The Bull Riders' Lost Princess

The First Offer

Her mother looked at her for a long terrible moment.

“Because I am afraid of what you will do once you know.”

Romeo Ferdinand did not send a threat. He sent an invitation that arrived the morning after the attack, hand-delivered by two Kings Riders in pressed shirts who stood at the clubhouse gate with their hands folded like choirboys. “Mr. Ferdinand requests the pleasure of Miss Montague’s company. Marlowe’s Diner, two o’clock. Neutral ground.”

Graham read the card twice, then tore it in half.

“No.”

“I wasn’t asking,” Hannah said.

“The man mails your mother black roses.”

“Then I’d like to see what he sends for an encore.” She took the halves out of his hand. “Somebody in this valley is going to tell me what they want from me. I would rather hear it across a table than through a fence.”

He exhaled through his nose, the sound of a man losing an argument he had already lost once before.

“I’ll be outside. If you’re not out in twenty minutes, I come in.”

“Fifteen. I’m going to want pie.”

.

Marlowe’s sat on the seam where Bull Riders territory ended and Kings Riders territory began, all chrome and cracked neon. Nobody started trouble there. The pie, rumor said, was the reason.

Romeo rose when she walked in.

She had braced for a brute. Instead he looked like a politician on his way to a fundraiser: dark hair swept back, a leather jacket cut so well it might have been tailored, a watch that cost more than her car. He smiled the way people do when they have practiced in a mirror and gotten very good.

“Miss Montague. Thank you for coming. I know the invitation was irregular.”

“It was polite. That was irregular.”

His smile flickered, then widened into something almost genuine. “I’ll take that as an opening.”

They sat. The waitress set down two coffees and a slice of lemon meringue in front of Hannah, who had not ordered it.

“I called ahead,” Romeo said. “It’s your father’s favorite.”

He does his homework, Hannah thought. She took a bite. It was perfect. She hated that it was perfect.

“I won’t waste your time. You have been home two days, and you’ve been shot at, threatened, and asked to pick a side by every man with a motorcycle. So plainly: I want this war to end.”

“Do you.”

“We were all handed a burning house and told to inherit it. I would like to put out the fire.”

“By sending flowers to my mother.”

For one heartbeat, the mask slipped. Then it settled back.

“A message, delivered clumsily, while I was grieving. I regret the delivery.” He tapped the table once. “Here is my offer. Protection for you, immediately, without conditions. A voice in every decision the Kings Riders make. And influence. Your name still means something here. Put it beside mine, and men who would never follow Graham Melville would follow us.”

Us. She set the word aside.

“And Mariam?”

“A more complicated conversation.”

“Of course it is.”

“Hannah.” His voice softened, as if he were sharing something sad. “Graham is a good man. But he’s too close to you. A leader has to see the whole board. He looks at you and sees the girl he lost. Every decision he makes bends around the hope that you’ll stay. You’ve felt it.”

She had. That was the problem.

She laid her fork down slowly. “That’s clever.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Five minutes of talking peace, and the only concrete thing you’ve given me is a reason to distrust the man who stood between my mother and a bullet yesterday.” She tilted her head. “It’s a wedge. A good one. But it’s a wedge.”

His eyes went very still.

“I’m not a bargaining chip, Mr. Ferdinand. I didn’t start this fight, and I won’t be passed across a table to end it. So what are you not saying? What do you get if I sit beside you?”

“A stable Love Valley.”

“And?”

“A legitimate one.”

“Whose legitimacy?”

He laughed, one short, startled breath that sounded nothing like the practiced smile. “Yours. The Kings Riders have power. We don’t have a name. A Montague at my side tells every rider I am the rightful heir to the original brotherhood.” He spread his hands. “Honest enough?”

“Closer.”

“You’re not what I expected.” His gaze moved over her face with real interest, the way a man studies a locked door. “I thought you’d be frightened, or flattered. You’re reading me like a contract.”

“Is there small print?”

“There’s always small print.”

Hannah stood and took her jacket. “Thank you for the pie. It was honestly very good.”

“Is that a no?”

“It’s not a yes. Ask me again once I know what your father actually did, and what you plan to do about it.”

Something cold flashed across his face and was gone. He rose and offered his hand with the same perfect smile.

“The offer stands through the funeral.”

.

Graham sat on his bike across the street, arms crossed, looking like a man pretending very hard not to be a bodyguard. His eyes ran over her fast.

“Twelve minutes.”

“I finished my pie.”

“Did he threaten you?”

“Worse. He was reasonable.” She glanced back at the window, where a leather jacket still sat unmoving. “He said you couldn’t lead properly because of me.”

Graham’s jaw tightened. “He’s not wrong.”

“That isn’t what I said.” She turned. “Why haven’t you taken it all back? You have the men. You could have pushed Romeo and Jackson out years ago.”

“Could I?”

“You tell me.”

A truck rumbled past with a dragon on its door. Graham watched it go.

“I could take the territory in a month. Men follow strength. But then what do I have? A hundred angry riders who lost their homes, and a town that remembers who burned it.” He shook his head. “Winning land is easy. Getting people to trust each other again is the hard part. I can force a man into a room with me. I can’t force him to believe I won’t knife him on the way out.”

Hannah looked at him for a long time.

“You’re not like him,” she said quietly.

“Who?”

She almost said my father. She didn’t.

“Nobody. Take me back.”

.

Inside Marlowe’s, Romeo did not move from the booth until Graham’s bike had faded down Third Street.

A broad, shaven-headed man with a scar down one cheek slid into the seat across from him: Silas Crane, his second-in-command, who had ridden behind Romeo since they were seventeen.

“Well?”

“She refused.”

“And?”

“She saw through my first move in under five minutes.” Romeo turned his cup in a slow half circle. He was smiling again, and this time the smile was real, which was somehow worse. “I thought she was a name, Silas. A symbol. Instead she’s smart. Very smart.”

“That’s a problem.”

“No. It’s an asset.” His eyes drifted to the empty street. “The Montague name was worth a great deal yesterday. Now that I know she can think, it’s worth more than the whole valley.”

Silas hesitated. “And Melville?”

“Graham stands between her and everything I need.” Romeo set down the cup. His voice was soft, almost pleasant. “She cannot keep her loyalty with him. Whatever it takes, Hannah Montague does not stay where she is.”