They burst through the front door, past a cramped and dusty seating area, and through an open doorway into the shop. Gunner guided her through a welter of bikes in various stages of repair. A skinny kid looked up and flung himself out of their way, the metallic clang of a tool hitting concrete echoing loudly as he watched them race by.
“Gunner? What the hell’s going on?”
A man stood in the doorway to what looked like an office, holding something greasy and metallic in his hand.
“Reece, change of plans. Taking the rest of the day off. Gotta...give a girl a ride, um, somewhere.”
Gunner managed to get all this out without breaking his stride. Claire got a look at the guy named Reece as she flew past. Mouth open, he followed their headlong dash through his shop.
“Bike’s out back.” Gunner slammed through a metal security door and they popped back out into the bright sunshine. Claire saw the bike, a big Harley, lurking in the shadows of the dead-end alley.
Gunner finally let go of her. She waited, shifting anxiously from foot to foot while he pulled back the chain-link security gate at the mouth of the alley, half expecting Adrian to appear any second. Gunner ran back to the bike, wheeled it forward, and climbed on. The Harley came to life with a deep rumble. To Claire, it sounded loud and powerful and a lot like escape.
“You got some kind of plan other than just running?” Gunner shouted over the noise of the big machine.
Claire hiked up the skirt of her waitress uniform and got on behind Gunner. She’d ridden bikes before, but this thing was massive.
And so was Gunner. She leaned forward across his broad back, her lips close to his ear.
“My apartment, for a start. Then...” She shrugged and leaned back.
Gunner turned, giving her a look that clearly said he thought she was crazy. But he gunned the big machine, dropped it into gear, and then they were gone.
Chapter Two
Gunner knew the guy was a shifter the minute the door opened. His scent was so strong it rolled off him in waves. Gunner thought the guy was either supremely confident no one would notice—or care—he was a shifter, or he was so out of control he wasn’t even trying to mask himself.
As it turned out, he was out of control. Gunner had been close to a few loose cannons in his life, and sometimes he fit that description. But this guy was beyond anything he had ever encountered. For a brief second, he’d debated if he even wanted to get involved.
But the look on the girl’s face told him there was no way he could just sit there and let the guy do whatever the hell he was going to do. For one thing, she was clearly terrified of the guy. For another, Gunner was pretty sure if she ran, he’d never see her again.
And that wasn’t something he was willing to let happen.
So he’d stood and turned, facing the guy. And bit back a laugh. The guy was a good half-foot shorter than Gunner, dressed in some high fashion suit and tie, with shoes so polished they practically glowed. Either he had a lot of money and didn’t mind flaunting it, or he was trying to make up for the lack of stature—or lack of something else—with the flashy clothes. As far as Gunner was concerned, neither mattered. All that was important was keeping himself between the guy and the girl.
The shifter radiated rage like a blast furnace. When Gunner put his hand on the guy’s shirt, he caught a glimpse of just how wound up the guy was. It wouldn’t have surprised him if the guy shifted right then and there. He was on the edge, and the least provocation could push him past his limits. Something needed to be done, and it needed to be done now.
“Take your paw off my shirt, you stinking animal.”
Gunner reacted, instinct and intense dislike for the guy fueling his actions. Grab the tie, yank hard, and aim for his nose. There was a satisfying crack as his head connected with the bridge of the guy’s nose. He was out instantly, sagging against the tie. Gunner let go and the guy hit the floor, blood pouring out over his nice white shirt.
And now Jillian...or Claire, as it turned out...was on the back of his bike as he wove through lunch hour traffic, burning through yellow lights, leaning hard into the corners.
It was pretty clear Claire had been on a bike before. She moved with him around corners and wasn’t clutching him in a death grip like some girls did. But she was holding on tight, and despite their speed and the cars honking around him, not all of his focus was on the road.
Gunner was acutely aware of her arms around him, the soft press of her breasts against his back, her warm hands on his stomach, just above the button of his jeans. When she’d hiked up her skirt to climb on behind him, he’d caught a flash of a long leg and a creamy-skinned, luscious thigh. Several inappropriate thoughts ran through his head.
The big yellow taxi was in front of him almost before he could react. Braking wasn’t an option, so he gunned the machine, leaning hard, swerving left around the ass end of the cab. He drew a deep breath as they rocketed through the other side of the intersection and made the effort to pull his mind away from Claire’s attributes long enough to not get them killed.
She’d shouted the street name in his ear, back when they were still traveling under the speed limit. He knew the area, and it wasn’t long before he was cruising down Belmont Street, past the red brick apartment buildings that had seen not only better days, but better decades. He felt her hand move away from his body and she pointed to one of the cookie cutter buildings.
He saw an alley and turned down the shadowy canyon that ran between her building and its neighbor. He could see traffic at the other end, meaning they had an escape route, and behind her building he found a small, garbage-strewn courtyard, weeds growing with abandon.
He swung into the courtyard, making a tight circle across the gravel and patchy, brown grass. Claire was off the bike before he’d killed the engine. He kicked down the stand and climbed off.
She’d climbed a set of cracked cement steps, and he was right behind her as she pushed through the door into a dim hallway that smelled like cat urine and cooked cabbage.
“Why are we here? If you’re in such a hurry, I can take you anywhere you want to go.”
She was fumbling with her keys in front of a nondescript door, the number eight missing but the ghostly outline still visible on the dingy wood.
“I need to get my stuff and my money. It won’t take long.” She slammed the door shut behind him, throwing the deadbolts. “I’ll be right back.”
Claire darted through a pair of curtains into what he thought was probably the bedroom. He heard banging and thumps and sighed. No woman he’d ever known could pack in less than an hour.
“So, you want some help...” He parted the curtains, stepping between them. And stopped dead.
Claire stood in the middle of the room, in just her bra and panties. Gunner blinked once, and without thinking, let out a low whistle.
“What the hell? I’m getting dressed here.” Claire grabbed the sheet from the bed, struggling to cover some part of her body with it.
“Sorry. I just wanted to see if you needed any help packing.”
“I’m packed. Turn around, damn it, so I can finish getting dressed.”
Gunner turned his back, but the image of Claire was engraved in his mind. The body he’d imagined beneath her waitress uniform was a far cry from what he’d gotten a good look at. The curves were there alright, but it was pretty clear, even in the dim light from the cloudy window, that he’d underestimated just how beautiful she was.
“So you’re packed? That must be a new record somewhere.”
He heard the rustle of clothing behind him, and it took all the control he had not to turn around.
“You ever heard of a bug out bag? The preppers have them. Well, so do I.”
“Preppers?” He frowned, trying to gauge where she was with getting dressed. Time it just right and he might catch another glimpse. Then he mentally kicked himself. The girl was obviously in danger and all he could think about was what she looked like in her bra and
panties.
“End of the world people, doomsday preppers. You know, survivalists. You can turn around.”
She was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, sitting on the edge of the bed, pulling on a pair of Doc Martens.
“Anyway, a bug out bag has all your essentials for survival, for a few days at least. Mine’s a little different, since it has pretty much everything I own.” She nodded to the duffel on the floor at the foot of her bed. He hadn’t even noticed it. He’d been to blown away by the sight of Claire.
“So, this guy’s been after you for a while then?”
Claire stood, yanked the thing from her hair that held it back, and shook her hair free. Red curls cascaded over her shoulders. Gunner watched as, just as quickly, she pulled it all back again, securing it behind her head.
“About nine months. I’ve been here for...” She scowled, bent, and hoisted the duffel onto her shoulder. “Something like four months. I thought I’d lost him.”
Claire shouldered past Gunner, heading for the tiny living room. She dropped the duffel, and Gunner watched as she yanked aside a corner of the floor rug, dropped to her knees, and proceeded to pull up one of the floorboards.
“Need any help?”
“No. I got it.” Reaching between the joists, she pulled up a leather satchel. “Just need to make a withdrawal from the bank.”
She stood in front of him, face slightly flushed, breathing a little fast.
“Look, thanks for the ride. I apologize for dragging you into this, but I’ve got to get out of here. Adrian’s going to pick up my trail pretty soon, or he’s going to beat my address out of someone at the diner.” She hoisted the duffel and slung the strap over her shoulder, the satchel held in her other hand.
Panic surged through Gunner. She was headed out the door, and if he let her go, out of his life. In the few seconds it took her to reach the other side of the room, he made up his mind.
“I can take you wherever you want to go.”
She turned, eyes wide. “You’d do that? Just up and take me...somewhere?”
He nodded. “Yeah. I would.”
“Why the hell would you do that? You hardly know me.”
“True.” He took a step toward her. “But if I let you go now, I’ll never get the chance to get to know you. And...” One more step. Her scent washed over him, the sharp tang of fear the most obvious, but beneath that, flowers and spice and something deeply feminine. Something overwhelmingly like home.
“...I’m not willing to pass up that chance.”
She looked up at him, blinked, lips parted, face flushing a pretty pink. “Oh. Well...I...”
Gunner smiled. He was back, his piercing blue eyes burning with desire.
“Just tell me one thing though.”
Claire took a deep breath, then nodded. “Okay.”
“Who’s the guy, and why’s he chasing you?”
“That’s two things...” Claire smiled, and Gunner noticed she had dimples. How had he missed those?
“He’s the son of my pack’s Alpha.” She’d gotten some of her composure back and she looked him straight in the eye.
“Why’s he chasing you?”
Claire hesitated, but her eyes never left his. Gunner waited.
“I left him at the altar.”
* * *
“Hell, when you decide to piss someone off, you really go all out, don’t you?” Gunner shook his head, giving her a lopsided grin and a raised eyebrow. “Your Alpha must not be too happy with you either.”
Claire shifted under the weight of the duffel and under Gunner’s intense scrutiny. Personal history wasn’t something she talked about, with anyone, and she certainly hadn’t told anyone about Adrian or being a runaway bride.
Keri and Glen from the diner knew her as Jillian from the block, a good Irish girl from the other side of town. Before that, in an entirely different state, she was Lisbeth, art school dropout working at a preschool, teaching little kids how to draw while she paid off student loans. Before that...she didn’t really remember.
She shifted the duffel again. “It’s not a good situation, any way you look at it.”
This was hard. Everything inside her screamed it was insanity to trust a stranger, especially another shifter. For all she knew, Adrian could have sent him to track her down. Except the head butt at the diner sort of ruled that out. But still, she knew nothing about him.
Pushing through all that was something else, a tiny sprout of what might have been hope. That, and the feeling she might not have to do this by herself anymore. It was enough, at least for now.
“So, you said you’d take me anywhere?”
“Yeah, that’s right.” He nodded, expectant, eyes like blue lasers fixed on her.
“Well, about that.”
She needed to make a decision. Trust a stranger with her life, or go back outside, alone.
“I don’t really have any place to go.”
That was the truth. She’d run before, but each time she’d had some warning, some sixth sense telling her Adrian was on her trail: the hair on the back of her neck going up for no reason, the feeling she was being watched. The feeling that told her to get out of town, no questions asked. And she’d always listened to those feelings.
This time, who knew? Maybe she’d gotten careless somehow, moved too close to home, slipped up with the name or the job. Or Adrian really was that good at tracking her down. He had a powerful pack with an influential Alpha backing him; she was out in the cold alone.
Gunner was quiet, and she figured she’d blown it. Playing the hero once, dragging her out of danger’s way, might be his limit for the day. She sighed, turned the doorknob, and stepped into the hall, dreading what might be waiting for her outside, sorry she’d misjudged the guy inside. His words pulled her back.
“I know a place.”
Now she was on the back of a roaring motorcycle, charging down some backwoods road hours from the city. He said he knew a place, but she’d assumed that place might still have been in the civilized world. Right now she thought they’d pretty much left civilization as she knew it.
They’d been riding at less than breakneck speed for a couple hours, going up and down small green hills. Then the terrain changed dramatically and the bike climbed what felt like completely vertical slopes, followed by descents that had her stomach in her throat.
The air was cool, almost cold, and she wanted her jacket but she didn’t want to ask Gunner to stop. For one thing, she thought they’d made good time, and the more distance between her and Adrian the better. But more to the point, there didn’t seem to be any place where he could stop. The road was narrow, the trees coming right to the edge of the cracked pavement.
It was almost dark when Gunner slowed down and swung the bike toward the edge of the road. For a moment, the crazy thought he’d been sent by Adrian shot through her mind again, that Gunner was going to kill her now by driving them both off the edge of a mountain.
But then she saw a narrow pea-gravel driveway in the splashing light of the bike. The track wound down, then up, beneath the canopy of pines. He stopped in a small opening, cutting the engine.
“We’re almost there.”
She climbed off and staggered a step or two as her legs remembered how to walk on solid ground. Gunner got off the bike and he went through a series of stretches, arms overhead, rolling his head from side to side, muscles rippling beneath his black t-shirt.
She’d just been tracked down by an ex-almost-husband, dragged to safety by a stranger, fled the city on a motorcycle with the same stranger, but at this moment the only thoughts she had involved what that stranger looked like.
Because right now, he looked pretty damn fine from where she stood. She’d hit it off with other guys, but the chemistry between her and Gunner was undeniable. Riding behind him for hours hadn’t hurt...or helped.
She’d pretty much mapped out the contours of his muscular stomach with her fingers under the guise of adjusting her hold on him as
they skimmed over the asphalt. The way his shoulders moved, the muscles tensing and relaxing, shifting beneath her cheek as she rested her head on his back, all of it—aided by the vibration of the big machine beneath her—had awakened something long dormant inside her.
“Where’s here, and where’s almost?”
“We’re close to Clyde, and almost is a cabin.”
“Who’s Clyde?”
Gunner undid the straps holding her duffel, and she grabbed it off the back of the bike. She still carried the satchel, the long strap slung across her body. No way would she trust that to a bungee cord on the back of a bike. Clothes, shoes, even her toothbrush...all that she could do without. But the stuff in the satchel was irreplaceable.
“Not a who, a where. It’s a little town in North Carolina, and we’re outside of it by about twenty miles, on the low side of a big mountain.”
He’d done whatever he needed to do with the bike to secure it, and from nowhere a small leather backpack materialized in his hands. He hung the strap over his shoulder and motioned toward the trees.
“It’s this way, a short hike through the woods. The path is well marked. Should be pretty easy for you in those boots.”
He turned and she followed, pushing aside brush and tree limbs. If there was a path, she had no idea where it might be hiding. Gunner seemed to be carving it out as they went.
“Do you know where you’re going?” A branch slapped her face, and a bramble wound its thorny fingers around her leg.
“You bet. Been coming here, on and off, since I was a kid.” His voice came from somewhere ahead of her and she scanned the dark forest, trying to get a line on him. Everything smelled like pine and cold air.
“Hey, can you wait. I’m stuck...” She yanked at another vine and impaled herself on something sharp, causing her to yelp in pain.
“You okay?” His voice was so close it startled her. “Here...” He took her hand, guiding her back to what she guessed was the path. At least it didn’t have things that lunged out, trying to kill her.
“You’re not much of a nature girl, are you?”
Untamed Hearts (BBW Biker Werewolf Romance) Page 2
