Princess
“Of course this is happening,” she muttered to herself.
“Because the universe loves to screw with me.” She wasn’t wrong.
In the past year alone, she had more troubles than she had had her entire life.
Sure, she had lived a pretty pampered life with her father being the head of the largest mob family in Chicago, but that was a life she was trying to forget.
It was a life that she was currently running from because going back to her father and his rules wasn’t something she ever wanted to do.
She got out of her car and popped the hood, staring at the mess of metal and wires, and knew instantly she was out of her depth. She could handle a lot—hell, she’d survived worse than a busted engine—but cars weren’t her thing.
Finding a tow truck driver to pick her up from the side of the road at this hour wasn’t an easy task—but hard tasks were her specialty. She had someone out to her location within the hour, and the tow truck driver gave her one option for someone who could repair her car—Butcher’s Body Shop.
As soon as she jumped down out of the tow truck, nearly breaking her damn ankle in the heels that she chose to wear for the day, she instantly regretted her decision.
The place was lined wall to wall with motorcycles, and that had red flags dancing in her head.
She knew bikers were bad news—especially bikers who didn’t belong to a club.
At least, that was what her father used to tell her.
They were his number one problem around Chicago, and he used to grumble about them daily.
They were wild cards, rogue assholes who didn’t give a damn about anyone but themselves.
Still, she didn’t have a choice in the matter.
A tall, good-looking man walked out of what she assumed was an office area.
His sleeves were rolled up, and grease was streaked across his forearm.
He looked like the kind of man who had been carved out of grit and regret.
Her father would not have approved of her dealing with a man like him, and that thought had her smiling to herself.
Princess squared her shoulders, refusing to let him see the hesitation crawling under her skin.
“My car’s dead,” she said flatly, tossing the keys onto the counter.
“Fix it.” She was used to giving orders, but the biker standing in front of her looked like he wasn’t used to receiving them.
He stood there, looking between her and the keys that she had tossed to the counter, smirking.
Yeah, maybe making demands and giving orders worked for her in Chicago, but in rural Mississippi, she wasn’t so lucky.
The guy looked over at her, his eyes dark and unreadable. For a moment, she thought he might tell her to get lost. But instead, he picked up the keys, turning them over in his hand like they weighed more than the metal that they were made of.
“Does bossing people around usually work for you, honey?” he drawled.
“My name isn’t honey,” she insisted, “it’s Princess.
” She inwardly cringed, knowing that her given name wasn’t much better than the little pet name he had assigned to her.
But there was no accounting for her parents’ bad taste in names or the fact that her father thought of her as a fucking princess since the day he found out that she was going to be a girl.
He chuckled to himself, “Well, that’s much better,” he mumbled more to himself than to her.
“Can you work on my car or not?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest. She was too tired to keep playing games with the oversized mechanic.
“Sure, it’s just going to take me some time to get the parts that I’ll need,” he said. She couldn’t help but roll her eyes at him. He didn’t even know what was wrong with her car, yet he was sure that it would take time to get the parts.
“How do you know that the parts will take time to be delivered if you don’t even know what’s wrong with my car?” she asked.
“You don’t trust me,” he said, voice low, almost amused.
Princess crossed her arms. “I don’t trust anyone, so don’t be offended.”
“Okay, no offense taken then. The parts will take some time because getting anything delivered to this town takes forever. I’ve been doing this for ten years now, and I can tell you that it’s going to take a few weeks to get any parts delivered.
But from what I’ve noticed so far about your car, you’re going to need a new radiator. ”
The tow truck driver had unloaded her poor car and waved back at the guy.
“See you later, Butcher,” he drawled. “Good luck with this one.” She wanted to protest and ask him just what he meant by that comment, but he was in his truck and driving down the dirt road before she could even open her mouth.
Princess decided to concentrate all her frustrations on the man standing in front of her. “So, you’re Butcher?” she asked.
He gave a slight nod, “I am,” he said.
“Well, Butcher, how can you tell from just looking at my car that the radiator is busted?” she asked.
“From the steam coming out of the hood,” he said, not even blinking. He was good, she’d give him that, but she still didn’t trust him.
“Fine, how long will it take to get a new radiator in?” she asked.
“A few weeks, just like I said a minute ago. If you want quick and easy, then you’re out of luck.
Nothing around here is quick or easy.” He winked at her—actually winked, and she wasn’t sure if she was turned on or repulsed.
That would be something for her to sort out later when she was tucked away in a nice little hotel room.
She couldn’t explain why, but she felt a bit off as she stood there looking at the mechanic.
For the first time in years, Princess felt the ground shift beneath her, and she hated it.
She knew that bikers were bad news. They were always wild cards—rogue assholes who didn’t give a fuck about anyone but themselves.
But for some reason, she didn’t sense that in the man staring her down.
“Let’s take a look at your car, and I’ll try to give you a more defined answer,” he offered.
“Fine,” she spat. She watched as he took her keys and walked over to her car. He popped the hood and stuck his head under, giving a small whistle. She was sure that wasn’t a good sign.
Butcher moved around the vehicle with a kind of deliberate patience that made her uneasy.
He wasn’t rushing, wasn’t flustered—just steady, methodical, like every bolt and wire had its place and he knew exactly where it belonged.
His hands were scarred, knuckles roughened by years of work.
Grease streaked across his forearms, but beneath the grime she could see the faded lines of old wounds—cuts that had healed jagged, burns that told stories she didn’t want to imagine.
She told herself not to stare. But her eyes kept drifting back to him.
The man was a shadow of something dangerous, something untamed, but she already knew that much about him. And yet, there was a quiet discipline in the way he worked, a focus that contradicted everything she thought she knew about men like him.
“You always watch people this hard?” Butcher’s voice broke the silence, low and rough, without looking up from the engine.
Princess stiffened. “I’m making sure you don’t screw me over.”
He smirked, the corner of his mouth twitching. “If I wanted to screw you over, sweetheart, I wouldn’t be fixing your car.”
Her pulse jumped at the term of endearment, though she hated herself for it. She shifted her weight, her tone flat. “Don’t call me that.”
Butcher finally glanced up, eyes dark and unreadable. For a moment, she thought she saw something flicker there—something heavy, something haunted. Then it was gone, buried beneath the same stoic mask he seemed to wear like armor.
Princess looked away, but not before noticing the scar that cut across his jaw.
It wasn’t the kind of scar you got from an accident.
It was the kind you earned in a fight, the kind that told her that he’d survived something brutal.
She hated that part of her wanted to know the story behind his scar.
The sound of his tools filled the silence, metal clinking against metal. He worked with precision, but there was a weight in his movements, like every turn of the wrench carried more than just the burden of fixing her car.
“You don’t trust bikers,” he said finally, voice steady, eyes still on the engine. She hated that he seemed to have her all figured out already.
“I don’t trust men who think the world owes them something,” she shot back.
Butcher chuckled, though it wasn’t warm.
“Then you’ve got me all wrong. The world doesn’t owe me a damn thing.
I owe it.” The words hung between them, and Princess frowned, caught off guard by the honesty in his tone.
She wanted to dismiss him, to keep her walls high, but something about the way he said it made her chest tighten.
She watched him again, this time not just the scars but the shadows—the way his shoulders carried a weight she couldn’t name, the way his silence spoke louder than his words. For the first time, she wondered if Butcher wasn’t just some biker.
Maybe he was something else entirely. Something broken and dangerous. Something she should stay far away from.
Princess cleared her throat, garnering his attention away from her car. “Um, I’ll need to know where the closest hotel is if I’m going to be in town for a while,” she said.
He chuckled again, and this time, she thought back over what she had said that might have been remotely funny.
“You’re not going to find any place to stay around here.
The closest motel is three towns over. It will take you about four and a half hours to drive there, but without a car, you’re out of luck.
” Yeah, her luck seemed to have run out about five states ago.
“Okay, then, where do out-of-towners stay around here?” she asked.
“We don’t get many out-of-town guests here,” he breathed.
“Well, I can’t sleep in my car,” she hissed, looking it over as though it offended her more than the man currently staring her down again.
He shrugged, “You can stay with me,” he offered. “I’ve got a spare room and spare bathroom, so you won’t have to share. It’s yours if you want it.”
Her gasp filled the space between them. “I couldn’t stay with you,” she insisted. “I don’t even know you.”
“Well, I don’t know you either, but the offer stands.
It’s either my spare room or the office back there.
” He nodded to the back room where he had come out of when she first arrived.
“I’m betting that my desk would be pretty uncomfortable to sleep on, though.
” He looked back under the hood, effectively ignoring her as she stood there trying to figure out what the hell she did to piss the universe off so much that she’d be put into this horrible position.
Her own bathroom did sound nice. She hadn’t had a shower in almost three days, and the thought of sleeping on the hard desk in his office really didn’t appeal to her already aching back.
“Fine,” she spat. He didn’t bother to turn around to look at her. “I’ll take your spare room.”
“All right,” he said, his head still under the hood of her car.
“We’ll leave in a few. I was about to call it a day when you rolled in here.
” She didn’t say anything, just made a humming noise in the back of her throat.
She was pretty sure it was a sound of disgust and not agreement, but he could take it anyway that he wanted.
She walked over to her car, popped the trunk, and got her suitcase and overnight bag out. Butcher shut the hood of her car and finally looked over at her, his smirk back in place. “Oh, and honey,” he drawled. “You’re welcome.”
She wanted to tell him to shove his “You’re welcome” up his ass, but she was pretty sure that the expression on her face already did that for her.
Butcher chuckled, shook his head at her, and walked back to his office, leaving her standing in the middle of his shop with her things.
Princess wasn’t sure what she had just agreed to, but she was pretty sure that nothing good was going to come from staying with the biker who seemed to find her amusing.
He’d figure out, sooner or later, that she was anything but amusing, and that would teach him.
Butcher’s Blade Universal Link-> Coming soon!
Ready for your next binge read? Then, you won’t want to miss book two of the No Mercy Boxing/MMA Trilogy. It’s releasing in January 2026! You can also pick up book one, Falling for the Knockout, here->