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About Rycks by Marteeka Karland
Title: Rycks
Author: Marteeka Karland
Series: Black Reign MC #1
Genre: Contemporary, Motorcycle Club Romance
Lyric: I’m in so much trouble. My orders are to find the highest ranking member of Salvation’s Bane or Black Reign MCs and sleep with them. Worm my way into their bed for longer than one night so I can take back information to Kiss of Death. Little did I know I’d find the one man I could never forget. The man who broke my heart six years ago and left me to fend for myself against a ruthless club who would break me the first chance they got.
Rycks: The second I saw here I wanted to punish her. Lyric ran out on me six years ago. Not that I’d given her any reason to stay. Now, she waltzes back into my life with an agenda I can’t figure out. When I do, I can’t decide what to do. The truth is as scary as it is infuriating. Lyric is my torment. She’s sent to me as bait in a bigger plan I can’t fathom. Mainly because I’m too distracted by what she reveals. Now I’m questioning my loyalties to both her and my mentor, El Diablo. She pulls at my need to protect at the same time she might just prove herself to be a traitor.
WARNING: Contains scene of violence, explicit language, and adult situations. Rycks is the first book in the Black Reign series. While you can read it as a stand alone book, you may better understand the characters and situations if you read books in the Bones MC and Salvation’s Bane MC series.
Excerpt from Rycks
© 2021
Marteeka Karland
My heart was pounding. Something wasn’t right. When I entered the other room, there was a long, semicircular table. In the center, in front of the table, was a chair on a black mat. Men sat at the table while more stood in the background. Wouldn’t you know it, Rycks led me to the center chair and indicated I should sit.
I looked up at him. He didn’t meet my gaze.
“You’ll answer their questions truthfully and completely,” he said softly. Then, finally, he met my gaze. When his eyes locked with mine, I knew I was looking at death itself.
Sucking in a little gasp, I swallowed. Then I nodded. “I’ve got nothing to hide.”
“You’ll address yourself to us, Lyric.” Havoc, the vice president of Salvation’s Bane, instructed. “Rycks isn’t a member of our MC. He’s here out of courtesy to him and his club since he’s helping us with this ongoing matter.” Havoc’s tone wasn’t unkind, but it wasn’t gentle either. The man meant business. Whatever had happened to lead to this meeting was serious. And more than just me confessing something to Rycks in an effort to help their club. “Do you understand?” When I nodded, he continued. “You told Rycks last night that you’d been sent by Kiss of Death to glean information from us.”
It took me a second to realize he expected an answer, that it wasn’t rhetorical. Then I responded simply, “Yes.”
“Did you pass on anything you saw? Anything you heard?”
“No. I was with Rycks from the time I met up with him until now.” I thought about the bugs. Was now when I needed to tell them? What was the protocol? Before I could answer, I was interrupted.
“We’re aware of that,” Havoc said. “What I want to know is, did you make it so that Kiss of Death could gather information on our club from the inside. Did you plant any listening or video devices?”
So they had found them.
“Yes. Not tonight, but when I was here before with Wrangler. In the common room. Last night, I was searched before I came in.”
“So you had nothing we could readily see or detect if we didn’t know what to look for.”
What was he getting at?
“Sir, I was with Rycks the entire night. Yes, I did as I was instructed and planted three bugs. I have no idea if they were visual or audio, but they had to be pressed into a wall or flimsy piece of wood. I didn’t go anywhere other than the common room, and the bathrooms I was allowed into all have tiled walls.”
“But you were there an hour and a half before you left with Rycks.”
I paused, thinking. “I suppose so, yes. But I was in the common room the entire time.”
Havoc nodded once, then used a remote to turn on a big TV across the room. My attention automatically focused there. On the screen, I saw myself at the bar with the time stamp. After a couple of seconds, the camera zoomed in. It focused on my left hand where I had apparently removed something from the pocket of my shorts and placed it under the lip of the bar. Then another scene with me doing the same at a table. And a couch. All of them out-of-the-way places that were easily accessible, but wouldn’t be noticed if they hadn’t been looking for them.
“I didn’t do that.” I said softly. “If you pan back, you’ll see it’s not me. I didn’t have anything that stuck to anything. It had to be pushed into the wall. Like a thumb tack.”
He did. And it was me.
“After checking the places in question, we found listening devices. There were also a couple of video devices. Then, you left the room. You stopped to talk to a club girl and get directions to the bathroom. She pointed you in a direction down the hall, which you followed. Only you didn’t go to the bathroom. You went to Thorn’s office.”
The next video on the screen was of her, rifling through the drawers in the president’s desk. Again, it looked as if she planted bugs all around the room.
“I’m going to need you to show us where all those bugs are, Lyric,” Havoc said. “We found some of them, but they’re extremely tiny. There were at least three places where it looked like you planted something, but we couldn’t locate the device.”
“But I didn’t –”
“Stop lying!” Rycks growled. “I gave you a chance to come clean with me, Lyric. You told me about Kiss of Death expecting you to infiltrate Bane and set yourself up with a patched member to feed them information. You neglected to tell me you’d already bugged the whole compound. How many times have you been here with Wrangler?”
“Only once. It was when I planted the bugs I was given. I didn’t lie to you, other than not telling you about them. I intended to, but our conversation was pretty intense and emotionally draining. Other than this, I’ve been completely honest with you. It was an honest omission.” “Bullshit,” he spat. I felt like he’d slapped me. I even flinched a little before I could stop myself. If I’d lost Rycks’s protection, I was fucked. Whatever happened down here, I had no hope of preventing. At that moment, I wasn’t sure I cared. Because, no matter what Salvation’s Bane did to me, it was going to be so much worse for Bella. And she’d never understand what was happening. Rycks had just ripped out my heart for more than one reason. I loved Bella with everything inside me, but I hadn’t realized how much I was beginning to care for Rycks. I hadn’t realized how tightly he had a hold of my heart until he ripped it from my chest. If they killed me, at least the pain would go away. But what would happen to Bella?
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About Marteeka Karland
Romance author by night, emergency room tech/clerk by day, Marteeka Karland works really hard to drive everyone in her life completely and totally nuts. She has been creating stories from her warped imagination since she was in the third grade. Her love of writing blossomed throughout her teenage years until it developed into the totally unorthodox and irreverent style her English teachers tried so hard to rid her of. Now, she breathes life into faeries, space hunters, werewolves, vampires, shapeshifters, and a few just plain ole ordinary people. She loves to see the awkward, self-conscious band geek get the captain of the football team and make him beg for it.
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