“You’re not alone, Mel,” he said. “Not anymore.”
I let the words wash over me, trying to believe them. The nausea in my stomach eased, just a little. I breathed out,long and slow, and for the first time all night, I didn’t want to throw up.
“I think I want to keep it,” I said, quiet.
Augustine squeezed my shoulder, once, hard. “Then we keep it. And we fight like hell. Anyone fucking touches you, they die. Palin and simple. Kill and ask questions later.” He hugged me, tight, and then backed away. “Sorry!”
I nodded, wiped my eyes, and let myself lean on him for real.
The voices below got louder, a rumble like thunder on the edge of a storm. But in here, for this minute, we were safe.
I melted into him, head on his shoulder, his heartbeat pounding a steady tattoo under my ear. It should have felt like hiding, but it didn’t. It felt like loading a shotgun and waiting for the knock at the door.
We sat like that for a long time, not talking, just breathing each other in. I thought about everything we’d survived: the chase, the bullets, the blood, the betrayals that stacked up like bodies in a trench. I thought about what it would be like to bring a kid into that—a world built out of desperation and luck, where every day was borrowed time.
“Think we’re too fucked up to be parents?” I asked, the words barely a whisper.
Augustine grunted. “Isn’t everyone?” He moved his hand over my stomach, just barely, like he was afraid to jinx it. “But I’ll tell you this. If that kid is anything like you, the world’s not ready.”
Tears leaked out of my eyes, slow and hot, but I didn’t wipe them away. I let them fall, soaking into his shirt, because sometimes you had to bleed a little to remember you were alive.
“It’s bad timing,” he said, and there was a smile in it, a real one. “But this kid’s gonna have something neither of us had. Parents who’d die to keep them safe.”
That did it. I broke all the way down, shoulders shaking, my voice a mess as I tried to say thank you, or sorry, or something else that might fix the broken world we’d built for ourselves. He just held on, arms like steel, and let me shake it out.
After a while, the noise below faded. The moonlight through the window was brighter now, painting our shadows on the wall behind the cot. The world outside was still a shitshow, still dangerous, still waiting for the first explosion. But in here, wrapped up in Augustine’s arms, my head pressed to his chest, it felt possible to believe in something better.
We sat together, silent, counting heartbeats, as the night wrapped around us like a secret.
16
Augustine
The next morning hit like a migraine, all icewater and daylight and the smell of stale sweat under my cut. By the time I made it out of my room, the clubhouse was already humming—bikers running on zero sleep, weapons being checked and double-checked, even the kitchen was busy, cranking out eggs and bacon like carbs could slow the inevitable. Nobody looked me in the eye, but I didn’t take it personal, as the only thing that mattered now was surviving the next thirty-six hours.
I went straight to church. Damron was in there alone, pacing the perimeter of the map table like a wolf in a county jail, a cigarette pinched between his lips and his cell phone in his hand. The window over the head of the tablewas cracked, letting in just enough light to halo the smoke and put a spotlight on the bags under his eyes. He didn’t look up when I stepped in, but I knew he’d clocked me from the moment my boot crossed the threshold.
“Morning, boss,” I said, keeping it neutral. He grunted, didn’t break stride, just kept moving, eyes on the big map where every pushpin and highlighter line told the story of the war to come.
After a minute, he stubbed out the cigarette in a chipped coffee mug and finally faced me. “You get any sleep?”
I shrugged. “Enough to remember my name.”
He smiled, but it looked more like a baring of teeth. “How’s Melissa?”
“Still alive. Still stubborn.” I didn’t want to say anything more, not yet, but I could tell by the twitch in his cheek that he knew something was coming. That was his gift—he could smell a secret before you’d even decided to spill it.
Damron took his seat at the head of the table, boots up, arms crossed. The pose was lazy, but nothing about it was relaxed. “Go on,” he said, “I don’t have time for the slow build.”
I blew out a breath, then leaned over the table, both palms flat on the wood. “Melissa thinks she’s pregnant.”
The words didn’t echo, but they didn’t have to. Damron’s face froze, a hairline fracture splitting the blank mask he wore. He stared at me, eyes locked, like he was waiting for the punchline.
“She’s late?” he said, voice gone very flat.
“Nausea. Gut instinct. She’s not sure, but…” I trailed off because there wasn’t anything else to add. A week or two and we’d know for real, but we both felt it, like an engine you could tell was about to seize even if it wasn’t smoking yet.
Damron drummed his fingers on the table, slow and deliberate. Then he fished out another cigarette and lit it, the flame in his cupped hands making the lines on his face look cut from stone.
