Page 1 of The Sins Of The Biker

Chapter One

HARLEY

Seven deadly sins—sins I know I’m guilty of most days.

To tell my story, I need to go back to the beginning—the first time I saw Serena.

I was sixteen years old, in my prime, and had just become a prospect for my father’s motorcycle club—the Sub Rosa MC—something I had been fighting for since I was a kid.

My father, the good man he was, didn’t want me associated with the club that way. He always wanted a better life for me and to make a career of working in the corporate world.

He was sure a lawyer would be a good suit, maybe so I could get him out of a jam if the situation ever arose. I wanted to make him proud and make something of myself, but that wasn’t the life for me. Even though I knew my mom didn’t want me to follow in my father’s footsteps, I couldn’t do this for her or my dad.

No, I needed to do this for myself.

The club was in my blood.

Although my parents did not allow me to hang around there as a kid, I practically spent most of my childhood at the clubhouse.

My cousin, Olivia, was my age, and we were close. Her father was and still is the sergeant at arms and also my mom’s brother. We were as thick as thieves and got into all kinds of mischief, like sneaking into the club when our dads weren’t watching or stealing some alcohol and cigarettes and hiding them in our jackets until we were on the roof of the building, where we would smoke and drink from the bottle, each of us taking turns.

But there were days when our dads were in a good mood and allowed us to hang around in the main room. This was where all the parties were held, and I saw things that a boy my age shouldn’t have seen, but it opened my eyes to club life.

They would warn us not to drink any alcohol or enter any rooms with closed doors, and I could never understand why we couldn’t enter a room. But now that I’m older, it’s abundantly clear why. Almost every night, a club member would have a woman in there, and this involved a lot of fucking, something my old man didn’t want me to see.

I had never seen my old man head to his room with a woman, which was a good thing. He loved my mom and used to say she was all the woman he could handle, and I loved that about them. Their love, that is. It’s something I wanted for myself in the future.

The club members held their meetings in the room with large engraved wooden doors out front, representing a place where they conduct business—a place called church but not the prayer kind.

Back then, it didn’t bother Liv and me when they were in that room because we sneaked some beer and hung out on the rooftop drinking it.

Some days, I would end up drunk and have to go home and explain to my mom why I reeked of beer. I always blamed the motorcycle club and said that the odor must have washed over me.

I had my first cigarette at eleven years old. It was the same for Liv. However, she couldn’t keep the smoke down. She would cough and splutter everywhere, but I loved it. So I continued to sneak a smoke when I could. What my folks didn’t know wouldn’t kill them.

I used to think I was so damn cool with a smoke in one hand and a beer in the other, and the kids at school thought Liv and I were the luckiest kids alive because we got to hang around a club. They didn’t know our parents forbade us to go there on most days.

Our parents tried to give us the best education money could buy by sending us to one of the best schools in Houston, but no matter how much money they threw away at the school, it didn’t stop Liv and me from ditching classes almost every day.

My mom also hoped I wouldn’t follow in my father’s footsteps. She did everything she could to keep me from the club, making me do chores around the house and sending me to a Portuguese language school so I could learn the tongue of my heritage, but nothing she did helped. I guess, after all this time, my parents finally accepted my wishes, and on my sixteenth birthday, I was voted in as prospect—the beginning of my life as a club member.

I initially expressed my anger. I mean, I’m the son of the president. Why do I have to start out as a prospect? But I guess if I didn’t, it would be considered favoritism, and all new members have to start at the beginning, so I shut my mouth and accepted the role.

On the morning of my sixteenth birthday, my old man opened the door to church for me for the first time and allowed me access to the room with its engraved wooden doors and a wooden table where club business was discussed.

As the president of the club, my father seated himself at the head of the table with a gavel in his hand, just like a judge. Anytime a member would get out of hand, my old man smashed the gavel down, causing everyone to pay attention.

As a prospect, you’re not usually invited into church until you’re a full member. Your job is to get them what they need and do anything that was asked of you, but today they asked me to come in. At first, I thought they found out about the car I had stolen the night before and hid in the garage at home to pull it apart and sell for parts, but I was wrong. I was always getting into shit like that.

I had entered and stood at the other end of the table while the others sat in their reserved seats.

My old man got up from his chair, walked around the table, grabbed my palm, and placed something in it. When I opened my hand, I noticed it was a patch with the word ‘prospect’ and the image of the Sub Rosa MC logo—a skeleton with a halo around its head.

He had embraced me, and I squeezed him tightly. Although I was sixteen, I was still his only son, and when he loved, he loved hard. I could smell the leather on his skin and the cigarettes he had smoked, and it only made me feel like I was home. This is where I belonged, and I wanted to be a Sub Rosa MC member.

After my dad explained the law of the club, which I knew already but merely nodded at every single word, it was Wave, our Vice President, who gave me a big smile and hugged me to him. He’s a good man and is only ten years older than me.

Wave is the name we call him because he’s a damn good surfer. Growing up in California, surfing was part of his everyday life. He left California for a different life and to escape his abusive father. He never looked back. Wave bumped into my old man at a bar one night, and the rest is history, so they say.

---