Unchained: A Biker Erotic Romance Read online

  This is a work of fiction. Any names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons--living or dead--is entirely coincidental.

  Unchained copyright @ 2014 by A. L. Summers. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.

  UNCHAINED

  Raina Chaplin could hear the roar of the motorcycles through the window of her upstairs bedroom. They’re back in town, she thought to herself, Daddy’s going to be upset.

  She glanced at the clock at her bedside. It was past seven. Time she should be up anyway, since she was supposed to be in the office by eight-thirty. As she got out of bed, she glanced at herself in the mirror above her dresser. Her dark auburn hair was sleep-tousled, but still hung to her shoulders in deep waves. Even without lipstick, her red lips stood out against her pale skin.

  Red was her color, even if she rarely had the opportunity to wear it. This morning, as she examined herself in the mirror, she was wearing the red satin baby-doll nightie she’d purchased last summer while on a trip to Dallas with her father. He’d thought she was waiting patiently for him to get out of his meeting, but in fact she had hurried to a local boutique for her illicit purchase.

  Raina was her father’s “personal assistant.” Her job description was very vague. Primarily she was to take notes of important things during meetings and remind him of his appointments, but there were other secretaries who already did most of that. Besides, there were many meetings where Daddy would say, “This one’s a little sensitive, Princess,” and then ask her to wait in her office or back at the hotel if they were out of town. Raina suspected that the real purpose of her job was to keep her close so that her father could maintain total control over her life.

  She smoothed the red satin against her body so that her breasts were clearly outlined and the curve of her waist was more clearly defined.

  “All dressed up and no place to go,” she said sadly to her reflection.

  She contemplated going downstairs for breakfast in just the nightie and the almost-transparent wrap that matched its color and shine, but instead she reached for the blue housecoat that hung on her closet door.

  Mustn’t upset Daddy, she thought to herself as she wrapped the heavy covering around her body. Then she said aloud to herself, “Daddy’s always upset!”

  Daddy was Miles Chaplin, CEO of Consolidated Power Enterprises, one of the largest power companies in Texas. CPE didn’t actually produce any electricity, but when power went from here to there, it probably traveled over CPE’s lines and towers. And the great state of Texas had thousands of miles of here to there, on which Miles had grown rich.

  In Texas, like anywhere else, money is power and power means control. Miles had—and freely used—all three. Many years ago, he had moved his company headquarters, along with his ever- increasing money, power, and control, to the small town of Porter, supposedly because Porter was more central to his operations, but in fact it was so that he’d be an even bigger fish in that smaller pond. CPE was the primary—almost only—employer in the entire county. That meant that Miles Chaplin effectively owned Porter and viewed it as his feudal domain. Miles controlled everything in Porter. Nothing happened there without his knowledge and approval. Everything was under this thumb... everything except The Crossed Reapers.

  The Crossed Reapers were a motorcycle club out of Dallas. Their President, Neil Gunn, recently purchased a ranch on the outskirts of town with plans to possibly move the center of their operations to Porter. Most of the club would remain in Dallas, as would a club house, but the officers and a small core of members would make the ranch their home base. Because CPE was headquartered in Porter, there were excellent internet and cellular services, so communications would not be a problem.

  An isolated location near a small town had its advantages for the officers of The Crossed Reapers. In a place like Porter, it would be much more difficult for rival clubs or law enforcement to keep tabs on the club officers. Strangers in town stood out more, and there were no nearby apartments from which to surveil the club’s daily operations. Neil hadn’t made his final decision, but he was very seriously considering also moving the primary hub of his operations to Porter.

  The only problem was Miles Chaplin. Miles hated all motorcycles and anyone who rode them. He considered the bikes themselves to be vulgar and noisy, and the people who rode them to be nothing but low-life, low-class trash.

  Perhaps his hatred stemmed from the fact that they reminded him too much of the poverty from which he himself had arisen. Miles wasn’t born rich. He was Texan pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps rich, and motorcycles and the people who rode them were everything that Miles had struggled to leave behind in his climb to success.

  And then there was the problem of motorcycles trespassing on CPE right-of-way easements. Service roads ran beneath the miles and miles of high tower transmission lines owned by CPE. A couple of times each year a bulldozer would lumber down those roads and clear away boulders or scrub brush so the path would be clear for line trucks when needed. All power companies posted signs that the roads were private, but for other companies that was just lawyer talk to help prevent lawsuits. For Miles, though, it was personal. Those were his roads, and no one but his people were going to use them.

  That’s why he had gates blocking the service road at regular intervals. The gates prevented anyone who didn’t have the pass code from driving a car or truck along the towers. But Texas is cow country and the lines crossed huge ranches, so the gates had to be designed to let cattle pass through. At regular intervals, there was a solar-powered electric gate directly across the road. Evenly spaced alongside that gate, heavy steel posts extended out many feet in either direction so a car or truck could not easily go around. Problem was, anything a steer could walk through, a motorcycle can ride through, and even before the Reapers came to town, local motorcyclists had enjoyed riding through vast stretches of Texas landscape beneath the tall towers of Consolidated Power Enterprises.

  ***

  The smell of sausage and eggs greeted Raina as she came down the steps. So did her mother’s voice: “Breakfast is ready honey, come eat before it gets cold.”

  “Good morning,” she said to her mother as Raina entered the kitchen. Then she gave her father a perfunctory peck on the cheek and also greeted him with, “Good morning.”

  He replied, “Good morning, Princess.”

  Miles always called her Princess. That’s how he thought of her. He was the King, and she was his Little Princess. She would never know hunger or want as he once had, because he could—and would—provide her with everything she could ever need.

  Raina hated being called “Princess.” It had taken her several years to get Daddy to drop the word “Little” in front of it. Each time he had called her “Little Princess,” she would pout and say, “Daddy, I’m grown up now, in case you haven’t noticed.”

  After he switched to just “Princess,” she tried to push him farther, saying “I have a name. It’s Raina.”

  But her father would always respond, “You will always be my little Princess.”

  Finally, she gave up and tolerated the term… but only from her father.

  Her mom had just set her plate in front of her when her father’s cell phone squawked with a sound very similar to the fire alarms at the office.

  “Damn,” he said, reaching for his pocket. His only words were, “Where?” and then, “How many?” He said “Damn!” again
and returned the phone to his pocket.

  “You’d better hurry, Princess,” he said as he gulped down the last of his coffee. “Storms took out four towers on line seven and another three on line nine and at least two on line six. We’re going to have to calculate the re-routes before demand peaks this afternoon.”

  With that, he gave his wife a quick kiss on the cheek and said, “Won’t be home for lunch, and if anything else goes sour I might not be here for dinner.” Then he hurried out to his car and headed for his office.

  Raina quickly finished her eggs and went upstairs to get ready for the day.

  When Raina got to CPE headquarters, she was surprised to see the huge parking lot totally empty. All of the line trucks and even all of the heavy crane and pole carriers were gone. She had never seen that before.

  She could hear her father’s raised voice as she entered the office. “Why the hell can’t you bring line four onto the grid? The maintenance cycle is completed. It’s on reserve status. It should be ready to go!”

  Miles came storming out of his office. “God-damned federal government and their mandatory control encryption. Someday they’re going to make us all so safe that nothing will work.” Then he yelled at the dispatcher, “Who do we have available to take a replacement encrypter to switch node one-dash-four?”

  The dispatcher looked back at him with eyes open wide in fear. “I’m sorry, sir. Everyone’s out in the field, even all the engineers. We’ve got a lot of wire down on lines six, seven, and nine, and at least two substations are out of service. The only vehicle in the yard is the old security jeep, but there’s nobody here to send.”

  “I’ll go,” said Raina suddenly. The sound of her voice startled even her. Daddy almost never let her go out into the field, especially not alone. “It’s just a thumbdrive, Daddy. It’s not like I’m going to be climbing a tower.”

  “I don’t know, Princess,” he said.

  “I have a name, Father. It’s Raina,” she answered, somewhat surprised at her own tone of voice.

  Miles looked around the office at the desks totally empty of engineers and field supervisors. “OK,” he finally said. Holding up a small object he explained, “We’ve got to get this out to the switch node. There are two techs out there trying to get the line on the grid but something’s wrong with the control encryption.”

  He handed her what looked like a cell phone and said, “This is a specially modified smartphone. It works as my personal control remote. The techs can use it to check that the encryption is working and then put the line on the grid.” He pressed an icon on the screen. “This app will open the gates for you. They will close automatically after a few minutes.” He gave her a peck on the forehead and said, “Hurry. I’m counting on you.”

  A few minutes later, Raina was headed north out of town on the maintenance road. The gates all opened for her just as her father had said, and about 45 minutes later she was at a white metal shed alongside a huge switch assembly. A man in a gray CPE work outfit ran out to meet her and accepted the gadget from her hands. As she was entering the shed, loud bangs from outside told her that the switches were activating to connect the line to the power grid.

  “Don’t you need this?” she asked, holding up the cell phone-like device her father had given her.

  “That’s his spare,” the man replied. “We tried to activate from headquarters, but nothing happened. We thought it was a control line problem, so we brought the boss’s remote on-site. It wasn’t until we got out here that we realized the key hadn’t been updated. You can leave it with us and we’ll get both of them back to Mr. Chaplin.”

  “Don’t I need it for the gates?” Raina asked.

  “Oh, yeah,” one of the techs answered. “Just get it back to your dad eventually. With everything else going to hell, he probably doesn’t even realize he gave you the secondary.”

  ***

  The conclusion to all that hustle and bother seemed rather anti-climactic to Raina as she walked back to the jeep. Everything had taken only a few minutes once she arrived. Still, line four was now attached to the grid, and it felt like she had accomplished something for a change. Not that what she’d done had been all that important, anybody could have done it, but the fact that she’d done something meaningful felt very, very good.

  She smiled in satisfaction, but then it suddenly hit her: all she’d done was deliver a small part. The fact that something so trivial was her most meaningful achievement in months illuminated the artificiality of her daily life. She was nothing but a child being kept busy while the adults went about their day.

  Her moment of happiness began to darken as the truth of her life bubbled up in her mind. “I’m spending my life catching fireflies,” she said aloud to herself, remembering how as a small child, her parents would sometimes pay her and her friends to catch fireflies outside while the adults socialized after dinner. At two cents per firefly, the children thought they were accomplishing something, and for only a few dollars, the adults had a quiet evening free of interruptions.

  She paused to trigger the gate at the top of the next rise and then continued aloud to herself, “Everyone else has grown up, and I’m still catching–”

  Her thoughts were stopped abruptly by the shock of what she saw as she topped the rise and started into the shallow valley beyond. Coming directly toward her on the narrow road was a double column of motorcycles. She could count at least a dozen of them, and more were coming over the next hill. She slammed her foot on the brake and the jeep slid to a stop in a cloud of dust.

  One of the riders at the head of the column held up his hand and the bikes slowed to a stop about a hundred feet in front of the jeep. Raina could now count 19 bikes. She could hear shouted voices above the rumble of motors. Someone was saying, “That’s some of those fuckin’ security assholes now. This time we’re not alone. Let’s see how they like gettin’ a beatdown for a change.”

  There were other shouts and voices, but Raina could not understand what they said. The rider who had given the signal for the column to stop made another motion with his hand and the noise of the engines died away, except for one. Whoever it was spoke to the rest as if he were in charge.

  “Talk first,” he said clearly. “I’ll check it out. Stay here unless it looks like I need you.” Then the lone engine revved slightly, and he pulled slowly away from the column and closed the distance to the jeep.

  Raina thought of calling 911 on her cell phone, but what good would that do? Even if she found a cellular signal, she was over 30 miles out in the scrubland. It would take the Sheriff at least a half hour to get here, even if he or a deputy were in town and ready to respond. She clutched the steering wheel, wondering if she should try to turn around and flee back up the road. A glance in the mirror told her the gate had closed behind her. They opened slowly. Would it open in time even if she could get the jeep turned around?

  Then the time for action was past. The lone rider was stopping his bike directly in front of the jeep. He was walking up to the door. Raina felt herself trembling slightly with fear. He turned back toward the rest and said loudly, “It’s not security.” Then he looked into the jeep and smiled.

  “You’re definitely not one of Mr. Chaplin’s security goons. What’s a pretty girl like you doing in a place like this?”

  Raina wasn’t sure how to react. Of all of the things she had expected or feared might happen, of all the things she thought he’d say, a stupid, corny pickup line from an old movie was not on the list. She found herself smiling back at the handsome stranger who now stood just outside the door of the jeep.

  He was ruggedly handsome, standing there in a thin T-shirt. The upper portions of his muscular arms were heavily tattooed. The crossed scythes on his left bicep identified him as one of the Crossed Reapers. His actions identified him as one of their leaders. From her father’s many rants about the Reapers, she had expected him to be coarse and vulgar and threatening. Instead, he was handsome, and polite, and very obviously stan
ding slightly away from the open window of the jeep so that she would feel less threatened.

  “I’m Neil Gunn,” he said brightly. “My friends and I were...” He shook his head and laughed. Then he smiled again. His deep brown eyes seemed to change color slightly. They became slightly lighter, warmer. For some reason, Raina felt herself again returning his smile.

  “The truth is, I’m Neil Gunn, President of the Crossed Reapers, and I brought some reinforcements up from Dallas for the day. We were hoping to meet up with some of the power company security people and discuss the way they’ve been treating my members when they catch them alone out here on the maintenance roads.”

  Raina was surprised at the honesty of what he said, and even more surprised at the polished way he spoke. From her father’s nightly tirades, she’d expected the President of the Reapers to be a knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing imbecile barely capable of speech. That was definitely not Neil Gunn. If it weren’t for his tattoos and rough appearance, he would almost fit in among the engineers and managers in her father’s office.

  He stepped closer. “What is a pretty girl like you doing out here in the middle of nowhere in a power company security jeep?” As he spoke he brushed against her arm, which was resting on the edge of the driver side window. Was it accidental or intentional? In either case, an electric thrill ran through her body.