off his leather jacket and his hard, muscular biceps visibly strain against the fabric of his T-shirt.

Each taut cord and vein guides my gaze down to his just as strong forearms. They dredge up a needy ache inside of me as they flex when he turns a sink faucet on and begins to wash up.

The longer I stand there gawking, the more his appearance stuns me. Specifically, how smooth his skin looks despite all that brawn beneath it.

I guess I was under the impression he should have an all-rough exterior akin to the thrilling darkness in his eyes.

From this side, I see no sign of tattoos or scars, but I do notice something else that strikes me as odd. The color of the wisps on his arms are starkly lighter compared to the dark hair on his head.

Maybe it’s just from the sun. I wouldn’t be surprised if he worked something laborious such as construction during the day. It would explain his physique.

Water suddenly pans off the coffee pitcher and splashes against his shirt.

Cursing, he reaches back—his muscles flexing everywhere—and grabs a handful of the fabric between his shoulder blades before tugging it off.

Oh, sweet fuck.

“Um, what?” Gertrude pipes in at the same time that stormy gaze latches onto me. “Are you sick? Your voice sounds off.”

I swallow a gasp and turn around to face the counter, feeling a blush creep up my neck at the realization I said that aloud.

“Uh, I moved,” I say into the phone, answering my cousin’s earlier question to change the subject.

She makes a noise that could be a combination of a scoff and snort. “No kidding. Well, how about I come visit then?”

I think back to the last time I saw her. Purple hair, tattoos covering her body, and a motorcycle with a wicked shine brighter than the one in her cheery blue eyes.

Yeah, a visit is long overdue. I miss her.

Just as I’m going to respond to Gertrude, heat and taut muscles suddenly become flush with my backside. Soft yet sinewy arms encase my own on the countertop.

I’m unable to turn around and face the man—and I was wrong. Grave does have tattoos; they decorate the entire length of his left arm.

My pulse thrums a little harder as I trace every dark and bold line in his skin with my gaze.

I’m at a loss for what to do other than feel. My pussy clenches, and as every second passes, I feel a need to rub against him rise.

I can’t believe that I like this—him, a total stranger, pressed against me so intimately.

A choked moan escapes me when I feel something hard against my lower back.

Gertrude’s assertive voice rings through my phone. “Celia? Are you having sex right now?”

“I’m at work, gotta go, love you!” I say in one breath, then I end the call.

The precise moment my thumb leaves the red icon on my screen, breath fans the back of my neck and sends a shiver down my spine. That thick bulge against my lower back digs into me harder.

Voice raspy and hushed, Grave asks, “Who was that?” His tongue follows his words, flicking against the sensitive lobe of my ear.

“My cousin,” I manage to reply, my voice breathy and pussy clenching as he begins to stroke my arms. His hands have that roughness I expected; desired.

And there’s something undeniably erotic about the clash of his skin against mine that has me pushing back against him, arching my back wantonly to feel that bulge against the seam of my ass.

A deep, strangled groan leaves his lips—and then I’m spun around and laid on the surface of the cool marble counter before I can blink.