I mutter something that probably sounds like “fuck off,” but my boots are already carrying me forward, heavier than concrete as I climb the steps one at a time, bracing for whatever version of her is on the other side. Judgment. Anger. Tears I caused. Consequences I earned. I reach the door, grip the handle, draw a breath that shakes all the way through me… and then I push inside.
The house is too quiet. Like the air itself is bracing for impact. Brooke spots me first from the kitchen doorway. Arms crossed. Protective big sister mode fully activated. She doesn’t tell me to leave. But her eyes tell me not to make this worse.
I nod once. Promising without words. Then I walk into the living room and there she is curled into herself in the corner of the couch. Knees to her chest, fingers digging into her own arms like she’s holding herself together because if she lets go, she’ll fall apart completely.
Her mascara is smudged, her cheeks are blotchy, and her breathing is uneven. She’s pissed, but that isn’t what guts me. It’s the pain underneath the anger. The kind that looks like it’s eating her alive.
She looks at me… and God, it hurts. Like she doesn’t know whether I’m the man she fell for or the one who broke her heart. Her voice barely makes it out. “What do you want?”
One sentence and she knocks the wind out of me. She isn’t scared. She isn’t crying. She’s just done. I take a small step toward her and she goes rigid, so I stop cold, like I’m one wrong move away from losing her for good. “I shouldn’t have yelled at you,” I say, each word scraping my throat raw. “Not in front of the club. Not anywhere. Not ever.”
Her laugh is sharp and painful. “That’s what you think needs apologizing? The location?”
I close my eyes because the truth of that hits hard. I was an asshole everywhere. Not just in public. “I was scared,” I admit. The words taste like humiliation. Because fear, for me, always comes out as rage.
Her eyes flash. “You think I wasn’t terrified? They tried to take me, Blade. And you made me feel like the problem instead of the victim.”
She wipes a tear with the heel of her hand, angry at herself for shedding it.
“You made me feel like a burden,” she whispers. “Like if I’d just stayed home like a good girl, everything would be fine.”
Jesus Christ, her words are a knife in the heart. “It’s dangerous because of me,” I say, voice shaking. “You being with me paints a target on your back.”
She steps back, shaking her head like that isn’t enough anymore. “Then talk to me. Don’t make me feel like you regret touching me. Or loving me. Or that I exist.”
Something cracks down the center of my chest. “I don’t regret you,” I swear. “Not one fucking second. I regret that I can’t seem to keep you safe without hurting you.”
Her lip trembles. She bites it hard, like she’s punishing herself for feeling anything at all. “Every time you yell,” she says, “I feel like I did something to deserve it.”
“No.” I step closer, desperate now. “No, Bri, that’s not—”
“That’s how it feels!” The shout rips out of her. Raw and tearing. “You made me feel small. Like nothing. Like loving you was stupid.”
I want to hold her. I want to fix it. But I can’t touch her yet. I don’t get to just take when she’s hurting because of me. I sit on the edge of the couch. Not touching her. Just close enough that she can move if she wants. Her fingers flex against her legs, like she’s fighting not to reach back. “I’m trying,” I say. “But I don’t know how to do this without messing it up.”
She finally looks at me again. And the pain in her eyes? It’s brutal. It’s honesty. It’s love terrified of its own depth. “Then learn,” she says. “With me. Not over me. Not around me. With me.”
I nod once. Because if I try to speak, everything I’m too scared to say is gonna come out.
She watches me. Long enough that I feel every mistake I’ve ever made crawling across my skin.
“I’m here,” I tell her, voice low and wrecked. “I’m not walking away. Not even when you want to.”
She doesn’t soften. “You don’t get to just say that,” she says. “You have to prove it. With more than fear and fists.”
“I will,” I promise. “However long it takes.”
She swallows, and one more tear slides down, slow and silent. “I want to believe you so bad,” she whispers. “But right now… I’m scared to trust you.”
Fear and love battle inside me, and love finally wins by a hair. “Then let me rebuild what I broke,” I say. “Piece by piece. With you telling me where to fucking start.”
Outside, engines rumble while the brothers wait and danger circles just beyond the walls, but none of that matters right now because this, her and me finally fighting for the same thing instead of against each other, is the only war that counts, and I swear on every scar I carry that I’m not losing her again, not now, not ever.
Her forehead presses to mine for a single heartbeat, just long enough for the world to finally shut up. I should be grateful she’s even this close after everything I’ve put her through, should keep my mouth shut and give her space so she can breathe without my chaos crowding her. But silence is what carved this distance between us in the first place, silence is what made her believe she had to swallow every fear and doubt alone, so I pull back only enough to see her face. Her eyes are red and shining, her cheeks damp, hurt still flickering under the fire that’s always been there, even when she thinks it isn’t.
“I need to tell you something,” I say, voice low and frayed around the edges.
She tenses, shoulders hitching like she’s bracing for another blow I never meant to give.
