Mace (Untamed Sons MC: Birmingham Chapter #1)

27. Mace

TWENTY-SEVEN

MACE

I take Nicky with me to visit good old Bernie. Mostly because I’m worried I might kill him if I’m alone. He has an office in Star City, and as soon as we enter, I get the entire vibe of this guy. He thinks he’s some kind of business tycoon.

There’s no reception desk, and from the look of it, there’s only one office—his.

I don’t knock, putting a boot to the door and kicking it open. It swings back violently, hitting the wall with enough force to leave a mark.

An older guy is frozen, a phone held to his ear as he stares. I waste no time, stepping into the room and kicking the broken door closed behind us.

Nicky goes to the desk, pressing down the button on the phone to end the call, and takes the handset from him, placing it back in the cradle.

“Get out of here or I’ll call the police,” he threatens, reaching for the phone, but Nicky moves fast, the knife in his hand embedding in the wood desk inches from Bernie’s fingers.

“They won’t help you, even if you could call them,” I say. I round the desk, grabbing him by the lapels of his suit jacket and dragging him to his feet. “You threatened my woman.”

“I don’t know your woman.” The words are strangled, his eyes darting with fear.

“Maylie Fernsby.”

Recognition dawns, and he looks like he’s going to shit his pants. “I never… I wouldn’t.”

I shove him back into the chair, which rocks savagely before I grab his hand and force it onto the top of his desk. “What are you doing?”

“You wanted to touch something that belongs to me, Bernie,” I say, my words calm even as my adrenaline thrums through my body in excited waves. “So, I’m gonna make sure you can never touch anything again.”

I grip his wrist as Nicky spreads his fingers wide. Bernie thrashes and tries to pull his hand free, but my hold is firm.

I take the knife from Nicky and press it to Bernie’s index finger. He freezes, his breaths ragged as a drop of blood rolls down the digit. “Please… don’t.”

“Did Maylie beg you not to blackmail her into fucking your disgusting cock?” My teeth mash together. “Did you hope the threat of eviction would drive her into your bed?”

I cut, anger driving me as I force the knife through the bone. Bernie screams like a dying pig as blood pools on his fancy fucking desk. When that finger is detached, I move to next .

Eventually, he stops screaming and sags into me until I finish removing all his fingers. When I’m done, I step back, wiping the bloody blade on his suit.

“You feel better?” Nicky asks.

“Fuckin’ delighted,” I mutter. Bernie sobs quietly, clutching his bloodied stumps to his chest. Fuckin’ prick. “We can go now.”

It takes me a week to find something suitable for the little family I’ve acquired.

I know Maylie will love it, but I’m fuckin’ nervous as I open the door to the apartment.

Shoving inside, I pocket the keys and wipe my palms on my jeans as Maylie steps in behind me.

She moves into the large living space, turning in a circle as she takes in everything. Her boots click against the wood floor as she wanders over to the window that fills most of the wall in front of us, giving a view of the city. The high-rise tower block I lived in with my mother was pulled down five years ago, but other similar structures are dotted on the horizon, peeking out between the other buildings. We’re only three floors up, but the sprawling city is laid out before us.

There’s something about her excitement that makes a smile spread across my face. “You like it?”

Her eyes snap to mine. “Is that a joke? Of course, I like it. This living room is the same size as the entire floor plan of our current flat.”

She steps back from the window, and suddenly, she won’t meet my gaze. My long strides eat up the floor in just a matter of seconds, my hand instantly wrapping around the side of her neck in a gesture that has become automatic to me. “What’s wrong?”

She winces, as if her thoughts pain her. “I’m just… a little worried.”

This makes me frown. Everything I’ve done is to ensure she has no fears or concerns. “Why?”

My thumb rubs over the line of her jaw, enjoying the feel of her silky skin beneath the pad.

“Is this… all a bit soon? What if we move in together and you decide I’m an utterly disgusting slob and you hate everything about me? I leave clothes on the floor all the time, and I’m shit at remembering to wash dishes. I like lazy mornings and busy evenings.”

“Babe, we’ve been living together for weeks.”

“It’s not the same. You can leave. If we do this, there’s no escape for you. You never really know someone until you live with them.”

“I know enough.”

“But—”

I silence her with a kiss, pressing my lips to hers and dipping my head so I can deepen our connection. Heat licks along my skin, the back of my neck warm as she melts into my touch.

As always, when I kiss her, the noise in my head quiets to nothing but her. She is the only thing in my sphere, the only thing I need to concern myself with. “All I care about is when I get into bed every night, you’re lying next to me.”

Her lips kick up at the corners. “You can’t say things like that to me. It makes me lose all my fight.”

I drop my hands to her hips, pulling her close against my body. “So, don’t fight it. Sometimes, things just work out the way they’re meant to.”

Her hands wrap around my back, holding me close.

“And you’re sure we can have this for the same price as what I was paying for my other place?”

I grab her chin, directing her head up so I can capture her mouth. I can’t stop from claiming every part of her whenever I’m near her. It’s like I have a sickness and she is the cure. “Babe, I don’t want you to worry about any of that shit.”

“I don’t want to not pay my way. That’s not who I am.”

I understand that about her, because I’m proud too, and she has stood on her own for so long that I can imagine she would find it difficult to give control to anybody else.

“Maylie, you’ve spent so many years taking care of other people. For once in your life, allow somebody else to take care of you.”

“Well, I’m still going to pay my way.”

“You know how you can do that?”

Her brow raises. “If this is about sex…”

I chuckle. “No, darlin’, I ain’t making you pay in sex. How you can pay your way is by doing something that fulfils you. What would you want to do with your life if you could choose?”

She pulls back from me as if my words burn her. “What do you mean?”

That question fills my stomach with an ugly, unpleasant feeling, as if she’s never considered the concept of doing something for herself. “Well, what did you want to do before your mum got sick? What was your plan for the future? ”

“I don’t know. I was only fifteen when Mum got sick. I haven’t ever considered my future, and now… what could I do?”

“You can do whatever you want. Work, don’t work, go back to school… fill the apartment with feral cats, for all I care.”

She chuckles. “Really? Feral cats?”

I press my lips into her hair before resting my chin on top of her head. “Whatever makes you happy, Maylie. You don’t have to decide now, but it’s something to think about. You’re gonna have your hands full anyway with your sister.”

She smiles, as if even the mere thought of the baby Ivy is expecting is more than she can contain. “I know the way Ivy got pregnant isn’t great. I wish she would’ve had the fairytale with a man who is devoted to her, but… I’m not unhappy about it either.”

“I know, and you’re going to be the best auntie there is.”

She scoffs at me, as if my statement is the most ridiculous thing she’s ever heard. “Of course, I am. I’ve been practising for this my entire life. And I get to be the fun one for a change. It’s pretty crap when all I do is tell them off.”

“Do you want to see the rest of the apartment?”

“Of course.”

I take her hand, leading her through to the bedrooms, finally stopping in the master suite. The room is huge, double the size of the bedroom she currently has, and she spends a long time walking the length of it.

“These windows are amazing. ”

The glass spans the entire length of the room, with a door opening out onto a private balcony for us.

“It’s tinted,” I say, enjoying the way her brows come together. “The glass,” I clarify.

I walk over to her, turning her around so her back is to my chest, and I carefully position her hands on the panes, shoulder-width apart.

She glances over her shoulder at me, a hint of curiosity dancing in her eyes that quickly fades into need as I run my hand down her spine.

“We can see out, but as long as there’re no lights on inside, no one can see in.”

I reach around her front, flicking open the button of her jeans and shoving them down her hips.

“Mace, what are you doing?”

“Exactly what I want,” I say. “Be a good girl and bend over farther for me.” She’s a little hesitant, but she slides her hands down the glass, pushing her ass out.

What a fuckin’ picture she is.

I slip my hand over her cotton underwear before grabbing the waistband and tugging them down. I can already see the wetness has seeped into the material, which makes me smirk as my fingers trail underneath her, pushing through her slit. The first touch makes her gasp, and her body twitches. “Mace…” I’m not sure if my name is meant to be a question or a plea, but I keep hooking my fingers along her folds before finding her clit and applying pressure as I circle around it.

She pants, letting out a moan low in her throat that makes my cock solid.

“We shouldn’t do this. What if someone sees? I mean, how sure are you that this glass is actually tinted? I don’t want anyone to see me like this.”

I growl low in my throat. “If anyone sees you, I’ll scoop their fucking eyeballs out.”

Her fingers flex against the glass as her breath quickens. “You’re such a caveman,” she accuses, pushing her ass out farther as my fingers slide into her wet cunt. “Oh… just there.”

I hook my fingers deep into her as I press my body against her spine, taking everything I desire while giving her the pleasure she deserves. My life has always been a shitshow. The only good thing to come out of it is the club, at least until I found her. The girl in the ridiculous bubble gum wig who brings brownies for strippers and always has a smile ready for everyone around her. She is the light in my dark, the sun in my cloudy sky, and I don’t give a fuck how fast this is, it’s meant to be, and there is nothing that will ever convince me otherwise.

I piston my fingers inside her, my thumb circling her clit as her pants grow wilder and more disjointed. It doesn’t take long for her pussy to squeeze tight as her climax hits her in a wave of pleasure.

As she sags against the window, as if her legs won’t hold her up, I undo my jeans and shove them halfway down my hips, just enough to free my cock. She started on birth control when we began having sex, so I don’t need a condom, which allows me to keep momentum.

Still in the ripples of her orgasm, I plunge into her, burying my shaft to the hilt. We both let out a strangled cry as her cunt squeezes around my length. Fuck, she feels amazing, and my hands span her hips before wrapping around her stomach so I can hold her tight against me as I start to pound into her.

There is a slight swell of her belly beneath my hands, just her normal curves, but for a moment, I imagine she’s carrying my kid. My cock turns into an iron rod at that thought. My seed growing inside her awakens a primal instinct within me. I need to have her, to own her completely. I’m feral with need.

I grip her tighter, hammering into her warm heat like a jackhammer. Her moans penetrate through the fog descending over me as I fuck her like I’m possessed.

It doesn’t take long for her pussy to contract around me again, squeezing the last bit of my restraint out of my body. My balls tighten to the brink of pain before my release spills inside her. My legs turn to jelly, and I brace myself against the steamed-up window, my hand covering hers and interlacing with her fingers.

All I can hear is our ragged breaths as we struggle to draw in much-needed air. I can smell the sex in the air.

“I think you destroyed my vagina,” she whimpers.

It’s enough to bring me back to my senses, and my primal desires fade into the background as concern hits me like a wrecking ball.

“Shit, did I hurt you?”

She glances over her shoulder at me, and the dazed smile on her face almost floors me. “No. You would never hurt me. It felt good. I mean, I’m still gonna feel you there for the next week, but it was a nice feeling. It was like you were so deep inside my body that my mind just couldn’t process everything.” She clamps her mouth shut, wincing. “Sorry. I’m ruining a really beautiful moment.”

I kiss the side of her neck, sweeping her hair out of the way so I can feel her skin beneath my lips. “No, you didn’t. I love everything about you, Maylie, especially when you talk too much.”

“That’s a good thing, because that happens a lot.” She slowly straightens, as if she’s done an hour at the gym on hard mode, and I pull my jeans up just enough so I can walk into the bathroom to grab some tissue. It’s not how I want to take care of her, but there’s nothing here to allow me to do more.

She stands in the doorway, watching me as I wipe the tip of my shaft. Then she walks over to me and wipes herself between her legs. “Good thing I’m on the pill now. Though there was definitely less mess when we were using condoms.”

It sits on the tip of my tongue to tell her to stop taking it, but one step at a time. She only just got used to the idea of us living together.

“Are you okay? You have this really weird look on your face.”

“I’m fine.”

“Mace?” Nate’s voice echoes through the apartment, and Maylie’s expression drops.

“Be out in the second,” I yell back.

Her eyes widen. “Did you know your brother was coming over when you pressed me up against the window and shoved your cock inside me?”

“Of course. He’s helping us move.”

Her cheeks turn a beautiful shade of pink. “He could’ve walked in on us having sex .” She whispers the last part.

Her outrage is fucking adorable. “I knew we had time.”

Her eyes bug out of her head as she quickly finishes cleaning herself and does up her jeans. “You knew we had time? What if he’d been a minute earlier? What if it took us longer to come? What happened to your ‘if anyone sees us, I’ll remove their eyes’?”

“I did, he wasn’t, and I know exactly how to make you come fast, baby.”

She huffs at me. “The last thing I want is your brother to see me getting railed.”

I take her hand in mine as she continues to grumble.

My brother is waiting in the living room, peering out the same window that Maylie had made a beeline for the moment she stepped into the apartment. Nicky is with him.

My brother gives me a knowing look, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively. He leans in and takes a sniff. “I can smell the sex.”

Nicky cuffs him around the back of the head at the same time as I smack my fist into his gut hard enough to make my point but not enough to hurt him seriously.

He bends over, letting out a rush of breath even as he laughs through it.

“Shut up and let’s get this done.”

Between us, it doesn’t take long. After the first run back to the flat, Toby and Ivy join us in the new place.

Toby has grown at least two inches in the last two weeks. He was always taller than Maylie, but now, he looms over her. Every time she picks up a box, he’s quick to take it off her, earning grumbles from her, but I approve.

“Where do you want this?” Nate asks Ivy, holding a box with Ivy’s name written on the side.

She tries to take it from him, but he steps back, clutching the box to his chest. “Are you crazy? ”

“It’s only got a few things in it. It’s not heavy.”

He scoffs at her. “Did you forget that you’re pregnant? You don’t lift anything when you’re cooking a person.”

Her eyes roll. “Fine. Just put it in my bedroom.”

He shakes his head at her as he strides past her. “No picking up anything.”

“Okay,” she agrees as her sister comes out from the hallway.

“What’s going on?”

“Your sister is trying to lift things,” Nate tattles as he disappears into one of the bedrooms.

Maylie scowls at Ivy. “There’s a reason all these hulking men are here.”

She glances around at my club brothers. “I thought it was just for the eye candy.”

Nicky snorts as he passes her, holding a bedside table in his arms as if it weighs nothing.

“Please, don’t lift anything, and try to relax. The last thing we need is to end up in hospital because you’ve overdone it.”

Ivy’s hand rests on her baby bump. “I have no intention of putting my baby at risk, Maylie. You can relax.”

I leave Maylie to order the boys around, letting them know where to put stuff. I don’t give a fuck where anything goes. All I care about is having her in my space.

The guys help me get the furniture into the right places before they head off, then I walk Nicky and my brother to the door.

“Thanks for your help today,” I tell them.

“Anytime, you know that, brother,” Nicky says. “She’s a good girl. You should make it official around the table. Making her your old lady gives her better protection if things happen.”

And things are going to happen. It’s only a matter of time before Crank is removed from his seat and fuck knows what will go down. We both know how deep the club is drowning in shit.

He pats my shoulder. “I like her. She’s good for you.”

“Ain’t sure if he’s good for her, though,” my brother jokes.

I jab him in the side, earning a grin as he darts to avoid my hit. “Get the fuck out of here,” I fire back.

When I shut the door, for the first time in my life, I feel settled in a way I never have. All I’ve ever wanted in my life is a family, a real family. I thought I’d found that with Maggie and her kids, but that was fleeting. My sister will never let me in the way I want to be, and Jack… is Jack. I have Nate and I have Nicky, but Maylie is an unbreakable part of my life. I want her to be my wife, to have my kids, to be my world.

When I head into the living room, which is now a mismatch of her furniture and mine, I see Maylie is standing out on the balcony.

Ivy and Toby must be sorting out their rooms.

For a moment, I watch her, taking the time to study her while she’s unaware. Everything about her calls to me, makes me hot and needy for her. I don’t deserve someone like her, and I don’t know what the fuck she sees in me, but I’m keeping her.

I head through the door, the cool air seeping through my thin shirt as she watches me. “Your brother totally called us out for having sex. ”

“I don’t care if the whole world knows. I like fucking my girl.”

She rolls her eyes, but she can’t mask the smile. “You’re so crass.”

“Yeah, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m not a Boy Scout, Maylie.”

Her eyes widen in mock surprise. “You’re not? There was me thinking you were a regular upstanding member of society.”

“Would a Boy Scout tell you that the moment we’re in bed, I’m going to destroy your pussy?”

Her lips part slightly as she sucks in a breath. “How do you make something so dirty sound so good?” I wrap my arms around her, pulling her to my chest as she leans into my embrace. “You changed my life in ways I didn’t even know it needed to be changed. I know it’s early to say this, and I don’t expect you to say it back, but I’m in love with you.”

Fuck, this woman. Sometimes I forget how innocent she was when we first got together. I forget that I’m her first everything.

“I’m in love with you too.”

“I’ve loved you from the moment I first saw you,” she admits. “And just so you know, I’m never letting you go.”