“Since they’re already here for the night…”

“I’ll wait until morning to make the call.”

“Goodnight.”

Grace lay back down, turning her light off. This was the time of day she dreaded the most, even with Bear and Daisy. She heard every sound. Sometimes, she even imagined she heard Winston’s footsteps coming down the hallway. She and Simone had waited in fear for the sound. She rolled over, curling into a ball.

Ice was back home in his biker club, surrounded by the men he called his brothers. He gained strength from having them close. Maybe she needed to take a lesson from him and start letting others into her life. Maybe then she could quit hearing those footsteps.

Chapter 14

“Are you sure you don’t mind?” CeCe asked.

“I’m sure. Go ahead and have some fun. I don’t expect you to sit here with me all night,” Grace told her.

“You wouldn’t be sitting here if you would accept one of the invitations to dance.”

“I will when the right one asks.” Grace had no intention of dancing with the few men who’d had the courage to approach her. One even sat down next to her in an attempt to draw her attention. Disgusted when he had picked his nose and winked at another woman passing their table, she asked him to leave.

It had been a terrible idea coming out with CeCe to the local hangout. She would give CeCe fifteen more minutes, then she had every intention of making an excuse to leave.

Grace watched CeCe and her pick-up move toward the dance floor while a couple at the next table argued. The young woman was angry with her fiancé over spending time with his mother the evening before.

“If I knew you were such a mama’s boy, I would never have started dating you to begin with.”

For several minutes, Grace was forced to listen to her berate and belittle the man who tried to soothe her anger repeatedly by apologizing.

Finally, the woman got up and left him sitting at the table alone, telling him she was going to the restroom. Grace had to bite her lip to keep from telling him to make a run for it while he had the chance. Instead, she watched the others on the dance floor.

When a chair next to her was pulled out, her head turned and she met ice-blue eyes staring back at her. She didn’t know if she should be frightened he was here. He was thinner than she remembered and his hair was cut close to his head showed a healing gash. The new haircut made him appear even meaner and more dangerous.

“Hello, Grace.”

“Ice, what... What are you doing here?” She looked wildly toward the dance floor for CeCe, but she had disappeared. She searched the room and found her talking at the bar with a different man. She also saw Max and Jackal at the other end, both standing casually, drinking beers.

Ice shrugged. “Would you believe I was in the neighborhood and stopped in for a beer?”

She licked her suddenly dry lips. “Were you?”

A smile tugged at his sensual lips. “No.”

“Oh.”

“How have you been?”

“Good. You?”

“Good,” he repeated her brief answer, his eyes sliding over her body in the royal-blue dress. “You look beautiful tonight.”

“Thank you. My brother told me you got out.”

“You told your brother about me?” He reached out, tugging the passing waitress’s skirt. “Honey, bring me a beer.”

The woman had initially looked angry at his familiarity, but when she got a good look at Ice, her frosty expression warmed, and she smiled seductively back at him.

“Sure thing, sugar.”

Grace mentally noted he had called her honey. So he routinely uses affectionate terms to address women, she thought.

“Only that you were the one to take me hostage,” Grace told him, taking a sip of her drink. “He wanted to let me know the man responsible for holding me hostage was out of prison.”

“I can tell you’re still pissed.”

“A woman tends to hold a grudge over something like that, Ice.”

“I was hoping you would have gotten over it by now.”

Grace narrowed her eyes on him. Was the man crazy?

While the woman from the next table sat back down and immediately began berating her fiancé for not ordering her another drink, the waitress returned, setting down Ice’s beer in front of him.

“Here you go, sugar.” Ice reached inside his wallet and pulled out a twenty. “Keep the change.”

“Thanks, sweet thing.” The waitress seemed even more attracted to him, giving Ice a slip of paper before moving off.

“Go away, Ice,” Grace told him as soon as he turned back to her.

He frowned at her closed expression. “No. I’ve had to wait for those dickheads watching you to back off.” Ice leaned closer to her. “I’ve missed you.”

Grace sat stunned by his admission. “I can tell,” she said snidely.

Ice crumpled the slip of paper, tossing it across the table. “Baby, I only have eyes for you.”

“Do. Not. Call me. Baby.”

“I think you need to loosen up. Let’s dance.”

“I don’t…” Before she could finish her protest, he pulled her from her chair and led her toward the dance floor.

Grace didn’t want to make a scene. She would dance one dance with him then find a way to slip from the club and go home.

It had been a long time since she had danced. Her mother had often thrown extravagant parties as she grew up, and she had learned to dance at an early age. She had also been allowed in nightclubs in Paris with her friends with Dax escorting them.

She had suppressed her love of dancing by staying away from the dance floor. Now, listening to the music, she was unable to prevent that love from slipping free. Her body moved lithely to the music. Ice was a good dancer, also, moving against her to the sensual beat. She raised her arms to the ceiling as her hips rotated in moves which drew attention to her, but she was unaware, lost in her own pleasure.

As soon as the music ended, Ice escorted her from the dance floor before another song had a chance to begin.

“I wanted to dance again,” she protested with a pout on her face, wanting to lose herself again.

“You want to dance? I’ll dance with you in private. Where did you learn to dance like that?”

“Paris,” she said, flouncing back to her chair. She noticed the man with the irritating fiancée watching her.

“Jesus, woman, you’ve given every man here a hard-on.”

Grace blushed bright red. Dax had gotten in many fights when she was younger with men she had spent the night dancing with. She had forgotten how uninhibited she tended to be while dancing.

“Sorry.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry about. Next time, we’ll be in a private place where I have a bed close by.” Ice grinned at her wickedly.

“There won’t be a next time. I don’t want to see you again. I don’t know why you came to see me, but nothing is going to happen between us.” Grace decided the best way to handle a man like Ice was to be forthright and honest.

“Why not?”

“Because...” She stared at the sexy man sitting next to her and briefly drew a blank. Then reason returned.