Claimed by the Reapers MC

2.The Clubhouse

The ride took twenty minutes. Twenty minutes of wind screaming past my helmet, of Tank's solid warmth against my chest, of streetlights blurring into gold streaks. I counted breaths. I counted exits. I counted the number of times I considered jumping off at a red light.

Three. I considered it three times.

But my sister's name was in their phone. My address was in their phone. And somewhere behind us, four other bikes flanked me like a motorcade for a prisoner.

We turned off the highway onto a road that got narrower and darker with every mile. Streetlights vanished. Mailboxes vanished. The world became pine trees and gravel and the bass rumble of five engines in formation.

Then the trees opened up.

The Reapers' compound wasn't what I expected. I'd pictured a warehouse, maybe. Barbed wire. Guard dogs. Instead, I got a converted auto shop with a two-story brick building beside it, fairy lights strung across a courtyard, and a hand-painted sign that read "REAPERS MC — FALLEN ANGELS CHAPTER" in gothic letters.

Home sweet hostage situation.

Tank cut the engine and the sudden silence pressed against my eardrums. I unpeeled my arms from his waist. My fingers had cramped into claws.

"You can let go now."

I jerked back like he'd burned me. "Sorry."

He didn't answer. Just swung off the bike with the grace of someone half his size and waited. Waiting for me to dismount. Waiting for me to follow. Waiting, I was learning, was something Tank did well.

The courtyard was dirt and packed gravel. A fire pit sat cold in the center, ringed by mismatched chairs and one leather couch that had seen better decades. Empty beer bottles lined a wooden railing. Somewhere a generator hummed.

"Quaint," I said.

Tank's mouth twitched. I chose to believe it was almost a smile.

Kael appeared beside me without sound. How a man that size moved that quietly, I didn't want to know.

"The shop," he said, nodding toward the converted garage, "is our business. Motorcycles. Legitimate. The building is home." He paused. "You're in the building. You don't go in the shop. You don't go near the road without someone with you. You don't use your phone. Is that clear?"

"What if I need to call my sister?"

"I'll give you a phone tomorrow. Supervised."

"Supervised."

"Did I stutter?"

I looked at the building. Two stories. Windows dark. A single light burning above the door. It could have been a bed and breakfast, minus the five criminals and the probable gun collection.

"How long?"

"Until I decide you're not a threat."

"And how long does that usually take?"

Kael's silver eyes held mine. "Nobody's ever been in your position before. You're the first person who's seen us work and lived to see the clubhouse."

Lucky me.

The inside was cleaner than I expected. Hardwood floors. A bar along one wall, bottles arranged by color. Pool table with green felt worn thin in the center. Leather couches that smelled of smoke and motor oil and something sharper underneath — gunpowder, maybe, or just testosterone.

A woman sat at the bar. Red hair, sharp cheekbones, leather jacket with a REAPERS patch on the shoulder. She looked at me the way you look at a stain on your favorite shirt.

"Who's the stray?"

"Guest," Kael said.

"Looks like a hostage."

"Guest," Kael repeated, and the temperature in the room dropped five degrees.

The woman — I'd learn later her name was Roxy, and she'd been the club's old lady before old ladies went out of fashion — raised her hands in surrender. "Just asking, Prez."

"Don't."

She slid off her stool and disappeared through a back door, but not before giving me a look that promised we'd talk later. Whether I wanted to or not.

Ghost appeared at my elbow. The man moved like fog. "I've set up Marcus in the basement. Vitals are stable. Your sutures held through transport." He said it like he was giving a surgical report. "I'd like to show you the medical room. If Prez permits."

Kael nodded once.

I followed Ghost down a hallway lined with photographs. The Reapers through the years. Men with their arms around each other. Funerals. A photo of a younger Kael with a man who had the same jawline — his father, maybe. I filed that away.

The medical room was a converted bedroom. Hospital bed. IV stand. A cabinet stocked better than some clinics I'd worked in.

"This is... extensive."

"Former combat medic." Ghost adjusted his glasses. "I don't like losing people."

"How many have you lost?"

His expression didn't change, but something behind his eyes went very still. "Too many."

Before I could ask what that meant, Wolf appeared in the doorway like an overgrown puppy who'd been told not to jump on the furniture.

"Ghost, Prez wants you. Something about the shipment." His eyes found me. "I'll babysit."

Ghost looked at me. Then at Wolf. "Don't."

"I'm offended."

"Don't."

Ghost left. Wolf leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, grin firmly in place. Up close, he was younger than the others — maybe my age, maybe younger. Brown curls fell across his forehead. His leather cut had WOLF stitched across the chest in white thread.

"So. Avery Sinclair, RN." He pronounced each letter like he was reading a menu. "You know, I've never met a nurse who'd walk toward five guys beating a man half to death."

"I've never met five guys beating a man half to death."

"Fair." He tilted his head. "You scared?"

"Should I be?"

"I mean —" He pushed off the doorframe and walked toward me. Not threatening. Curious. Like I was an animal at the zoo he hadn't seen before. He stopped close enough that I could smell spearmint gum. "Jax wants to scare you. Ghost wants to figure you out. Tank wants to protect you. Prez wants to own you." He tapped his chest. "Me? I'm just enjoying the show."

"What show?"

"You." He grinned. "You're already messing with their heads and you've been here twenty minutes."

I didn't know what to say to that, so I said nothing.

Wolf's grin softened into something almost real. "Relax, nurse. Nobody's gonna hurt you. Prez gave his word. And Prez's word is —" He searched for the word. "— unbreakable."

"Why?"

"Because Kael Voss would rather cut off his own hand than break a promise. It's the only thing he has left that's clean." Wolf pushed off the wall. "Come on. I'll show you your room."

My room was on the second floor. Small. A single bed with a quilt that smelled like lavender — someone had washed it recently. A window facing the woods. A door that locked from the inside.

A door that locked from the inside.

"That's a test, isn't it?"

Wolf didn't answer, but his grin confirmed it. "Bathroom's down the hall. Someone'll bring you breakfast in the morning. Any questions?"

"About fifty."

"Save 'em. Prez likes answering questions himself." He paused at the door. "One thing. Don't go in Jax's room. It's the one with the snake on the door."

"Of course it is."

"And don't look him in the eye too long. He takes it as a challenge."

"Anything else?"

"Yeah." Wolf's voice dropped. "Whatever you do, don't fall for any of us. This life — it chews people up. Pretty nurses included."

Then he was gone, bootsteps fading down the hall.

I sat on the bed. The mattress sagged. Outside my window, an owl called twice and went quiet. Somewhere below me, five men who'd almost killed someone tonight were probably deciding whether I was an asset or a loose end.

I should have been terrified. I was terrified.

But under the fear, something else hummed. Something I didn't want to name. Something that had started the moment Kael's thumb pressed against my pulse and hadn't stopped since.

I kicked off my sneakers. Lay back on the unfamiliar quilt. Closed my eyes.

Sleep didn't come for a long time. But when it did, I dreamed of silver eyes and the roar of five engines carrying me somewhere I couldn't turn back from.

A knock on my door woke me at dawn.

"Breakfast."

Not a question. Not a request. Kael's voice, low and certain, traveling through the wood like it had every right to be there.

I opened the door. He stood in the hallway holding a plate of scrambled eggs and toast. No leather cut. Just a black t-shirt stretched across his chest, ink visible at the collar, hair still damp from a shower. He looked younger without the armor. More human. More dangerous.

"You made me breakfast?"

"I don't cook." He handed me the plate. "Tank does."

I took it. Our fingers brushed. He didn't pull away.

"Eat," he said. "Then we talk."

"About?"

His smile was the slowest, most terrifying thing I'd ever seen. "About what happens next, little nurse."

He walked away before I could answer. But at the stairs, he paused.

"Welcome to your new life, Avery."

The way he said my name — like a secret he was keeping — stayed with me long after the eggs went cold.

(End of Chapter 2)