Chapter Ten

Fuck.

Dio grabbed his cock through his jeans and squeezed, needing relief and yet determined to get rid of the damning evidence of his arousal toward Skye.

He sat on the edge of the bed and pulled on his boots, lacing them up. The tension in his lower back returned, and he stood. He had to keep moving.

He needed to get out of here. He couldn't handle being around her. Maverick shouldn't trust him with his daughter. Everything he'd imagined about her was no longer a mystery. She had a nice little landing strip disappearing between her legs. Her breasts were perky and perfect.

Going over to the bathroom, he rapped his knuckles on the door. "Skye, I'm taking off. Lock the place up when you leave."

The spray of the water hummed in the background. All he could imagine was her hard nipples wet and quivering. It took no imagination to see everything in his head. He'd seen her. All of her.

Grabbing his duffle by the front door, he stormed out of the house. It took him thirty seconds to Bungee cord the bag onto the back of his Harley and ride away from the house, trying to outrun his thoughts and temptation.

He made the short ride to the clubhouse, determined to take himself off running security. With his back fucked up, he'd do better working in the parts shop. That way he could stay on his feet.

He couldn't trust himself to be around Skye, morning and night, when all he could think about was her young, fresh body and her willingness to make him feel good.

His balls ached. He parked the bike at the end of the line formed against the back of the building.

In his rush to get off the bike, his boot caught on the seat, and he lost his balance, landing on his ass. Pain radiated down his leg.

He threw the helmet in his hand and gritted his teeth. Frustrated with himself, he rolled until he was on his hands and knees and could get up. Once on his feet, he let out his breath in a groan.

Bane strolled over to him. "Drinking already?"

"I wish." He left his duffle on his bike. "You need to take me off the security roster and put me in the parts shop for the week."

"Back still giving you trouble?"

"Yeah." He limped to the door of the clubhouse.

"You should have Skye help—"

"I'll be fine in a couple of days. I just need to ease back on the riding until I feel better." He walked inside.

Skye's the one who got him into this mess. While not responsible for the problem in his back, the pain of being around her pushed him too far. He was careless. All his attention went to her when she was around, he wasn't watching what he was doing.

He never would've entered the bathroom if he had been in his right frame of mind. He knew she was taking a shower. He knew she'd be naked. He knew he'd see her.

Fuck. He knew better.

Jagger, Ruger, Cord, Maverick, and Brett sat around the table. He stood at the end, waiting until Bane filled Jagger in on the rotation change.

The MC president glanced at him and nodded. "Brett, you're running security on Crew Two until next week."

"No problem, Prez." Brett leaned back in his chair.

Jagger looked around the table, settling on Maverick. "You're in the shop this week, right?"

Maverick cleared his throat. "Yep."

"Dio's working with you." Jagger turned to the others. "Cord and Link can ride. Maverick and Dio can man the place by themselves."

Dio shifted his weight to his other leg. He needed the parts shop job but working alongside Maverick all day ate a hole in his gut. Nobody knew how he'd reacted to Skye lately, especially his MC brother. Guilt and shame ate him up.

Maverick and Brooke had welcomed him into their home, into their family, and most of all, trusted him around Skye.

"Riders round up." Jagger walked with the others outside.

Dio took off in the other direction, going to the door leading to the parts shop in the front of the building. Behind him, Maverick loomed, silent and aware. His MC brother's quietness never bothered him. He always welcomed the chance to work beside him because Maverick was a great listener.

Except today, Dio didn't feel like talking.

"UPS picks up tomorrow." Maverick shut the door behind him. "I'll get a pallet, and we can start sorting the outgoing orders."

"Sounds good." Dio took the clipboard off the side of the shelving unit.

Maverick would kill him if he mentioned he had a problem with Skye being around. His MC brother wouldn't take the information without questioning what his problem was in the first place.

He scanned the list of orders. Carrying the clipboard with him, he retrieved each item, keeping the orders separated on the counter in piles per invoice. After he finished one sheet, he brought out the unassembled boxes and started taping them together.

Once he completed the taping, he leaned to the side, stretching his back. Whenever he stopped walking and stood still, he could feel the weakness in his lower back.

"Hurting?" asked Maverick.

"Nah." He picked up the muffler and put it in the box. "Just gotta keep moving."

"I hear you." Maverick printed out a label. "Getting old sucks."

He chuckled. "Speak for yourself."

"You're not far behind me, brother."

Skye's dad had ten years on Dio. But they'd both lived a hard life. Maverick spent a lot of years in prison, and Dio earned his battle wounds riding for Havlin since he was eighteen years old.

"Brooke, whether she knows it or not, reminds me daily that I'm getting older." Maverick stuck the label on the box. "I drag my ass home every night, and I'm ready to go to bed by nine o'clock."

"Hell, you know she doesn't mind having you at home." Dio envied what they had.

Their love was apparent to anyone who spent time with the them. After all the years they'd been together, Brooke was Maverick's world, and he'd never seen a woman more in love with her old man.

Maverick chuckled. "Thank fuck for that."

He grabbed the fuel filter and two bottles of two-stroke oil. "We'll need a biohazard and a liquid sticker for the box." He pushed the box down the counter toward Maverick at the printer.

The whir of the printer filled the shop. Dio pulled the next order.

"When are you going to settle down?" asked Maverick.

He dropped the brake cable he had in his hand. "I got a house. I got a club. Money is rolling in as long as I can ride. That's all I need."

"You say that now. But there will come a time when you'll want a soft body beside you for longer than an hour." Maverick cleared his throat. "We live a hard life. You need to balance the shit that we go through, or you'll die a cranky asshole."

He chuckled. "Some will claim it's too late for me. I'm already an asshole."

"Skye doesn't think you are." Maverick pointed at him. "You'll do what you need to do so that you never disappoint her."

Maverick walked away, disappearing behind the shelving units. Dio ran his hands over his face. Suddenly having Skye in his life seemed like too big of a responsibility.

"She's grown up," blurted Dio. "She doesn't need me anymore. It won't be long, and she'll get married and move away."

As much as he needed to remember that, the idea of losing her filled him with anger. There was nobody good enough for her.

Maverick returned to the counter. "You truly are an asshole if you think that."

Leery of asking Skye's dad what he meant by throwing his own words back at him, he dropped the subject of Skye and concentrated on filling the next box.

But keeping busy only stopped the conversations with Maverick. Keeping his hands busy failed to shut off his thoughts; his head worked overtime.

Despite trying not to think of Skye naked in his bathroom, he'd thought of a hundred ways he could fuck her.