With a knee to the balls.

The chick had grit and I respected that.

Once I was seated, there were limited spots to choose from. Shane got in behind me and Harper climbed onto his lap. Axton sat with Dallas on his lap, his hand going automatically to her still flat stomach. The way those two kept reproducing they were going to have their own rock band within a few years. Rhett and Linc got in with Linc having to sit between me and Devlin and Rhett to squeeze in between Natalie and Shane, leaving Marissa the last one to get in.

She stuck her head in and huffed. “Okay, now where is my big ass going to sit?”

“Marissa!” Dallas, Natalie, and Harper all scolded her with a glare.

“Hey, my ass makes two of any of yours. So yeah, it’s big. Now where do I sit?”

Before I could open my mouth, Linc reached forward and pulled her inside. “Your sexy ass is going to sit right here.” He arranged her on his lap and then buried his face in her neck, making her giggle. “Damn girl. You smell so good. If I didn’t like dick so much I’d totally be all over you.”

I gritted my teeth, silently repeating to myself that Linc was gay and I had nothing to worry about. There was no reason to rip his spine out through his throat. None at all.

Rhett and Natalie’s snickers caught my attention, distracting me momentarily from thoughts of wanting to destroy the man who had been able to help Liam turn his life around so completely with the personal training he provided. Rhett had his arm around Natalie’s shoulders, whispering something that was making them both crack up. The way those two acted around each other was a lot like the way Rhett and Marissa acted. It confused the hell out of me.

Who was he really after? Which one of them was he actually sleeping with?

Devlin grunted at the sight and turned to pound on the partition that separated the back from the driver. “Let’s get the fuck going,” he barked and the limo pulled out into traffic.

Traffic was still pretty backed up from all the fans going home from the concert so it took a good thirty minutes before we got to the club in downtown Chicago. When we got there we went straight to the VIP room that was on the second floor and had its own bar. Surprisingly, Emmie and Nik were already there along with a few of the members of Trance and Alchemy.

“How did you get here before us?” Jesse demanded as he took the bottle of Corona that Emmie offered him. “I thought you weren’t leaving until later.”

“Interesting story,” Nik said as he handed me a bottle of Bud. I took a thirsty swallow as he explained how their driver had taken a detour that had gotten them to the club ten minutes ahead of us even after they had left after us.

“I’m surprised that Emmie let the driver live,” Natalie commented as she took a long swallow from her glass of Sprite.

“He might be alive, but he won’t be forgetting Em anytime soon. Not with that black eye she gave him,” Bishop, the lead singer for Alchemy assured everyone with a hard laugh. “But I realized a valuable lesson. I’m never gonna piss her off.”

“Yeah, you’ll live longer that way,” Nik assured the man with a grin. Wrapping his arms around his wife, he leaned back in his chair, sipping at his own beer.

For the next hour I turned my attention to drinking beer and trying not to let my eyes stray too often toward Marissa who was doing everything she possibly could to avoid me but also gain my attention all at once. She didn’t drink her usual white wine, instead going straight for shots with Felicity, Rhett, Carver, Dave, and Linc. She laughed and squealed as she danced with several of Trance’s band members all at once, then wrapped her arms around Rhett’s waist and swayed back and forth to a slow song with her head on the rocker’s shoulder.

If she wanted to make my blood boil she was doing a flawless job of it. And the madder I got, the more beer I drank. Two hours in I was feeling the effects of a few too many beers and the need to make Marissa and every fucking body else know that she belonged to me and only me.

She was out on the dance floor with a glass of something fruity in one hand and her other hand wrapped around Rhett’s arm as she danced between him, Natalie and Linc. I slammed my now empty bottle of beer down onto the bar top, making Emmie—who had been standing close by—jump. But I didn’t think to apologize. My mind was cloudy but focused on only one mission.

Kiss Marissa.

“Fuck, why am I the only sober one when he is suddenly shit faced?” I thought I heard Axton whine behind me.

Was I shitfaced? Maybe, but I didn’t care.

As I strode toward my girl, someone stepped in front of me, but I pushed past him, not caring if I knocked the man on his ass or not. As I drew closer, Natalie and Linc stopped dancing and Natalie took a few steps back, pulling Linc with her. After a small hesitation she reached for Rhett and tugged him back with her and the muscle head. Marissa, oblivious to her friends’ desertion and my approach continued to sway to the soft music with her eyes nearly closed.

My buzzed mind decided to take advantage of her like that and I wrapped my arms around her from behind. My hands folded around her waist and I lowered my head even as she stiffened in my arms. Burying my nose in her neck, I inhaled like a man deprived of oxygen would take in lungful after lungful of fresh air. Dallas had been right earlier. Marissa’s shampoo did smell good. It was something different from what she had once used, but it smelled delicious and made her hair soft and shiny.

Marissa tried to turn in my arms but I tightened my hold around her waist, locking her in place against me. As if it had developed a mind of its own, my tongue snuck out and tasted the soft skin under her ear, rewarding me instantly with a shiver that she was unable to contain. Around us everyone else disappeared and I swayed to the music with her. I didn’t dance, but if it meant I got to have her in my arms then I would do the fucking Macarena.

The feel of her in my arms, the taste of her skin on my tongue and her body brushing against mine as I forced her to dance with me was working havoc on my body. With the seven beers I’d consumed lowering my inhibitions, I was powerless to control the hunger that was starting to consume me. With a groan that sounded like a growl even to my own ears, I turned her around to face me.

Blue eyes stared up at me with a mixture of hurt, confusion, and anger. Her mouth, that beautiful luscious mouth, opened to say something but I fused my lips to hers and swallowed whatever she had been about to say. She stiffened in my arms even more, but I brushed my lips back and forth coaxingly until she relaxed against me and began to kiss me back. The taste of her invaded my senses, consuming me with her honey flavored essence. I wanted more, craved more. I felt her sigh more than heard it and her hands grabbed hold of the hem of my T-shirt and pulled me closer.