Chapter 9 Bones
BONES
The apartment above Yu’s Laundromat smells like fresh paint and regret.
I’ve been sitting on the couch for the last hour, staring at a glass of whiskey I poured but can’t seem to drink. It’s good whiskey too—the expensive shit I splurged on when I got my first construction paycheck, thinking maybe having my own place meant I should have nice things.
Turns out nice things don’t mean much when you’re too wired to enjoy them.
Emma’s back.
In Stoneheart.
She walked into Devil’s Bar looking like every fantasy I’ve had for the last six months, and I ran like a fucking coward.
I pick up the glass, take a sip, set it back down. The whiskey burns but doesn’t warm. Nothing’s warmed me since that motel room in North Carolina.
This apartment was supposed to be a fresh start.
My first real home that wasn’t the clubhouse, wasn’t a room with a bed and a footlocker and nothing else.
I’ve spent months fixing it up—new paint, furniture that doesn’t come from the side of the road, actual curtains instead of just blinds. Made it into something that’s mine.
But it still feels empty.
Everything feels empty without her.
I stand, pace to the window that overlooks Cedar Street. The laundromat’s closed for the night, awning dark. A few cars pass by, heading home from the bar probably. The reopening will go late—people celebrating, drinking, living their lives.
And I’m here. Alone. Because Stone told me to stay away from Emma, and I’m trying—I’m really fucking trying—to follow those orders.
Six months of respecting his ruling.
Six months of not calling, not texting, not tracking her.
Can’t track her. Stone took away all my access when he stripped my rank. Changed the passwords, locked me out of the system completely. The tracker’s still in her shoulder blade, still active, still broadcasting—but I can’t see it anymore.
It’s been like going through withdrawal.
For years I had alerts set up. Any time she went somewhere unusual, my phone lit up and I’d just happen to check in. Or show up in New York. Coincidence was a skill I perfected.
Now I have nothing.
No alerts. No access. No way of knowing if she’s safe, where she is, who she’s with.
Right now, I don’t know if she’s still at the bar. And every part of me is screaming to go find her.
Maybe she left. Maybe she went back to Stone’s house. Maybe she’s at the clubhouse. Maybe she got in her car and drove back to New York already, too hurt or angry or disappointed to stay.
I have no fucking idea.
And it’s killing me.
I down the rest of the whiskey, welcome the burn. This must be what normal people feel like—people who don’t track the woman they love. This low-grade panic, this constant not knowing.
I hate it.
But it’s the way it has to be.
I went against Stone once. Do it again and I’m out for good.
And that would be worse than dying.
The thing nobody understands—the thing I can barely explain to myself—is that losing the MC would be like losing a limb.
I’d still be alive, technically, but I wouldn’t function.
Wouldn’t know how to move through the world without that structure, that brotherhood, that sense of belonging to something bigger than myself.
I found the club when I was sixteen and had nothing. No family, no future, no idea who I was supposed to be. Stone gave me purpose. The brothers gave me family. The patch gave me identity.
Losing it would destroy me.
But being without Emma? That’s living without a heart.
Painful. Fucking excruciating. But survivable, in the way some things are—slowly, if you grit your teeth and keep moving, working, breathing. And don’t think too hard about the empty space she leaves behind.
Having no heart is helpful in my world. Makes the violence easier. Makes the hard decisions simpler. Makes it possible to do what needs to be done without getting tangled up in feelings.
So I wait. Like I’ve been waiting since I was sixteen years old and saw Stone’s wild daughter for the first time.
She’ll come home for good. I know that the same way I knew, the first time I touched her, that I’d never want anyone else.
And until she says she’s staying? I’m keeping my fucking distance. Even if waiting is torture.
I refill the glass. Take another drink. Stare at the wall where I hung a few photos—the club, Devil’s Bar before it burned, me and Cash on our bikes. Normal shit that normal people put on walls to make a place feel like home.
Except Emma’s not in any of the photos.
Because I never had the right to put her there. Not officially. Not while she was still figuring out what she wanted.
Footsteps on the metal stairs outside.
I freeze, glass halfway to my lips. The stairs to this apartment are on the outside of the building—metal and noisy as hell. Someone’s coming up.
Heavy footsteps. Determined.
My heart kicks into overdrive.
Stone? Coming to check on me, make sure I’m keeping my promise to stay away from his daughter?
Lee? Coming to warn me she’s looking for me?
Or—
Emma.
The footsteps stop outside my door. A pause. Then a knock.
Three sharp raps that echo through my chest.
I know it’s her before I even move. Know it in my marrow, in that hollow space where my heart used to be.
Of course she came here.
The thought rises unbidden, smug and certain. Because some part of me never doubted she’d follow me. Not really.
I set the glass down carefully, trying to steady my hands. Six months of waiting and now she’s standing on the other side of that door. Shit.
Another knock. More insistent.
“Bones, I know you’re in there. I can see your bike on the street.”
Her voice. Six months since I’ve heard it in person, and it does something to me. Makes my hands shake slightly as I cross to the door.
I don’t open it.
“Swan.” My voice comes out rough. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“Well, I am here. So are you going to open the door or are we going to have this conversation through three inches of wood?”
“Depends.” I lean my forehead against the door, so close to her but still separated. “Are you here for good, or are you just passing through?”
Silence on the other side of the door.
“Emma?”
“I—” She stops. “I don’t know.”
The words feel like a punch to the gut, but I can’t say I’m surprised.
“Then I can’t let you in.”
“What?” Her voice rises. “Bones, that’s not—”
“Not fair?” I finish for her. “Maybe not. But I’m not doing this again.”
“You don’t understand—”
“I understand perfectly.” My hand presses flat against the door, wishing it was her face I was touching instead of cold wood.
“Six months ago I let you walk away because you weren’t ready.
I respected that. But I’m not losing my patch—losing the only family I’ve got—for a woman who might be gone again by morning. ”
“Bones, please open the door.”
“Emma. With all due fucking respect, unless you can tell me you’re in, this door stays closed.
You want me? Just say the word. I’m yours.
You want this? I’ll fight Stone, the club, whoever I have to fight.
” I swallow hard. “But not for a maybe. Not for ‘I don’t know.’ So either you’re all in, or you’re walking away. ”
The silence stretches between us, thick and suffocating.
“That’s what I thought,” I breathe, and push off from the door. “Go home, Emma.”
“No.”
“Emma—”
“Let me in, Bones.”
“I already told you—”
“I know what you told me. And I’m telling you to let me in.”
“So we can what? Have the same fight we had six months ago? So you can leave again when the darkness scares you?” I shake my head even though she can’t see it. “I’m done with that.”
“Fine.” Her voice turns cold. “Then I’ll just—”
The words cut short with a loud thud against the door, a sickening crack. The sound of something—or someone—hitting the metal stairs.
“Emma!” I wrench the door open in panic, imagining her tumbling down those rusted death traps, skull cracking on concrete—
Something shoots between my feet—Emma’s upper body, arms extended—and before I can process what’s happening, she’s flipping backward in a controlled somersault, her legs following through my doorway in a graceful arc until she’s fully inside my apartment, landing in a crouch like some goddamn ninja.
“What the fuck?” I stagger back, heart hammering. “Did you just—did you fake falling down the stairs?”
Emma rises to her full height, brushing invisible dust from her jeans. Her dark hair has come loose from its ponytail, framing her face in wild strands. She looks satisfied, like a cat who just knocked something expensive off a shelf.
“I needed to get in here somehow,” she says simply. “I need to talk to you.”
I stare at her, my mind still trying to catch up with what just happened. This woman. This fucking woman. She fake-collapsed to trick me into opening the door, then somersaulted into my apartment like it was the most normal thing in the world.
“You could have called,” I say.
“Would you have answered?”
“No.”
“Then I made the right choice.” She crosses her arms, looking around my apartment with those sharp, observant eyes. “Nice place.”
“Emma.” I point toward the door. “Leave.”
“No.”
“Jesus Christ, you’re still the most stubborn—”
“Are you going to make me?” She tilts her head, challenge in her eyes. “Because I’d like to see you try.”
I drag a hand through my hair, trying to get control of the situation. Of myself. “Why are you here?”
“I know my dad ordered you to stay away from me.”
I let out a breath. “Then you understand why I need you to leave.”
“So that’s it? I’m here to see you, and you’re not even going to have a conversation with me? You’re just going to do what he says?”
“He’s my president.”
“He’s my father! And he doesn’t get to dictate who I see or talk to or—” Her voice cracks. “God, you’re all the same. All of you. The club comes first, always. Before me, before anything.”
“That’s bullshit, and you know it.”