Chapter 2
Doc
I open the door and the cold rushes in like it owns the place.
She’s on my porch, barely upright. Hoodie torn at one shoulder, hands scraped raw, blonde hair everywhere like she ran without thinking about what she looked like. Her eyes are huge. Blue. Too bright against her pale face.
Bare feet.
That’s what makes my stomach drop.
A girl doesn’t end up barefoot on a night like this unless something went wrong. Unless she ran hard enough to lose shoes, or someone took them.
Either way, it means fear.
She sways like the porch is moving under her.
I step forward, ready to grab her, but I force myself not to rush. Cornered people bolt. Traumatized people swing. I keep my hands open where she can see them.
Then her gaze meets mine.
And the whole damn world shifts a fraction, like something inside me locks onto her before I get a vote.
Not because she’s pretty, though she is. Not because she’s curvy under that hoodie, soft lines in all the right places that any man would notice.
She is beautiful. Not in the polished, staged way. In the raw, breath-catching way that makes your chest tighten before your brain catches up.
But that’s not it.
It’s the way she looks at me. Like I’m a door out of the dark. Like if I shut it on her, she won’t survive the night.
Her lips part. No words come out. Just breath, shaking and white in the air.
She makes a small sound, more plea than voice, and her knees start to fold.
I catch her.
One arm around her back, the other under her legs, solid and sure. She’s all cold through, a chill that bites straight into my skin. Her fingers clutch my leather cut like it’s the only real thing left in her world.
That grip punches low in my gut.
Protective. Immediate. Ugly.
The kind of feeling I don’t let myself have, because feelings make you sloppy and sloppy gets people killed.
I back into the cabin and kick the door shut with my heel. Deadbolt. Chain. Lock. My hands do it without thought.
Lorenzo Grant is the name on my paperwork. Doc is what the Damned Saints call me. It’s what the men I served with called me too.
I carry her to the couch and lower her carefully. Her head lolls and I catch it before it knocks the armrest. My palm ends up cradling the back of her skull, fingers in soft hair, and for one stupid second, I hate how right it feels to hold her like this.
Her lashes flutter.
She tries to fight sleep like it’s dangerous to close her eyes.
“Hey,” I say, low. “Stay with me.”
Her gaze flicks to the door. Then to me. Then it slides out of focus.
“Shit,” I mutter under my breath at the situation. At whoever put her here.
I pull a blanket over her, thick and heavy, and check her pulse at the wrist. Fast, but steady. She’s cold, dehydrated, and in shock.
And scared enough to run barefoot through pine woods until she landed on my porch.
I stand, already moving. I grab the med bag.
I kneel beside the couch and open it. Shears. Gauze. Antiseptic. My hands move on instinct, steady.
She stirs. Barely a sound, but her fingers twitch against the blanket.
I lean in, keep my voice low. “Hey. You’re safe. I’m a doctor. They call me Doc.”
Her eyes crack open. Glazed, unfocused, but locked on me.
“I need to check you over. You hurting anywhere?”
She doesn’t speak, just gives the smallest nod.
That’s enough.
Her eyes drift closed again before I even reach for the shears.
I keep it clinical. Hands only where they need to be, nothing extra. Lift the blanket at the shoulder, cut the hoodie seam. Bruising. Scrapes. No open wounds. I clean what I can and cover her again.
Hands, scraped raw.
Wrists, bruised, deep and shaped by fingers.
I lift the blanket edge, cut the jeans at the seams, and slide them off. Patchy bruising up her legs from falls and hard ground.
My jaw locks. I keep moving.
I disinfect the worst of the scrapes. Wrap her wrists. Press gauze to the places where skin split and dried stiff. She doesn’t flinch.
The whole time, I’m more aware of her body than I want to be. Curves under fabric. The softness of her against the couch. The faint scent of her under cold and dirt.
And the whole time, I hate myself for noticing because she’s not here to be seen like that. She’s here to survive.
Still, the sight of her makes something in me go quiet and fierce.
She’s mine to protect.
I check her knees. They’re scraped. Feet wrecked, cracked and torn, blood dried in patches from however long she ran barefoot through hell.
I clean them carefully. Apply ointment. Wrap them tight enough to hold, loose enough not to hurt.
No bleeding now. No breaks. But the kind of pain that lingers.
I cover her again and tuck the blanket in around her.
She got here on will alone. No help. No backup. Just pure survival.
Whoever did this to her?
They won’t get a second chance.
Not while I’m breathing.
Her face is softer than it has any right to be after what she’s been through tonight. She looks like she belongs somewhere warm and safe, not on a stranger’s couch.
My gut tightens.
Protective is an easy word. It doesn’t cover it.
I grab my comms. “Ghost.”
His voice comes through, low and steady. “Doc.”
“I’ve got a woman at my cabin. Barefoot. Bruised. Cold as hell. Looks like she ran from something. I heard an engine close before she hit the porch.”
Short pause. Ghost thinking.
“You safe?”
“For now.”
“You want eyes?”
“Yeah. You and Blade. Keep it quiet.”
“Copy.” Another beat. “Sin?”
“If it’s trafficking, there’s money. Loop in Sin. Treasurer knows how to follow a trail.”
“Done. I’ll keep Havoc on standby,” Ghost says. “You think it escalates, you tell me.”
“Will do.”
I set the comms down and breathe once, slow.
That’s the difference between being alone and having brothers. Alone, you watch the dark and hope. With the Damned Saints, you watch the dark and plan.
Two years ago, I didn’t want brothers.
I wanted quiet. Distance. A life where no one expected anything from me except to keep breathing.
Ghost had other ideas.
We crossed paths overseas a few years ago.
He got patched up under my hands and didn’t complain once, which told me everything I needed to know about him.
Later, when I was back stateside and trying to pretend I was fine, he found me at a clinic and told me about Lovestone Ridge and the Damned Saints.
He didn’t sell it like a dream. He sold it like a fact.
We need you.
You can have a place here.
I said no the first time.
Then I woke up from another nightmare where I was back in the sand, hands slippery with blood, trying to keep a soldier alive who was already gone.
I said yes the next time.
Now I’m here, in a cabin tucked into pines, not far from the clubhouse, with a girl on my couch who looks like she ran through hell and stumbled into my doorway.
My gaze goes back to her.
It hits again, that pull. The stupid, immediate certainty in my body like it already decided she matters.
I don’t do that. I don’t attach. Attachment gets you hurt.
I learned that before I could spell the word.
Foster homes teach you quick what it means to be temporary. People feed you, house you, sometimes even care, but you always have a bag half packed in your head. You always watch for the moment their patience runs out.
Some people told me I’d end up on drugs. Some told me I wasn’t worth the trouble. One man told me, laughing, that kids like me always came back around asking for money.
I didn’t.
I worked. I studied. I kept my head down until I could get out.
Medicine was the first thing that made sense. Body breaks, you fix it. Bleeding stops when you clamp it. Pain eases when you do the right thing.
Simple.
Then war made it complicated.
Then the woman soldier on my table made it personal. But she died anyway.
That’s the part nobody talks about when they call you a hero. You can do everything right and still lose.
I come back to the present when her breathing shifts. It catches. A small, strained sound slips out of her, thin with panic.
Her lashes flutter. Her eyes open halfway. Blue, unfocused, searching.
She tries to sit up and fails. Pain pinches her face, frustration right behind it.
“Easy,” I say. “Stay down.”
Her throat works. “Where…,” she rasps, voice wrecked. “Where am I?”
“My cabin,” I tell her. “You knocked. You passed out.”
She jerks her head toward the door, eyes going wide. “They’re coming.”
Fear is a living thing in her.
“Maybe,” I say, steady. “If they do, they’re not walking in here.”
She looks at me like she wants to believe it and is terrified to try.
She needs something solid. A name. A reason to hold on.
“I’m Doc,” I say. “Lorenzo Grant.”
Her gaze sticks on my mouth, then lifts to my eyes.
“Doc,” she whispers, like she’s testing the word.
“Yeah.”
She swallows hard. Her hands tremble under the blanket. She tries to pull it tighter, but her fingers don’t cooperate, still stiff and clumsy from the cold.
I reach for a glass, fill it with water and hold it out without crowding her. “Drink. Small sips.”
She flinches at the movement. Then she sees what it is. Water. Her eyes drop to it like it’s a miracle and a trap at the same time.
“I won’t hurt you,” I say, reading her hesitation. “I’m not drugging you. I’m a doctor. I checked you for injuries, and I had to cut your clothes to do it. You were covered the whole time. You’re in shock and you need fluids.”
She takes the glass. Her hands shake so hard the water ripples. She drinks one sip, then another, eyelids fluttering like even that costs her.
“Good,” I murmur. “Keep going.”
She takes a third sip and coughs, then shakes her head like she’s angry at herself for coughing.
“What’s your name?” I ask. “Just your first.”
A beat. She studies me like she’s measuring the risk of giving me a name.
“Carly,” she says.
“Carly,” I repeat. “Okay. Carly, I’m going to keep you safe.”
Carly’s head snaps toward the window. Terror floods her face so fast it’s like a switch.
My body goes still.
“Hey,” I say, firm. “Look at me.”
Her eyes jerk back to mine.
“You’re inside,” I tell her. “Locks are on. I called my brothers. We have back-up.”
Her lips part. “Brothers?”
“Club brothers,” I say. “Damned Saints.”
Headlights sweep past the window. Then again.
A knock hits the door.
Carly goes rigid on the couch. I set the glass down and stand.
“Stay here,” I tell her. “Don’t move.”
I go to the door and open it.
Four men on the porch. No hesitation, like they showed up thinking this would be easy.
Their eyes drop to my chest.
My cut.
The one in front lifts his chin. “You alone?”
“Are you lost?” I ask.
He gives a thin smile and tries to look past me. “We’re looking for a girl.”
“You’re on private property,” I say. “Turn around.”
He shifts closer. “We can do this easy.”
I step forward, blocking the door. “Trust me. You don’t want the hard way.”
One of the others mutters something under his breath. They all keep looking at my patch like they just realized what it means.
The leader squares up. “You don’t know what you’re in.”
“Do I look like I give a fuck?” I say. “Last chance.”
He opens his mouth.
Engines slice through the night.
Two bikes. Fast. Close. Tires hit gravel. Headlights sweep across the trees. Then silence.
Ghost and Blade walk out of the dark like they’ve been here the whole time. Blade hangs back a step, eyes already moving.
Ghost stops beside me. “Doc.”
“Ghost.”
He looks at the men like they’re furniture in his way. “Something going on?”
The leader stiffens. “We’re just asking questions.”
Ghost gives him a slow once-over. “Four of you. Three of us. Funny how that still puts you on the wrong end.”
The man scowls. “That’s not how math works.”
Ghost’s mouth barely moves. “That’s how power works.”
Blade shifts his weight, calm and steady. “We can end this now if you want.”
The men freeze. The leader looks at our cuts again. He gets it.
Ghost nods toward the steps. “Leave.”
The leader lifts his hands. “Fine. No trouble.”
“Too late,” I say.
They back off. Slow. Eyes locked on us until they reach their car.
Doors slam. The engine growls to life and pulls away.
Blade keeps his eyes on the road. “They’ll be back.”
Ghost looks at me. “She inside?”
“She is,” I say. “And she’s staying that way.”
Ghost nods once. “I’ll post a couple prospects at the road. Eyes up.”
I nod. “Appreciate it.”
Blade gives the treeline one last sweep, then falls in behind Ghost as they head for their bikes.
Engines fire low and smooth. They roll out, taillights vanishing between the trees.
I turn back to the cabin.
To Carly.
To whatever comes next.
“You’re safe here,” I say.