Waiting is dangerous.
I feel it in the air before anyone says a word to me.The compound has developed a pressure ridge, like the moment before glass gives way.Men are being polite.Careful, too careful.They’re watching Savage.
And because they’re watching him, they’re watching me.I hate that more than the threat.
I’m in the yard midmorning, helping Tyler and Seth reorganize a supply rack that doesn’t actually need reorganizing.They didn’t ask me to help.I didn’t ask if I should.I just showed up and started moving things, and they fell in line without complaint.
That part is new.“Fuel should go lower,” Tyler says, uncertain.“Right?”
“Only if you want gravity working for you instead of against you,” I reply.“You drop a crate from that height, you’ll punch a hole straight through the floor.”
Seth nods quickly.“She’s right.I dropped one yesterday.”
Tyler grimaces.“Mama M yelled?”
“She didn’t yell,” Seth says.“She just stared.”
Tyler winces harder.
I smile faintly and adjust the rack, stepping back to assess it.“Better.You’ll thank me later.”They thank me now.
When they walk off, Fury drifts over, arms crossed, expression unreadable.“You doing inventory now?”
“Just rearranging the furniture,” I reply.
He huffs a laugh.“You got half the prospects listening to you like you outrank them.”
“I don’t,” I say calmly.
“But they think you do.”
I straighten, meeting his gaze.“That’s not something I asked for.”
“No,” he agrees.“But it’s happening.”
We stand there for a moment, both watching the yard.Steel’s running perimeter checks.Saint’s deep in conversation near the bikes, his posture tight.Savage isn’t visible which means he’s working.Or thinking.
“People are nervous,” Fury says eventually.
“People are always nervous,” I counter.
“Not like this.”
I tilt my head.“Say what you mean.”
He does.“They don’t know if Savage will choose the club or you.”
That lands like a quiet detonation.“I’m not a choice,” I say and cross my arms over my chest.
“That doesn’t matter,” Fury replies.“You’ve become one.”He leaves me with that.
I don’t chase him.I don’t go looking for Savage either.That would be the instinct, to corner him, demand answers, try to offer solutions.I don’t.Not because I don’t care, but because this isn’t something I can fix by proximity.
This fracture belongs to him.What belongs to me is refusing to become smaller so men can feel bigger.
I spend the afternoon moving through the compound with intention.Not avoiding people.Not inserting myself either.I let conversations come to me.Let silences sit.A patched member I don’t know well, older and scarred, with eyes like flint pauses when I pass.
“You settling in,” he says.Not a question.
