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  Kris had walked out on me.

  “Shit,” I said, falling into the nearby chair. Where had all of this gone so wrong? Kris was my future, the woman I was going to marry.

  And now she was gone.

  My chest caved in and I put my head in my hands, knowing I should go after her. She was the best thing that had ever happened to me and without her, I was just another asshole biker again.

  No, I was President Asshole Biker now.

  “Fuck!” I swore again, pushing out of the chair and stumbling toward the bedroom. The room smelled like her, her clothing slung about the room in her haste to get away from me.

  All because I had told her to. It hadn’t been her leaving. It had been my fucking words that drove her away.

  Falling onto the bed, I looked up at the ceiling and felt the pain kicking in over my buzz. What the hell was I going to do without her? I had to apologize. I had to go after her and make this right.

  But I wouldn’t give up on the club for her. I had worked my ass off for this, waited patiently for the day I would be given the keys to the clubhouse. Of course, under the circumstances, it sucked, but life went on.

  It went on.

  Chapter 10

  Kristina

  I scrubbed a hand over my face, feeling the pull of another sleepless night wearing me down. For the last two days, I’d taken up at a run-down motel, with no place to go. I had no friends to go bunk down with. My family had pretty much disowned me when I had moved in with Rex, thinking he was too old and too rough for their daughter.

  That and they couldn’t understand why I’d thrown away my future with my ex.

  Fuck them.

  Not now I had nowhere to go, and for the first time in quite a few months, I felt hopeless.

  “Another coffee, honey?”

  I looked up at the waitress, shaking my head. “No, I’m good.”

  She gave me a look but turned away anyway. I could only imagine what she saw: the bags under my eyes, the haggard look on my face.

  The hopelessness.

  Reaching into my jeans pocket, I pulled out the few dollars I had left, my attention snapping to a familiar piece of paper falling onto the table as I did so. Opal’s number, the woman from the helmet shop.

  The woman who was interested in forming an all-women club.

  I pulled in a sharp breath as I thought about what that would mean.

  What we could do.

  What we could stop the Jesters from doing.

  That was what I wanted to do more than anything. Sure, my heart had been ripped out of my chest, I had lost the single most important person in my life, but there was a more pressing need than my own heartache.

  The cartel had just officially infiltrated into the US. With the Jesters helping them, there would be more women being taken from their homes, more girls being robbed of their innocence. Rex couldn’t see through the forest for the trees, but I could.

  We couldn’t help the cartel, or make their lives easier.

  Hell. The cartel needed to be stopped.

  Someone needed to stop them now, before they gained more traction.

  Fingering the piece of paper, I thought about the consequences. This would pit me and Rex against each other for good. If I succeeded, I would cost him and the club valuable funds in the process.

  I would lose everything I had.

  The problem was, I already had lost everything. When Rex told me to leave, to get out of his house, I knew it was over. He would never put me before any of the club business. Sure, he’d said dumb shit before to push me away, but nothing like that. He hadn’t gone that far.

  And if he was willing to go that far, say such a wretched thing just to put me in my place, I knew I would always be second rate to him.

  Some people were okay with that, but I wasn’t.

  I wanted him to see me as an equal.

  Because I was his equal.

  Reaching for my cell, I typed out a message to Opal. If she was serious, then so was I.

  It didn’t take long for her to find me. Her hair hung around her shoulders as she hurried to my table. “Oh honey, are you okay? You look like shit.” She slid into the booth across from me.

  “I feel like it,” I said, letting out a rusty laugh. “I wasn’t sure you would come.”

  “Not come?” she asked. “This is the most exciting thing that has happened to me in quite a while. Of course, I was gonna come. Are you serious about it?”

  “Dead,” I said, swallowing my emotion. “I’m ready to start this biker club up.”

  Opal grinned, reaching across the table to touch my hand. “Then let’s get this shit started. What kind of money do you have?”

  “None,” I said, knowing what a bind that put us in. We needed funds. This was a very expensive venture in more than one way.

  Opal waved her hand at me. “Good thing I know some people then. We might have to take out a loan, but if this works out, we will pay it back tenfold in no time. My pop also owns an old storefront if we want to use it for the clubhouse right now.”

  Tears sprang to my eyes. “I don’t know how to thank you, Opal.”

  “Call me Mama Bear.” She corrected me.

  Chapter 11

  Kristina

  Two weeks later, I looked around the worn table, feeling a sense of satisfaction flowing through my veins. Mama Bear had proved to be a very resourceful woman, getting not only a list of women together, but also securing the funds and the building we were meeting in tonight.

  Not only that, she had let me crash in her spare bedroom while we pieced together our group, and I had grown to love the hard woman. I’d told her about Rex, shedding the last bit of tears I would cry over him and our failed relationship. I didn’t want to go back to him, but that didn’t mean I didn’t love him.

  The problem was, I loved him too damn much.

  He had tried to call me. My cell was full of missed calls from him, text messages I had quit reading, my heart breaking as I deleted him from my phone completely. He had been a chapter in my life, one I would never forget, but he had also made it perfectly clear he did not want me in his new chapter and for that, I was going to stay gone.

  I had to. Things would not change between us with him in the hot seat, refusing to let me in on anything, and as much as I hated to even think about the next five or ten years without him, I had to.

  Besides, I had something else to throw my energy toward and tonight was the first of many meetings we would have.

  Rapping my knuckles on the table, a quiet fell around the room. “Thank you all for coming tonight.”

  Pairs of eyes stared back at me and I struggled to find my words, now understanding what Rex probably went through in his first meeting as president. The weight of what I was about to do was heavy on my shoulders, the responsibility I was about to take on.

  Maybe we did have something in common after all.

  So, I took in a deep breath and put on my best face. “Tonight, will be the start of something new for these parts. Tonight, the women are taking back what they have been denied. We’ve been told we aren’t strong enough, we don’t have the balls to protect ourselves or to ensure a club’s future. Well I am sick and tired of the men telling us what we can and cannot do.”

  “Hear, hear,” one of the women said, banging her fist on the table. “We aren’t just eye candy. We are more than that.”

  “You’re damned right you are,” I added, giving her a nod. “And we are gonna prove it to anyone who questions our worth.”

  Another woman spoke out. “I heard we are going after the cartel.”

  Murmurs vibrated through the group, some looks of concern flashing amongst their faces. Going up against the cartel would be no easy feat. Some of us might not make it when all was said and done.

  “That’s right. We are. The cartel stand for everything we are against, and anyone who associates themselves with the cartel is jus
t as much to blame as they are. Women aren’t something to be traded and exploited for money, and the men who turn a blind eye to what’s happening are the ones who don’t have the balls to do what’s right. We are more than warm bodies on the back of their bikes and in their beds, more than pets to be housed on the side while they make their deals and profit off the lives of our sisters.”

  As I spoke, those looks of concern hardened into resolved stares of women who understood we had this chance, this opportunity, to free the most oppressed among us, the ones who faced the same discrimination we had, magnified by at least a thousand.

  “I’m in,” Mama Bear said. “The cartel is stealing our babies off the street and doing unspeakable things to them. Someone has to stand up for the victims. Someone has to stop this from happening.”

  I looked out over the crowd. “If any of you do not want to be part of this, then you can leave, right now. If you do want to make a difference and stop these assholes, then we will initiate you tonight.”

  There were grumblings around the group, and I stepped away from the table, joined by Mama Bear. We walked out of the room together, leaving them to decide what they would do.

  “Someone has to be president,” I told her when we were out of earshot. We hadn’t really talked about it. And she had done so much to bring all of us together. I hadn’t cared who would run this thing, wishing only to be a part of this beautiful group coming together around ideas dear to my heart.

  She let out a laugh. “Someone? That someone is you, Kristina. After that speech, they will all be vying for you to be their president.”

  I looked at her, feeling butterflies in the pit of my stomach. It was something I’d sensed when I’d felt the change in that room, when the fear of the cartel had shifted into quiet resolve that they had to be stopped.

  But this thing was real now. And what if I screwed up? It’s not like I was president of a PTA, trying to organize a bake sale.

  This was the fucking cartel.

  “I’m not ready to lead anyone.”

  She placed a hand on my shoulder, the solid gaze from her giving me strength.

  “Of course you are. You were born to be this club’s president. You’ve felt all these things, been used at the expense of your very soul, lived through it, and came out stronger for it. Don’t let the biased opinion of a man, out of touch with reality, get in your head.”

  I drew in a breath, feeling it pull on my lungs. I knew who she was talking about and she was right. I was bigger than Rex, bigger than any box he had tried to force me into. I had suffered in my life, and now it was time for me to stop the suffering for others who were even worse off than myself.

  I could do this. I had to. “Call them back together.”

  Mama Bear gave me a grin and turned away to do as I asked.

  I followed her, waiting for the room to quiet when I entered, then stood behind the table looking at the crowd. “Anyone want out?”

  No one moved. A few swallowed hard, but everyone remained in their place and pride flooded my veins. “Alright then. Now it is time to elect a president.”

  “I vote Kristina,” Mama Bear said immediately. “This is her brainchild. Only feels right that she lead it into the next decade.”

  “I second it,” another called out.

  “All in favor?” Mama Bear asked.

  The chorus of ayes nearly brought tears to my eyes. I was a president. I was in charge of leading these women. “Thank you,” I forced out. “I will not let you down.”

  “Now for a name,” Mama Bear continued. “What shall we name our club, Madam President?”

  I thought for a minute before a smile crossed my face. “I want the devil to shake in his boots when he hears us coming. I want him to cower in fear.”

  “Them bitches are up,” one of the women called out, causing the room to laugh.

  “Hell’s Bitches,” Mama Bear breathed, a grin on her face. “That’s what we should call ourselves.”

  I returned her grin. “I like it. All in favor?”

  “Aye!”

  Chapter 12

  Kristina

  The next week I walked into our temporary clubhouse, amazed by the work that had been done in the space already. A growing cache of weapons stood in the corner, from guns to grenades, all in the process of being cataloged by a few of the women. Other women huddled around a large map on the wall behind me, one that traced cartel runs from the US to Mexico.

  All of that prep led to accomplishing one goal, and our plan to do that was simple: hit the cartel where it would hurt them the most and rescue any women we could.

  Any drugs or weapons we confiscated we’d sell off market to fund our raids.

  And I wasn’t fucking around.

  If any Jesters tried to protect the cartel runs, we would shoot them dead.

  The thought of Rex lying dead in the desert horrified me, but as much as that image made me want to back out of my own deal, I knew I couldn’t. He had chosen his bed and I had chosen mine.

  We were on different sides of a war, and I intended to show him just what I was capable of, what he could have had if he hadn’t been such a sexist, corrupt fool.

  He wouldn’t know what hit him.

  I walked over to the map, tracing the lines with my finger. Before we went after the cartel, I needed to make our club’s presence known to the men who protected the them.

  I needed to make a statement to the Jesters.

  “You really want to go through with this?”

  I turned toward Mama Bear, seeing the concern in her eyes. All of the club members had started on their road names, each one of them coming up with an appropriate name with a little help from my new council. It was quite impressive how well they fit, though I had yet to find mine.

  “Yeah, I have to.”

  She drew in a breath. “You know you would be declaring war, a war we’d have to fight in with a newly formed club, right? These girls, they have heart, but they are young and inexperienced.”

  “I know.” I swallowed hard. “But we can’t wait much longer on this. We have to strike while the element of surprise is there.”

  “But are you ready to come face to face with him? You know you will, and when that time comes…”

  “I will shoot him in the center of his forehead,” I finished for her, tired of everyone tip-toeing around me about the president of the Rough Jesters. Word had gotten out that I was pitting the Bitches against my ex-boyfriend’s club, and I hoped they didn’t think this was all about my broken heart.

  What we were doing was bigger than all that, and besides, my feelings for Rex complicated things; they didn’t make what we had to do easier.

  “Come on,” I said, turning away from the map. “Let’s pay them a visit now.”

  Mama Bear stared at me for a moment before nodding. “I’ll get the girls and the bikes. I’m assuming you want my loaner?”

  I nodded, thinking about the bike in Rex’s garage. That bike had held so much promise for us, so many memories, but I would burn in hell before I rode on it now. Until I could gather up enough funds for my own, I would be riding on one of Mama Bear’s.

  She turned away and I walked over to the corner where the weapons were located, selecting one of the small guns laid out on the table. “Is this loaded?”

  Robyn ‘Hair Trigger’ Waters nodded, wiping her hands on her jeans. She was my enforcer, the one who would whip these girls into shape and get us competing with the other clubs. “Yeah it is. Do you want two of them?”

  I held the gun in my palm, testing the weight of it. “No, one will do the trick this time. Make sure everyone who rides is outfitted and knows how to use their guns. We will be going out in two days.”

  “Yes ma’am,” she responded, a hint of a grin on her face. “We can’t wait.”

  I couldn’t either. Tucking the gun in my waistband, I walked out the door and toward the garage where everyone was loading up,
engines roaring to life all around me. It was time for Hell’s Bitches to flex their muscles.

  Finding my bike, I swung my leg over it, grateful for the small amount of training I had on this thing. Mama Bear had done her best, even offering me a helmet once or twice, but I refused.

  I couldn’t cover my face now, not when I’d become the president of the newest club. Putting one on was something I would have done before, something a club girl who thought her future in her biker man’s bed was all planned out for her.