Maverick (Dark and Dirty Sinners' MC #6) - Serena Akeroyd

Prologue

Maverick

The tight space of my bunk was no place for two guys to lie together, at least not in this fucking heat.

I thought I’d known the likes of this smothering inferno before, but nothing beat this summer in Kembesh. While we were up high in the mountains, sheltered somewhat from the outright blast of bone melting hell, the monsoons had been particularly bad this year. My insides felt like they were being stewed, and I was used to worse circumstances than this one. Used to the worst combat situations imaginable.

I blew out a breath, which made the hairs on Nic’s chest shift under the breeze and, trust me, in these conditions, that was about as much of a hurricane as it got around here. I studied his pecs, abs, and the delicious divots where his muscles created a whole different plane of their own, and I was beyond tempted to rest my hand there, to let my fingers slide down to cup his dick.

But I couldn’t.

We were bunking with our ODA, an unusually small one of ten members because we’d just lost Harrison and Wamba. They’d been blown up, and the rest of us bunch of Snake Eaters—Special Forces—were still coming to terms with their deaths. Wamba was the last fucker I thought we’d lose. He was neurotic all the way, following regulations left and right to his usual point of madness. If anyone should have died in that IED explosion, it was me.

I’d never been good at following orders, which technically made me a shit soldier, but I tried to follow rules as much as I was able to. Being raised with MC brats had me questioning shit I shouldn’t really question, but along the way, I’d pulled some crazy stunts, saved some important people, and I’d managed to earn my place in the Green Berets.

Nic was older than me and I was his subordinate, and we definitely weren’t supposed to be fucking, but the other guys turned a blind eye to all that when he had his hallucinations.

The whole team knew Nic should be back home, we all knew he should be retired, but he was too good at what he did, and our SOB of a colonel kept pulling shit, doctoring his reports, and making moves that saw Nic in the sandbox time and time again.

We were tight, brothers in arms who would die for each other, but for Nic, we wouldn’t just die—we’d outright fucking kill.

That was the level of devotion he stirred in us.

We’d go into hell for him, would cross the Judecca to bring him back. Only trouble was, the river of wailing in Hades was where Nic’s mind was half the time anyway. How could we retrieve someone from their thoughts? Rescue them mentally if not physically?

But our love for him was why our bunk was at the back. The others had adjusted theirs, made makeshift curtains to give us some privacy that was more for their benefit than ours. I’d go so far to say that Rodger and Ruby were homophobes, but they never said shit.

Never would.

Because I kept Nic going. I kept him lucid.

I had no idea why, but I did. Lying in this tight bunk with him, just breathing the same air, just relaxing as much as we could in this fucking shithole, it calmed him down.

I respected the others too much to try anything, even though I wanted to. Losing Wamba and Harrison was hitting us all hard, and knowing we were about to get two new team members wasn’t helping. With what we did, we needed to trust our brothers, and that was tough when we had to bring two new soldiers in. More than that, we had to survive long enough to get those new team members—

“I’ve got a bad feeling about this place, Mav.”

Those were the first words he’d said since he’d woken up from a fitful sleep.

“That’s because you’re paranoid,” I replied lightly, even though he really wasn’t. Nic had an inbuilt monitor for trouble that was usually spot on. But as unease filtered through me because I knew he was right, I tried to shift the tone. “You just know that the only MREs we have left are the goulash.”

He pulled a face, but his smile peeped through. He was filthy—we all were. This combat outpost was in the middle of Bumfuck, Afghanistan, and it was barely functioning as we’d just recouped it from the Taliban two nights ago. Running water was a luxury right