Contracted Wife to the MC President

Chapter 4

Harper POV

I woke up to cedar, gun oil, and stale smoke.

For a second my brain didn't know where I was. Unfamiliar sheets, an oversized t-shirt tangled around my thighs. Then it all landed at once, the bar, the ride, the locked door.

I opened my eyes.

Reaper was already up, sitting in the armchair across the room, watching me like he'd been there for hours. Fully dressed, denim, black henley, cut, boots laced tight. He didn't look tired. He looked like a man who'd spent the whole night staring at the door.

"Get up." Rough, low. "Lawyer's downstairs. Chaplain too. It's time."

I didn't hesitate. Threw the covers off, bare feet hitting cold wood, and stood, smoothing his shirt down over ruined silk trousers. No makeup, no mirror. I felt stripped down to nothing.

He walked to the closet, pulled something off a hanger, tossed it on the bed.

A motorcycle jacket, worn soft at the elbows.

"Put it on. Cold downstairs."

It swallowed me, sat wide on my shoulders, dropped past my hips. Smelled like him. Felt like armor and a brand at the same time. I stepped into my scuffed heels.

"I'm ready."

He didn't smile. Just opened the door and let me go first.

Daylight made the clubhouse look worse, not better. Sticky floors, stale tobacco, bleach. The main bar was packed, forty-something men in leather standing in a wide silent circle, every eye locked on me as I hit the last step. White silk, red soles, a jacket three sizes too big.

I kept my chin up and walked straight into the middle of it.

Reaper stayed at my side, a wall of heat I could feel without touching.

Two men waited by the bar. One, a nervous guy in a cheap gray suit hugging a briefcase like it might save him. The lawyer. The other was Knox, standing next to an older biker whose neck was solid prison ink, holding a small battered black book. The chaplain.

"Let's get this over with," Reaper said.

The lawyer scrambled forward, papers hitting the table. "Mr. Cross, Ms. Evans, license is expedited, offshore transfers are drafted exactly as requested. Sign here, here, here."

I didn't read a word of it. I already knew what I was signing away. I signed fast, hard strokes.

Reaper took the pen after me, fingers brushing mine, and signed his name next to it.

"Done." The lawyer grabbed his papers back, edging toward the door. "Am I free to go?"

"Knox. Get him out of here."

Knox hauled him out by the collar.

Reaper turned to me, boots against my heels, the circle of bikers tightening around us. It didn't feel like a wedding. It felt like something closer to an initiation.

The chaplain stepped up. No mention of love, sickness, or objections.

"You step into the Saints, you don't step out." Gravel in his voice. "You take his name, you take his enemies. His blood is your blood."

"I do." I didn't waver.

He turned to Reaper. "You take her, you become her shield. Her enemies die at your gates."

"Yeah." Reaper's eyes never left mine.

"Give her the iron."

He pulled a ring from his pocket, no gold, no stone, just a heavy band of brushed titanium, like it had been cut off a gun barrel. He took my hand and slid it on. Cold, heavy, perfect fit.

"You're mine now, Harper." Just for me. "Blood and bone."

"Seal it," the chaplain said.

His hand shot up to the back of my neck before I could brace for it, fingers tangled in my hair, pulling me flush against him.

His mouth crashed into mine.

Nothing soft about it. Rough, hot, absolutely certain of itself. He tasted like coffee and tobacco. I gasped against him and grabbed the lapels of his cut without deciding to.

Heat pooled low and fast. I kissed him back, nails digging into leather, every rational thought gone.

The room erupted, boots stomping, a wall of noise.

He pulled back an inch, chest heaving against mine, eyes gone completely black. His thumb dragged along my neck.

Then the doors blew in.

Not opened, exploded. Wood shrapnel flying, the perimeter alarm shrieking over the sound of tires screaming outside.

Then the gunfire started.

Automatic weapons tore through the front windows, whiskey bottles bursting behind the bar, glass and liquor raining down.

Reaper changed in an instant. Groom gone, something else entirely standing in his place.

"Get down!"

He shoved me to the floor before I understood what was happening, the air knocked out of me on impact. He didn't duck. He planted himself over me, gun already in his hand, and fired three rounds into the smoke pouring through the door.

Screaming everywhere. Bikers returning fire. Cordite and blood thick in the air.

A bullet split the wood pillar inches from his head.

He grabbed my collar. "Move!"

He dragged me toward the back, my heels sliding on wet floorboards, his grip the only thing keeping me upright. We dropped behind the bar just as bullets shredded the wall where we'd been standing.

I hit the floor hard, knees first. He landed beside me, checked his magazine, slammed it back in.

"Is it my father?" I shouted over the noise.

"Mercenaries." He racked the slide. "Suppressed rifles, high-end gear. Your old man didn't waste time."

A body dropped onto the bar above us and slid off, landing next to my feet, chest torn open by a shotgun blast.

I stared at it, heart slamming against my ribs.

Reaper reached over, pulled a compact 9mm off the dead man's belt, checked the chamber.

Then he turned to me.

He didn't tell me to hide. Didn't tell me to close my eyes.

He put the gun in my hands.

His eyes locked onto mine, dead serious, terrifyingly certain.

"Welcome to the Devil's Saints, Mrs. Cross." Clear, even through the chaos. "Don't miss."