Tread: Biker Romance (Ronin MC Series Book 1) (2 page)

“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.

“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.

“I just need a moment,” I mumbled, taking another step, almost going to the ground in a puddle of ivory when I caught the train on my heel again.

“Grace, what are you doing? Everyone is inside.” Mother tried to smile, but her hand shook.

“I’ll be right in. I just need to catch my breath.” Her smile was as shaky as her hand, but she finally dropped it and nodded slightly before closing the door.

The click of the latch catching sounded like a gong in my head, reverberating over and over like church bells after a joyous occasion.

I whipped the lace backwards and took a fresh breath of mountain air. Spring air. The time of rebirth and renewal. Without another thought, my hands already clenched tight at my thighs, I lifted the cumbersome weight and turned.

My feet flew in their satin slippers, not giving any padding to the random stones in the grass as I ran. Because I was running. Mark that up to another cliché in my life.

My feet carried me to the side of the Temple where the reception was scheduled to be held. The tables were set with vases of wild flowers cut from our fields. Oh, how they were clever. The cake was in the corner, and out of curiosity, I made my way to it. It was four tiers, with little white pillars holding up the layers. It was taller than I was. Dwarfing me, really. I supposed it had to with all of the people it was meant to feed.

My eyes traveled to the bottom of the baby’s breath and daisies cascading down, until I saw the shiny, silver bowl lain next to it. It was overflowing with cards, some falling onto the table. Curious, I opened one addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Mathias Bloom. In the envelope was a card with handwriting taking up the entire inside, but what fell out cemented my decision.

Money. Green and white sustenance given with love and obligation to help aid a new life. I grabbed the bowl and its contents without another thought and wrapped it in the folds of my dress, like a gardener at harvest time.

I looked around like a fugitive, already wondering if I could go to jail for my crime. I contemplated putting it back for a brief second and walking back into the Temple, but a rustling of fabric had me darting away and into the parking lot beyond the building. It was filled to the brim, some electing to park on the side of the road or in the grass.

Luckily, for me at least, my father’s house was three down, as a shepherd had to stay close to his flock. We had just left minutes before, but it seemed like hours. I reached my old sedan and dumped my bounty into the passenger seat before bursting into the house with one mission: purse and keys.

Sitting behind the steering wheel, I gasped for breath and turned the ignition, almost having a heart attack when it stuttered. “Oh, please, Jesus.” I twisted my wrist again and the motor caught. I flew down the road, leaving the only home I’d ever known without a backwards glance.

Runaway bride, check.

I vowed that was the last cliché I’d ever be again.