Haven: Renegade Saints MC (6 page)

Victoria

I barely slept that night. Danny had taken me to Max’s place—it was cleaner and nicer than I’d expected—and I’d settled into a bedroom on one side of the house. Even though I was dying to know what he got up to when no one else was around, I didn’t snoop.

The room I picked had a queen-size bed and an empty bureau. When Danny took me by the apartment, I was surprised to realize I didn’t actually care about most of my stuff. I didn’t really want to take it with me. The memories of those clothes that I had reminded me of Silas, and I wanted to get rid of them.

When I called Kitty and told her what I was doing, she’d flipped out.

“You can’t be serious, Tor,” she said, snapping her gum. “I mean, you barely know this guy!”

I winced. I hadn’t even told her about the marriage plan yet, just about the “temporary” living arrangement. Even though I wasn’t sure what would happen in the future, I doubted Max would let me move out of his house. If there was any chance that Silas was still out looking for me, I had a feeling I wouldn’t even
want
to leave. After all, I’d turned to Max for protection; I didn’t even think I’d had any other options.

“You can’t do this,” Kitty whined. “I mean, he could be a psycho!”

“I have to do this,” I argued, already feeling worn down from Max’s arguments. I felt irritated with Kitty, too. She knew how badly Silas had treated me, and yet she still never insisted that I stay with her or anything like that. “I don’t have any other choice.”

“Victoria, that makes you sound like a hooker,” Kitty snapped.

“Whatever,” I said. “I have to go.”

Danny had been a perfect gentleman the whole time, even if I’d caught him checking out my ass every time I bent over. He carried my bags into the room I chose and then parked himself in the living room, in front of the television. Before Max got home, I went to the kitchen and made myself a snack—a glass of water and a ham sandwich.

Then I went back to “my” room and tried to sleep.

By the time Max got home, I was in bed, halfway there. He knocked on my door and asked if I wanted pizza. I should have given him some snappy comeback about how no self-respecting woman would eat pizza the day before her wedding, but I winced when I remembered no self-respecting woman would marry someone she didn’t love.

That whole night I had nightmares about Silas. They were awful. Silas breaking into Max’s house and kidnapping me, Silas ruining our wedding, Silas showing up with a gun and putting a bullet in Max’s skull.

The last one kept me awake for a long time. It made me think of how my dad, Kristoff, died. He was found with a bullet in the brain. Someone had just shot him and then left him to die like an animal.

The sun was coming up by the time I fell asleep again.

In the morning, someone knocked on my door. I tensed, thinking it was Max, but a few seconds later, I heard a soft voice, lightly accented in Spanish.

“Hello, Miss Victoria?”

“It’s Tori,” I called back through the door. “What is it?”

“I am here to help you get ready, ma’am.”

Puzzled, I got to my feet and opened the door. Standing in front of me was an aging Hispanic woman, wearing a crisp white uniform and orthopedic shoes. She had a friendly smile and she was carrying some bags.

“Mr. Max thought you might want to wear one of these,” she said softly as she slipped the bags into my hands.

I frowned. “What are these?”

The woman smiled at me. “I don’t know, ma’am,” she said softly. “Would you like some breakfast? Toast? Eggs? A croissant?”

I wasn’t hungry, but my stomach rumbled. The woman must have taken that as a yes, because when I looked up, she’d completely disappeared.

Frowning, I put the bags down on the bed and opened them up. There, in front of me, I saw a couple of white and cream dresses. They were all informal, and looked like they might fit me if I sucked in my stomach and had someone else zip me up. But I didn’t like the idea of wearing something borrowed; after all, I didn’t exactly know where they came from. Maybe Max had a stash of female clothes in his closet? I giggled loudly. I knew I was nervous, but this was a little too much.

The maid returned with a breakfast tray just as I was getting dressed. I chose an old outfit of mine, something Silas had hated. It wasn’t the infamous red dress, but it was close: a navy lace dress with a pencil skirt and a bodice that nipped in my waist and made my breasts look bigger than they really were. It was one of the only things I owned that gave me actual cleavage. If I was being completely honest, part of me wanted to look really nice for Max. After all, he was doing me a huge favor here.

Part of me wanted to run.
Tori, don’t be ridiculous
, I thought.
Max isn’t going to hurt you
. Even though he’d argued with me yesterday about my father, I wondered if he knew something that he wasn’t spilling. After all, he was a secretive man with a past. He had to have something.

But I knew I couldn’t run. I’d agreed to marry him, and that’s what I was going to have to do. The maid waited patiently for me to finish dressing, then she looked at me.

“Ma’am, would you like me to do your hair?” She held out her hands. “I’m used to doing hair,” she added. “I can do it up, if you’d like.”

I sighed. I wasn’t particularly in the mood to argue, and I hated having someone’s hands prickling my scalp. But I could tell she was already going out on a limb just from offering her services to me, and I didn’t want to be rude.

“Sure,” I said, trying to force a smile on my face. “That would be great.”

An hour later, I barely recognized myself. The maid had pinned up my hair in an elegant, sweeping updo held by thousands of pins that I could feel pricking my scalp, but none of them were visible. I was astounded at how I looked.

“Thank you,” I said softly. “This is really lovely.”

She nodded. “I got practice from my daughter,” she said, failing to conceal a smile. “For her quinceañera. She was so picky!”

“Your practice paid off,” I replied, admiring the back of my hair in the mirrored glass. “Thank you again.”

“Of course.” She nodded. “Will there be anything else?”

I bit my lip. Part of me was dying to ask her if Max was there, if I would be able to run away without getting caught. It would be so easy. Just slip out the door, run down the driveway, go back to my old life.

I closed my eyes and thought about it. For a moment, it was incredibly tempting. But then I remembered Silas, and all the other kinds of trouble that were waiting for me back at my apartment. I was trading my freedom for protection, and part of me still wasn’t sure that it was a good idea.

But before I had time to speak, Max burst into the room, deflating my bubble. The maid smiled with a knowing look on her face as she bowed to Max and showed herself out of the room.

“Hey,” Max said shortly. He was wearing a clean button-down shirt and dark jeans. “You ready?”

The vision of my running away burst like a balloon in my head. No matter what I thought when he wasn’t around, I knew that I couldn’t lie to Max. And I couldn’t hide from him, and I most certainly couldn’t run from him.

“Yeah,” I said softly. “I’m ready.”

To my surprise, Max looked me up and down. “You’re gorgeous,” he said after a moment. My heart melted a little.

“Thanks,” I replied. “You don’t look so bad yourself.”

Max grinned. It was a grin that didn’t exactly suit him—both boyish and charming. It intrigued me; I started wondering just what other qualities Max had that I’d never laid eyes on.

As Max herded me out of the room and into his car, I felt myself sinking into a warm place of surprising contentment. Despite whatever happened with my father’s death, part of me
wanted
to trust Max. Part of me wanted to stick around, even though I had no idea what was going to happen between us. Part of me wanted to find out.

“You nervous?” Max winked at me and I felt my heart flutter in my chest. It had never been like this with Silas. I had a feeling that if Max caught me on a hormonal day, I’d start crying at his niceties just because. He was so nice to me, and he didn’t have to be nice to me at all. After all, he was the leader of the Renegade Saints. Bikers aren’t exactly known for their kindness and goodwill towards others. But Max was really proving himself, and I couldn’t wait to see what the future would hold.

“A little,” I said. A blush came over my face. Max looked deep into my eyes before he started the car. I giggled.

“What’s so funny?”

I shrugged. “Nothing,” I said after a beat. “I just realized I’ve never seen you behind the wheel of a car before. You’re always on a bike.”

Max laughed. “That’s true,” he said, nodding his head.

We didn’t talk for the rest of the ride downtown. The Marquette City Hall building was nicer than I’d expected, done up in marble with gold trim. It looked like it was trying too hard to be Boston, but I didn’t mind. I didn’t always like living in Marquette, but I appreciated that we weren’t stuck out in the country. At least there was always something going on, at least there was always
life
.

“Check out the crowd,” Max said under his breath. We parked the car in a garage across the street and I gaped. There was a line of couples stretching outside the door. It was funny to realize that all of these people were getting married, too, that all of them would have the same wedding anniversary date as Max and me.
That is, if you stay married
, I thought to myself.
You might wind up getting divorced. He did offer
.

That thought troubled me. I hadn’t really taken into consideration just what Max and I were doing together. We were both giving up a measure of freedom. This meant that neither one of us would be able to date other people, or have serious relationships. This wasn’t the natural way to get married. It was shocking to me to realize that everyone else was there because they loved each other.

“You’re being quiet,” Max observed. “What happened to Tori the Chatterbox?”

I blushed. When I was little, my dad always called me a chatterbox because I couldn’t ever stop talking. I’d never been self-conscious about it until I grew up and went to college. Silas told me that he thought it was unattractive when women babbled all the time without actually saying anything. Now, I wondered if he’d changed me for good.

“It’s just weird,” I said finally. “All of these people are getting married, too, but they’re doing it the real way.”

Max shook his head. “You don’t know that,” he said. “Some of these women could be pregnant, and the guy’s just trying to do the right thing. Or maybe they’re in a situation more like ours.” He winked at me.

I was dying to ask him just exactly what that meant, but I didn’t get the chance. A stern-looking female guard with close-cropped hair stepped in front of us.

“Get in the back of the line,” she ordered brusquely. “I don’t have time for people who cut today.”

I giggled again. It sounded absurdly loud, but to my pleasure, Max joined in. By the time we were at the back of the line, I realized we were probably going to be there for a while.

An hour later, the same woman, looking even more irritable, was pulling us into a small, windowless room. No matter how nice the Marquette City Hall looked from the outside, the inside looked like a Soviet-era bunker. Everything was painted cinder block and utilitarian wood furniture.

A large judge in black robes stood up. He smiled at me. “That’s a nice looking couple,” he said to the guard. She rolled her eyes and left.

“Thanks,” Max said to the judge. He reached into his pocket and handed over a slip of paper. “This is our license.”