Chapter 9 Mercy
MERCY
Saturday nights at Devil’s Bar are always chaos, but tonight feels different.
Maybe it’s the number of MC brothers drifting in—Hawk with Andi, Axel at the pool table even though Poppy’s home with the baby, Duck nursing a beer instead of staying in with Maggie.
They’re trying to look casual, but I’ve worked here long enough to know when something’s up.
Maybe it’s because Cash hasn’t left his spot at the end of the bar since he showed up at six and helped me finish prepping. His knuckles are bandaged—something that happened after he left last night but he refuses to tell me how.
Whatever it was, it’s changed something in him. In us.
But even more than that, it feels like something is coming, like they’re all on high alert.
But maybe that’s just me. Maybe I’m imagining it because all I can think about are the packed bags back at my apartment, and the fact that I have to lie to my boss, my friend, and tell her I need time off for a family emergency before I just…disappear.
I glance over at Kya. The plan sits in my stomach like a stone.
She’ll understand the lie. Tell me to take a week, maybe two.
I’ll thank her, give her a tight hug, then go straight to the ATM, withdraw what little cash I have, then get in my car and leave.
I don’t know where I’m going. I’ll figure that out on the road.
I’ve gotten good at running—it’s the only thing I’ve been good at since I left Gabriel.
But this time feels different. This time, I’m leaving something behind that matters.
My eyes drift over to Cash.
I don’t know how I’m supposed to say goodbye to him…
“Two IPAs and a whiskey neat,” the guy in front of me orders, sliding a twenty across the bar.
I pour on autopilot, muscle memory taking over while my mind races.
The crowd’s thick tonight, filled with locals, college kids who drove up despite finals week, and enough leather cuts to make it clear this is MC territory.
I’m halfway through the order before I realize my fingers are trembling.
I chance a glance at Cash, and of course, he’s watching me.
Has been all night, tracking my every movement with an intensity that’s different from his usual flirting.
This is protective. Possessive. Like he knows what I’m planning. Fuck.
I focus on counting out the change, but the register keys blur and clack under my fingers.
The problem with Cash is that he makes me want things, and I can’t figure out if this feeling in my ribcage is dread or hope.
Both feel like popping a blood blister between your teeth—sharp, metallic, a little bit sick.
I shouldn’t have let it get this far. Shouldn’t have let myself believe I could stay in one place long enough to want someone.
But that’s the problem with wanting—it always ends the same way.
At least this time, I get to choose when it ends.
He’ll hate me for leaving, but that’s better than watching him get dragged into my mess.
“Hey beautiful, how about you and me get out of here?” A drunk college boy leans too far over the bar, breathing beer fumes in my face.
Before I can respond, Cash materializes at his shoulder. “You’re done for the night.”
The kid starts to argue, takes one look at Cash’s cut and the cold promise in his eyes, and backs away with his hands up. “Yeah, OK, man. Didn’t realize she was yours.”
I don’t even have to ask what Cash is doing.
He’s staking territory the only way he knows how: like a wild animal who’s decided home is wherever you are.
The kid scurries off, and Cash leans over the bar, his jaw working, his fingers drumming the sticky surface.
For a second I think he’s about to say something to me, but instead he glares at the next guy in line until the man audibly loses his nerve and decides to order from the new guy instead.
“You don’t have to do that,” I murmur, wiping condensation off pint glasses in a mindless rhythm.
He shakes his head. “Do what?”
“Hover. Act like you’re about to drag some dude out by his throat just because he talked to me.”
This time, his lips tug in a crooked near-smile. “Then he shouldn’t try to touch what doesn’t belong to him.”
“Belong?” I echo, the word catching in my throat. I should push back, remind him that I don’t belong to anyone. But that primal part of me, the one that’s been living on adrenaline and fear for too long, goes soft at the sound of his voice. The part that craves safety whispers, just let him.
He doesn’t move closer. He doesn’t have to. The space between us crackles with all the things we aren’t saying—me planning to disappear before dawn, him already claiming me in ways that make it impossible to leave clean.
He leans over the bar, dropping his volume. “Suppose that’s up to you.”
The words shouldn’t make my pulse jump, but they do.
After the life I fled, hearing any man talk like that should send me running.
A year ago, it would have. But now—after months orbiting the MC, months of watching how these men protect what’s theirs—it makes me wonder what it would feel like to belong to someone who doesn’t want to own me, just guard the space around me.
What Cash wants isn’t control. It’s faith.
The kind that says if I said yes, he’d burn the world down to keep me safe.
But that kind of loyalty isn’t just dangerous—it’s contagious.
If I let Cash stake his claim, my fight becomes the club’s fight.
And they’ve already got Summit breathing down their necks, city officials in their pockets, and cops sniffing around for excuses to shut them down.
If Gabriel drags his badge into this mess, he won’t stop at ruining me—he’ll bury them too.
The thought alone is enough to make my stomach twist. These people gave me refuge when I had nowhere else to go. I can’t be the reason they lose everything.
That’s why I have to go before he gets the chance to play hero. Before his loyalty sparks a war none of us could win.
“Up to me?” I manage, barely loud enough to rise above the music. “Does that mean you’re going to stick around all night acting like my prison guard?”
His tongue does that devious flick against his teeth—the one that means he’s holding back something sharp. “Not a prison, Mercy. It’s a fortress. And if you’d stop fucking fighting me, you could be part of it.”
I almost drop a glass. Fortress. The word hits like a warm hand to the chest, equal parts comfort and danger. My eyes sting, and I hate that it feels like the first kind thing anyone’s said to me in years. I spin away to re-rack pint glasses and buy myself some dignity, but Cash doesn’t let it go.
He moves behind the bar and cages me between the keg cooler and the ice bin.
There are witnesses everywhere—Kya catching it over the prep sink, Lee over by the taps pretending not to notice—but with Cash this close, the rest of the bar goes flatline.
There’s only the smell of man and bike leather, and the heat from his body, and the way he dips his head so I have to look him square in the face.
“I need you to stop fighting me, angel.” His voice isn’t angry. It’s almost begging. He’s so close I can see how impossibly long his lashes are, see the tiny scar through his eyebrow, the little curl of tension at his lip.
“Cash—” I start, and my voice buckles.
He brushes a piece of hair behind my ear, slow and careful, like he’s been practicing this move in his head for weeks.
“You want to run, I’ll let you run. But if you stay…
if you let me do what’s in my head…” He trails off, clenching his jaw, the veins in his forearm going rigid.
“If you’ll just say yes to me, Mercy, you’ll never have to be scared again. ”
He’s not asking for forgiveness or permission. He’s making me a promise, one I am absolute shit at believing but suddenly, standing in the cold beer-funk air with his hand warm on my jaw, I want it so bad it aches.
“I’m not—” I try, but the rest of the sentence gets stuck. I’m not ready, I’m not yours, I’m not someone worth claiming. They’re all true, and all useless now, because I can’t get the words out, and Cash doesn’t need them, anyway.
He leans in even closer, lips curving with that reckless tenderness that makes my knees want to fold.
“I’m not scared of your worst, Mercy.” His thumb traces my cheekbone, and now I’m sure Kya’s watching, but I can’t seem to care.
“You give me all your broken. I’ll give you everything I got.
” The way he says it, low and cracked and almost a little scared, makes my head go static.
I open my mouth to argue, but all that comes out is a whisper. “You say that now.”
Cash’s eyes flicker, the green gone cut glass. “I’ll say it always.”
I study his face, the bandaged knuckles, the set of his jaw that always looks a little dangerous, and before I can figure out my answer, someone yells at the other end of the bar, breaking the moment.
“Mercy! Can we get some service or what?” It’s Felix, Poppy’s brother, waving his empty glass and making a show of being outraged.
I fire back with a one-finger salute, and Cash shoots him a look that could strip paint.
Felix just grins wider, like he’s the king of the dirtbags, and when I give him a fresh hard cider on the house, he clinks it on the bar in a little toast: “Here’s to Mercy, who’s too good for any of you neanderthals. ”
I suspect he’s talking about Cash, but I’m not about to call him on it.
The rhythm of the bar takes over. We’re slammed from seven to almost eleven, and Cash plays co-pilot the whole night—restocking coolers in the back, lending a hand with drunk customers even though I’ve dealt with drunks for years and don’t need it.
Still, in some weird way, I’m into it. Not just the help, but the attention.
I could get addicted to the way he tracks me across a crowded room, or how his jaw ticks every time I so much as smile at a customer who looks twice at me.
Maybe I should just say yes.
The thought ambushes me, and for a second I let myself imagine it.
Saying yes. Staying. Building something real here instead of running again.
But then I remember the burner phone in my apartment, the already packed bags, the car full of fuel so I won’t have to stop for hours.
And I remember that I’m not built for staying.
Maybe I could just give him one night…
I don’t get the chance to consider it further when a cold jolt prickles the base of my spine. The bar’s suddenly too quiet—just for a breath, but enough for my bartender senses to go full DEFCON 1. Through the front window, blue and red lights unfurl like a goddamn peacock.
Cash catches my eye. I see the calculation in his face. He’s already moving toward me when the door opens.
Three cops walk in.
For a second, I just see the uniforms—dark blue, badges catching the bar lights. These aren’t our usual Stoneheart PD guys. I’ve never seen them before. Two beefy guys built like bouncers, all thick necks and suspicious eyes.
And then the third steps between them, taking the lead with his air of authority.
The tray in my hands tilts. Empty glasses slide, crash to the floor in a cascade of breaking glass that seems to happen in slow motion. The sound is distant, muffled, like I’m underwater.
Gabriel.