Contracted Wife to the MC President

Chapter 2

Harper POV

My heart slammed against my ribs hard enough to bruise, but I didn't let it touch my face. I wasn't giving him the adrenaline running through me. His thumb was still rough against my jaw, calluses scraping skin, heat bleeding into places it had no business reaching.

"We have a deal," I said. Steady.

He held my eyes for a long second, hunting for the crack, the lie, the fear. He didn't find any of it. Something dangerous tugged at the corner of his mouth.

He let go of my jaw, and the cold that rushed in where his hand had been was almost worse than the heat.

Reaper turned toward the booth. The one on the left, a wall of a man with a braided beard and a scar splitting his eyebrow, was watching the whole thing like he couldn't quite believe it.

"Knox." Reaper's voice didn't need to be loud to cut through the bar. "We're heading to the yard. The heiress is coming."

Knox stood, boots thudding on the floorboards, and looked me over, white silk, red soles, the whole mismatched picture of it. "You sure, Boss? She looks like she belongs on top of a wedding cake, not on a bike."

"She's my problem now." Reaper didn't glance back. Just started walking. "Keep up, Harper."

I followed. My heels cracked against the floor in a rhythm that had nothing to do with the heavy thud of the men's boots ahead of me. Every eye in that bar tracked me out the door, but I kept my chin up until I hit the cold outside air.

The alley smelled like wet brick and gasoline. Rows of bikes idled in the shadows, and Reaper walked straight past all of them to a matte-black Harley, stripped down to nothing but muscle and menace, same as its owner.

He swung a leg over, leather groaning under him, and looked back at me. "Get on."

I looked at the bike. Looked at my silk trousers and heels. There was no graceful way to do this. I hiked the fabric up to my knees and climbed on, one heel finding the footpeg.

"Hold on," he said.

I reached out slowly, wrapping my arms around his waist, and the second my hands landed on his stomach something electric shot straight through me. He didn't just feel solid, he felt carved. Heat poured off him straight through my jacket.

"Tighter," he ordered, the words rumbling into my own chest. "Unless you want to end up paint on the road."

I pressed myself against his back and locked my fingers together. Cedar, leather, tobacco, it swallowed my perfume whole.

He kicked the stand up and hit the throttle.

The engine tore open the quiet with a snarl that I felt in my teeth. The vibration climbed up through the seat, up my thighs, settled somewhere I wasn't ready to think about. Then he dropped the clutch and we shot into the dark.

The city blurred past. Wind ripped my hair loose from its chignon, but his shoulders took most of the cold before it reached me. I gripped his hips with my thighs, holding on through every hard turn, feeling his muscles shift and pull under my hands with every gear change. It was terrifying. It was too much. It was the most alive I'd felt in twenty-four years.

We left downtown behind for the industrial district, chain-link and razor wire stretching twelve feet up around a compound that looked built to keep the world out. Armed men at the gate hauled it open the second Reaper's headlight hit them.

He cut the engine in a dirt yard crowded with trucks and bikes, and the silence afterward rang in my ears, my whole body still humming from the ride.

He got off without offering a hand. I untangled myself, legs shaking as my heels hit gravel. My white suit was streaked with exhaust and dirt now, whatever polish I'd walked in with, gone.

"Move," he said, already heading for the warehouse at the back of the lot.

Inside smelled like smoke and bleach. A handful of bikers stopped mid-task to stare as we passed. I kept my chin level and stayed close behind him, close enough that nobody tried anything. He was a wall nobody wanted to test.

We climbed a wooden staircase to the second floor, down a dim hallway, to a door at the far end.

He pushed it open and stepped back to let me through.

His room. Stark. Cold. A massive unmade bed took up most of the space, charcoal walls, blackout curtains sealing out any trace of the outside. Gun oil and cedar hung thick in the air.

He shut the door behind us. The deadbolt clicked into place, final and loud in the quiet.

I turned to face him. We were alone now, and the adrenaline that had carried me through the bar and the ride sharpened into something closer to fear. He filled the room in a way that made it feel smaller than it was.

He didn't move. Just stood there by the door, eyes moving over my ruined hair, my flushed face, the dirt on my white silk.

His jaw tightened.

"Take off the suit," he said.