Contracted Wife to the MC President

Harper POV The iron door of the Devil's Saints clubhouse fought me the whole way open. Smoke hit first, thick enough to taste, layered over stale beer and motor oil. Metal blasted from busted speakers, bass climbing up through the floorboards and into my ribs. I stood in the doorway like I'd walked into the wrong funeral. White silk Tom Ford. Four-inch Louboutins. Hair pulled back so tight it pulled at my temples. I belonged in a boardroom, not a windowless bar owned by the most violent men in the city. The bartender clocked me first. His rag stopped mid-swipe. He elbowed the bearded mountain next to him without looking away from me. Then it spread. Someone cut the music. The bass died and left a ringing kind of quiet behind it. A room full of leather and ink turned to look at me, and none of it was friendly. I didn't reach for my purse. Didn't blink. Twenty-four years of Evans family dinners had trained me for worse than this. I found him in the back corner booth, two men flanking him who looked like they'd bitten through steel for breakfast. Even seated, Jaxson "Reaper" Cross made them look like furniture. I crossed the room. My heels cracked against the sticky hardwood, loud in all that silence. Bikers stepped back just enough to let me through, close enough that I could feel their stares crawling over the white silk. I stopped two feet from his table. He took his time looking up. Pulled on a cigarette, let the smoke out slow, and only then let his eyes land on me. Winter eyes. Flat, gray, nothing behind them. The mugshot hadn't captured any of it, the jaw, the stubble, the black hair pushed back like he'd stopped caring what it looked like an hour ago. Ink climbed his neck and vanished under his collar. "You're lost, sweetheart." His voice scraped low, and something in my spine reacted before my brain caught up. "I'm exactly where I intend to be." Steady. Crisp. "I need five minutes, Mr. Cross." The men beside him laughed. He didn't. He crushed the cigarette out, planted both hands on the table, and stood. He kept unfolding. Six-foot-four of muscle wrapped in leather, moving toward me with the kind of patience only predators bother with. He didn't stop until his boots nearly touched my heels. He blocked out the room entirely. I had to tip my head back just to hold his eyes, and I still didn't step back. Vanilla and dry-cleaned silk against cedar, tobacco, and something like gun oil. The contrast alone was enough to make my skin prickle. "Thirty seconds," he said, quiet now, quiet enough that it was just for me. "Then my boys walk you out to the alley." "I need a husband." He stared at me. For half a second the ice cracked into something almost human, confusion, before a dark laugh rolled out of his chest. "You're out of your mind." "I'm a pragmatist." I held my ground while his chest nearly brushed my lapels. "My father is Senator Richard Evans. He's marrying me off to a man who wants a punching bag with good hair and a better last name. If I run, his security drags me home by the wrist. I need protection his money can't buy off." "And you think that's me." "I know it is. The Saints don't answer to anyone." "And what do I get out of it, heiress?" "Legitimacy." I said it flat, no hesitation. "The Feds are choking your cash flow. Marry me and you get my trust fund, three shell corporations, and enough political cover that the FBI thinks twice. You go untouchable. I go unreachable." The silence after that had weight to it. He didn't laugh this time. His eyes dropped to my throat, watching my pulse jump against my skin. He was waiting for the crack, for the tremor, for the moment I turned back into a scared girl playing dress-up in a biker bar. It never came. I watched something shift behind his eyes. The amusement burned off, replaced by something darker, hungrier. His pupils blew wide. He wasn't looking at prey anymore. He lifted his hand, slow, and let his fingers graze the collar of my jacket. His thumb found the soft skin under my ear, his hand closing around my jaw, rough and hot and entirely too sure of itself. Heat shot straight through me, and I hated how much I felt it. He leaned in until his mouth nearly touched my cheek. "I'll take the money, Harper Evans." His breath dragged over my ear. "I'll put my name on you. I'll bury anyone your father sends after me." His thumb dragged along my jaw, and my knees actually considered giving out. "But hear me." His voice dropped lower, dead serious now. "This isn't a deal signed behind closed doors. You put my ring on, you don't just get protection. You belong to me. In my house. In my bed. Every part of you." He pulled back just far enough to watch my face, his grip tightening on my jaw. "Do we have a deal, wife?"