The Bare Bones (The Bare Bones MC) by Layla Wolfe Page B

know how to explain it to him without explaining the reasoning behind it. I decided to keep it to myself. If I confessed that a psychologist thought my frigidity—or “anorgasmia” as they more clinically termed it these days—was a direct result of Cropper’s disgusting molestation of me, the whole story would spill out. Ford would go bury Cropper, the club would fall apart, and Ford would possibly wind up in jail.
    Maybe I was giving myself too much credit for deeply affecting Ford. I’d seen him toss beefy bruisers around a boxing ring like they were made of foam rubber, and I’d seen him pull his Sig Sauer on a guy who cut him off in traffic. Cropper had been right about a few things. Ford was no angelic saint, and he was more dark-skinned than anyone knew.
    “What?” said Ford slyly, fishing for a compliment.
    I made a bowtie with my drawstring. “I’ve actually never had that huge of an orgasm. Damn. I always suspected you’d be one hugely talented guy in bed.”
    This was enough to make Ford embrace me and plant an enormous smooch on me. At first it was kind of disgusting, seeing as how he’d just had his face buried between my legs. But he’d wiped his face off and I could only vaguely taste it. I figured these Bare Bones men had put their faces in far worse things before.
    A strange thing happened. Love surged through me. It was as though the orgasm opened up the floodgates and it all came pouring out. Such a powerful, frightening deluge of pure love that was so strong my chest literally wrenched with the vitality of it.
    It terrified me.
    If you never love anyone, you can never be hurt, right?
    I didn’t love Dr. Dubois in the same way I’d always loved Ford. My feelings for Jake were safer, more conventional, more shallow. Jake was certainly handsome, a good provider, popular in social circles. He was moody but knew to never cross any lines, to never get too intense.
    That’s what I wanted. Love makes you crazy. Love reaches its fist down your throat and wrenches your organs from you. Love consumes you, so you have no room in your soul to think of anyone else.
    I couldn’t get involved with the Bare Bones, much less the Veep who controlled everything. It would upset my life. It would take everything and turn it upside-down and shake it until the nuts and bolts and all the embarrassing little broken things fell out.
    “Ah,” Ford sighed with contentment against my mouth. “My Maddy. My little Cookie. I’m staking my claim. You’re mine. Mine and only mine. You’re my property, my sweet Cookie.”
    I was blown away that he’d remember what he slipped up and called me that fateful day we kissed in the pool. He’d called me sugar cookie and now he was doing it again, in a purposeful and cruel attempt to reel me in.
    I was relieved when someone knocked on the door. Ford being here in the hospital to begin with was a gigantic shock, in and of itself. Him muff diving in a locked hospital room was enough to scar me for life.
    I wanted nothing more than to make out with him forever, feel his velvety lips against mine, to take his enormous cock in my hand and satisfy him. But I was a registered nurse, accustomed to forcing myself to do unpleasant tasks. The unpleasant thing right now was to stop being self-indulgent and get back to reality.
    “Oh!” I cried, sitting up straight.
    Ford’s dopey smile never left his face, and I remembered he could only hear out of one ear. The pressure of the IED blast wave had probably ruptured his eardrum and slammed his brain against the inside of his skull.
    I pointed at the door, my eyebrows raised. “Someone’s there.”
    “Madison?” It was a muffled male voice.
    What the fuck? How did anyone know it was me ? I shot Ford a fearful look. “Yes?”
    “This is Security. Just wanted to know if you were okay in there.”
    Standing, I adjusted my uniform and gestured at Ford to do the same. When he stood, his belt buckle I had undone dangled heavily between