I swing my leg over the bike and pull off my helmet to hand it to him with a raised brow. “You live here?”
Alder hangs it beside his on the handlebars and shrugs. “It’s my mom’s place. I crash in her spare room sometimes when I don’t feel like sleeping at the clubhouse.”
I let my gaze drift over the place, taking in the sun-faded prayer flags strung between porch posts, the stained-glass panel catching light in one of the windows, and rain catchers hung along the eaves. That makes a lot more sense.
“So, where do you live?” I ask before I can catch myself. But something about seeing him here, in this strange, bright pocket of the world, is stirring up some curiosity.
Alder gives me a look like I’m an idiot, and that I should know this already. “Here and the clubhouse,” he says simply, then turns and heads towards the porch.
I follow him, looking around for signs of anyone else.“So… your mom is here?” I ask. Why the fuck did he bring me to his mom’s cabin in the woods?
“No.” He stops at the bottom of the porch steps, looking towards the pond. “She’s at an ayahuasca retreat. Last one ended with her in the psych ward, so not sure how long she’ll be away this time.”
What the fuck…
My eyes slowly sweep my surroundings again, over the pond, the flags billowing in the soft breeze, and the bursts of colour against the muted, earthy tones of the trees. Ducks waddle up from the water as they shake droplets from their feathers, and the wind chimes above the porch send out a string of cheerful notes.
My fingers flex at my sides as I try to pull some of that colour into me and force it to take root… but it all just slides right past me. This is the kind of place where people breathe deeper without thinking, and where the corners of their mouths lift before they even notice… yet it all hovers just out of reach. Close enough for me to recognize it, but too far to touch. So I let my hands fall loose again at my sides as the dim, muted grey settles inside me once more, and I return to that place I don’t want to belong to, but can’t seem to leave.
A sharp quack suddenly cuts through the air, and Alder smiles widely. I follow his gaze to one of the ducks as it flares its wings and charges at a chicken, before spinning to do the same to another duck.
“That’s Wingnut,” Alder says proudly. “He’s the best fucking duck ever.”
Wingnut starts waddling towards us with purpose, and I brace myself as he seems to zero in on me. But he veers off at the last second, unleashing another barrage of quacks on some unsuspecting chickens, and Alder just chuckles.
My phone starts buzzing in my pocket, and I sigh. It’s been going off since we left the university, each vibration just another reminder of where Ishouldbe.
“How pissed are they going to be?” Alder asks, turning his head towards me.
I shrug, unable to muster up even an ounce of care, because I know how this is all going to play out. Quiet tension, loaded silences, disappointing looks, and probably a ‘talking to’ from my department head. But fucking let them… It’s all irrelevant, and there’s no room in me for dread, guilt, or whatever else they think I should be feeling.
“That’s why I don’t have a phone,” Alder says, turning back to watch Wingnut terrorize the yard.
“You don’t?”
He shakes his head. “No.” Then he lifts one shoulder in a slow shrug. “Well, I do. But it’s one of those flip phones, and no one has the number. It might be around here somewhere…” His gaze drifts lazily around the porch before he shrugs again and turns back to the yard.
I huff out a breath with a shake of my head. The quiet confusion I get around this guy just grows louder the longer I’m around him. He’s the vice president of a motorcycle club with ties deep enough to keep cops off his back, and powerful enough to run underground auctions without blinking. He’s a man with influence, reach, and a reputation people whisper about with fear. And yet… he crashes in a spare room in his mother’s colourful cabin without a permanent address of his own, hasa burner phone he can’t even locate, and seems completely content here in a yard full of birds and trees.
Or maybe there’s nothing confusing about it at all. Maybe he makes perfect sense.
The buzzing picks up again in my pocket, and Alder closes the space between us in a couple of confident, unhurried steps. His eyes lock with mine as his hand slips into my pocket, and his fingers curl around my phone. He pulls it out and glances at the screen, then sets it face down on the porch railing.
Then he jerks his chin towards the cabin and heads up the stairs, disappearing through the front door without looking back.
My phone vibrates again from its spot on the railing, but I keep my eyes on the door as I automatically follow him up the steps, as if a tether has wound its way through me, pulling me in with quiet insistence.
Inside, the cabin is a burst of warmth and light. Sun spills through stained-glass windows in the kitchen, casting splashes of red, blue, and gold across the wood floor. The kitchen opens into a small dining nook, with a living room off to one side, and every surface holds something that's either alive or was once alive. Potted plants lean towards windows, bundles of dried herbs and feathers tucked into mason jars sit on shelves, strings of shells hang from the ceiling, and coloured glass catches the sun throughout the entire space.
Alder moves through it like a storm cloud rolling into a summer day… all sharp edges, dark, and solid against the softness around him.
That makes two of us.
He pushes a door open off the living room, stepping inside as he shrugs his cut from his shoulders.
And my heartbeat grows a little louder.
I step into the doorway just as he tosses his cut over the back of a chair by the bed and starts unclipping his holster. My eyes track every movement he makes. The way his shoulders roll as he strips off his hoodie, leaving him in a plain white T-shirt, pulled taut across his chest. His tattoos ripple across his forearms as he moves, ink flexing with every muscle, and his hair falls loose around his face, the dark strands brushing the tops of his collarbones.
