Maybe she left. Maybe she went back to Stone’s house. Maybe she’s at the clubhouse. Maybe she got in her car and drove back to New York already, too hurt or angry or disappointed to stay.
I have no fucking idea.
And it’s killing me.
I down the rest of the whiskey, welcome the burn. This must be what normal people feel like—people who don’t track the woman they love. This low-grade panic, this constant not knowing.
I hate it.
But it’s the way it has to be.
I went against Stone once. Do it again and I’m out for good.
And that would be worse than dying.
The thing nobody understands—the thing I can barely explain to myself—is that losing the MC would be like losing a limb. I’d still be alive, technically, but I wouldn’t function. Wouldn’t know how to move through the world without that structure, that brotherhood, that sense of belonging to something bigger than myself.
I found the club when I was sixteen and had nothing. No family, no future, no idea who I was supposed to be. Stone gave me purpose. The brothers gave me family. The patch gave me identity.
Losing it would destroy me.
But being without Emma? That’s living without a heart.
Painful. Fucking excruciating. But survivable, in the way some things are—slowly, if you grit your teeth and keep moving, working, breathing. And don’t think too hard about the empty space she leaves behind.
Having no heart is helpful in my world. Makes the violence easier. Makes the hard decisions simpler. Makes it possible to do what needs to be done without getting tangled up in feelings.
So I wait. Like I’ve been waiting since I was sixteen years old and saw Stone’s wild daughter for the first time.
She’ll come home for good. I know that the same way I knew, the first time I touched her, that I’d never want anyone else.
And until she says she’s staying? I’m keeping my fucking distance. Even if waiting is torture.
I refill the glass. Take another drink. Stare at the wall where I hung a few photos—the club, Devil’s Bar before it burned, me and Cash on our bikes. Normal shit that normal people put on walls to make a place feel like home.
Except Emma’s not in any of the photos.
Because I never had the right to put her there. Not officially. Not while she was still figuring out what she wanted.
Footsteps on the metal stairs outside.
I freeze, glass halfway to my lips. The stairs to this apartment are on the outside of the building—metal and noisy as hell. Someone’s coming up.
Heavy footsteps. Determined.
My heart kicks into overdrive.
Stone? Coming to check on me, make sure I’m keeping my promise to stay away from his daughter?
Lee? Coming to warn me she’s looking for me?
Or—
Emma.
The footsteps stop outside my door. A pause. Then a knock.
Three sharp raps that echo through my chest.
