Dex ARe Read Online Free Page A

voice.”
    I leaned against the lamp post and let my backpack slide off my shoulder. “Lucky it’s just my voice. I’m just getting off work. I smell like blood and three kinds of vomit.”
    “Words to melt a man’s heart, gorgeous.”
    I shook my head but didn’t answer. Sly paused a beat, letting the silence hang for a second.
    “We need to talk,” he finally said. I pressed the back of my head against the lamp post and shut my eyes tight. “I have to see you. Can you come to the Den this afternoon? Preferably after you shower.”
    I bumped my head against the lamp post twice and looked up toward the sky. It was already blazing bright. “Sure. Just let me get a few hours of sleep first, okay? I’m on sevens.”
    “Whatever you need, Ava. Why don’t you let me send Colt or one of other guys to pick you up around three?”
    “It’s okay. I can drive myself. That way I can leave open the possibility of making a clean getaway.”
    Sly paused again before answering. “Suit yourself, honey. Just don’t be late.”
    I couldn’t help but smile. His tone was light but his intentions clear. Sly Cullinan, President of the Great Wolves M.C., was a man used to getting what he wanted. And right now, he wanted me. My heart tripped again knowing full well what that usually meant.
     

Chapter Three
    Dex
    Charlie Brogan had a voice as loud as a freight train. The sound of it slammed into my ears as he dragged the covers off me and snapped the window blinds, letting in stabbing rays of sunlight. It took me a few seconds to remember where the hell I was. Pine paneled walls, clean white sheets, and a twelve-point buck head mounted across the room. I was in one of the rooms above the Wolf Den. I had vague memories of staggering up here when my Welcome Home party died down last night. It was more like earlier this morning.
    “Wakey, wakey; eggs and bakey! Goddamm, you look like hell, kid,” Charlie bellowed.
    I muttered something in the neighborhood of “Fuck off,” but it choked in my sandpaper throat. Something thumped next to my ear. I got one eye opened and saw it was a water bottle. I managed to prop myself up on one elbow to unscrew the cap. The water felt clean and good going down and I chugged it.
    “What time is it?” I said when my throat started working again. Blood pulsed between my ears as the full weight of my hangover settled in.
    “Almost ten.” Charlie sat down on the edge of the bed and patted my leg. Shit. Even that hurt. “Think you’ll live?”
    I sat full up. I was wearing my t-shirt from yesterday and a pair of boxers. My jeans and leather jacket were in a heap on the floor.
    “Do I even want to ask how I made it up here and how those made it over there?”
    Charlie wagged his gray caterpillar eyebrows at me and smiled. It made me glad. For so long, I’d seen nothing but grief and worry in his round face. It pained me to know that I caused it. It was good to see some of the old light in his eyes.
    “Well,” I said. “The bed’s empty and I don’t see panties on the lamp shade. Can I assume I made it up here unmolested?”
    Charlie let out one of his great belly laughs and got up. “Nobody downstairs is talkin’. ’Course, they aren’t walking or doing much of anything else either. I swear to God, I started my morning checking for pulses.”
    I heaved my legs over the side of the bed. Everything in me felt like rubber. My stomach roiled when I stood, but I made it across the room and grabbed my jeans. They reeked of whiskey and beer so I threw them back into a corner. I took another swig of water.
    “Aggh,” Charlie hollered. The sound of it stabbed through my head. “You’re a lightweight, Declan.”
    He wasn’t wrong. There was a time I’d have been the last wolf standing after a night like last night. I wasn’t sure it was a title I had much interest in retaking. Still, for the first time since I’d gotten out of Marion, this felt like home. It wasn’t. Not yet. I still had