TANK_Forsaken Riders MC Romance
Page 1
Table of Contents
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2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Collections
Stonybrooke Shifters
Billionaire Romance
Time Travel Romance
Highlander Time Travel Romance
Dystopian Romance
Dragon Shifter Romance
Wolf Shifter Romance
Bear Shifter Romance
MC Romance
TANK
A Forsaken Riders Standalone MC Romance
Book 21
Samantha Leal
Copyright ©2018 by Samantha Leal. All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic of mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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And if you want to check out some of my other stories…
Standalone Contemporary Novellas
Mountain Daddy’s Nanny
The Baby Offer
The Forsaken Riders
The Forsaken Riders series is a collection of novelette and novella length standalone Bad boy romances that fit together to tell the longer tale of the Forsaken Riders – and the woman they love - as they fight to dominate the town of Slate Springs.
Tanner (Book 0 Prequel)
Available HERE
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King (Book 1)
Lynx (Book 2)
Steel (Book 3)
Gunner (Book 4)
Hawk (Book 5)
Bull (Book 6)
Stag (Book 7)
Stick (Book 8)
Decker (Book 9)
Ax (Book 10)
Hunter (Book 11)
Rocket (Book 12)
Diesel (Book 13)
Breaker (Book 14)
Flash (Book 15)
Hammer (Book 16)
Brick (Book 17)
Chains (Book 18)
Ranger (Book 19)
Snake (Book 20)
Tank (Book 21)
The Lost Creek Shifters
The Lost Creek Shifters series is a collection of novelette length standalone Bad boy romances that fit together to tell the longer story of the ancient tale of the bear and wolf shifters in a small mountain town. Enjoy!
ARLO (Book 1)
SCAR (Book 2)
BLU (Book 3)
BODHI (Book 4)
KODHI (Book 5)
ZEKE (Book 6)
…and also from Totally Romance…
STONYBROOKE SHIFTERS
DADDY SHIFTER’S VIRGIN
A SECRET BABY FOR THE SHIFTER
THE SHIFTER’S MAIL ORDER VIRGIN
DADDY SHIFTER’S FAKE FIANCE
THE SEAL SHIFTER’S SECRET BABY
CLAIMED BY THE ALPHA DADDY
NANNY TO THE SHIFTER
THE SHIFTER PROTECTOR’S VIRGIN
SECOND CHANCE WITH THE SHIFTER
OAK MOUNTAIN SHIFTERS
HER BILLIONAIRE SHIFTER BOSS
HER SECRET PROTECTOR BEAR
A SECRET BABY FOR DADDY BEAR
THE ALPHA’S MAIL ORDER BRIDE
THE ALPHA DADDY’S NANNY
BANISHED DRAGONS
CAPTIVE TO THE DRAGON
DRAGONS OF KALDERNON
THE DRAGONS OF KALDERNON COMPLETE SERIES
DRAGON DREAMS
DRAGON PROTECTOR
And we would also love it if you would
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Table of Contents
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Collections
Stonybrooke Shifters
Billionaire Romance
Time Travel Romance
Highlander Time Travel Romance
Dystopian Romance
Dragon Shifter Romance
Wolf Shifter Romance
Bear Shifter Romance
MC Romance
1.
The sun was so bright overhead that Jessica could barely see. She squinted her eyes to be half closed and raised her hand to her forehead as she looked out across the desert. The heat was intense and was rising from the ground, making the air in front of her ripple and steam. She leaned back against the door of her car and unscrewed the cap on the bottle of water she was holding, before she took a long, drawn out sip.
She was hot and tired, but she was stuck right there and had no way of moving without aid. She should at least be thankful that she had thought ahead and bought the water when she had stopped at the gas station several miles before, even if she was about to finish it.
She looked down at her cell phone and furrowed her brow. She had called Zack ten minutes ago, and she was sure, by now, that he should be bombing out across the desert, the town long behind him. She sighed as she looked down at the ground and kicked at the sandy rocks with the tip of her sneaker. She had left the house in such a rush that morning, everything had been completely mismatched when it came down to her outfit, and she looked as if she had tumbled out of a thrift store. So, of course, this would be the day her car decided to conk out and leave her stranded in the middle of nowhere.
She took another sip of the water and drained the bottle, before she looked up toward the midday sun. It was baking hot and she was starting to feel dizzy.
“Come on, Zack,” she breathed. “I can’t stand it out here for much longer.”
When the steam and smoke had started to come out of the hood, she had rolled her eyes and instinctively pulled over to the side of the road and got out to try and take a look herself. Being the daughter of a mechanic, she had regularly seen underneath the bonnet of cars and trucks, even if she didn’t have any real clue of what she was looking at. She had scrunched up her lips and shrugged to herself.
Just as she thought, she had no idea what was going on… all she knew was that it didn’t look good.
She’d slammed the hood down and climbed back into the driver’s seat, and when she had turned the key to try and restart the ignition, she had been met with a cough, a splutter, and then… silence.
Queue Zack.
She’d reached straight for her cellphone and called her man. Surely, she could count on him?
“Babe, I’ve broken down on the side of the highway,” she’d said as she chewed her lip and fanned her face with her hand. “Can you come and get me, bring one of my dad’s tow trucks.”
“Of course,” he’d purred, and he had assured her he would be right there.
But she was still waiting.
She looked down at the time on her phone and realized she’d been standing there now for over an hour.
Where the hell is he? She gritted her teeth.
It wasn’t until another half hour had passed, six calls had been ignored, and five text messages, that Jessica decided that something must have happened. Her heart beat fast and she tried to stay out of the sun by sitting in the small amount of shade that was being cast on one side of the car. She sat on the hot ground and breathed in and out quickly, just trying not to panic and succumb to the heat any quicker.
When she finally heard the rumble and thunder of a truck coming
out from toward the mountains, she leaned forward and in a haze began to wave her arms back and forth as fast as she could without using too much energy.
Her mouth was dry and almost sealed shut, her hair was wet and stuck to the back of her neck, and she felt as if she was about to fall unconscious, the heat was so overbearing.
She’d been out there without shade for almost three hours, and now with the water long gone, she was on the verge of passing out.
She waved and waved, and just hoped that the truck would see her as she tried not to cry.
“How is this even happening…” she whispered, as she struggled to pull herself to her feet.
She raised her arm again as she leaned against the side of her car, and she cried with relief as the truck blared its horn and started to slow down, before it pulled to the side of the highway and up next to where she was waiting.
“Thank God,” she breathed as she closed her eyes and slid back down onto the ground.
The truck hissed as it braked, and she let her head roll onto her shoulder as she braced herself to have to move again.
“Hey?” a voice cut through the silence. “Hey, are you alright?”
She could hear the patter of feet running toward her, and she felt a pair of hands scoop her up under the arms and help her to her feet.
“Jesus,” the trucker said. “How long have you been out here, the sun, you’re burning!”
Jessica’s head rolled onto his shoulder and she closed her eyes.
She was safe and someone had found her.
Now she was just going to have to find out what the hell had happened to Zack…
“These wires have been cut,” her pop said as he looked under the hood with a worried expression on his face.
“Excuse me?” Jessica looked up at him, completely confused and still in a daze from her brush with dehydration and death out in the desert. She was still drinking as much fluid as possible the next day, even though she had been discharged from the emergency room after only a few hours. The trucker who had found her had taken her there in a blind panic, completely startled and scared for her, and with no clue over what he had just stumbled across. She had sunburn, but it was nothing that a lot of aloe and rest wouldn’t fix, the dehydration, however, could have been another story, and she had been lucky.
“Yeah,” her dad said as he closed his mouth tightly. “It looks like someone has tampered with your car…”
Jessica’s blood ran cold.
“What the…?” she looked out toward the big sliding doors that were thrown open letting in a marginally cooler breeze than what was being circulated in the shop by an electric fan. The sun was setting, and the day had been long, but what was worrying her the most was that Jess still hadn’t heard from Zack.
She bit her lip and felt tears welling up behind her eyes.
“I don’t understand,” she said, her voice a small croak.
Her dad flexed his fists and looked as if he were about to spiral into a rage.
“I want you to go home, Jessica,” her father said sternly. “Get your rest and don’t think about this for another minute. I’ll get to the bottom of it.”
He had looked up at her and she could tell how serious he was and she didn’t want to argue.
Had someone tried to harm her?
She swallowed nervously and nodded her head, before she turned on her heel and picked up her purse.
It had been a crazy two days, and not at all how she had been expecting to spend the run up to her birthday, but life was obviously throwing her curve balls from every angle and she was going to have to do what she did best and just roll with the punches.
She walked out the front door of Durrett Motor Inc and felt as if she had been slapped in the face. And she couldn’t shake the feeling of dread.
Zack had been missing now since she had called him when she had been in trouble, she hadn’t told her father, but she knew…
If the wires had been cut, then it had to have been him.
On the walk back to her house, her mind raced with theories and possibilities. One moment, she was cursing herself for even thinking that maybe Zack could have had something to do with her car breaking down, and then the next she was almost certain that it must have been him.
They had been dating for six months and gotten close quickly, however, Jess had always found herself holding back from him and she couldn’t explain why. He was fun and handsome, but he definitely had a mean and immature streak, and Jessica had wondered if maybe they weren’t so compatible after all. She wasn’t as crazy about him as he seemed to be about her, and lately, he had been asking her questions about them moving in together which she had expertly side stepped.
She turned the corner onto her street and saw her house at the end of the cul-de-sac. She smiled as she felt the familiar presence of home, and just longed to be within the confines of her own lovely space, unwinding in private and not having to worry about what had just happened.
“Yeah right,” she whispered to herself. “As if you’re going to be able to push this out of your mind.”
She wandered up the driveway and pulled her key out of her back pocket before she slid it into the lock and opened the door. She flicked on the lights in the hallway and as she peered through into the living area she could already see the little red light flashing on her answer machine. She narrowed her eyes before she took a step closer, and then she held her breath.
She didn’t believe in psychic abilities, or anything whimsical like that, but in that moment, Jessica just knew the message was from him.
Zack.
She pressed play.
“Hey babe, sorry I haven’t been in touch… Give me a call, yeah?” His voice seemed to echo around the room and she felt the rage begin to rise within her.
“What the hell is he playing at?” she said as she scrunched up her nose and ran her hands through her hair with exasperation.
She punch dialed his number into her phone and held it to her ear, tapping her foot and chewing her lip, resisting the urge to blast him the moment her answered.
“Hey gorgeous,” his slick voice cut through the rings as he hit answer.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Jessica gasped. “Hey gorgeous?”
Zack started to laugh, and Jessica felt as if her head was going to explode. For some reason, he seemed to think this whole thing was funny.
“What happened to you yesterday?” she asked him with her mouth sagging open. “I called you, I needed help, and you told me you were coming for me…” She was spluttering over her words and in such a state of shock she could barely string a sentence together.
“Oh man,” Zack laughed as he tried to catch his breath. “I wish I could have seen your face.”
“My face!?” she spat. “I really hope you weren’t behind this Zack because it wasn’t funny, like seriously wasn’t funny! I was stuck out in the blistering heat for almost three hours, I could have died!”
His laughs subsided, and he coughed nervously.
“Seriously?” he asked, his voice quiet and small.
“Deadly,” she said sternly.
“I, well… I mean, babe, it was a joke… I didn’t know you were driving out there, or that far. I mean trucks go up and down the highway all the time, how could you have been stuck for that long?”
“I don’t know what fucked up crazy little world you live in, Zack,” she said trying to keep her cool. “But what you did… that was all kinds of illegal and dangerous. And I can’t for a second fathom why you would want to play a prank on your girlfriend like that? I mean, are you insane?”
He was silent on the other end of the line and she was lost for words once more.
“It was just supposed to be a bit of fun,” he finally managed to squeak. “I thought you’d break down somewhere in town and have to get towed. I was trying to prove my point that even though you’re the daughter of a mechanic, you still need me… you know, to be your man and keep you safe. I knew your
dad was out of town yesterday and it wouldn’t be so easy for you to call him…”
She felt her jaw sag even further.
“And yet, by trying to prove that you can keep me safe you’ve done exactly the opposite,” she said. “You put me in danger.”
There was silence between them and Jessica raised her hand and pinched the top of her nose in frustration.
“If my dad ever finds out it was you… he’ll literally kill you,” she said.
“God Jess, I am so sorry, honestly I am… I was just trying to prove a point. I wanted you to realize you do need me and you’re not so independent after all, you know? We should be living together by now. I love you, please, come on, you’ve got to listen to me.”
“Oh, I’m listening,” she said with a snort of laughter. “And I’ve heard all I need to know…” she felt herself trail off and she leaned back against the wall and looked up at the ceiling. “I was having doubts before yesterday, Zack, but this has just confirmed that we aren’t right for each other.”
She paused for a moment to allow him to protest, but then she shook her head and continued.
“Zack, what you did was out of control.”
“But I didn’t mean any harm, I didn’t think it through, I mean God, you’re my girl… I would never do anything to hurt you. I can’t even believe this is how it panned out. I’m stunned.”
“I’m stunned too,” she said. “At your stupidity.”
She shook her head and tapped her foot against the floor as she looked down at her forearms and at the pink of sunburn that was still flaming away on them. She swallowed and blinked away a tear.
“You’re childish and petty,” she said. “And I don’t want to be with you anymore.”
“But Jess,” he said.
“No,” she didn’t even let him finish what he was going to follow on with. “I don’t want to hear anymore. Even if this hadn’t happened yesterday and you hadn’t put me through what can only be described as hell, I would still have come to this decision eventually. You and me, we just don’t click. You’re juvenile, you’re mean… and I don’t want you in my life.”