Viper’s Single Mom (Pike Creek Riders MC #1)

1. Tara

TARA

T he lunch rush at Bea's Diner hit like a thunderstorm—sudden, overwhelming, and leaving everyone slightly damp from exertion.

I balanced three plates along my left arm while refilling coffee with my right, muscle memory from four months of slinging hash in Pike Creek guiding my movements.

Table six wanted extra napkins. The couple in the corner booth needed their check.

The trucker at the counter kept trying to catch my eye for a refill.

Normal Tuesday chaos. Exactly what I needed.

"Order up!" Bea called from the kitchen, her voice cutting through the clatter of dishes and conversation.

I spun toward the pass-through window, already calculating my next five moves, when my phone buzzed against my hip. I ignored it. Tips were better when the service was fast, and God knew I needed every dollar.

The buzz came again. Insistent.

"Honey, you gonna get those burgers to table four before they grow legs and walk themselves over?" Bea's weathered face appeared in the window, one gray eyebrow raised.

"On it." I grabbed the plates, but the phone buzzed a third time. Three texts in a row meant Izzy's school. My stomach clenched as I delivered the burgers with a practiced smile, then ducked behind the coffee station to check my messages.

Unknown number.

My hands stilled on the screen. I'd blocked Harrison's number months ago, but he always found new ones. Burner phones. Friends' cells. Once, memorably, his law firm's fax line converted to text.

The first message loaded.

I know where you are.

The diner sounds faded to white noise. My finger hovered over the delete button, but the second message appeared.

Pike Creek is smaller than Milwaukee. Smaller than Cheyenne. Definitely smaller than Spokane.

Every town I'd fled. In order.

The third message made my knees weak.

Isabelle looks happy at Mountain View Elementary. See you soon.

"Tara?" Bea's voice sounded distant. "You alright back there?"

I wasn't alright. I was drowning in the middle of a crowded diner, lungs refusing to draw air. Harrison had found us. Again. After four months of looking over my shoulder, of jumping at every unexpected sound, of watching Izzy finally start to smile again—he'd found us.

"Just need a minute," I managed, voice steady through pure will.

The rest of my shift passed in a blur. Automatic movements, automatic smiles, automatic responses.

My mind raced through the familiar spiral: how much money did I have saved?

Enough for gas to the next town? The next state?

How would I explain to Izzy that we were leaving again?

What lie would soften the blow this time?

Eight hundred forty-three dollars. That's what four months of double shifts and scrimping had saved. Not enough for first month, last month, and security deposit anywhere else. Barely enough for gas and motel rooms if I stretched it.

We were trapped.

By the time my shift ended at three, my hands had developed a persistent tremor. I'd dropped two cups and a plate, earning concerned looks from Bea and irritated ones from the cook. The September afternoon sun felt too bright as I stepped onto Main Street, everything too exposed.

The hardware store sat three blocks down, its faded sign promising "Everything You Need Since 1952." What I needed was a miracle, but I'd settle for new deadbolts. The ones in our rental were ancient, probably installed when Eisenhower was president.

Elmer Simmons looked up from his newspaper as the bell chimed my entrance. "Afternoon, Tara. How's that little one of yours?"

"She's good." The lie came easily. Izzy was having nightmares again, had wet the bed twice this week, but Pike Creek didn't need to know that. "I need new locks. Deadbolts. The strongest you have."

His weathered face shifted, reading something in my expression. "Again? Didn't you just change them when you moved in?"

"The landlord wants better ones." Another lie. I'd changed them myself that first night, Izzy sleeping beside me because was scared.

Elmer stood slowly, joints protesting. "Follow me."

The lock aisle overwhelmed me with choice. Grade 1, Grade 2, single cylinder, double cylinder, smart locks that connected to phones I couldn't afford. My hands shook as I examined packaging, prices blurring together.

"This one's good." Elmer tapped a box. "But if you're looking for real security..." He studied me for a long moment. "Locks only do so much against someone determined."

The words hit like ice water. "What do you mean?"

"I mean Pike Creek takes care of its own, but sometimes folks need more than what the sheriff can provide." He leaned against the shelf, voice dropping. "The Pike Creek Riders, that motorcycle club out on Route 7? They've been known to help folks in certain situations."

"I don't... I can't afford?—"

"Didn't say anything about affording." His eyes held years of small-town knowledge. "Just saying sometimes the law isn't enough. And sometimes people who look dangerous are the safest bet."

I bought the locks. My hands fumbled with my wallet, counting out bills while my mind spun.

A motorcycle club. Harrison had connections in clubs back in Milwaukee, had bragged about the lawyers who kept them out of prison.

Trading one threat for another seemed like jumping from a frying pan into a volcano.

But Izzy's face haunted me. The way she'd finally started laughing again. The friend she'd made at school. The room she'd decorated with drawings, the first time she'd bothered since we'd started running.

I sat in my ancient Honda Civic, engine ticking as it cooled, staring at my phone's GPS. Pike Creek Riders MC appeared as a red pin seven miles outside town. The clubhouse photo showed a converted warehouse, bikes lined up like soldiers, skull logo painted across weathered wood.

Everything about it screamed danger.

Harrison's text glowed on my screen. See you soon.

I started the engine.

The drive took twelve minutes. Long enough to rehearse seventeen different speeches, abandon all of them, and arrive with absolutely no plan.

The clubhouse squatted beside the highway like it was daring someone to have a problem with it.

Three Harleys sat out front, chrome gleaming in the afternoon sun.

A garage bay stood open, revealing more bikes in various states of repair.

This was insane. I was a suburban mom who'd never gotten so much as a speeding ticket before Harrison.

My most rebellious act before marriage had been sneaking wine coolers in college.

I drove a Honda and wore cardigans from Target and had no business walking into a motorcycle clubhouse to ask for protection from my lawyer ex-husband.

But I was out of options, out of money, and almost out of hope.

The gravel crunched under my worn flats as I approached the door. Music thumped from inside—classic rock, it sounded like the song born to be wild. Ironic, considering I'd been born to be mild and was only here because mild hadn't kept me safe.

My knock was barely audible over the music.

I tried again, harder.

The door swung open, revealing a man who looked like he ate danger for breakfast and washed it down with whiskey.

Leather vest over black thermal, arms thick with muscle and ink, beard that had gone past trendy into mountain man territory.

The patches on his vest declared him "Wolf" and "Vice President. "

He looked me up and down—khakis, sensible shoes, cardigan despite the warm afternoon, purse clutched like a shield.

"You lost, sweetheart?"

Every instinct screamed run. Instead, I lifted my chin and met his eyes. "I need to speak with someone about... protection."

His expression shifted, amusement to assessment. "That so?"

"Please." The word cracked, desperation leaking through. "I was told you might help."

Wolf stepped aside. "Viper's in the back. He'll want to hear this."

The inside of the clubhouse assaulted my senses. Smoke, leather, motor oil, and something distinctly male. A bar dominated one wall, neon beer signs casting red and blue shadows. Pool table, dartboard, couches that had seen better decades. Three men looked up from a card game, conversation dying.

I didn't belong here. Every cell in my body knew it. But Izzy's safety mattered more than my comfort.

"Boss," Wolf called toward a door marked OFFICE. "Got a visitor."

Footsteps approached, unhurried but purposeful. The man who emerged from the office doorway made Wolf look approachable. Older, early forties maybe, with dark hair that was starting to go silver in places and eyes that missed nothing. President patch on his vest. This was Viper.

He took one look at me—really looked, like he could see straight through the suburban mom costume to the terrified woman beneath—and something in his expression shifted.

"Ma'am." His voice was whiskey and gravel. "What can the Pike Creek Riders do for you?"

I stood in that clubhouse, surrounded by everything I'd been taught to fear, and prepared to beg dangerous men to save me from a monster in a three-piece suit.