The Biker's Secret Girlfriend Read online

  Then they started down the road together, King always right at Maverick’s side, despite the lack of a leash.

  Karly didn’t dare move, as she’d have to drive right by Maverick and his dog, and he’d surely recognize her car. Wouldn’t he?

  “Of course,” she muttered to herself, another phrase she could’ve used last week in his kitchen.

  When he’d disappeared down the road, she turned on her headlights and stole away from the building. She passed the convenience store, ready to head home and carefully lay Navy in her crib so they both could get some good sleep.

  Maverick stepped into the road in front of her, his frame boxy and rigid, almost like he was bracing for her to hit him. King joined him, the animal’s jowls moving like the dog was barking.

  Thankfully, Karly wasn’t driving very fast, and she was able to stop in plenty of time. Maverick was almost to her window before she even had the vehicle all the way still. He bent down and peered through her window, his face a hard mask that sent fear through her as quickly as a bullet.

  His eyes softened the teensiest bit, and he glanced in the backseat too before miming for her to roll down the window.

  She did, because she’d already been caught.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked, his voice low. He looked behind her, and then down the street in front of her. Trees bordered both sides that way, and no cars were coming.

  “I don’t know,” she admitted. “My baby wouldn’t go to sleep, and the car ride soothes her. I just…ended up here.”

  “It’s not safe for you to be here,” he said.

  “Not safe?” She’d felt perfectly safe last week. Warm even. Invited. It had been wonderful to be taken care of again, and Karly had always wanted a man to dote on her. Make her feel pretty.

  He sighed, obviously at war with himself. He focused on the ground, and she wished he’d just say what was on his mind. He’d been able to in the kitchen last weekend.

  “I want to go out with you,” she blurted.

  After what felt like a very long time, Maverick lifted his eyes to hers, and she finally found a spark in them. Some indication that this man felt something.

  “Come back to the loft,” he said. “I’ll open the back bay for you. It’s really not safe for anyone to see your car here.” With that, he walked away.

  Karly had no idea what to do. If it wasn’t safe, shouldn’t she just go home? She watched him walk away from the car, his back straight, that dog obediently at his side.

  And she didn’t want to go home.

  Ten minutes later, Navy was asleep in the same bedroom where Karly had stayed several nights ago, and Maverick had a fresh pot of coffee going in the kitchen. Karly felt like she was walking on eggshells on top of very thin ice as she closed the door on her sleeping daughter and tiptoed down the hall toward the man she’d just admitted to liking.

  “Tell me why it’s not safe,” she said, wrapping her arms around herself. Now that she was here, she wished she’d have dressed better for the midnight drive to settle Navy to sleep. As it was, she wore a pair of pajama pants and a sweatshirt that hung off her shoulder. It had been Derrick’s and was one of the few items of his she didn’t leave in the box in the closet.

  “Was your grandfather ever in a motorcycle club?” he asked, and Karly froze. She hadn’t been expecting him to ask that.

  “I have no idea,” she said. “I can’t imagine he would’ve been. He tended to the orchards forever before passing them to my dad. He calls the trees children without names.”

  Maverick nodded. “I think he was a Hawk. Their club is farther north than here, just across the lake to the west.”

  “So what if he was?” she asked. “It would’ve had to have been a long time ago. I don’t remember it at all, and my mother has never mentioned it.” She would flip out, as Karly’s mother was nothing if not prim and proper and always ready to entertain.

  “The Hawks and the Sentinels don’t mix,” Maverick said simply.

  “I…I don’t even know what that means.”

  Maverick came around the bar, and she realized he’d been using it as a shield between them. And now he’d removed it. He reached out and touched her face. Karly tried very hard not to lean into his touch, but it had been so long since she’d had the tender touch of a man in her life.

  Maverick tucked her hair behind her ear, his voice low and husky when he said, “Once a Hawk, always a Hawk.”

  “But I’m not a Hawk,” she said.

  “It would be very dangerous for us to be together,” he whispered, his lips dropping to her temple. Heat exploded through her, and Karly stood very still, trying to absorb her emotions, the way this man made her feel alive, and his words.

  His lips traced a path down her cheek to her jaw. “If your granddad was a Hawk, they consider you one too. If you or your family needed help, they’d come if you asked them to.” He pressed his mouth to her throat.

  “We’ve been in trouble,” she said, her words made mostly of air. “All of my siblings have at least.”

  “Mm,” he said, still working his magic against the tender skin along the side of her throat. “Did you ask them to come?”

  “I didn’t know we could. I don’t think anyone knew that.”

  Maverick pulled back. “I haven’t been able to find out if he really was a Hawk, but they’re watching me now. Their Vice saw me help you fix your car, and he’s claimed you.”

  Karly’s eyebrows went up as a healthy dose of indignation moved through her. “Claimed me?” And she had no idea what a Vice was.

  Maverick nodded, very serious indeed. “That’s how motorcycle clubs work, honey. If you’re in theirs, you can’t be mine.”

  Be his. Karly couldn’t believe it, but she actually liked the sound of that. “Even if I don’t want to be in theirs?”

  “Even if.”

  Frustration welled in Karly, and she finally lifted her arms and put them on his shoulders. He steadied her with his hands on her waist and they swayed like they were dancing at their high school prom. Karly’s emotions popped through her, excitement racing down her spine and up her arms. She felt tingles in her toes and fingertips, and she couldn’t help the smile that touched her lips.

  “So what do we do?” she asked, laying her cheek against his shoulder.

  “We need to find out for sure if your grandfather was a Hawk,” he murmured. “Then we have to be very careful who sees us together.”

  “Which was why I had to pull into the bay.”

  “Mm hmm,” he said. “And why you can’t leave until morning.”

  She straightened, alarm pulling through her. “What?”

  “Bikers are out at night, Karly. It’s not safe.” His bright blue eyes blazed at her, and she absolutely believed him.

  “And what if my grandfather was a Hawk, and I still wanted…to go out with you?”

  “Oh, we won’t be going out,” he said, a playful smile barely curving that strong mouth. “We’d have to stay in.”

  “Keep it secret,” she whispered, thinking of all her siblings who’d had secret relationships over the past couple of years. The idea thrilled her, and she shivered.

  Maverick pulled her closer, the warmth from his body seeping into hers along every point. “That’s right, sweetheart. You’d be my secret girlfriend.”

  Chapter Six

  Maverick was one-hundred percent certain Karly didn’t know what she was getting herself into. She had no idea how motorcycle clubs worked, and no idea how him claiming her when she belonged to the Hawks would start a war between the clubs that he wasn’t sure he could win.

  But there was something magical about holding her in his arms. Touching his lips to her skin. Feeling her melt into that touch, and sigh softly, and close her eyes as if she was experiencing something amazing.

  Maverick was, he knew that.

  And he’d used the word girlfriend, and she hadn’t even flinched. But he didn’t want to complicate tonight, so he held
her close to him, swaying with her until she pulled back, a hint of apprehension in her eyes.

  “I should go lay by Navy,” she said, her voice barely more than a whisper. She’d piled all her curls on top of her head, and Maverick tucked that stray hair behind her ear again.

  “All right.”

  “I try to sleep when she does,” Karly continued. “Otherwise, I never do.”

  “I’ll head to bed in a little bit,” he said.

  “Do you always walk your dog in the middle of the night?”

  “Every night,” he confirmed, and their eyes met. Karly’s held a flame of interest in them, and Maverick couldn’t remember the last time a woman looked at him like that. Had Ruby ever glittered a glance at him this way?

  Karly put her palm against his chest and smiled. ‘See you in the morning. I promise I won’t wake you, and we’ll be gone before you get up.”

  “I’ll probably be on the couch again,” he said, though he never slept on the couch. Only that one time, last Friday night.

  And as he wasn’t as young as he used to be, it had taken him all week to catch up on the sleep he’d missed.

  “You don’t need to do that,” she said.

  Maverick didn’t commit either way, and she Karly wandered out of the kitchen, taking that pretty face and stunning spirit with her.

  He sagged against the counter, all his defenses completely gone with this woman. It was like she’d reached right into his heart and undone everything he’d put in place over the past year and a half.

  She pulled on him, and she pulled hard.

  “She has a kid,” he muttered, and Maverick had never fancied himself a father—at least not of smaller humans. He knew several of his boys in the club viewed him as their father, but at least he wasn’t as arrogant as Wyatt Carter and hadn’t taken his club name as Daddy.

  He shook his head, wondering why it had been so hard to find out if William Addler had been in the Hawks. Their historian should have that information, and the fact that Maverick hadn’t been able to obtain it made him think it wasn’t there to be found.

  Or was being doctored.

  Why Daddy and Bulldog cared, he wasn’t sure.

  “You know they want to go to war,” he told himself as he padded down a different hall and went into his master suite. They were still upset about the “raid” in Williamsburg last year, even though the Sentinels had not busted into that place to do anything against them personally.

  In fact, a whole article had been written up about their heroics in helping the police bring down a drug cartel. Which, of course, was exactly the problem.

  Maverick hadn’t cared. He’d kept his nose clean and made sure his boys hadn’t been arrested or interrogated, and he’d come back to Forbidden Lake to finish a custom build that was a week late.

  The Hawks could find something else to fill their time. Maverick wasn’t going to feel bad about eradicating drugs from Northern Michigan, not by a long shot. And with the Hawks across the lake and essentially out of his hair, he hadn’t given them another thought.

  Until Karly Lydell.

  He undressed and got in bed, whistling for King to come lay by him. The dog jumped up on the bed and circled on the other side, finally flopping down so his side pressed into Maverick’s leg. He absently stroked the dog, wide awake and staring at the ceiling.

  No, he couldn’t hear Karly. If she’d come in while he was already asleep, he’d have no idea she was there. His place was so big, he actually had doors closed leading to areas he never used.

  But something seethed beneath his skin, knowing she was here, under the same roof as him, mere steps away.

  He had to find out if her grandfather had ever ridden with the Hawks, and then he’d be able to make an informed decision. When she hadn’t called after driving away last weekend, Maverick had made the attempt, but he’d also expected her to call him at some point.

  As the days had marched by, and his phone had only contained Sentinel business or a new custom build, his hope had waned.

  “She’s here now,” he whispered to himself. “And she let you hold her, kiss her.” Maybe not in the spot he wanted, but he didn’t want to move too fast and scare her away. Because Karly Lydell was definitely a scared little rabbit around him, and he wanted her to come to him over and over again.

  With those thoughts in his head, he finally fell asleep, the hole that had been in his life all this time gaping and wide—but he now had a way to fill it.

  He woke with sun streaming across his face and his dog barking his fool head off.

  “King,” Maverick ordered. “Quiet.”

  The dog ran out of the room, and the door started to swing inward. Maverick sat up, very aware that he wasn’t wearing clothes and that he’d taught King to bark at danger.

  He quickly pulled on a pair of gym shorts he’d tossed on the chair next to the window and headed out the door after his German shepherd.

  A baby cried somewhere in the loft, and he found Karly shielding her daughter from his dog.

  “King, heel,” Maverick said, dashing into the room. He scanned the windows, the exits, trying to determine if there was any other threat. Didn’t seem to be.

  His dog returned to his side, and Maverick held his palm flat toward the floor. “Down. Wait.”

  King whined as he lowered onto his haunches, not quite going all the way to the floor as he trembled with anticipation.

  “I was just going,” she said, her voice shaky. She pressed her lips to her daughter’s forehead and smoothed her wispy hair back as the girl quieted.

  “I’m sorry,” Maverick said, moving forward again. King came with him, and Karly kept her eyes right on him.

  “She’s usually not afraid of dogs,” she said. “My brother has a couple of them. A big one too.”

  “King can be intense.” He held out his hand again, and the dog dropped all the way down this time. “He’s calming down. He probably just got startled. He’s trained to alert me if something isn’t right in the building.” Maverick realized a moment too late how that sounded. “Not that you’re not supposed to be here.”

  Karly blinked at him, and her daughter faced him too. Maverick had no idea what to say to the child. Or to Karly.

  “I didn’t mean to wake you,” she said.

  “You didn’t. King did.” He wasn’t exactly sure what time it was, but he didn’t feel a moment away from collapsing, so it couldn’t be that early. “I’m going to my brother’s for lunch today anyway. Time to get up.”

  “Do you go to his house a lot?” she asked.

  “Yes,” he said simply. “He has a couple of girls that love me.”

  Karly stared at him for a moment and then she burst into giggles. The little girl started laughing too, and Maverick smiled at both of them.

  “What’s your daughter’s name?” he asked, the awkwardness between them broken now.

  “Navy,” Karly said, and the little girl looked at her mom. She was the spitting image of Karly, right down to the dark eyes as wide as quarters and the curly, dark hair.

  “She’s beautiful,” Maverick said.

  “Navy, this is Maverick,” Karly said, though the girl couldn’t be older than…well, Maverick had no idea how old she was.

  “How old is she?”

  “She just turned one last week. Same day as the wedding.”

  “Oh.” No wonder she’d needed an escape that day. Karly adjusted the girl on her hip, and Maverick flew into motion. “Let me get the door for you.”

  “Thank you,” she said, moving toward it.

  “Call me later,” he said, not intending it to come out quite so demanding. “I mean, I don’t have your number.”

  She nodded and left, and Maverick couldn’t help standing at the top of the steps and watching her go down them. Then he stepped over to the control panel on the wall and pushed the button that would lift the bay door where she’d parked her car.

  It was almost eleven, and surely the Hawks wo
uldn’t have their spies at Ruby’s twenty-four-seven.

  At least Maverick hoped not.

  Chapter Seven

  Karly attended every family dinner on Sunday afternoon, because she got to have a few minutes of adult conversation and someone always helped her with Navy.

  If anyone had noticed that she’d now spent two nights away from home in the past ten days, they didn’t say anything. She could still feel the echoing burn of Maverick’s lips against her neck, and she reached up and covered the spot with her palm.

  A shiver ran through her, and she got up to go sit by her grandmother. “Hey, Grams,” she said, hoping she aged as well as her grandma.

  “Hello, dear,” she said with a smile. “Did you like the lasagna?”

  “It was okay,” Karly said. “I don’t like mushrooms.” She glanced over at her mother, who’d decided she was going to take up a low-sugar diet and started trying all kinds of recipes that didn’t include Karly’s favorite food group—carbs.

  She’d made a vegetable lasagna with no noodles. Just zucchini, mushrooms, olives, and cheese. Oh, and sauce. It was more like lasagna soup than anything, and Karly had eaten it along with her other siblings.

  Phoenix had finally said, “Dude, this isn’t that good,” and gotten up to put his mostly full bowl in the sink. Then he’d opened her parents’ freezer and pulled out a few pizzas. Her mother said nothing as Phoenix made frozen pizza—and as everyone had migrated to that after glancing at her.

  “I don’t think anyone liked the mushrooms,” Grams said with a throaty laugh. She patted Karly’s hand and started talking about Navy. Karly could hear the love in Grams’s voice, and she felt it moving through her too.

  She loved her family. After Derrick’s death, they’d been all she’d had, as she lived twenty minutes out of town and had been focused on building her own family instead of making a lot of friends.