SPARTAN (Iron Kings MC, #2) Read online

  Contents

  Title

  Copyright

  Get the Latest

  Blurb

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Epilogue

  Next Book in Series

  Want More MC Romance?

  Franca Storm Library

  About the Author

  IRON KINGS MC

  BOOK 2

  FRANCA STORM

  This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  SPARTAN. Iron Kings MC. Book Two.

  Copyright © Franca Storm (2020). All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of the author.

  Cover Design by Clarise Tan at CT Cover Creations

  Cover images provided by:

  ©istockphoto.com Stock Photo 473096540

  The sale of this book without its cover is unauthorized. If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that it was reported to the publisher as “unsold and destroyed”. Neither the author nor the publisher has received payment for the sale of this “stripped book”.

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  A king to hardened, dangerous men.

  I’m the President of the Iron Kings MC.

  Their rock-solid leader.

  A tried and tested warrior.

  I don’t bend. I don’t break. I don’t lose it.

  But something’s pushing me to my limit.

  He’s still out there, the psycho who took everything from me.

  Vengeance is burning through my veins.

  I can’t move forward.

  I can’t let it go.

  Then she wedges herself into my life.

  The feisty blonde, all toughness and attitude.

  She calls to me, distracting me from my mission and easing my rage.

  But I destroy anything I touch.

  The women who get too close end up dead.

  I can’t let it happen again.

  There’s no room for love anyway while I’m holding onto so much hate.

  1

  ~Spartan~

  NOT ENOUGH.

  It weren’t never enough.

  My fists plunged deep and real hard into the bag, making angry dents that I wished were wounds in that fucker's body. Thoughts like that were what’d been spurring me on for the last two hours of my workout. Who was I kidding? It’d been spurring me on for the last month. Ever since Knox Price had pulled a disappearing act on us.

  We’d been all geared-up to end it with him after so many years of him getting away with shit and slipping through our fingers. Years of him getting away with all the damage that he’d done to me, my baby girl, and my club.

  We’d managed to deal him a major blow, taking down his club, the notorious Rogue Riders MC. We’d got them all.

  All except him.

  The one I’d wanted more than any of them other twisted shits.

  Yeah, he was technically useless now with his whole club gone and being on the run and wanted by the law. But I couldn’t let it go.

  I wanted that fucker in the goddamn ground.

  He’d taken way too much from me.

  He’d murdered my wife. She’d been a true innocent. Sweet, caring, gentle. She’d never hurt nobody in her whole life. She’d spent her days spreading kindness and love wherever she went, to everybody she’d come into contact with.

  He’d tried to take my baby girl too.

  He’d ordered his guys to go after my club brothers and tried to destroy our brotherhood several times over.

  All outta greed.

  He’d murdered, maimed, and destroyed, all for something so fucking empty.

  He’d betrayed me for nothing!

  And it wouldn’t go unanswered.

  The idea of him still out there living his life, burned me down deep, nagging at me real fierce every goddamn day.

  The thing was, he weren’t seen as an active threat no more, just as a washed-up ex MC Prez. It meant that I couldn’t justify putting the club on it. The boys had been through enough anyway. I wasn’t gonna drag them through more bullshit and danger. It meant I had to handle it on my own and keep them outta it.

  As far as they all knew, I’d let it go, just like I had once before.

  I was the guy who didn’t get emotional about shit, the guy who lived by a strict code, a goddamn warrior’s code. I had ever since I’d enlisted years back. I didn’t lose my shit over nothing. I was the rock for everybody, always had been. I didn’t have the road name, Spartan, for nothing. The only time I’d ever strayed from all that was right after Andrea had been murdered. I’d lost it for a bit, my grief and rage getting the best of me. Finn had helped pull me outta that destructive mindset just in time, before I’d brought everyone down with me for my vengeance crusade.

  Since then I’d kept my head clear.

  Then that motherfucker had come at me and the club again.

  I’d never let it happen again.

  Even on the run and without his club, he was way too dangerous to be left out there. The guy just wouldn’t stay the fuck down. I couldn’t relax and let up until he was dealt with.

  But all of that took time, especially with me hiding it from the boys.

  So, in the meantime, I had to work out my frustrations somehow. I’d been down at Ricky’s a lot, a gym just a few miles outside of Ridgefield, away from the eyes of the club.

  I didn’t want them seeing me in this state, cuz then they’d know something was up.

  I was pounding out emotions I weren’t used to feeling.

  Frustration. Rage. Pain.

  All of it would stop once I managed to zero in on that fucker.

  Knox Price was a dead man walking.

  And there was nothing and nobody on this goddamn earth who was gonna stop me.

  The chain hooking the bag into the ceiling above rattled violently under my brutal attack.

  I could feel eyes on me. It was shit left over from my military days. I could sense everybody in the room, knowing right where they were at, how many were around me, and how many were too fucking close. Back in the day, that skill had meant the difference between life and death. Nowadays, it was just aggravating. I could never fully shut it out, shut the world out. It wasn’t just a skill. The intense way it worked now was some kinda PTSD symptom according to the shrink I’d seen after my wife’s death. Hell, I had a lot of symptoms of that shit, but I was handling it just fine on my own. I was leading my own club, leading a bunch of hardass complicated guys, and running an empire under the Iron Kings umbrella that was doing real well.

  I was fine, beyond functional.

  Sweat already drenching my skin and clothing, my heart pounding in my chest and my breath coming fast and hard, I pushed it fur
ther.

  Picking up speed and ferocity, I wailed on the bag, reaching a level of intense focus that started to block out my surroundings finally.

  “You know you’ve been hogging that thing for over an hour, right?”

  The voice cut through my nearing sense of satisfaction, jarring me right back to the reality of the crowded gym. It was fucking brutal.

  Pissed, I growled low in my throat, as I spun to see who the hell had dared to interrupt my workout. I’d been coming to Ricky’s long enough that everybody knew to keep outta my way.

  I was stumped to see a familiar face eyeing me in challenge, her hands slapped to her hips.

  Daniella Moore.

  She grinned. “You don’t know how to share, is that it?”

  “Dani.”

  “Spartan.”

  Goddamn it. She had a way of undercutting any negativity I was feeling with just a few words and that infectious smile of hers. How?

  She must’ve seen the violence of my workout, must’ve heard me growling when she’d bothered me, but she didn’t seem to care. She seemed immune to it.

  I took her in.

  Ice-blue eyes gazing up at me, glinting with challenge. Curly blonde hair pulled back off her face into a high ponytail. Gray track pants clinging to her tight little body. A neon-pink sports bra pushing her C-cup tits up into a real nice offering, the sports bra baring her toned stomach. And that was when I saw it. A scar to the right of her navel. I knew my battle wounds well. No doubt about it, it’d been caused by something with a serrated edge. It looked pretty fresh, a couple of years ago at the most.

  “Hey,” she called. “How about you quit staring like a creeper and move your big, hulking body away from that bag, so I can have my turn, huh?”

  A laugh exploded outta me. Watching a tiny little thing giving me grief was ludicrous. I couldn’t actually believe it was happening. She was really something else.

  I stepped away from the bag. “Have at it, love.”

  “There you go. You can share.” She brushed past me and dropped the sparkling silver bag she’d been holding. Crouching down, she pulled out a pair of gloves that were the same shade of pink as her sports bra. She slipped them on quick like a pro.

  I walked over to the bench a few feet away. I snatched up my towel and started dabbing away at my soaked skin and shirt as I watched her.

  Goddamn.

  Her hits came hard and fast like a whirlwind on the bag. Not just her fists neither. Nah, she was putting everything into it. Knees, feet, elbows. Her face was all determination, bordering on rage, as she went at it.

  It was real clear to me that it wasn’t just a workout to her. She was fighting. Fighting someone.

  “Your technique’s sloppy, love.”

  She stilled mid-punch and eyed me. Stepping back and dropping her arm, she asked, “What about it makes it sloppy?”

  “For one thing, you keep dropping your shoulder so your opponent’s gonna know where and when you’re gonna strike. Worse, though, your emotions are taking over and screwing up your aim and power.”

  Instead of taking it negatively, her eyes lit up. “Thank you. That’s useful. No one’s ever pointed that out to me before.”

  “No problem.”

  “So, what else?”

  I frowned. “Else?”

  “What else am I doing wrong? Or, right, even?”

  When I hesitated, she went on, “None of the trainers here will help me out. They say I’m too small and fragile,” she reported with disgust.

  Yeah, this gym weren’t known for being good for women. It weren’t friendly overall neither. A bunch of the members thought they were real badass, but I knew posers when I saw them. It didn’t mean they didn’t give off a dangerous, assholish vibe to civilians, though. The fact that she had the courage to walk in here, let alone actually join, said a hell of a lot about her. There weren’t nothing fragile about her.

  “They dunno what they’re talking about.”

  Hope lit her eyes. “Show me.”

  “What?”

  “Show me some stuff.”

  “I ain’t training you.”

  “Why not?” She folded her arms across her chest. It pushed her tits up and had my cock stirring.

  Before I could get a grip, she stepped right up to me. She smelled like coconut and strawberries. So fucking sweet. Shit. I checked myself real quick. Couldn’t be thinking like that. Couldn’t go there with her, not with nobody.

  I couldn’t be risking it.

  It was too dangerous.

  For her.

  “I got shit to do,” I told her.

  “Yeah? Like what?”

  “I run a club, a ton of businesses. I got brothers, staff, a daughter. All of them need me.”

  She studied me. She wasn’t buying that I had somewhere to be right now. In all fairness, I was lying. I’d taken a day off. I was free and clear, able to do whatever the fuck I wanted. Deviant, my VP, was holding the fort.

  “So,” she said, stepping right into my space, her eyes burning into mine. “Cold today, is it?”

  “What?”

  “You run hot and cold on me.”

  “Is that right?” I knew I did. I just didn’t know she’d picked up on it.

  She trailed her glove down my chest, her eyes burning into mine. “Next time you’re running hot, look me up.” She smirked, then walked back to her gym bag. Shucking off her gloves, she stowed them back inside. “See you around,” she said, tossing me a wink as she hauled her bag over her shoulder and strolled through the gym.

  Damn, she was something.

  But she was playing with a wolf.

  2

  ~Daniella~

  MY BODY WAS SHAKING.

  My pulse was going wild, my belly flip-flopping like crazy.

  That was the most brazen thing I’d ever done!

  It wasn’t like he was just anybody either.

  I’d just thrown the gauntlet down at the booted feet of the notorious president of a badass motorcycle club. A man who was ex Special Forces, a hardcore warrior. Rumors abounded about him back in Ridgefield, some claiming that he’d killed men with just his bare hands. He was a leather-clad, tatted up, muscular hulk of a man. He was a king to hardened, dangerous men.

  And he’d also been kinder and more respectful to me than any other man I’d ever known in my thirty-five years of life.

  When I’d retreated to Ridgefield a couple of years back, he was the one who’d made me feel welcome, the one who’d made the difficult transition from big city life to the small town world a lot easier.

  I smiled to myself at the memories as I pushed open the door to the locker room.

  Dropping my bag down in front of my locker, I swiftly unlocked it and pulled out my cell phone. Relief filled me when I checked the time and saw I still had twenty minutes to get back for my shift. I’d been worried I was running behind schedule. Waiting for the bag that Spartan had been hogging had cut into my workout time quite a bit. I’d done about twenty minutes on a speedbag, then waited for the one I’d really come there for. Every other one had been occupied by gym members just beginning their workouts. The owner had pointed me to Spartan’s, telling me he’d already been at it for a couple of hours and that he had to be off any minute. Twenty minutes of waiting later and he still hadn’t let up until I’d interrupted him.

  With a sigh, I stuffed my phone in my bag, along with my street clothes, locked up my locker, then headed to the bathroom. The locker room was unisex, so I couldn’t risk changing in there in case any of the creepy gym members walked on in. Given the number of lewd looks I kept getting out on the gym floor, I didn’t feel safe stripping off in such an accessible area.

  I pushed out of the locker room and made a sharp right for the bathroom, shoving open the heavy door and strolling inside… right into a half-naked body.

  “Holy shit!”

  I inadvertently dropped my bag in my shock. As I tried to reach for it, I tripped on the handle and
lost my balance, smacking right into the wall of hard, inked, rippling muscle in front of me.

  It was like some kind of clichéd meet-cute scenario ripped from a cheesy rom-com. Except I was already very familiar with Scott “Spartan” Tate. Now, with my body squished up against his half-naked body, intimately familiar.

  “Uh… sorry,” I mumbled, feeling my cheeks burning with embarrassment.

  I pressed my hand to his chest for leverage to push myself off him.

  A rumbling chuckle came from him as I steadied myself and stepped back, averting my eyes quickly.

  Was he seriously laughing at me? Agitation transcended my embarrassment and I found myself yelling, “Why the hell didn’t you lock the door?”

  “Lock’s broken,” he answered simply. “Why didn’t you knock?”

  “I was in a rush.”

  “You gotta be more careful.”

  My gaze shot to his. Was that a start of a lecture?

  He went on, “The guys here ain’t safe for you. Some of them have got their eye on you. What if it weren’t me in here right now?”

  Okay, that was actually really sweet.

  It had me softening and forgetting about my need to save face through being harsh and dismissive. My go-to basically when I felt ill at ease.

  Spartan didn’t deserve that.

  I nodded. “Okay, yeah.”

  He smiled then slipped his fingers into the waistband of his sweatpants, starting to pull them down.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Changing.”

  “Right now? In front of me?” I shot a glance over my shoulder. “With the door open?”

  He shrugged. “Ain’t got nothing to hide.”

  I tutted and turned and walked to the door, closing it.

  When I turned back around, my breath caught in my throat at the unbelievable sight before me.

  His pants were pooled on the floor at his feet and he stood there rifling through his duffel bag completely naked. Even more startling than that was the fact that his dick was hard, raging even. Two studs glistened in the head.

  Holy hell, he was magnificent.