Eventually the skyline disappeared behind us, and the smell of smoke and oil gave way to dry grass and pine. Thorne slowed, guiding the bike off the main road, down a dirt track rutted with old tire marks. The trees closed in until we broke out into a clearing, the kind of nowhere place where even echoes forgot how to find you.
It was kind of beautiful, sure, but I was also a woman. Alone with a man. In the woods.
He killed the engine. Silence dropped hard, broken only by the tick of cooling metal.
“You can let go now, Arden,” he said, giving me a pointed look over his shoulder.
I hesitated, fingers tight around him, but I got off the bike and immediately found my lighter in my pocket, running my thumb over it and knowing if Thorne triedanything, I could burn him.
He swung off the bike with the same effortless control he had with everything. Then he passed me without a word and walked to the lip of the overhang, boots crunching on fallen leaves. The moon cut him in half, one side a knife of light, the other a length of shadow. He settled on a flat rock that looked like it had been used as a meeting place a thousand times. Empty beer bottles rolled in the dirt at his boots. Crushed cigarette butts pooled in a little crescent like a black tide.
He planted his elbows on his knees and leaned forward, chin in his hands, the motion lazy but watchful. When he exhaled, his breath pooled across the night and toward the city lights. My grip loosened on my lighter a little bit as I watched him relax.
The clearing had a kind of honesty to it. Just him and me and the sky so wide it made my problems feel small. I climbed up onto the rock next to him, settlingclose enough that the arm of my jacket brushed his. He looked at me once, the barest lift of his head, as if he was measuring what I might do next. Then he settled back, patient. He was so calm. He closed his eyes and tilted his face back to the moon, and I just…stared.
I traced the line of his scar with my gaze, the sharp cut of his profile against the pale glow above us. His hair fell loose around his face, black and gleaming, and I had the sudden, dangerous want to touch him. I held my breath and let the night press closer, let myself be swallowed by the fact that it wasn’t Viktor who owned that silence. It was Thorne.
Finally, after what felt like hours but what was only ten minutes or so, his eyes opened, and he looked over at me. His lips tilted into a small grin, his green eyes taking me in. “What’s your story, Arden?” he asked. “How’d you end up at Viktor’s?”
No one had ever asked me that before. Even Leah never asked. I think it was one of those things we all locked away. It was hard to talk about where we came from, because it just reinstituted where wewere—and most of us did everything in our power not to think about that.
When I didn’t answer, Thorne waved a hand as if to erase his question. “No. Actually, tell me why you haven’t left.”
That one was easier. “Leah,” I said simply. I could’ve ridden away during one of our theft missions, but I couldn’t. “She’s like a sister and Viktor knows. He makes sure she’s never on the same missions as me.”
Thorne ran his hand over his mouth and nodded. “Yeah, that sounds like Viktor.”
I eyed him. “Why don’t you run?”
“Kane,” he said with ease, surprising me.
“Kane Creed?” I asked, sitting up. “Rafe Creed’s right hand?”
Thorne rolled his eyes. “Yup.” Then seeing my confusion he shrugged. “He isn’tlikea brother. The bastard is my brother.”
My mouth fell open. “You’re serious?” I asked.
Thorne smirked at the disbelief in my voice. “Dead serious. Same father, different mothers. Doesn’t matter, though. In Viktor’s house, blood isn’t thicker than anything. It’s just another leash.”
I leaned back on my hands, staring at him in the dim wash of moonlight. I could see the resemblance.They had the same color eyes, even though I’d never really been close enough to Kane to be sure. That was on purpose. Since they both arrived at the estate, Kane was named a ‘Creed’, shaped in Rafe’s image, but continued on his track of being more brutal. If you wanted peace in Viktor's estate, you stayed the fuck away from Kane.
Thorne was…nothing like that. He wasn’t as strict or pristine as Rafe. Hell, Rafe never even talked.Never. I didn’t know why. No one did. Although, Kane talked enough for them both. But Thorne was lighter than them. Not by much, but it was clear he wasn’t a Creed.
“Why didn’t you train with Kane?” I asked him. "When you guys got here, I remember how Kane took to the courtyard immediately, and you just…didn't. Most boys are forced to. I always wondered why you weren't."
Thorne huffed out a laugh, dry and humorless. “You have to be invited, Arden, and when you are, it’s not a choice. I guess the rules are different for the boys in the house, but we all have to find a way to sell ourselves. Kane’s always been a fighter. The decision for him was simple. He was destined for the courtyard, but he also knew he would never beat Rafe. It was dumb luck that Rafe somehow convinced Viktor to let him train Kaneto be a backup of sorts, another brutal product. I didn’t get roped into it. I know too much about stealing to be wasted on brute force.”
I frowned. "So you stay for Kane?"
Thorne nodded solemnly.
I thought about Leah waiting back at the estate, how her absence was the weight tied to my ankles every time the road opened up. For the first time, I realized maybe none of us stayed just for fear or conditioning. We stayed because we couldn’t cut free without taking the people we loved down with us.
“I don’t think it will last though. Me not being in the courtyard,” he said, snapping me from my thoughts, his expression grim. “Viktor will figure it out soon enough.”
I frowned. “Figure what out?”
He curved his body toward me, his eyes finding mine. “I’d make him a lot more money if I was stealing from his clients, not from the streets. You, too.”
