UC Berkeley hadn’t been Layla’s first choice of university. But in the wake of her dalliances with the Marauders Motorcycle Club, her parents hadn’t given her very many options.

Registration for summer classes was closed, otherwise she would have been out of town a lot sooner than September. In the meantime, she wasn’t allowed to so much as venture to the grocery store on her own. Layla was on lockdown.

It could be worse, she thought to herself as she scrolled through a few of her favorite Tumblr accounts. At least Mom isn’t trying to move into one of the dorms with me.

She leaned her chin on her hand as she scanned each picture on her screen. They were all of sexy, half-naked hunks sprawled out for her benefit, their bodies gleaming and their muscles flexed. Usually she liked the “Captain America” type, clean-cut boys with strong jaws, short hair, and twinkling blue eyes. Those were the boys she knew she could corrupt, and Layla took endless pleasure in the thought of making a good boy go bad.

But things were different now. She’d had a taste of the darkness that lay on the other side of the divide—men who lacked the self-restraint and shame of the boys who’d had her before. And she couldn’t stop thinking about it.

She thought of Gareth’s whiskey-tainted breath curling into her mouth as he kissed her against the bathroom wall. She thought of his rough beard on her flesh, his mustache tickling her nose as he pressed his rigid body against hers.

There was no desperation to his desire. He didn’t need her. He wanted her. And from the way his gritty, calloused hands dug at her soft flesh, it was clear that he knew he would get it, too.

Gareth was confident and self-assured. He didn’t wait for permission. He didn’t ask. He took. The thought of it made her squirm against her mattress.

But what about Jesse?

Layla closed her eyes, thinking of his lopsided grin and the mischievous glint in his gorgeous green eyes, both of which had disappeared the moment he saw her legs wrapped around Gareth’s waist. He still lingered somewhere between the caution of boyhood and the principals of the alpha male, but bending her over his bike had been a great start to his transition.

She remembered the way his fingers sank into her hips, planting seeds that would later bloom into dark violet bruises along her bones, like a trail of forget-me-nots tattooed upon her skin. She would have borne them happily, even with a pride—badges of honor for having been fucked by the president of the Marauders MC—had he not thrown her away like trash once he was done.

That was where the fantasy had ended, and the reality had set in. She’d thought she was special. She’d thought what she had with Jesse would mean something—not love, but something—and when it became clear that she was just some toy for him to play with and share amongst the group, she realized what a mistake she’d made in believing otherwise.

Layla Long was not trash. And she damn sure wasn’t going to let anyone treat her like she was. She may have been a bad girl—hell, some even called her easy—but that didn’t mean she didn’t have any self-respect. She liked sex, and she loved danger, but she knew a steep price when she saw one, and the loss of her identity and self-worth was not one she was willing to pay.

Not even for a hunk like Jesse King.

As she stared at the array of half-clothed men before her, she wondered if he’d come for her. After all, she was a Marauder now. But she wasn’t sure to what extent, or what membership even meant for the girl their club president had used right there in front of them.

Whatever, she decided, opening up another page. I’m not gonna let myself get passed around. Besides, I’ll be in California soon. I doubt they’ll even think twice about me once I’m there.

The thought stung a little, but she wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t like any of them were thinking twice about her now, anyway—certainly not Jesse.

I guess that’s the problem, she reflected, though she tried not to think about it too much as she lost herself in the sea of ripped bodies on her screen.

Just as a damp, familiar warmth was settling between her legs, Layla heard something skitter across the outside of her window.

She looked over her shoulder. It was pitch black outside. She couldn’t see a damn thing.

Must’ve been a moth, she thought to herself as she watched a .gif of a muscle-bound man squeezing the contents of a sponge out over his massive pecs. It made her think of Jesse.

Dammit, no! He doesn’t give a shit about you, Layla. Get over it!

There was another clatter, this one louder and more forceful than the first. Whatever was colliding with her window, it was too powerful to be a moth.

Layla stood up and cupped her hands on either side of her face, gazing out of her window at the darkness beyond. Below her, she caught the barest glint of light reflecting off of chrome.

Her stomach twisted. It was a motorcycle.

She thought about ignoring it. Given what had happened last time she’d associated with the Marauders, whatever they wanted couldn’t be in her best interests, and she was already on thin ice with her parents as it was.

But what if it was Jesse? What if he wanted to grovel at her feet and beg forgiveness? It would give her the opportunity to end things on her terms—to get the last word in. And she simply couldn’t resist that.

She flung open her window and leaned out over the ledge. It wasn’t Jesse, but he would do.

“What do you want?” she sneered at Gareth staring up at her from the garden.

“You,” he said. “We got business.”

“Business?” she echoed, folding her arms. “I didn’t think you were the kind of guy who did sloppy seconds.”

She thought she saw him quirk a smile. “This ain’t about that,” he said, fingering the pebble in his palm. “It’s about the club. Come down here so we can talk.”

“We can talk from here,” she replied, narrowing her eyes. “What does the club have to do with me?”

Gareth shrugged. “More than I was willin’ to admit, at first,” he said. “But you got a way with words. You got a way of makin’ Jesse see reason, and that’s somethin’ I can appreciate. I want you to come back and keep runnin’ that mouth’a yours so’s we can be a real club and not just some kids fuckin’ around for the hell of it.”

Layla rolled her eyes. “How stupid do you think I am? All you want is some bitch you can pass around. You’re in it for the pussy.”

“Oh, I’m gonna get that anyway, Cinderella,” Gareth said with a wolfish grin. “But right now, I got bigger fish to fry. You heard about Los Muertos?”

“No,” Layla admitted. She’d tried very hard not to think about that over the past week, but she couldn’t help but be intrigued now that Gareth had broached the subject. She sighed, then added: “What happened?”

“Exactly what Bear thought,” Gareth said, leaning back against his bike as he pulled a hand-rolled cigarette from behind his ear. “The cartels lost a lotta product that night, and they came after Los Muertos pretty hard. Dragged a few of ‘em all the way across the border and hanged ‘em by their ankles, then cut off their heads and left ‘em there for everyone to see.” He took a long, self-satisfied drag. “It was fucked up.”

Layla swallowed hard, seized by a dark chill. She hadn’t expected anyone to actually get hurt, let alone murdered in the streets. If she had known, she would have never gone on that ride to the Los Muertos warehouse.

“We’re layin’ low for now,” Gareth continued as the cherry on his cigarette bloomed once again. “But I’m thinkin’ we gotta move pretty fast, if we wanna take over their business. I was hopin’ you might convince Jesse for me.”

“Wait,” she interrupted. “Take over the business? You mean you want to sell what you took from the warehouse? Isn’t that dangerous—not to mention we didn’t get very much…”

She stopped when she saw the smirk on Gareth’s face.

“Gareth… what the hell did you do?”

“I took some liberties,” he said, blowing smoke rings into the stars. “Along with all the meth I could fit in my pockets. Jesse don’t know about that part, yet. But he will, and when he finds out, I need somebody to have my back. Takin’ over Los Muertos’ territory would really put us on the map, especially if we could start runnin’ for the cartels—”

“Jesus!” Layla hissed, her stomach turning violently. “Why the fuck would you want to work for the cartels? You saw what they did to Los Muertos—imagine what they’d do to you!”

“I ain’t gonna step on their toes,” Gareth said. “I just wanna pick up where Los Muertos left off. I want a piece of that greenback pie. Shit, in just a few months, the Marauders could be runnin’ not just Oasis, but Phoenix, Tucson—you name it. This is our chance to be more than just some backwater gang eatin’ fuckin’ birthday cake in a run-down chop shop. We’d have a future!”

“I already have a future,” Layla said, shaking her head vehemently. “And it’s not here with the Marauders or the cartels.” She took in a deep, shuddering breath. “I’m going to UC Berkeley in the fall.”

Gareth scrunched up his nose. “Where the fuck is that?”

“It’s in California, dumbass,” she answered with a scowl. He made it seem so inconsequential. “Far enough away from here that I won’t have to worry about you trying to fuck up my life every time you get a little horny or trigger happy. I’ll be in college—you know, actually making something of myself.”

“Oh yeah?” Gareth said, raising a gilt eyebrow. “Like what?”

Layla hesitated. “What do you mean?”

“You said you were gonna make somethin’ of yourself,” he said. The scorching heat of his stare made her feel like she was on fire. “I wanna know what.”

She squirmed, tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, and gave a little shrug of her shoulders. “Whatever I want.”

“That’s what I thought,” Gareth chuckled, grinning from ear-to-ear, his bright white teeth flashing in the moonlight. “You have no fuckin’ clue what you want, do you, princess? You’re still tryin’ to pretend like there’s anything out there for you that’ll make you feel like you did on the back of a bike. I hate to ruin the endin’ of your movie, but there ain’t. This is all there is for you—the only thing that’ll ever make you feel alive.”

He blew smoke in her direction, and the noxious scent wafted in through her open window as if he’d exhaled only inches from her.

“You’re a Marauder now, Cinderella. There ain’t nothin’ and nobody else out there for you but us.”

Layla clenched her jaw so hard that the muscle in her cheek began to twitch. Gareth was wrong about her. She was better than all of them combined—even Camel, who seemed like a sweet kid who’d gotten tangled up in the wrong crowd. She had a direction in life, and unlike theirs, it wasn’t straight down to rock bottom.

“Go to hell,” she said as she began to close the window.

“That’s a pretty cage you’ve got there, sweetheart,” Gareth said as the pane muffled his tone. “But no matter how gilded it is, you’ve still got bars all around you.”

Layla latched the window up tight, almost as if it would keep Gareth’s words from following her to her bed. But no matter how hard she tried to forget, there they were again, stating exactly what she’d already known.

The only thing that had ever made Layla Long feel free was riding through the desert on the back of Jesse King’s bike.

What if she never felt that way again?