Tread: Biker Romance (Ronin MC Series Book 1)

by Morrow, Justin

  Tread: Book One of the Ronin MC Series © Copyright 2015 by Brandace Morrow and Justin Morrow

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, printed, transmitted, downloaded, distributed, stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, without the express permission of the author. Please do not participate or encourage piracy in any capacity of copyrighted material in violation of the author’s rights.

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, or any events, occurrences, places, or business establishments is purely coincidental. The characters and story line are created from the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

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  [roh-nin]

  noun, plural ronin, ronins. Japanese History

  1. A samurai who no longer serves a daimyo, or feudal lord; a master-less Samurai.

  MY NAME IS TREAD, AND I’m the lead mechanic for Ronin Auto. I’m also either one of the baddest motherfuckers you will ever meet, or the answer to your prayers. Just depends on which way your compass is pointing. Literally.

  Most motorcycle clubs give you a handle when you prospect. My MC is different. We were given our handles at birth.

  Our fathers founded the club after coming home from Panama, having participated in Operation Just Cause, pooling their money to buy land on New Mexico’s southern border. While they risked their lives and lost brothers to protect our people, illegals were walking onto U.S. soil with guns and drugs, seemingly with the United States’ blessing.

  Arizona and Texas had walls, surveillance, and patrols, while the vast majority of New Mexico went unguarded still. After realizing what the Central American cartels were capable of, the founding members saw the opportunity to help our country while helping themselves. They sent the mules back, but kept the drugs as their prize in an often lethal game of hide and seek. They charged a king’s ransom to get wanted felons safely out of the country. By the time these men started having children, there was a legacy and a duty driving them to plan ahead.

  Once the next generation was old enough to enlist, we were on a bus out of town to defend our nation’s freedom. We went Airborne, Air Assault, and Special Forces, earning the pins and tabs that we would wear for the rest of our lives. When our enlistments were up, we came back to our sleepy town with knowledge, honor, and righteous indignation.

  Ronin had controlled the border for over twenty years.

  While the first generation took up arms voluntarily, the second generation were born to this fight.

  We became a dynasty.

  “AMEN.”

  I looked to my father at the head of the table as he unclasped his hands and smiled at us. He reached for a plate, and we followed. Several of my siblings broke off into conversation, but I just reached for the green beans.

  Filling my plate as platters were passed around, I shuffled everything together in a disgusting mash that looked better fit for pigs.

  “Grace, have you started your vows yet?” I looked towards my mother with an automatic smile that was neither genuine nor sincere.

  “Of course. I’m almost done.” She smiled approvingly and moved her long hair behind her shoulder.

  “Perfect. And you, Mathias?” My head swiveled to the seat beside me and I studied him. The man that I would be spending the rest of my life with was no more than a baby, or at least he looked it. Cheeks rounded with youth flushed as I gritted my teeth.

  “All ready done, Mrs. Peters.” I swallowed, but my mouth was dry, making me choke. Reaching for my water, I chomped down on an ice cube, the sound loud in my ears.

  “Grace, you shouldn’t do that. It’ll ruin your teeth.” My mother didn’t bother to lower her voice as she scolded me.

  Licking my lips, I mumbled, “Sorry.”

  After dinner, I walked Mathias to the front door, our chaperone my little brother that eyed us as if we might try to steal away in the hall closet for something inappropriate.

  “Dinner was wonderful as usual, Grace. Thank you so much for having me.” Mathias looked at me with eyes that were the exact shade and size of the basset hound I had as a little girl.

  “Of course,” I said quietly, my hands knotted together tightly. I didn’t invite him to dinner; in fact, I didn’t care one way or the other if he was here or with another girl. Woman, I corrected the thought. I was a woman. Twenty-one year olds across the world had more experience in their pinky toes than I had in my entire life.

  Mathias looked at my brother and smiled sheepishly before taking my hand hesitantly. I couldn’t help the sigh that escaped, but he misunderstood it.

  “Don’t worry, Grace. Soon we will have our own house and will be inviting your parents for a visit. I’m counting the days,” he said earnestly. I wholeheartedly believed him; I just didn’t share the excitement.

  I leaned up on my toes impulsively, lifting my chin to catch him in a kiss, an attempt to thwart the doubts that had plagued me for the last nine months.

  Mathias stumbled back, as if I was a cobra striking instead of his fiancé. His eyes widened, his hands ripped from mine. His brow was shiny with nervous sweat as he checked on my brother. Boyd was in the entryway shredding the petals of a flower with its own thorns, making me cringe.

  “Grace.” The nineteen-year-old boy-man admonished me, completely scandalized. I took a step back and closed my eyes against his horrified expression before I threw my hands up in frustration.

  “You aren’t even a little bit curious? You’re willing to marry me without knowing if I kiss like a fish, or gnaw on you like a dog with a bone?” Mathias stepped towards me, taking my hands again.

  “When we have our first kiss, it will be with the blessings of God, in front of our family and congregation.” He chuckled, a he-he sound that made me cringe again. Mathias didn’t notice. “I love that you’re curious. Only three more months, and I will give you everything you ask.”

  My mind instantly filled with images of dark rooms with the curtains drawn, our bed the only place we would ever come together as a married couple. While that seemed to work exceedingly well for my parents—considering their eleven children—I couldn’t help but want something more. More places, more than me on my back. More, I always seemed to want more.

  My family would be shocked, scandalized, at my thoughts. No doubt convinced the devil was whispering to me in my dreams of debauchery. Images of my father standing on his pulpit raising his worn Bible, face red as he spouted about sins of the flesh flooded my mind.

  “You’re right, Mathias. Forgive me,” I said reflexively. And just like that, all was forgotten.

  That night, I lay in bed staring at the ceiling a few feet in front of my face. The sound of my sisters shuffling and snoring in the other sets of bunk beds my lullaby for as long as I could remember.

  I held up my hands in front of my face in the twilight, their shapes black shadows against the white walls. I tried to envision a plain gold band on my left hand, an indentation from years of wear on my third finger. I tried to envision the skin marred with scars from dinners made from scratch, dry and cracked from washing dishes by hand more than three times a day to keep up with the children I was expected to spew out as if my womb was a portal that opened every nine months.

  Touching the back o
f my hand to my mouth, I puckered my lips. My skin was warm and dry, just like I imagined Mathias’s lips would be. Opening my mouth, I touched my tongue to the dry skin, feeling like there was a slimy worm wriggling on my hand. With a sigh of despair, I dropped it down to the cotton sheets.

  Was I destined to be a slimy worm? More importantly, would Mathias sticking his tongue in my mouth feel like a wriggling, creepy crawler for the rest of my life?

  Unfortunately, I was almost positive I knew the answer.

  “I JUST COULDN’T DO IT. Could. Not.”

  I looked towards the girl sitting beside me but stayed silent. Always silent.

  “I mean, it’s like . . . I don’t even know what. Eighteenth century, caveman craziness.” She flung her hands out, almost upsetting a figurine on our table. Holly didn’t get it, not that she ever did.

  “I’m positive there were no cavemen in the 1700s,” I corrected her dryly.

  Holly held up a finger to punctuate her point with wide eyes. “There probably were in Utah.” She spread her hands to encompass the entire mass of people around us.

  I rolled my eyes and swallowed my agreement. Holly’s family was part of our church, but her parents weren’t diehards like mine. She went to the community college and got to date whomever she chose. She wore makeup and pants, while I was stuck with skirts that fell below the knees and freaking Chapstick.

  My eyes automatically scanned the area, as if someone could overhear my less than proper thoughts.

  “Are they expecting the first pecker you see to be your husbands?” Holly said a little too loudly.

  “Would you shut your mouth!”

  Holly just rolled her eyes. “Oh, come on, I wasn’t that loud.”

  “Yes, you were. Plus, my mother has supersonic hearing. Like a bat.” My eyes were wide and my pulse raced as I tried to spy her frizzy head in the crowd.

  “Yeah, well, she’s going to suck the life out of you one baby at a time. I’m serious, have you ever seen one before?” Holly asked, her eyes on the smartphone in her hand.

  “I’ve gone through the same anatomy classes in high school you did, not to mention sex ed. I’m good.”

  “Here it is.” She held up her phone with a smirk, and I was positive every person behind me had just seen the woman on her phone deep throating a horse. I slap the phone down, where it clattered loudly onto the table.

  “Holly,” I ground out between my teeth as my face flooded with color. “This is a church function and we’re the cashiers, you idiot.”

  “Grace, I heard a commotion. Is there a problem?” my supersonic hearing mother said from behind me as I spun in my seat.

  “No, Mother. Holly dropped her phone, is all.” My mother turned to her with a frown.

  “You must be more careful, Holly. Those things are expensive for a young lady.” I wouldn’t know, since I had never had a phone, whether it be smart or otherwise.

  Holly flashed her dimples, and my mother lost her scowl. Just like that, she was in like an angel through the gates. She held her fingers in front of her face and wiggled them. “Butterfingers. I’ll be more careful, I promise.”

  My mother eyed us both before glancing around. “Why don’t I take over here so you can mingle with the crowd? You can tell them about the wedding; it may bring in more sales.”

  That was exactly what I wanted to do. Not.

  “Of course, what a great idea!” Holly jumped up, hooked her hand in my elbow, and almost dislocated it as she stood. I scrambled to follow my arm before it became detached and found myself behind a rack of winter coats with Holly’s eyes shining brightly.

  My friend was beautiful, but when her eyes sparkled, I knew a bad idea had passed through her mind. “I have the best idea!”

  “Yeah. No.” I turned to leave, but she had an amazingly strong grip for such a tiny thing.

  “Hear me out. The reason you’re marrying Josiah or Jeremiah—”

  “Those are the Duggers. His name is Mathias.”

  Holly rolled her eyes and brushed my comment away with her free hand. “Whatever, it’s the same thing. Anyway, the reason you’re stuck is because you don’t have any money, right?”

  “Aside from the fact that I would be leaving the only family I have, and place I’ve ever known, yes, I suppose you could say that,” I said slowly.

  “What if we got you some?”

  I stared at her blankly. “Money?”

  “No, a tiki torch. What do you think I’m talking about?”

  “At this point, it’s anyone’s guess.”

  Holly pulled a jacket off the rack while I rubbed circulation back into my arm. “You can have this coat for fifty dollars.”

  I looked at the tag. “It says it’s twenty-five.”

  Holly ripped the tag off. “No it doesn’t.”

  “Um.”

  “We up the prices.” She held her fingers an inch apart. “Just a little bit. Then at the end of the night, we take the difference. People are still giving to charity and the good cause of setting up your house. Tax write-off and cash in your pocket.”

  “You’re insane. I’m not stealing from the church or these people.”

  Holly visibly deflated. “Fine. All I’m saying is they came out to give to a good cause. Is it so good when your dad is practically forcing you to marry a man you don’t love? To be stuck cleaning a man’s house while he does whatever forever?”

  Her words pierced a part of me that I’d kept hidden away in a tiny part of my heart for as long as I could remember. It’s not that I didn’t want to have kids and a home. I just wanted it to be on my terms and not ‘Happy twenty-first birthday, here’s the perfect beau’ with nary an objection tolerated. Really, I was lucky to have been given this long. I managed to spread my two-year Vet Tech degree into four years with unnecessary classes for as long as I could.

  It was not that my parents cared what I studied. It never mattered to them, really. They could just say that I got my education before settling down. I was a woman who lived the existence of a sixteen-year-old in another world and, I felt like I was being strangled slowly with an ever-tightening hand.

  “I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

  “But, Gracie—”

  “I said stop, Holly. No more.”

  Holly’s face fell and she sighed. “All right, let’s go sell some knickknacks so that you can buy a marriage bed.”

  “Tell me about your vacation again,” I requested as we walked towards the nearest group of people. I felt bad for snapping at her, but really, this was my life and I’d known for a long time.

  “To Mexico?” She took my olive branch with her usual enthusiasm. “It was hot, and I’m not just talking about the weather. Sunbathing on white sandy beaches, all the fruity drinks you could want, and when the sun went down we danced.” She sighed again as her eyes turned dreamy. “Men in board shorts with muscles you could bounce a quarter off of looking at you like you were their Eden. It was magical. I can’t wait to go back.”

  I can’t imagine wearing a bikini, or dancing like I knew she danced, but it did sound magical to me. Maybe what heaven would be like, if one were able to mold it into anything they wanted to spend the rest of eternity in.

  THREE MONTHS LATER, A WOMAN with chubby fingers tortured me as she stuck bobby pins into my brain, or so it felt like, anyway.

  I stayed silent as my sisters, aunts, and mother twittered about like a flock of hummingbirds. It was my wedding day, and I was dying.

  The hand at my throat was a living, breathing thing that grew tighter as the clock wound down. On the outside, my face was relaxed, placid, and tranquil. But if you were to look at my neck, my pulse beat hard enough to serve as a beacon to even the most reserved vampire. I was minutes away from giving up a freedom I’d never known. I swallowed hard, the tick echoing in my ears. Today I would get a husband, and a cookie cutter, two-story house on the same street as my parents. I would literally be handed from my father to my husband.

&n
bsp; “There. I think that’ll do you, Grace.” I attempted a smile and thanked the pudgy woman, who wasn’t really a hairdresser but a member of the congregation, and that’s all that mattered, really.

  I stood in my heavy lace and turned to the room. My mother burst into tears as everyone exclaimed. I couldn’t look that amazing, of that I was certain. My hair was covered in an antique veil, handed down from my mother’s line all the way back through time. It was heavy, itched, and smelled like mothballs, but it was pretty and completed my shroud of a virgin-white bride.

  I felt like I lived my life by clichés. Virgin, check. Never been kissed, check. Arranged marriage, check. Let my husband provide while I had dinner hot when he comes home, check.

  Sighing, I turned towards the door. Someone thrust a bouquet into my chest so hard it knocked the breath out of me and I stumbled.

  “Really, Grace. You have to be more careful. You almost ripped your train.”

  “Sorry, Mother,” I mumbled from under the cloying cloth. Could one suffocate in lace? It felt like a great possibility.

  By the time the entourage made it to the Temple, beads of sweat were rolling down my face. I felt like I might puke, my stomach tightened, my mouth watered. My breaths rasped out of my lungs like an asthmatic, and I wondered if I was about to pass out.

  I held up a hand to stop the flow into the Temple. I physically couldn’t make my feet cross the threshold.

  “Come, dear.” My ever-present mother beckoned me with her hand. I stared at the weathered skin, knuckles red from years of washing dishes by hand—the hand that had held me through nightmares and plaited my hair in braids. Looking into my mother’s eyes, I saw a trickle of fear enter them, but knew she could hardly see my face. What was the saying? Mothers always know.

  I swallowed audibly and took a step back.

  “Grace?” Her hand waved at me like one of the white doves we were to release as we exited the church as husband and wife.