Biker Romance: Never Desire an Exile (Exile Love Biker MC Series Book Book 2)

by Kara Summers

  I spit out a mouthful of blood, panting and wide eyed. He just chuckled and used my dazed state to his advantage, tying me up to a nearby tree. He somehow managed to force my legs apart and tied them down as well.

  “There we go, exactly how I wanted you,” he hummed.

  I was doing my best to keep the tears back and keep myself from shuddering. I was more than a little surprised to see that he was the only one around. I grit my teeth and dropped my head forward, shuddering.

  “Where are the rest of you?” I whispered, venom dripping from my words.

  “There are no others. They ran off after you killed the boss,” He murmured, settling on a stump across from me, looking at me thoughtfully.

  My eyes widened as I took in what he was saying. If he was telling the truth, it meant that one of the most dangerous outlaw biker gangs had been taken out and I was the one to do it. That brought me some comfort at least. Maybe I was going down, but at least I’d taken these fuckers with me.

  “Can’t say I feel much sympathy,” I murmured.

  He stood up, the cabin blazing behind him. “Keep your mouth shut!” he snapped, stepping forward and slapping me across the face so hard my ears rang.

  I spit out another mouthful of blood as he continued on his pathetic rant. “They might have just been criminals to you, but those men were my brothers! That was my family.”

  “You picked a shit family,” I murmured, looking up at him, my gaze defiant. I wasn’t going to let this jerk off win. If I was going down, I was going to go down swinging.

  His eyes narrowed and he closed the space between us, reaching out and gripping my jaw between his fingers. I was forced to look into his face now and I saw a man who looked far older than he really was thanks to years of drugs and alcohol. His teeth had all but rotted out of his mouth and his eyes were red and hazy, while the deep wrinkles in his skin did nothing to help his aged appearance. His breath smelled rancid and it made my stomach turn, but I never broke from his gaze. I wasn’t going to give this up without a fight.

  “You’re going to regret every word that came out of your whore mouth. Did you think I was just going to kill you?” he whispered. “Of course not.” A wicked smile came to his lips and I felt a shiver run down my spine. “I’m going to wait right here until that boyfriend of yours comes running. And when he gets here, I’m going to rip him to pieces right in front of your eyes.”

  My blood turned cold and I reacted without thinking. I started to scream. It wasn’t a fearful scream, it was an animalistic sound of rage. I pulled at the ropes that held me to the tree and I managed to slam my forehead into his nose.

  He howled and stumbled back, holding the broken and bleeding protrusion. “You whore!” he screamed stepping forward.

  He wrapped his thick hands around my neck and began to squeeze. I could feel the power and anger in those hands, squeezing and crushing the life out of me. My eyes fluttered and my head lolled as I felt the last of the air slipping from my body. I whimpered weakly and just as the world started to go black he pulled his hands away.

  “No, I want you to be awake for this,” he grunted.

  I sucked in as much air as my lungs would hold, watching him blankly as he started to tear at my shorts. Soon enough they were around my ankles and he was working at his own belt buckle. Blood was pouring from his nose and I could hear him muttering under his breath.

  “If she’s going to act like a whore, I’m going to treat her like one.”

  The acidic panic was coming up my throat now and I tried to yank my legs closed but it was no use. Luckily, the rancid, rotting man wouldn’t make it very far.

  A gunshot echoed through the forest and an explosion of red filled my sight. Blood splattered my ankles, but it hardly registered. The man fell forward, blood pooling underneath him where the bullet had entered and exited his skull.

  I was panting hard, laughter exploding from me out of pure instinct. Nothing in this moment was funny, but it was the only way I could vocalize my relief. I slumped against the ropes, my eyes closed. Before I knew it I was wrapped in warm, safe arms and the sounds of police sirens echoed around the mountains. The police weren’t typically the people Ryan and I would have relied on, but this time we didn’t really have any options.

  “Kisha, oh my God Kisha,” he whispered, kissing my face over and over again. “I’m here. I’m here,” he whispered.

  The words turned me to mush, and all I could do was collapse against him as he untied me. I eventually managed to pull myself together and give the police a statement. As soon as we were cleared of any crimes, we hopped in the truck to head back to Nashville.

  Damien’s convoy never came because the fucker had taken the men out before they could arrive. It was how he managed to find us. Even the strongest man could crack under the right kind of pressure. We hadn’t said much to each other since the rescue and I could feel his eyes on me every few seconds.

  “Kisha,” he said softly. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t,” I said simply, my voice even and relaxed. “I’m not mad.”

  “I shouldn’t have left you.”

  I took a breath and looked at him. “It’s probably better you did.”

  “How can you say that?”

  “If you hadn’t gone down the mountain, we would have both been tied to a tree and we’d probably be dead now. It worked out. I’m not mad.”

  He was silent for a long time. “How can you be so relaxed?”

  “I’m not. I’m shaken up as fuck, but it’s okay. I’m going to be okay and we’re going to be okay.”

  Another thick silence. “What did you need to go get in town, anyway?”

  “Well, this isn’t the ideal way I wanted you to find out, but no time like the present I suppose.”

  He handed me a small hunter green box and when I opened it, there was a delicate diamond ring inside and a small note that simply said.

  ‘Will you marry me?’

  Chapter Fourteen

  I said yes of course and in the spring we were married. Despite the horrid events in the mountain, we still went back there for our honeymoon. We weren’t going to let that asshole ruin the place we’d found love.

  Our story ended the way so many others do. It was a fairytale, really. We got married, we made love and we had two beautiful daughters who were growing up just as wild and fast as we had. Ryan was teaching them how to play pool and I was teaching them how to drive the little mini bikes we got them for Christmas.

  I leaned on the counter, watching as Ryan read to them. It was some outlaw, Western that he had loved growing up and the girls loved it just as much. I smiled softly and disappeared back into the kitchen to toss the first batch of cookies I’d made that night. I’d accidently burned them and had run to the store in order to buy the prepackaged one.

  Once we were married, I’d wanted to be a good wife, but cooking was just never a skill I was meant to master. I stacked the cookies on a tray neatly and carried them out to my children and husband, watching Shiloh and Riley squeal with excitement.

  Ryan took a cookie off the tray and bit into it, looking at me with a cocked brow. “Kroger?” he asked with a little grin.

  “Kroger,” I confirmed.

  He smiled and pulled me down onto his lap and the girls made faces of disgust. I just laughed and shook my head, placing a big wet kiss on Ryan’s cheek.

  “I love you.”

  “I love you more.”

  I smiled and nuzzled his cheek, “You’re going to have to prove it.”

  He just grinned and pressed his lips to mine and I was instantly transported back to our very first kiss. This was my life and I couldn’t have been happier with the way it turned out. I’d spent most of my teenage years thinking I was unlovable until Ryan came back into my life.

  He’d saved me. I knew that without a doubt.

  The End

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  BONUS HISTORIC ROMANCE STORIES

  Beatrice Mystery Romance

  Chapter One

  “Beatrice Martin!” the voice rang out loud and clear from the library.

  I winced just a little and sighed, looking down at the small collection of insects I had in a box. There were all in glass jars, though I’d fastened cheesecloth around the lip of the jar so that my little friends wouldn’t perish. Freedom wasn’t a concept I understood, so I did not think that keeping them trapped in these jars was cruel.

  I put the lid back on the box and pushed it under by bed, running downstairs to face my nanny. She was a heavyset woman with a thick Scottish accent and a round face that became red when she was angry with me; which was most of the time.

  As I came down the stairs, the woman snatched the back of my dress and pointed to a collection of small bones that were sitting by the fireplace.

  “What in the world have you brought into this house, child?”

  “It’s only animal bones, Mary!” I answered, not quite sure why she was so upset.

  “I can see that they are only animal bones. Do you take me for an idiot? I don’t care what they are! What I care about is why they are here? Why are they scattered about the floor?”

  “I was investigating-,”“You were investigating animals?”

  I sighed in frustrating and ran my fingers through my hair. “No! Father says that what happens to the body after death can tell you a lot about how the person, or animal, died. I thought I could learn a lot about how the body works from the animal bones.”

  “Animals and humans are completely different. You’re wasting your time and you’re making a mess,” Mary said, shaking her head back and forth.

  “But father says-,”

  Mary reached out and grabbed my shoulders, gripping my arms tight as she started into my eyes. “Listen to me child, I know you think your father knows everything. I know you think that you are meant to follow in his footsteps, but you will ruin your life! Don’t you know that?” she whispered, looking almost worried as she stared into my eyes. “No man will want a woman that plays with dead things and collects bugs. Your mother is probably rolling over in her grave knowing what her daughter has become.”

  I stared at Mary, my blue eyes wide in disbelief. My mother had died only a year before and I was still reeling from the loss. The fact that my nanny would bring her up like this was a slap in the face. Tears welled in my eyes and Mary sighed, reaching out and wiping them from my face.

  “Child, I did not mean to make you cry,” she said gently, shaking her head and pulling me into a hug.

  I sank into her soft body, my small frame overwhelmed by her. I was mad at her, but it still felt good to be held by somebody. I sniffled and tried to hold back my tears, though I was shaking with the effort it took. Mary pulled back and sighed, wiping another tear from my cheek.

  “I don’t want to make you sad, child, but you have to understand that this is not normal behavior for a young girl.”

  “But father is a detective, and I want to be a detective one day,” I said.

  “Little girls don’t grow up to be detectives.”

  “Then what do little girls grow up to be?” I challenged.

  “Wives and mothers,” she explained.

  That answer would haunt me for the rest of my life. My little run in with Mary wasn’t going to stop me from studying and learning. I continued to read my father’s books and ask him questions. I considered him a passive educator. He never would have allowed me to go out with him, but he was more than happy to answer any questions I had.

  My father was a good man and an even better investigator, but the stereotype of the drunk, brooding detective followed him home. My father never got over my mother’s death and often drank to forget that she was gone. It was this vice that would take is life when I turned seventeen.

  I was alone in the world after my father died since I’d chosen not marry in order to pursue my dream. I’d spent my entire life learning to be a detective and I wasn’t going to give up now. My father had been very good at when he did and had run his agency under the name “B. Martin”. The offices of Bernard Martin would soon become the offices of Beatrice Martin, though the world would never have to know that. I would simply be “B. Martin II”.

  Cases started rolling in after my father died and I chose the ones that I would take on carefully. I did not want to be overly ambitious since I was just getting started. As soon as I realized that I was good at what I did, however, I became far less picky. I was better than Scotland Yard, though they never would have admitted to calling me on many occasions to consult.

  Some people were shocked when a tall red-headed woman showed up on their doorstep, but they never turned me away. Soon, word spread like wildfire that B. Martin was the rightful heir to the family business no matter my gender. I was making it in the world, and while my suitors were few and far between, I could care less. I was not concerned with things like babies and marriage. I was far more interested in what happened to bodies post mortem and the budding fields of Forensic Science and pathology. My life was fulfilled by my work.

  People thought me a bit strange, but no one was willing to say much about it because everyone knew that if they were looking for justice, there was only one person they wanted on the case.

  B. Martin.

  Chapter Two

  "I simply do not understand why I'm expected to go to these events. Doesn't Scotland Yard know how many murders take place in this city each night?" I hesitated at my own question. "Judging by their performance, I'm going to recant that question," I said, sucking in a breath as my best friend pulled the strings to my corset so tight that I could barely breathe. "That's too tight!"

  "No such thing," Victoria said, handing me the rest of my dress. "And you're expected to go to these things because you're a public figure in London. You're a female detective. That's curious enough, but the fact that you're good at your job makes you even more irresistible."

  "I just wish I did not have to wear all this!" I whined, motioning at the layers of fabric that had been wrapped around my body in order to make me look thinner.

  "You're still a lady, and you're expected to look nice when you go to balls," Victoria said, pulling a few cosmetics pots from a bag she'd brought.

  I groaned and eyed them almost suspiciously. "Must I wear that?"

  "You must."

  "But why?" I whined.

  "Because one day being a detective won't be enough to fill your life. You will wake up alone in your bed one day and wonder why you never married," Victoria said with a certainty I didn’t share.

  I pressed my lips together and sighed. "Men don't marry women who are detectives," I said softly, echoing my nanny from all those years ago.

  "That's not true. Times are changing, Bea," she said softly, starting to pull my hair back out of my face. "I know that you think you can't have both, but that's just not true. You can be a detective and a wife. You just have to give people a chance. You have plenty of suitors, but you push them away and go back to your potions and formulas."

  "I must focus on my work," I argued.

  "That's an excuse and we both know it, Bea," Victoria said, sticking a hair pin in my curls. "You hide behind your science because you're afraid."

  "Are you a psychologist now?" I scoffed, pulling my hair pin out and repositioning it in spite. Every time I replaced it, it all but fell out of my hair and Victoria smiled.

  She took the pin out of my hair and redid it so that it finally stayed in place. "Not a psychologist, darling, just a loving friend."

  I looked at her and sighed softly, shaking my head. “You are delusional,” I murmured, allowing Victoria to pat my face with pink pigments that stained my lips and cheeks.

  “Hardly, love,” she hummed, pulling a single curl down so that it fell in my face. “
I am not delusional. It’s just easier for me to see from the outside than it is for you to see from inside that stubborn head of yours. You should know that,” she said softly, pulling back.

  I took myself in in the mirror, and while I hated to admit it, Victoria had done a wonderful job. I looked like a true lady, which was something that I did not get to say too often. I wasn’t not known for my feminine charm. I was more likely to walk into a room covered in blood than wearing a dress. I sighed softly and turned to look at her.

  “Thank you. I really don’t know where I would be without you,” I said with a soft smile. “I look great. Better than I ever thought I would.”

  Victoria smiled and crossed her arms over her chest. “You should give yourself a little credit. You gave me the materials to work with,” she said, taking my arm and guiding me down the hall. “The Yard sent a carriage. They’re waiting.”

  As I followed her out of the house, my heart started beating a little faster. Social situations were not a place where I felt comfortable. I’d never really learned to conduct myself at large, formal functions like the one I was attending. As much as Victoria tried to tell me that times were changing, I knew she did not quite have that right. There were still things women were expected to do and I did not do any of those things.

  Victoria stood by the door and waved in my direction as I slipped into the carriage silently, glancing back over my shoulder and struggling to keep my composure. I could stare into the eyes of a killer and not flinch even in the slightest, but when it came to going to a ball, I was a mess.

  I took a deep breath and relaxed against the luxurious velvet seating, surprised that they’d sent such a nice carriage in the first place. I’d showed up their agency on more than one occasion and I wasn’t exactly their favorite person.

  The carriage took off and I groaned, closing my eyes and leaning my temple against the inside of the carriage. I always got a bit sick on these monstrosities. I stayed patient, but I was thankful when the carriage came to a stop and the driver opened the door for me, helping me out and keeping me upright as I stepped out onto the street.