Page 46 of Nicolette

“What? Sorry lost in thought,” I explained with a sheepish grin.

“You need to hang out on the other side. Savage Pride business is for members only,” Nine reminded me.

Rolling my eyes, I got up from my chair and headed for the main area. “What exactly am I supposed to be doing while not participating in club business?”

“Once things settle down, you can hang out with the others downstairs. Today, you’ll need to find something to entertain yourself with,” Rambler answered. “We have a little library where we keep all the pride’s history and memoirs on past MC Presidents if you feel like reading. I think there’s some romance trash too that some of the women have left there.”

Whipping around, I gasped. “Did you just call romance novels trash?”

The twins looked at me, then Rambler, back to me as if waiting for a showdown.

“You’re right. It was unfair of me to call them trash when I’ve never read them,” Rambler admitted. “However, the covers leave me to believe there isn’t much substance in them. I might be biased since I enjoy reading for educational purposes.”

“So, in other words, you’re a nerd,” I concluded.

Rambler opened his mouth to speak, raising a finger as if to argue with me, then thought better of it and simply nodded.

“Then, Mr. Smartypants, I challenge you to read one of those romance novels and consider it a look inside the female mind. Read how a woman truly wants to be romanced, touched, and fucked. Because all of that will be in there, I assure you…” I paused for effect, “… in great detail.”

Now the guys were snickering, trying to hide their laughter as I called Rambler out.

“Oh, don’t you gentlemen think you’re off the hook,” I warned. “If I’m going to make him read a book, then all of you are under the same obligation. I’m nothing if not fair. Enjoy your super secret biker meeting while I go snoop. Oh, and if any of you feel like maybe asking Onion Ring to send up some more food, I would gladly give you a thank you a blowjob.”

“Who is Onion Ring?” Nine questioned, breezing right past the promised blowjob offer.

“The guy who brought me my food, I think you called him prospect,” I explained, then tapped my chin. “That’s more of a label than a name, right? Unless you mean like a mining prospector, but if that’s the case, Onion Ring would be better.”

Polo covered his mouth with a hand, but I could see the laughter lines around his eyes and his shoulders shaking.

“You think a feline shifter, who’s a biker, should be named… Onion Ring?” Nine asked, choosing his words carefully as he spoke. “Why the fuck would we do that?”

“Aren’t they named after something unique to them? I know most are probably from some job, a cool moment, or a drunken night they make an ass out of themselves, but that man has a gift, I tell you a gift, for onion rings.” Even to my ears, the passion I was putting behind this fact was getting a little creepy, but I’d already committed.

Nine just gave me a peculiar look and scratched his jaw. “I’ll take it into consideration—”

“No, you won’t, but I appreciate you not blowing me off for being weirdly obsessed with onion rings,” I admitted. “All right, so before I make a further disaster of myself, I’m gonna go find something to do that’s not here.”

I left the office area and reentered the main open space with the giant-ass table, scanning the room to see if there was anything else interesting. There was a seating area near the entrance to the office with a couch, a loveseat, and two armchairs. Further into the room was a dartboard, pool table, and three bookshelves with a hodgepodge of reading material on them.

For the most part, this place was empty, clearly used for large gatherings, and that’s it.

I meandered over to the bookshelf and glanced to see what, if anything, might engage my senses. A smoky blue cover caught my eye, so I pulled it off the shelf. Skyla, that’s a pretty name. When I flipped to the back, my brows shot up at the description on the back of the book. A stripper caught in between two rival MCs of fae and warlock. Missing fairy coke, steamy sex, hot fae bikers, and a dash of kink—hell yeah, this was the book for me. Plus, who would ever pick wizards over fae? Easy choice if you asked me.

Happy with the book I found, it was time to get comfy and read. Sprawled out on the couch, feet kicking in the air as I read, I didn’t notice the man until he cleared his throat. Glancing up, I found Onion Ring holding a plate overflowing with his namesake.

“Ah, they said you seemed to like my rings, so I brought up a plate to apologize for being a creep earlier,” Onion Ring said as he set the plate down on the table. “I wasn’t sure what you liked to drink, or I would have brought that with me, but I can totally grab you something.”

Setting the book aside, I sat up and plucked an onion ring off the plate. I had to make sure they were really as good as I thought before or if I was just starved. With the first bite of the crispy yet melt-in-your-mouth coating, I knew I’d been right.

“These are the best onion rings I’ve had in my life,” I shared, doing my best to try and express just how I felt about them. “I don’t know what you do, but I’m never eating these anywhere else. You, my friend, are a god of deep-fried onions.”

He laughed nervously as his cheeks turned pink. “Thank you, I was in culinary school before I found out I was a shifter, and well, life kinda changed, ya know?”

“God do I know,” I mumbled around the food I’d shoved into my mouth.

“Anyway, did you want something to drink?” he asked.

“Um… what do you have that isn’t alcohol?”