Tread: Biker Romance (Ronin MC Series Book 1) Read Free

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.

 
     
     
     
     
    LEAVING HOME TURNED OUT TO be the easy part. I feared I would have police out trolling the streets for my car, my face plastered on the nightly news. I watched obsessively from a hotel outside of Farmington, New Mexico for two days. After going through all of the envelopes, discarding the checks I couldn’t cash, and buying clothes and a toothbrush, I had one thousand and forty-five dollars to my name.
    Hotels and gas were expensive, so I went on foot to try to find a job of some kind that paid under the table. My first was as a waitress, but it turned out I was not too savvy at gaining tips. After a week of backbreaking, foot aching labor, I had made a total of fifteen dollars.
    Next, I tried the local animal shelter, a rundown place of brick and mortar that put down more animals than they saved. That was where I acquired a purebred English bulldog, who had heartworms and was allergic to everything under the sun. The money for medication was too much, they said. They fired me for taking her out of the euthanasia room, even after I offered to pay the adoption fee. It was then I decided it was time to move on.
    Heading south was my only plan—a pretty picture of sandy beaches, and what distinctly sounded like Holly’s voice in my head telling me to get there.
    I was disparaging my plan hours later, baking in the hot desert sun, my little car’s A/C unable to compete with the heat. There was nothing. Well, there were truckers, scrub brushes and the random mountaintop, but no towns, and I was low on gas.
    For the first time since I had left, I prayed.
    God had nothing to say to me, or my God hearing ear was nonexistent because I felt no pull in any direction, not that I had much choice but to go straight.
    “Tell me what to do, Bella,” I ordered my silent companion. She was snoring, probably dreaming of the pork chops she had never tasted. She smacked her lips before sawing off again.
    “I just want an adventure. A sign. Am I doing the right thing?