Stone’s jaw tightens. “You think you know what’s good for my daughter? Better than I do?”
“I think she’s old enough to make her own choices.”
“Choices?” Stone’s voice rises slightly. “You didn’t give her a choice when you started tracking her. Didn’t give her one when you implanted one directly under her skin.”
“That wasn’t a choice for her to make.”
“How was it fucking yours?” Stone’s voice gets louder with each word.
I stay calm. “I swore I’d keep her safe. And I sure as hell wasn’t about to stop just because she turned eighteen.”
Stone stares me down, waiting for me to back off, but I don’t blink. I know how to take hits. I’ve had a lifetime of practice.
“That patch you wear is supposed to mean loyalty,” he says finally, voice quiet. “Me. The club. Then everybody else.”
“Yeah, it did mean that,” I say. “Still does. But some things go deeper than the patch. And you know that, Stone. You wouldn’t have given me the job if you didn’t know it.” I don’t raise my voice to match his. I don’t need to. “You picked me to watch her because you knew I’d die before I let anything happen to her. You needed that, so you used it. You think I don’t know?”
Lee cuts a glance my way. His jaw ticks. I get the sense that if Stone wasn’t standing here, he’d be saying the same words I just did.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have,” Stone says. He studies me, long enough that I feel the weight of what he’s about to say. “Maybe I screwed up both my daughter and you.”
“You didn’t screw anyone up. You did what you had to do.” I pause and look directly at him. “Just like I did. She’s alive because I did what I had to do. And I willneverapologize for that.”
He just looks at me, like he’s weighing all the ways this conversation could end. His fists are still tight at his sides, but I’m not backing off. Stone can’t hit me like he wants to. Not in front of Lee, not with Emma in the next room. This man always knows the score. It’s just that this time he hates it.
“You gonna kick me out?” There’s no fear in my question. There’s everything to lose, but no fear.
“I should. I told you that if you went near my daughter again, you’d lose your patch. That wasn’t a suggestion, Bones. That was a promise.”
“I’m aware.”
“Dad, come on—” Lee tries, looking between us with alarm in his eyes.
“This is between me and Bones, Harley.”
Lee’s mouth thins at the use of his full name but he shuts up. Even though I can see the disagreement written all over his face.
Stone turns back to me, and I feel the weight of all my years with this club pressing down on me. I was sixteen when I started hanging around. That’s fourteen years of nothing but the MC. Of brotherhood, of purpose, of belonging. And all of it about to disappear because I couldn’t stay away from the club princess. The one person who’s ever mattered more to me than the patch.
The one person I’d give everything for.
“You want me to go get it for you?” I keep my voice steady even though my hands aren’t. “I’ll give you my cut. You can have Tank or Hawk rip the patch off if you want. Make it official. I’ll even go and visit Duck to get my club tatts blacked out. Whatever you need to feel better about yourself, Stone.”
His eyes flash, like he’s shocked I’m not begging.
“It didn’t have to be like this,” he says. “If you’d told me what you were doing—asked. Then maybe I would have agreed with you. I know she’s wild at heart. I might have even said yes.”
“Are you fucking serious?” We all turn at the sound breaking into the moment.
Emma’s standing in the bedroom doorway wearing one of my T-shirts—a faded Stoneheart MC one that hangs to mid-thigh on her. Her hair is a mess, her lips are swollen, and there’s a fresh bite mark visible on her neck.
She looks furious.
Stone releases a breath. “Emma?—”
“Don’t.” She crosses her arms, and even though she’s tiny compared to all of us, there’s something formidable about her right now. “Don’t you dare punish Bones for this. I’m the onewho came here. I’m the one who showed up at his door. I’m the one who refused to leave.”
“That doesn’t change things?—”
