“Don’t apologize. That’s not criticism. I just…wish you didn’t. I wish there was something I could do.”
“Maybe over time,” I suggest, “they’ll pass. Right now everything’s still fresh.”
“I’ll never let anything happen to you,” he promises quietly. “Never again.”
The words make my eyes sting. I blink hard into the dark.
For a long time, Billy was safety, too. Billy was my protector. But Billy’s safety always came with a price, even when we werekids. I owed him my attention, my obedience, and ultimately, my body.
Ryder—all these men—they never ask anything more from me than I am willing to give.
“You hate motorcycle clubs,” I say, to get out of my own skull. “Like, really hate them. I’ve never asked you why.”
He takes a deep breath and blows it out slowly, ruffling my hair.
“Wyatt told me you lost someone,” I add.
“Mm,” he says. “Yeah.”
“Who?”
I feel his intake of breath against my back.
“My sister,” he says. “Samantha.”
The words shock me. A sister is too close, too painful. I’d been bracing for a colleague or a friend, not family.
“Oh,” I whisper. “Ryder…”
“She was sixteen. And she was…annoying.” He breathes a light, affectionate laugh. “Loud. She never left you alone. Always chatting. She started seeing this guy with a bike and a leather jacket. That whole thing. She thought it was romantic, like being chosen by somebody dangerous gave her some kind of protection or meant she was special. I was overseas and my mom kept saying she was worried. That Samantha was slipping, coming home late and not calling. Skipping school.”
He takes a deep breath and pauses for a long beat.
“They found her in a cheap motel. She’d gone to a party there. Cops said she overdosed, but Sam wasn’t that kind of kid. She was messy and stubborn and she’d lie about where she was going, but she wasn’t a user. She hated pills. Couldn’t even swallow a fucking Tylenol without gagging. And they left her. Her boyfriend and his friends just took off because they didn’t want to get caught. They didn’t call for help. They didn’t evendrag her into the hallway and bang on a door. They didn’t do anything except save themselves.”
His hand squeezes my shoulder.
“I hate everything about them. The mythology. The idea that they’re a ‘family.’ Because when it matters, there is no fucking family. It’s all a lie.”
I stare into the dark for a long moment, the image in my head of a teenage girl abandoned to die a nightmare. Then I wriggle to turn myself toward him and press my mouth to his throat, right over the steady beat of his pulse. I have no fucking idea what to say.
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper.
He tightens his arm around me. When he speaks, his voice is rough.
“That’s why I don’t want you near that fucking clubhouse, that’s why it kills me to know that I lost you to them at all.”
“You didn’t lose me. I’m here, and I’m not going away. Jesus. I’m so fucking sorry about your sister.”
“I know,” he says on a sigh. “I know you are.” A beat. “But…thank you for saying it.” And he squeezes my arm again and gives me a kiss on the top of my head.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“YOU SURE YOU’RE ready?”
Jake reaches for my hand where it’s resting on the comforter and squeezes it. His laptop is open, resting on his thighs.
It’s been three weeks of avoidance. Three weeks of settling into new routines, making a kind of unconventional home with each other, and healing. I’m feeling steadier. Wyatt rarely shows any pain. And I’m ready to face the one thing that’s been hanging over me since we settled into this waiting phase.
