Wyatt (The Black Roses MC #5)

Prologue

Maizie

“ S hot, shot, shot,” my roommates scream from beside me at the little Boston bar we wandered into.

We’re celebrating with a capital C . One, because it’s my twenty-third birthday, and two, because we just took our last final of the semester.

Emily and Taylor are two years younger than me.

They both turned twenty-one a couple of months ago.

Their birthdays are a week apart, and what a week that was…

I’m excited to celebrate with them, especially away from the confines of the life I’d been living in Shine.

My own twenty-first birthday was spent with my parents at a Wednesday night church service in my hometown.

Let’s just say their birthday celebrations are significantly different from mine.

The freedom I’ve found since moving away from Shine and my parents has been the absolute best thing about finally being able to go to college.

Boston has been good for me. At first, I doubted I’d make it here at all.

My family isn’t exactly rolling in money, and it took me a little time to save enough so that I wouldn’t have to be working nonstop to pay bills and try to squeeze in classes where I could.

That’s a big reason I lived at home for so long after graduating from high school.

It helped me save money and allowed me to only have to work part-time while living in Boston.

And God willing, I’ll never have to move back in with my parents.

Emily, Taylor, and I down the lemon drop shots, which the bartender graciously overpoured, before slamming our glasses back on the bar.

“This bar is way better than the last two,” Emily says as she leans her back against the dark wood bar top. “Way cuter guys.” Her eyes linger on a couple of guys who make their way past us, smiling as they meet up with a group of their friends.

“The last one wasn’t so bad,” Taylor interjects.

“Too many polo shirts and pressed khakis for my taste,” I say, turning to Emily in agreement.

That’s all I saw growing up in Shine. It was as though all the boys at church had the same strict dress code.

Sure, I had dates after I turned sixteen, but they were the guys my parents set me up with.

Usually they were the sons of the other members of our small church, and I’m pretty sure collared shirts and Dockers were the only things in their closets.

I sure as hell never saw them in anything else.

There were plenty who tried to get me to take off said Dockers, but anything other than a couple make-out sessions was a no-go.

I remained steadfast in the church-required purity oath.

The entire idea that the members of the church were so focused on the girls proudly wearing purity rings as a sign of devotion is as absurd to me now as it was back then.

At least it got me out of falling for the empty—and often annoying—promises that the boys I dated liked to throw around.

They thought they were so clever and the girls didn’t talk about who did what or who said what.

We knew exactly which boys tried to get under our skirts, and we knew exactly who let them and what happened to them afterward.

Nothing particularly nefarious with the leaders, but those boys would turn around and call the girls who fell for their lines sluts while simultaneously high-fiving each other.

It was disgusting, and I never wanted any part of it.

“Well, look what we have here,” Emily says, startling me out of the memories I often try to shove down.

I’m not a fan of remembering my high school days.

Leaving Shine meant leaving behind the bullshit of my parents’ strict rules and becoming a new Maizie—one who no longer felt the need to befriend only the girls they deemed appropriate, or spend time with the guys they thought would make good husbands someday.

Once they’d sown their wild oats, of course—whatever that was supposed to mean.

Taylor and I shift our gazes to the group of men who walk in.

“That’s more like it,” Emily says, her eyes zeroing in on the four men. From what I can tell, they seem a little rough around the edges. They’re all wearing jeans that look well-worn, and MC cuts, which I’m used to seeing.

The small town I grew up in is home to the Black Roses MC, and I went to school with a few of the kids who later joined.

I never had much to do with them, seeing as my parents hated the club and everything it stood for—which, according to my dad, was ungodly lawlessness and perversion of our town.

I never really agreed with him, though. The kids I went to school with were always nice to me, and their families showed up to every football game to cheer them on.

My parents were there, too, to watch my band performances, but there was no missing the disgusted looks they used to throw the MC’s way.

The cuts I see read Bone Breakers across the back, with a mean-looking skull dripping blood from its sharp teeth. Arizona is printed on the bottom.

Well, that certainly paints an image.

“Listen, I’m all for checking out guys who don’t look like they’re on their way to Sunday brunch, but those cuts are a little ridiculous,” I say, turning back around and signaling to the bartender for three more shots.

“Oh yeah? And what do you know about cuts?” Emily asks.

“I grew up in a town that has an MC,” I reply with a small shrug.

Through the two years of rooming with these girls, I’ve remained a bit vague about my past. Maybe I was afraid they would judge my meager beginnings, seeing as when we moved in, they both unpacked designer label after designer label.

Or maybe it was because I was determined to leave the old me behind—the one who lived with her Bible-thumping parents and their suffocating rules.

“Girl, have you been holding out on us? The stories you must have!” Emily exclaims. Out of the three of us, she has a flair for the dramatics and thinks most people our age live their lives as a nonstop party. She couldn’t be more wrong, at least where I’m concerned.

“It’s not as salacious as you think it was,” I say with a small shrug. “They were like everyone else I grew up around, working and raising their families.”

“Did you ever date one of the bikers?” Taylor asks.

I laugh and shake my head. “No way. My parents would have completely lost it if the idea so much as crossed my mind.”

“Well, your parents aren’t here, and that man is fine as hell,” Emily says, wiggling her eyebrows and nodding toward someone behind me. I turn and see the profile of a man ordering a few beers at the far end of the bar.

It’s a profile that’s…

Quite familiar.

I whip my head back in the direction of my friends. “I know him,” I whisper-yell.

Nolan Dawson is standing in the same bar as me, wearing an MC cut.

The Nolan Dawson, who is the brother of one of the only friends I had in high school.

The Nolan Dawson, whom I had a huge crush on, but never dreamed of telling anyone about.

He was popular and aloof. His sister, Mia, said he was a jerk, but I always figured it was the normal brother-sister rivalry thing.

I didn’t know him well—or at all, really.

Even though I was friends with Mia in high school, we didn’t hang out that much.

I was always busy with church activities, and she seemed to have a lot on her plate, too.

Taylor looks behind me. “He’s cute. You should go talk to him.”

“You absolutely should,” Emily agrees, nodding excitedly. “Have some fun. Hey, he could even dust off your pretty kitty.”

My nose scrunches at the term she uses to describe that particular body part. My mother always called it a flower, which, in my opinion, is just as cringy. Personally, I’ve never called it anything because I don’t talk about it. And no one has ever been close enough to “dust it off.”

Emily laughs, and her attention is quickly captured by something behind me. “Looks like he made that decision for you,” she says.

“I thought that was you,” I hear a voice say behind me. When I turn, Nolan is standing next to me. “Little Maizie Wright,” he drawls, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. “You’re not exactly the first person I thought I’d find at a bar in Boston.”

“Disappointed?” I ask, returning his smirk.

My eyes wander over his face. The little dimple that used to make my heart beat a million times faster is prominently on display when his lips turn up into a full-fledged smile.

Instead of blushing and turning away like I would have done all those years ago, I let him see the appreciative once-over I give him.

I have no idea where the surge of confidence is coming from, but I don’t hate it.

Nolan looks me over from the top of my head to the bottom of my black-heeled boots. “Not in the least,” he says, shooting me a wink. “Can I buy you a drink?”

My inner teenage self is screaming yes , but I play it cool with a shrug and a slight tilt of my lips. “Okay.”

God, I'm pretty sure he’s gotten hotter since the last time I laid eyes on him—five years ago at my high school graduation.

He’s tall, with the same lean, firm build I remember—though I can’t get a good look at his torso beneath the T-shirt and leather cut he’s wearing.

His sandy-blond hair is a little longer than the last time I saw him.

But it adds to the carefree persona he’s always had—as though he has better things to do with his time than worry about getting a haircut.

Nolan gets the bartender's attention and orders two beers. I’m not really a beer person, but when he hands me the longneck, I accept it with a thankful smile.

“What on earth are you doing in a place like this?” he asks before taking a long pull from his beer.

I sip mine and try not to wince at the skunky taste. “I go to school in Boston. It’s my birthday, so my roommates and I are out celebrating. What about you?”