Total pages in book: 61
Estimated words: 63608 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 318(@200wpm)___ 254(@250wpm)___ 212(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63608 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 318(@200wpm)___ 254(@250wpm)___ 212(@300wpm)
Ledger’s entire body goes rigid. He stands in one fluid motion, stepping between me and the door.
“Stay,” he whispers without looking back.
I nod, heart hammering all over again.
He opens the door a crack.
“It’s me,” Shaft’s voice mutters.
Ledger relaxes by half an inch and swings the door open wider. Shaft walks inside, looking grim.
“What’s wrong?” Riot asks.
Shaft glances at me, then lowers his voice. “We caught someone on the cameras.”
Riot’s shoulders snap tight. “Where?”
“Back road. Half a mile from the cabin.”
My breath freezes.
Riot steps forward. “Same guy as before?”
“Maybe. Hard to tell. Hoodie. Could’ve been him.”
“Did he see the cameras?”
“Don’t think so.”
“What was he doing?”
Shaft hesitates.
Riot’s voice turns lethal. “What was he doing?”
“Waiting,” Shaft says. “Just standing at the tree line. Watching the road.”
A violent chill runs through me.
Riot swears under his breath a low, vicious sound I feel in my bones.
He turns to me, anger barely held back. “Pack your things.”
My pulse spikes. “What? Why?”
“We’re movin’.”
“But—”
“This place has eyes on it now that don’t want to go away,” he snarls. “We’re not staying in a target zone.”
Shaft nods. “We’ll bring the truck around.”
Riot turns to me. He holds out a hand. “You trust me to keep you safe?”
Not a command.
Not an ultimatum.
An invitation.
A lifeline.
I take it.
His fingers close around mine, warm and steady, pulling me up gently. He doesn’t let go even once as he leads me to the bedroom to grab my bag. The whole time, he watches the windows, the shadows, every crack and creak of the cabin.
“Riot?” I whisper. “Are we in danger?”
He stops.
Turns.
Looks at me with something raw in his eyes.
“No,” he says. “You’re not. You’re never in danger with me.”
His thumb strokes my knuckles so briefly I could pretend I imagined it.
“I won’t let anything touch you,” he adds. “Not again.”
A shiver runs down my spine.
“What about you?” I whisper.
He gives a small, broken smile. “I stopped worrying about myself a long time ago.”
He squeezes my hand once, then releases me and grabs the bag.
“Stay behind me,” he orders gently. “Don’t talk to anyone. And if I tell you to run, you run.”
My breath stutters. “Is it that serious?”
“Someone hit you with a truck twice,” he growls. “And someone else stood outside this cabin. So yeah it’s that serious.”
Fear curls tight in my stomach.
But something else grows there too fierce, warm, unexplainable.
I trust him. God help me, I trust him completely.
We step outside to loading trucks and armed brothers. The sky is turning gray, storm clouds gathering in thick rolls. Riot moves ahead of me like a shadow, silent, deadly, and keenly aware of everything.
His hand reaches back blindly and brushes my hip, guiding me behind him. Like he’s done it a thousand times. Maybe he has. I wish I could remember.
I lean into the motion, into the safety of it, into him.
By the time we’re in the truck again, my heart hasn’t slowed.
Riot starts the engine, jaw clenched. “Where are we going?” I ask.
He glances at me, eyes softening barely. “Somewhere safer,” he states. “Somewhere you were before.”
That shouldn’t calm me. But it does.
Somewhere inside the fog of my mind, a spark flickers, warm, bright, familiar.
“Will I remember it?” I ask.
He looks at me for a long moment. “I don’t know,” he murmurs. “But I’ll be right there if you do.”
Heat blooms in my chest. And for the first time since the accident, I’m not scared of remembering bits and pieces. But I have a fear. I’m scared of remembering everything.
Especially him.
Thirteen
Ledger
I want her. God help me, I want her. Just not like this.
The new safe house isn’t much to look at from the outside — a plain one-story place tucked behind a storage facility on the far edge of Freedom Falls. No one outside the club knows it exists. Hell, some of the brothers don’t know it exists.
That’s the point.
The Kings learned a long time ago that big threats don’t announce themselves. They slither. They wait. They hunt quiet.
So we built places for hiding. For regrouping. For protecting our own when the world turned sideways.
Right now, Kelly is exactly that, someone we protect. Someone I protect.
I kill the engine, scan the yard, and circle the truck before I even get her door open. The air tastes wrong. Heavy, thick with a storm coming. Wind full of that metallic tang that reminds me of nights in the barracks before a mission.
Kelly sits in the passenger seat, hands curled tight in her lap, jaw set even though I can tell she’s exhausted.
She puts on a brave face for me.
She always did.
I open her door and offer a hand. She stares at it for a beat like she can’t decide whether taking it makes her stronger or weaker.
Then she slips her hand into mine.
Warm.
Soft.
Familiar in a way I can’t say out loud.
“You okay?” I ask, keeping my voice low.