Free To the Edge by Cindy Gerard

in every crease, crag, and crevice on his face and flared in the wildness of his dilated pupils. He was bare to the waist but for a few strips of fringed leather and a loop of heavy chain linked by two nipple rings.
    My God, that had to hurt.
    When he caught her staring, he flexed his left pec and the tattoo on his chest of a naked woman with a witchy red mouth and humongous breasts wiggled her hips.
    "Rule number one: Never make eye contact."
    Jillian whipped her head toward Char, who was watching her with cynical amusement. She couldn't help it. Fascinated, she swung her gaze back to biker man. He licked his lips, grabbed his crotch with one hand, and made an equally lewd gesture with his pool cue with the other.
    The air deflated from her lungs in a rush. "Oh God."
    "You did it again." Char slammed her bat in plain view on top of the bar. "Do not look at the animals," she ordered for good measure. "Unless you want to feed 'em."
    Jillian threw her a horrified look.
    "Didn't think so," she said, cackling.
    Carefully avoiding eye contact with anyone, Jillian searched the corners of the bar for Garrett. She'd just spottedhim when all hell broke loose.
    A table crashed to the floor, making her jump as another man stood—his young face bloodied and battered—and flashed Garrett a grin so wide, it almost closed the one eye that wasn't swollen shut. To the sound of breaking glass, vicious curses, and a war cry of, "Hooah!" he dived into a sea of bikers in a blur of flying fists.
    Jillian watched in stunned horror as Garrett, with a smile—a smile, for God's sake—calmly picked up a pool cue and waded in toward him.
    It all happened so fast that she could barely follow the action. She'd taken a self-defense class once where the instructor had demonstrated how to place a hard kick to the thigh that, in theory, shocked the femoral artery and rendered the attacker unconscious. Jillian had never seen the technique put to practical use. In fact, she'd forgotten about it.Until now.
    In a lightning fast move, Garrett proved the theory on the firstdo-rag dull witted enough to come at him with a knife. She sucked in air on a gasp as a beefy, oily biker took a swipe at Garrett's ribs with a wicked and lethal-looking knife. He dodged, spun, and with a well-placed kick dropped his attacker like a stone.
    She hadn't even digested the violent stealth of the action when, giving a little come-on motion with the cupped fingers of his left hand, Garrett invited the next comer to experience the brunt of the blunt end of the pool cue. Garrett's precision jab to his diaphragm was followed by a hard, quick strike to his jaw. The Hulk Hogan look-alike folded with a thudding moan.
    After that, the not-so-bad-after-all bad boys still standing didn't have much left in them except empty threats and bruised biker egos—not that they didn't continue to make a lot of noise. But for the most part, it was pretty much all over but the obscenities that they hurled like rocks.
    All business, completely in control, Garrett snagged the Hooah boy by the back of his shirt and dragged him to his feet. Using only the pool cue as a deterrent, Garrett backed toward the door holding off anyone who might be stupid enough to challenge him. Considering that the amassed IQ of all bikers present most likely topped out around 100, she was amazed when none of them did.
    "Get out from behind the bar and head for the car," Garrett ordered her quietly.
    Jillian was so enthralled by the skillful and expedient violence he'd used to deal with the situation, and so relieved to be getting out of there without a little up close and personal contact with her crotch-grabbing admirer, she didn't even bother to rail at Garrett for issuing orders and expecting her to hop to—like she was an army grunt or some harpy biker babe who lived to lick his boots ... or get in his pants.
    "Not so fast, chickie." Char held out her hand.
    When Jillian just blinked, the bartender dug the other half of