PROLOGUE
JOSIE
These bikers sure know how to throw a party.
The Stoneheart MC clubhouse is packed wall-to-wall with leather and denim. Someone’s cranked up the speakers loud enough to rattle the floor-to-ceiling windows, competing with the crack of pool balls from the corner and the steady hum of voices that fills every inch of the sprawling lounge.
The place is a study in contrasts—old farmhouse bones meeting modern renovation. A massive leather sectional dominates the main room, worn and comfortable, facing a stone fireplace that’s been lit despite the crowd generating more than enough heat. The kitchen gleams with dark granite counters and steel appliances, while the long wooden farmhouse table nearby is scarred from decades of use, currently covered in bottles and platters of food.
Not exactly where I normally spend my Tuesday nights. Usually, I’d be elbow-deep in case files with a glass of wine and a rerun ofSchitt’s Creekplaying in the background. But standing here, surrounded by the noise and the laughter and the easy chaos ofpeople who actually like each other? I’m surprised to realize I don’t want to be anywhere else.
A year ago, walking into an MC clubhouse would’ve had my heart in my throat. These days, I know the leather and the tattoos are just window dressing. These guys are good people. Loud, stubborn, occasionally terrifying—but good. And somewhere along the way, I stopped feeling like the lawyer they tolerate and started feeling like someone who might actually belong.
Besides, when your highest paying client, who also happens to be President of the local Motorcycle Club, invites you to a party, you can’t exactly say no.
We have plenty to celebrate. And plenty to mourn.
Somewhere in the back, Duck is holding court with a growing crowd of locals who keep encouraging him to do another shot. He’s hard to miss—a barrel-chested man in his sixties with a thick white beard that would make Santa jealous and pale blue eyes. He owns the only garage in town and has been patching up bikes and bikers alike for longer than most of us have been alive. I know for a fact he’s the closest thing to a father figure half these guys have ever had. His deep, smoky laugh carries over the noise as someone claps him on the shoulder.
Meanwhile Maggie, his wife, laughs at his antics. She’s a compact woman with silver-streaked hair and capable hands that are equally skilled at knitting baby blankets, taping cracked ribs, and smacking sense into idiots who need it. Right now those hands are wrapped around a whiskey sour as she watches her husband with the kind of fond exasperation that only comes from forty years of marriage. She catches my eye across the room and winks.
I should be celebrating too. After all, I’m the one who woke up a judge at two in the morning to secure an emergency divorce decree, expose a dirty cop’s financial ties to the cartel, outed Summit’s criminal background, and freed a woman from an abusive marriage.
I watch as the woman in question, Mercy, kisses Cash, the MC’s Treasurer. She’s a riot of red curls and curves, a woman who takes up space and doesn’t apologize for it. Her sleeve tattoos catch the bar light as her arms wrap around his neck, and when she finally pulls back, her green eyes are bright with the kind of joy I wish I could bottle. Cash—all sharp cheekbones and pale green eyes, the kind of unfairly gorgeous that makes smart women stupid—looks at her like she hung the moon and he’s just grateful to be standing in its light. His hand finds the small of her back, protective and possessive all at once. He’s a few years younger than her, but you’d never find a more well-matched couple.
He grins, hauling her back in again for another, longer, kiss as his biker brothers cheer.
They’re free.
I’m happy for her, don’t get me wrong. But watching them together, watching the way he holds her as if she’s his entire world, makes something horrible twist in my chest.
I turn back to the bar, taking another swig of the beer I’m nursing. It’s my third and the kind of cheap stuff that reminds me of the college frat parties I once attended back in my school days, and trying very hard not to stare at the man across the room.
Stone.
The President of the Stoneheart MC is talking to his Sergeant at Arms, Hawk, about something. On the surface, Hawk looks like a man built like a semi with a bad attitude. His arms are crossed over his broad chest, his dark eyes scanning the room even as he listens to Stone. But I’ve seen him with his partner, Andi, and their three kids, watched him melt into a puddle when one of the twins tugs on his beard or baby Adam falls asleep on his chest. The man’s a softie wrapped in leather and scowls.
Stone, on the other hand…
His face is serious, his hands moving in that deliberate way he has when he’s working through a problem. The party swirls around them, but Stone stands apart from it. Like a rock in the middle of a river, the jovial energy flows around him, glancing off his controlled facade.
He’s only in his late forties, still young and fit, but the silver threading through his dark hair and beard gives him a distinguished edge that makes my stomach flip. His weathered face tells stories of bar fights and hard years, but it’s his eyes that get me every time. Steel gray and missing nothing. The kind of eyes that make you feel seen in ways you’re not sure you want to be.
God, you’re pathetic, Bright. Just go talk to him.
We’ve been dancing around this thing between us for months. The lingering looks. The accidental touches that don’t feel accidental at all. The late nights in his office when the conversation drifts from legal issues to topics far more personal.
I’m not imagining this thing between us. IknowI’m not imagining it.
The question is whether either of us is brave enough to do something about it.
“You’re staring.”
I nearly jump out of my skin. Kya materializes beside me, a knowing smirk on her face.
“I’m not staring. I’m... people watching.” The excuse is basically the lamest thing that’s ever stumbled out of my mouth.
“Uh-huh.” She slides onto the stool next to mine, taking a sip of her drink. “You’ve been ‘people watching’ the same person for the past hour.”
