Claiming Cody

When Lucky moved to the Outer Banks to work in Thorn and Cain's surf shop and eventually fell in love with them, Cody lost himself in gambling to dull the ache of missing his best friend. The flashing lights of the casino, the feel of cards beneath his fingers, and the rough-smooth texture of poker chips all served to drag him deeper into an addiction he was slowly giving himself over to. It helps that he works security there, easy access, and an increasing reason not to go back home. The Rollin' Jokers are family, always would be, but there's an ache Cody can't fill with the roar of his machine and the wind in his hair. The best he can hope for is to dull it one bet at a time.

Wreck owes a lot to the Rollin' Jokers MC, after all, his old man was a founding member. So, when the Joker's president asked for a favor, no way would he turn him down. Even if the favor meant playing babysitter to Mark's out-of-control son, Cody, who seemed to get a kick out of pushing buttons Wreck didn't know he had. Still, he has no intention of letting Mark down, and if that means teaching Cody some discipline, well then, there are plenty of ways he could make it fun...for them both.

Only...Cody's got different ideas, and issues that are only just being brought to light. Add in bad boy Bellamy, the wandering nomad biker who happens to land on the same road Cody's cruising down, and Wreck finds his carefully ordered world turned upside-down. Now he's wrangling kittens, including a human-sized one hell-bent on making a home in Wreck's lap when he's not looking to scratch his eyes out...and Bellamy? Let's just say that's the mystery element in an equation Wreck's not certain he can solve.

With the past closing in and the future uncertain, Wreck's desperate to find a way to protect Cody....from himself, from his demons, and from a past that's come back to haunt him.

LAYLA DORINE lives among the sprawling prairies of Midwestern America, in a house with more cats than people. She loves hiking, fishing, swimming, martial arts, camping out, photography, traveling, and visiting museums and haunted places.

Layla got hooked on writing as a child and she hasn't stopped writing since. Hard times, troubled times, the lives of her characters are never easy, but then what life is? The story is in the struggle, the journey, the triumphs and the falls. She writes about artists, musicians, loners, drifters, dreamers, hippies, bikers, truckers, hunters and all the other folks that she's met and fallen in love with over the years. Sometimes she writes urban romance and sometimes its aliens crash landing near a roadside bar. When she isn't writing, or wandering somewhere outdoors, she can often be found curled up with a good book and a kitty on her lap.