Page 2 of Her Feral Biker (Savage Kings MC #6)

ANNALISE

He followed me home, the leather clad man who watched me from across the street while I worked.

He watched me after I shut the shop up, too, and made up my decorations for the next day.

And when I unpacked my stock a few days early, putting out unseasonably warm weather clothing for the kids that their parents probably wouldn't want to buy just yet.

But I wanted to see how long he’d stay watching me for. How long he would wait.

If him being there would keep the other monsters who visited me during the night at bay.

Because the man dressed all in leather who stood next to the black motorbike that lacked the showy chrome all the other bikes in town seemed to have in excess, that man, he never moved.

Not for all the hours as the sun beat down on him.

Not after it set and left him and the bike in the darkness, both of them blending into the shadows all too well like they belonged within their shroud. But I knew he was there.

Watching. And waiting.

The other monsters who visited stayed away wherever he was present.

For once, I closed up my shop and walked home unaccosted. It took everything I had not to peek out my window that night and see how long he waited outside the house, but something told me that he wouldn't stay. Not once I stepped through that door.

And…out again.

Because I walked into the house, avoided everyone because they were asleep, and walked back out before they were awake the next morning.

The life of an overworked avoidance insomniac.

I cracked open the door on the shop to the first flicker of sunrise the next day, my legs aching almost as much as my eyeballs, and found a card wedged into the doorframe.

Missed you last night.

Nothing else. That was it. The entire message.

I stared at the printed—the freaking printed —card, aware who it was from.

My breath stalled, knowing the monsters who loitered in the darkest shadows were only afraid of the things they couldn’t see.

I crumpled the card in my hand and kicked the door shut behind me, staring at the carnage of my midnight crafting session the night before.

My unaccosted crafting session, because of my watchman.

Some monsters are scarier than others.

“No, you didn’t miss me at all. Coward,” I murmured, dropping my bags near the counter.

Navigating my way around last night’s mess, I tossed the balled up card into the empty trash can and headed for the sole luxury in the shop that I allowed myself: a coffee machine in the back.

The scent of roasted beans filled the shop’s small interior as I worked.

By the time the sun had risen in full and people littered the sidewalk out the front of my window with their waves and jaunty smiles, I was caffeinated and ready to start my day.

Also, my floor was clean, the shop was tidy and the offending message was buried at the bottom of my little plastic pink trash can that matched the rest of this season’s decor.

By the time those same shadows outside grew long, my eyelids drooped and my coffee refill had grown cold. I tapped my mug with listless fingers and wished I had an extra hand to help out in the shop, but that was part of being a sole business owner…the sole part.

“Thank you,” I murmured to Janice Flannigan as I failed to cover a yawn. “I’m sure she’ll love it.”

She stared at me with over made up eyes. “Yes, I’m sure he will,” she said pointedly, tossing bleached hair.

“Mhmm. Yep.” I nodded, my gaze sliding to my watch. Two hours to go .

“Can you believe it? We have so many people in town today!” Clarissa, my local hairdresser, bounced through the doors as Janice exited, holding a bouquet of paper flowers.

I blinked at her. “We do?” Her shop was a good two blocks up, and we rarely got to talk unless it was absolutely dead. Which did happen. “What are you doing down here, then?” I yawned again.

Okay, so midnight decorating was a really bad idea.

At least I closed on Sundays. I could sleep then. Wait, what day was it again?

“It’s sale night, remember? The shops are staying open for a few extra hours.” She peered at me, her brows dipping beneath her perfectly curled, blonde-bombshell fringe. “You do remember, right?”

“Uh huh. Yep.” My conversational skills were complete for the day. “Four hours to go. Whoo.” I added a smile when my cheer fell flat. “Whoo?”

“Five hours to go, Annalise. Do you want me to make you another coffee? Are you sick?” Her hand drifted toward my forehead.

I backed up a step and bumped my butt on the counter. “Nope. Not sick. Just tired. I did too much yesterday and now I’m paying for it with an exhaustion hangover.”

My gaze drifted toward the front window, but the shadows had already covered the streetscape opposite.

I couldn't see my leather clad watcher, if he was even there at all. I bet he got a sleep in, and didn’t suffer from hangovers.

Mind, he looked a fair bit older than me, so he probably had a bit more experience than I did in that arena.

That thought led to another thought, one about what other experience a man like him might have. Soon, my cheeks were blazing in a way that had nothing to do with how tired I was or how crappily my air con worked on a perfectly cool afternoon.

“Uh, Annalise?” Clarissa peered at me. “Are you okay? Like, really okay? Shut the shop up and go home, you know? You make plenty here, and sale day isn’t that important."

I blinked at her. She had no idea how much I needed sale day to work for me, and I didn’t want to let down my end of the bargain I’d made with the rest of the business owners in the street who had made a promise to trade longer and harder for the day in order to ramp business up and try to boost each other for one day.

Business owners who already resented me for buying in when they rented.

My neighbors barely spoke to me as it was.

“Of course it’s not. But the street worked for this. And it is. And I—” I stopped my word vomit and covered another yawn with my hand that trembled slightly. Dammit . I really do need sleep. “I’ll be fine.” The flimsy lie didn’t convince either of us.

Perfect blonde fifties curls bobbed around Clarissa’s pretty face. “I’m getting you coffee. Right now.” She bustled back out the door she’d entered from, waving her paper flower bouquet above her head like a flag.

The door shut behind her with a bang rather than a tinkle of the little bell that should have done its dingle duty.

I really need to fix that.

The door banged again, knocking me out of my brain fog head space. I looked up to find the long shadows a whole lot closer, and my shop darker.

I reached up to flick the lights on. “Clarissa, shouldn’t you be watching your own shop?”

Silence greeted me.

I blinked and turned about, focusing properly on the person behind me for the first time. “Sorry. I thought?—”

But the customers in my shop weren’t my usual sort. Not at all.

Worst, I knew these sorts of customers. I also knew they weren’t here for sale day.

The two men dressed in their suit pants and jackets looked completely out of place in Jackson Ridge and especially my store that mostly catered for moms and kids and the occasional harried dad who also often looked out of place.

But I knew these two men. Or at least, I recognized them. And I didn’t want them in my shop any more than they wanted to be here.

Both stepped back, flanking my door, and said nothing. They just stood there in the perfect intimidation tactic.

Worst time to vague out, ever.

I glanced over my shoulder at the counter to find what was probably a cold cup of coffee by now that sat on the edge with a hand written note tucked under it.

Don’t work too late. Call if you need.

Clarissa.

I wanted to cry. Or scream.

Instead, I glanced back out the window, into the shadows.

Please be here. Please.

But I didn’t know my watcher’s name, and I doubted he would be there, if they were here tonight. My other monsters.

My door banged again. I didn’t need to look up.

“The shop’s closed.” The lie slipped from my lips, poorly thought out at best/worst, but it was the first thing that slipped across my panicked mind.

“Funny thing, because the sign here says that you’re open.” Prinze Kola sauntered into my shop like he owned the place. He wished.

Dark hair fluffed over one eye in a fringe that should have been greased down to fit the mafia heir mold. I knew who he was. Everyone did. Surely he had other ways to occupy his time. But for whatever reason, he decided to bother me.

And I couldn't get rid of him. Lie—I knew how to get rid of him. I just chose not to play but his rules. Which was both funny and not funny all at once.

And not a joke, really, though I wanted to laugh hysterically at the thought, because if he had it his way, he would. Laugh, that is.

And take everything I owned.

“I was getting around to closing up.”

“And yet, you’re too late.”

“What do you want, Prinze?” I said, tiredly.

“What I always want, Annalise. For you to take up the offer. The same offer that I made last week.” He neared me, and I took a step back.

Mistake.

His smile sharpened. My senses, overstimulated and overtired, went haywire.

I wanted to run, but that would be a greater mistake than the one I already made.

He wouldn’t chase me, but his friends in their suits would and I knew his sort.

The bully who never came alone or unarmed.

Nor would he stop at causing pain in order to get what he wanted.

My chest constricted. I’d spent every dime I saved and the inheritance split between myself and my sisters to buy my shop.

The land this little building sat on, the actual store itself.

Everything in it. This place was mine and I’d do anything to keep it that way.

No one would take it from me. My one little piece of something in this world.

Will my watcher also try to take something from me?

I pushed that thought aside and focused on the threat before me. The real one, not the fantasy man of last night who kept me up for hours well beyond when I should have given him permission to be inside my mind. Hell, I didn't even know his name.

Instead, I struggled to focus on Prinze as he stepped into my space. Fingers brushed over my arm as one of his men pushed the door open and left. My attention jerked and the hand gripped my arm tight.

I let out a cry and yanked away from him.

“I’m not selling anything to you,” I seethed. Find someone else to pick on. Please. I summoned every inch of my remaining energy. “For the last time, get out.”

Prinze smiled faintly. “I don’t know why you think you can say such things.

If I were you, I’d be more careful, little Annalise.

It would be so awful to see all this…” He gestured about the shop, turning to his other minion and nodded.

The man strode over to my till, jimmied the drawer open and scooped out the cash to my sharp objection.

A blade flicked open at my waist, stifling my cry as I stilled, and Prinze kept talking.

“It would be so awful to see all this hard work of yours, Annalise, just disappear. Like it never existed. Could you imagine coming in one day and the shop wasn’t here at all?

Like it was…burnt out?” Prinze gifted me another faint smile.

“I’ll collect rent until you sell, or the shop isn’t here and then I’ll take the land from you anyway.

” He turned towards the door, then swiveled back to face me and his smile dropped, his mask discarded to show the cruelty that lay beneath.

“Or maybe you’ll be inside when it burns. ”

No threat entered his voice, only a promise of when. My breath ceased altogether as he walked out of my shop, whistling softly. The little bell tinkled over the door, the traitorous thing deciding to work finally, far too late.

Numb, I picked up the cold coffee and drank it, wishing my watcher had been here tonight in time to prevent the real monsters from coming in.

Wishing I knew his name as I tried to fix the broken till. Wishing I had a father who wouldn't tell me I should sell the shop to Prinze and marry someone who would take the pressure away from me rather than follow my dreams.

Wishing, wishing, wishing.

Cuddling my cold coffee, completely numb, I locked the door to my shop, turned out the lights and curled behind the counter on the industrial carpet. That was where I fell asleep in the dark, hoping that tonight wasn’t the night that Prinze carried out his promise.

Because I was too scared to walk home alone without my watcher shadowing the path behind me.