Chapter 3 #2
Cain is gone.
Out drinking, probably.
Drowning his rage in whiskey and self-pity.
He won't be back for hours, maybe not until tomorrow.
I could leave.
The thought is terrifying.
Exhilarating. Impossible.
I could pack a bag. Call my mother. Walk out the door and never look back.
Before I can talk myself out of it, I'm on my feet. Moving.
My hands are shaking as I pull a duffel bag from the closet—the same one I brought when I moved in three years ago, back when I thought this was love.
I throw in clothes—whatever I can grab, whatever will fit.
Underwear, jeans, t-shirts.
My toothbrush.
The photo of my mom and me at a Steelers game, the one I keep hidden in my nightstand because Cain said it was stupid.
I'm crying again, but these tears feel different.
These tears feel like hope.
I can do this. I can leave.
I can go to my mother's house, and she'll take me in, and I'll be safe.
I'll be free.
You'd be nothing without me.
I freeze, my hand hovering over the duffel bag.
Who else would want you? Look at yourself.
The voice in my head is so clear, so real, that I actually turn around, expecting to see Cain standing behind me.
But the apartment is empty.
Just me and my half-packed bag and the shattered glass I still haven't cleaned up.
Your own father doesn't want you. Why do you think he's never around?
My hands are shaking harder now.
I look at the bag—at the pitiful collection of clothes and toiletries that represent my entire life—and something in my chest cracks.
Where would I go?
My mother's house is the first place Cain would look.
And he would look. He would come for me. He would find me.
You're mine. You're fucking mine.
He always said he'd find me.
Always said there was nowhere I could run that he wouldn't track me down.
I believed him then. I believe him now.
And even if I got away—even if I managed to disappear—what then?
I have no job. No money of my own. No skills that matter. I'd be starting from nothing, with nothing, and Cain's voice would follow me wherever I went, reminding me of all the ways I'm worthless.
The duffel bag sits on the bed, half-full and accusing.
I should zip it up.
Should grab my keys and walk out the door.
Should prove to myself that I'm stronger than the voice in my head.
I don't.
Instead, I unpack.
Slowly. Methodically.
Putting everything back where it belongs. The clothes in the drawer. The toothbrush by the sink. The photo in my nightstand, hidden beneath a book he'll never read.
I clean up the broken glass, sweeping the shards into a dustpan, wiping the whiskey from the wall. I finish chopping the vegetables. I start dinner.
This is my life. This is all my life will ever be.
But even as I fall back into the familiar routine, I can't stop thinking about what Cain said.
He stripped my patch. No vote. No church. He just did it.
Leviathan broke protocol. Broke the rules of his own club. For what?
For me?
That doesn't make sense. I'm nobody. I'm nothing.
There's no reason for a man like Leviathan to risk his position, his authority, his reputation, for a woman he's barely spoken to.
But he did.
He saw Cain's hand around my throat, and he acted.
Not with a vote, not with discussion, but immediately.
Decisively. Like it mattered. Like I mattered.
I think about the way he looked at me last night.
Not with pity—I've seen pity before, and this wasn't that.
Something harder. Sharper.
Something that saw through all my careful masks and recognized what was underneath.
Something that was angry on my behalf.
No one's ever been angry for me. Not like that.
My mother doesn't know what's happening.
My father doesn't care.
My friends—the few I had before Cain isolated me—drifted away years ago.
I've been alone in this for so long that I forgot what it felt like to have someone in my corner.
Leviathan doesn't know me.
Doesn't owe me anything, but he looked at me like my pain was personal.
Like my fear was an offense he intended to address.
For the first time in three years, someone saw what Cain does to me and didn't look away.
I don't know what to do with that. Don't know what it means or where it leads.
Maybe nowhere.
Maybe Leviathan stripped Cain's patch and considered the matter handled.
Maybe I'll never see him again.
But as I stir the pot on the stove, listening for the sound of a motorcycle that might mean Cain's return, I hold onto that moment in the parking lot.
Go inside. Now.
He said my name. He told me to go. And when I walked away, I felt something I hadn't felt in years.
Safe.
It was only for a moment.
Only for the time it took me to cross the parking lot and reach the clubhouse door.
But for that brief stretch of seconds, I wasn't afraid.
Wasn't bracing for impact. Wasn't calculating how to minimize damage.
I was just... walking. Like a normal person. Like someone who didn't have to be afraid.
I want to feel that again.
Want to remember what it's like to move through the world without fear. Want to know who I might be if Cain's voice wasn't always in my head, telling me I'm nothing.
The thought is dangerous. Treacherous.
If Cain knew what I was thinking—if he had any idea that another man made me feel safe, even for a second—he would kill me. I'm not exaggerating.
I'm not being dramatic.
He would put his hands around my throat, and this time, he wouldn't stop.
So I bury it.
Push it down deep where no one can see it.
Lock it away with all the other things I can't afford to feel.
But it's there.
A tiny spark in the darkness.
The memory of cold blue eyes that saw everything and didn't look away.