Before I had the chance to confront Jay, he’d stormed out. He had ridden out with a few of his brothers an hour ago, engines roaring like thunder, leaving me in enemy territory with nothing but my nerves for company. I’d been pacing the clubhouse for what felt like forever. Every laugh and scrape of a chair set my teeth on edge.
When the doors finally slammed open, I spun around. They spilled in, loud and restless, leather scuffed. Jay was in the middle of them, blood streaked down his cheek, his knuckles split open. His kutte hung off one shoulder, the shirt underneath torn and damp. He didn’t even look at me, just kept walking straight down the hallway.
Something in my chest pulled tight and a shot of worry ran through me. Before I could stop myself, I followed, past the bikers in their rooms, past the medical room, and up the stairs.
His door wasn’t locked, and I didn’t knock. I shoved it open and stepped inside.
He stood with his back to me, stripped down to nothing but dark jeans hanging low on his hips. His broad shoulders were cut with scars, muscles pulled taut as he braced one hand against the dresser, breathing hard like every inhale hurt. I couldn’t stop my eyes from taking in every inch of him, my heart thumping and my stomach doing flipflops.
I opened my mouth, but the words died, because when he turned enough for the light to catch him, I saw it.
Ink, black and permanent, carved over the left side of his chest. One word....Caleb.
No reaper skull. No club patch. Just my brother’s name, written over his heart.
My throat closed, and my eyes pricked with tears. The room tilted. “Yo...” My voice cracked. “You carry him with you.” He really did love Caleb as much as I did.
Jay froze. His eyes found mine, but for once, he didn’t cover up. Didn’t smirk. Didn’t deflect. His chest steadily rose and fell, and I couldn’t stop my eyes from lingering on the ink, on the heartbeat under it. His pupils blew wide, catching me staring. His mouth parted, like he was about to speak but thought better of it.
“Always,” he said, his voice rough enough to scrape against my ribs.
The air between us shifted. Grief and rage pressed down until I could barely breathe. Because in that moment, I knew that beneath the President, beneath the reaper, there was still Jay. And Caleb was still alive, beating under his skin.
I should’ve walked out and pretended I hadn’t seen it. Pretended his chest wasn’t carved with my brother’s name. But I didn’t. Instead, I crossed the room, grabbed the first aid kit off the shelf, and dropped it hard on the dresser beside him.
“Sit,” I ordered, sharper than I meant to.
Jay’s mouth twitched. “You patching me up, princess? Didn’t think you’d care if I bled out.”
“I don’t,” I snapped, pulling out a roll of gauze. “But if you keel over from blood loss, I lose the only person who might actually find out what happened to Caleb. So, do me a favour and shut up.”
He stared at me for a beat, like he was weighing whether to throw me out, then lowered himself into the chair by the bed with a grunt. I crouched in front of him, pressing a cloth to the cut along his ribs. He hissed through his teeth, muscles tightening under my hand.
“Stop being a baby,” I muttered.
His laugh was humourless. “You’ve got no idea what kind of pain I’ve learned to ignore.”
I risked a glance up at him. Big mistake. His eyes were on me, storm-dark, pupils blown wide. His gaze pinned me in place, and my stomach flipped. I looked away fast, focusing on the blood staining the cloth instead of the man it was spilling out of. I couldn’t fall for him, not again, not when I didn’t mean anything to him.
We worked in silence after that, my hands steady, his jaw clenched.
When I tied off the bandage, I stood and dropped the scissors back into the kit. “There. You’ll live, unfortunately.”
Jay smirked then. His lips parted, slow, deliberate. “You always did have a sharp tongue, Lucy.”
“Yeah,” I said, turning for the door before I did something stupid, “and I’m not afraid to use it.”
I shut his door behind me and headed straight downstairs for the bathroom. My hands were shaking, blood on my knuckles from his wounds, and I needed a minute. I washed my hands and splashed water on my cheeks to try to cool them off. I pushed the bathroom door open and wiped water from my face, trying to steady my breathing before anyone noticed. The hallway was dim, the low thrum of voices and music from the main room pulsing like a heartbeat.
Riot was leaning against the wall across from me, arms folded, shades pushed up into his hair, like he’d been waiting.
I froze. “What?”
He didn’t move, just watched me a moment with an unreadable stare. Then, quiet enough so only I could hear, he said, “You shook him up there.”
My stomach dropped. “I only patched him up.”
Riot’s mouth curved almost into a smile but not quite. “I’ve known him a long time. Seen him bleed more times than I can count. He doesn’t let anyone close when he’s raw. Not the brothers. Not me. But you? He let you in.”
