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PROLOGUE

JUSTIN

I flip down the kickstand and relax into my seat, legs extended out on each side of my Harley-Davidson Dyna Glide Sport.

The glowing light of the night club gives a blue hue to the parking lot as the bass inside thumps low.

The allure of the night, getting lost in a stranger under the darkness of the club or the evening sky, it used to be a way to let loose after a long week.

The life of a punk kid, doing just enough to get by, and letting loose every chance I can without a second thought to anyone else or anything.

That was before, though.

Now, I’m changing.

This place doesn’t call to me like before.

My focus is shifted.

I’m no longer Justin William Miller, the youngster trying to figure out where I fit in this world.

The boy who left a small town to chase the dream of seeing the whole fucking world is long gone.

I’m not the Marine whose knee was busted up from shrapnel after an ambush and lost my career.

While I can’t exactly say who I am, I know who I’m not anymore.

At twenty-three, I’m in this in between space.

Some say go home.

What is there for me, back there?

Newton, North Carolina is nothing more than a dot on a map.

The Marines gave me purpose and an escape.

My future was supposed to be traveling the world and serving my country.

First time in combat and boom, the shrapnel hit and shattered my knee leaving me with a new one made of screws, metal, and God knows what else.

The occasional limp now and scar are the only way for anyone to know.

Don’t ask me to carry a ruck sack and do miles because my bum knee can’t do it and that’s what got me the discharge.

How many times did I try?

How many times did I put that sack on and attempt to put in the work?

I don’t remember, I lost count.

The way I pushed until my leg literally gave out from under me will always be a defining moment.

Willpower doesn’t always win.

That day was nothing more than leaving me eating a face full of gravel, grass, and humble pie.

Some things can’t be fixed with sheer willpower.

That is how Tripp and the Hellions found me.

In a bar down the street drowning myself in pity.

As a prospect now, I go where I’m told, do as instructed, and I don’t ask questions.

They don’t care if I can carry the weight of another man physically as long as mentally I can keep my mind on the club.

I can do this.

I can put my brothers before all others including myself.

I can follow orders as directed even if it’s not the best job in the club.

Even if it means picking up the President’s underage daughter who has been drinking a little too much with a fake ID.

A girl that is too beautiful for this world.

Dia Nicole Crews.

I don’t know her, not really.

I know of her, seen her around, from a distance sort of thing.

She is BW’s baby sister.

Eighteen years old, maybe nineteen now, but there is no way she’s legal to drink.

She graduated high school last fucking month.

I have no business even looking at her twice, but I’ll be damned if she doesn’t get everyone’s attention, including mine.

The instruction came from Tripp through BW.

Pick her up and make sure she is safe at home.

I won’t be leaving even if it means staying with her until she’s passed out.

Is this job ridiculous?

To some probably.

But the thing about prospecting is: respect.

Following an order, a directive without question is about trusting and respecting a brother.

I have to prove myself and this is just another step in that process.

Here I am, leaning against my bike, black hoodie pulled up, doing everything to keep my face neutral as a group of girls stumble out of the club front door.

Laughter spills out amongst them, drunken giggles as my eyes lock to hers.

She pauses as if time stops for her too.

She stands in black leather shorts, a red lace body suit, and black leather jacket casually draped over her shoulders, with little half boots on her feet.

Her blond hair is wild from dancing.

It’s her eyes, though, the curious look as she’s locked to my gaze.

She grabs a girl to her right by the arm, saying something before leaving the group making her way directly to me.

Her boots click against the pavement before she comes to a stop with just inches between us.

“You’re my ride?” she sort of asks and states at the same time.

She smells like vanilla and rum.

A fragrance that any man could be drunk on.

“BW sent me. Said you gotta come with me.”

She lifts an eyebrow, the corner of her mouth sliding up into a sly half-smile.

“Looks like I got lucky tonight. They sent hot stuff for me. This is a change. I’ll have to be sure to thank Blaine for the eye candy.”

There is a challenge to her tone.

I put my hands up in surrender.

“Just a ride, darlin’.”

She looks around then back to my bike.

“You’re gonna give me a ride?”

I nod as I hand her a helmet I had strapped to my sissy bar.

“Is that a problem?”

She hesitates then studies me.

“You don’t have an ol’ lady?”

Shaking my head, I answer honestly, “no time for that. I’m a fuckin’ prospect.” I let out a laugh and give her the reality to get off this personal shit.

“Need to get you home, make sure you’re safe, and then I’m sure I got some toilets to scrub, or a floor to mop.”

This elicits a laugh from her as she puts the helmet on.

I get on my bike, settling in as I slide the kickstand partially up, she climbs on behind me like she has done this a thousand times before.

She is Hellions royalty, I’m sure she has been on the back of a bike since before she could fucking walk.

She wraps her arms around my waist, relaxing in behind me with her chest tight to my back.

Something new settles inside my stomach.

I’ve had women on the back of my bike before.

Not one of them has ever been this calm getting in place.

To her, this is second nature.

She was born to ride.

I kick up my kickstand the rest of the way before firing up the engine, dropping a gear, and taking off.

Nothing about her changes, she is simply taking another ride on another bike, with another Hellion.

No tension, no reaction.

She doesn’t live far from the night club.

It’s a nice condo on the beach.

I couldn’t live here, the way all of them look the same, being set up alike, it isn’t my thing.

For a young woman, though, this is safer.

Plus, I know BW just moved her in not long ago.

It’s a summer thing until she goes back to school.

She’s in college.

I think someone said she wants to be a vet.

This is her summer break.

From what BW said, she’s struggling being away from home and as much as her parents want her to be with them, Doll thinks it’s best to let her have her own place to help her transition back to school.

Dia wants to have independence as well, according to her brother, but knowing Tripp, he’s still controlling it, and that is why she’s set up in this place.

Killing the engine, I hold my hand up for her to use as she climbs off my bike.

At the contact a different shock flows through me.

A silence settles in the air between us as she takes off the helmet shaking her already messy hair out.

“You wanna come in?” she invites.

“Shouldn’t invite random guys in your place, Dia.”

She shrugs, “you’re halfway to Hellion, you’re not random.”

“Halfway to Hellion, you got jokes,” I kid back with her.

No one said don’t go inside with her, and I wasn’t told to stay outside.

In fact, the directive was keep her safe and don’t leave until she’s sleeping off the night.

“Look I’m home from college for the summer. Not big on being alone. You’re safe. You’re not the kind of guy to murder me. Don’t make me stay the night by myself.”

Alone with Dia Crews is reason enough to say no.

She’s a dangerous drug with her looks and sweet personality, I could get high off being around her.

Yet, I find myself climbing off my ride.

She begins to walk ahead.

I pause taking off my helmet and contemplate what I’m doing as she looks over her shoulder at me.

“You comin’ or what?”

Like some lovesick fool, I follow and I can’t help but wonder if this very night will be my rebirth or my undoing.

Inside, the place is tidy.

It smells of lemon with a slight hint of burnt bacon, maybe from her breakfast.

I lock the door behind us as she heads into her kitchen.

“You want anything?” she asks and my idiot mind immediately thinks of all the naughty things I’d love to do to her.

Yeah, I want something: her.

“I’m good.”

She takes out a soda, popping the top to the can, taking a sip while gesturing for me to follow her to the living room.

She points to her couch, “sit.”

The leather is worn, comfortable.

She drops down beside me, but not touching me.

Tucking her legs under her, there is this casualness between us as if we do this regularly.

“Thanks for picking me up, Justin.”

“No problem.” I don’t actually know what to say.

I don’t want to be the dick that says I really didn’t have a choice.

BW issued the order and he’s fully patched now, just in the last couple of months actually.

I’m not going to question his order.

I don’t dare risk my final rocker over a ride.

“Most prospects aren’t this relaxed when they pull ‘Dia Duty’ to grab me.”

“I’m not most prospects.”

She studies me, eyes laser focused as she seems to be sobering up.

“No, Justin, you’re not like any other man.”

We sit in silence as she takes me in.

I don’t avoid her stare and I find I’m comfortable with her even without saying a word.

“Do you like it?”

“Do I like what?” I run my hands over my thighs, the denim of my jeans against my palms.

“Being a prospect?”

She nods.

I laugh, “Darlin’ no one likes being a prospect. Do you like it? Growing up in it?”

She smiles proudly.

“It’s all I know. I can’t imagine life any other way. People hear the words motorcycle club or Hellion, they make assumptions. It pisses me off. Guns, drugs, whores, trouble. In school some people wouldn’t let me come to their houses because of who my dad is.”

“Their loss, missing out on you.”

She pulls her tangled hair up into a messy bun using a hair tie on her wrist, but continues on her ramble.

“There is so much more to club life. As a brother, it’s loyalty, it’s family. As a female, it’s about unity. We are a community that sticks together through the good and the bad times. The world is an ugly place, I’ll take the Hellions all day over sorting life outside of it. That’s my family thick and thin.”

Our conversation flows easily and before I know it, the clock reads 4:13 and she’s half-asleep beside me on her couch.

“I should go,” I whisper softly.

Her eyes flutter, “you don’t have to.”

Oh, yes, I do.

The longer I stay, the more the lines blur.

She’s eighteen.

I’m twenty-three.

I’m a prospect in a club that her dad leads.

She is the kind of woman people protect from guys like me, not the kind who stay up and talk until dawn with.

However, I don’t move.

“You ever been on a real ride?”

She seems to wake up at that questions.

“Wide open, free?”

I nod.

She shakes her head.

“Tonight, maybe. With you, it’s the closest I’ve ever had.”

“No, a ride without a destination. No purpose. Just open air, miles, and opportunity.”

She smiles slow, in a sleepy daze, “that sounds perfect.”

Without thinking, I reply, “maybe I’ll take you sometime.”

She smirks, “Yeah, maybe you should.”

And just like that, we’re something.

We aren’t quite friends, no longer strangers.

Not something that can be defined or explained.

We are something.