Chapter 6 #2
I lead her to the workbench in the back. It’s cluttered with tools, but in the center, sitting on a velvet rag, is a piece of metal I’ve been working on for weeks.
"Look," I say.
She steps forward, fingers hovering over the object. A rose. Forged from darkened steel, every petal beaten out by hand, folded and curled with obsessive precision. The stem is twisted iron, thorns sharp enough to draw blood. Heavy, permanent, indestructible.
"I made this," I say, voice low. "While I was watching you."
She picks it up, the weight surprising her. She traces the delicate edge of a steel petal. "It's beautiful, Blake."
"I work with metal because it makes sense," I tell her, leaning my hip against the workbench. "It has a melting point. It has a breaking point. If you apply enough heat and pressure, you can change it. Fix it. People aren't like that. People lie. They break and they don't go back together."
I look at my hands, scarred from burns and cuts, lethal weapons that have ended lives. "I came back from the service, and nothing fit. The noise in my head didn't stop. The only time it got quiet was when I was down here, burning things."
I step closer, trapping her against the workbench again. I need to be close. I need to breathe her in to clear the smoke in my mind.
"Then I saw you," I say. "Three months ago. You were arguing with a delivery driver who dropped a crate of flour. You were fierce. You were terrified, shaking like a leaf, but you stood your ground."
I reach out, cupping her cheek. My thumb brushes her lower lip.
"I saw the cracks in you," I confess. "I saw how broken you were. And I saw that you were still standing. You were still trying to make something sweet in a bitter world."
Her eyes fill with tears, magnifying the blue. She leans into my palm.
"Ownership wasn't the goal. Sanity was. When I looked at you, the world finally snapped into focus. The static from the desert, the ringing of the hammer—it all faded. You were the only thing in this town that made me feel like I didn't have to be a monster."
I pause. "Or maybe you made me feel like being a monster had a purpose. If I could protect you, then the violence in me was worth something."
A tear slips free, tracking over my thumb.
"I can't breathe without you, Tiff," I whisper, the admission tearing out of my throat like jagged glass. "Down here in the dark, with just the fire... I suffocate. But you? You're the air. You're the only clean thing I've ever touched."
"Blake," she chokes out, dropping the steel rose onto the bench with a heavy clang. She throws her arms around my neck, burying her face in my shoulder. "You're not a monster. You saved me. You're the only one who ever saw me."
I wrap my arms around her, crushing her to me, lifting her off her feet. I bury my face in her hair, inhaling deeply. The buttery caramel, the sweetness, the life.
"I'm keeping you," I vow against her skin. "I don't care about the law. I don't care about your ex. I will burn this entire mountain down before I let anyone take you out of this forge."
She clings to me, legs wrapping around my waist. "Don't let me go. Please, Blake, don't let me go."
"Never."
The perimeter alarm shrieks, a piercing violation of the quiet.
This isn't the proximity warning of a passing car. This is the breach alarm. Zone 4. The lower trail. I set Tiffany down, shifting gears instantly. The softness vanishes from my eyes. Weight forward, hands ready.
"What is it?" Tiffany asks, fear spiking.
"Zone 4," I say, moving to the weapon rack on the wall. I grab the Mossberg 590, the action racking with a sound that echoes violently in the shop. "Someone's on foot. Coming up the goat path."
"Ramon?" she whispers.
"He wouldn't know the goat path," I say, mind racing. That trail is steep, treacherous. Only locals know it. Or professionals. "Stay here. Get behind the anvil. Do not move unless I tell you to."
"Blake—"
"Do not move!" I bark, the command voice of a Sergeant snapping out.
She scrambles behind the massive iron anvil, making herself small. Good girl.
I move to the heavy steel door leading to the rear of the property. I check the monitors mounted above the workbench. Grainy black and white footage shows movement in the trees. Two shadows. Moving fast. Tactical.
Not lawyers. Hired muscle. Professionals.
Ramon didn't just bring a legal team. He brought an extraction team. He thinks he can snatch her back and vanish before the MC even knows what happened. He’s wrong.
I check the load in the shotgun. Slugs.
"Blake?" Tiffany's voice sounds small from behind the anvil.
I look back. Her eyes are terrified, but she grips the steel rose I made her like a talisman.
"I'll be right back," I say, voice eerily calm. "I have to go take out the trash."
I unlock the heavy door and step out into the cold mountain air. The wind bites, cutting across my bare skin, but I don't feel it. I feel only the rage. A cold, white-hot fury that someone dared to step onto my land to take what is mine.
I slip into the shadows of the pines, silent despite my size.
I am the hunter now. I know every rock, every root, every shadow on this peak.
They are tourists in my world. I move toward Zone 4, shotgun stock pressed against my shoulder.
I hear them now. The crunch of boots on gravel.
The heavy breathing of men not used to the altitude.
"You sure this is the place?" a voice whispers. Harsh. Urban.
"Tracker says she's here," another replies. "Grab the girl, incapacitate the biker. Boss wants her untouched, but the guy is fair game."
Incapacitate the biker. I almost smile.
I step out from behind the trunk of a massive pine, leveling the shotgun at the lead man, just twenty feet away.
"You took a wrong turn, boys," I say, voice booming through the silent forest.
They spin, weapons raising—silenced pistols. Professional, but too slow. I don't fire. Not yet. I want them to see me. I want them to see the size of the man standing between them and their paycheck. I want them to know they just walked into the den of a beast starving for a fight.
"Drop them," I order. "Or you stay on this mountain forever."
The lead man hesitates. He looks at his partner, then back at me. He sees the patch on my chest—I'm not wearing my cut, but the ink on my skin spells out Broken Halos. He sees the dead look in my eyes.
"We just want the girl," the man says, trying to sound tough.
"The girl," I say softly, stepping forward, leaves silent under my boots, "is the reason you're still breathing. I don't want to upset her with the noise."
I rack the shotgun again, ejecting a live shell just to show them I have plenty to spare. It hits the ground with a definitive clack.
"Turn around," I bark. "Run. Tell Ramon that if he sends anyone else... I send them back in pieces."
The man stares. He weighs his options. He sees the math—a paycheck isn't worth dying in the middle of nowhere against a special forces psycho with a shotgun. Slowly, they lower their weapons.
"Smart," I say.
They back away, eyes fixed on me, until they hit the tree line, then turn and scramble down the path, sliding on loose shale in their haste. I watch them go until they vanish. I wait until the sound of their engine fading down the access road confirms their exit.
I don't relax. Adrenaline pumps, a toxic sludge in my veins. They know where we are. The sanctity of The Forge is broken. They touched the perimeter.
I turn and head back inside. I lock the heavy door, throwing the deadbolts with savage force. Tiffany stands behind the anvil, face pale.
"Did you...?" she trails off, looking at the shotgun.
"They're gone," I say, leaning the weapon against the bench. "For now."
I cross the space between us in two strides. I need to touch her. I need to verify she's still here. I grab her, pulling her against me hard enough to bruise.
"We can't stay here," I say into her hair, heart hammering against her chest. "He knows the location. He sent pros."
"Where do we go?" she asks, clutching my shirt.
"The Clubhouse," I say. "I wanted to keep you to myself. I wanted to keep you in my world. But I can't protect the perimeter alone against a team like that while watching you."
It kills me to admit it. It feels like failure. But I will not let pride get her taken.
"Pack your bag," I tell her, pulling back to look into her eyes. "We're going to war, Tiff. And I need my brothers."
She nods, the steel rose still clutched in her hand. "Okay. I'm ready."
I look at her—fierce, terrified, and beautiful. My throat tightens.
"You’re the air in my lungs," I growl, the words tearing out of my throat like jagged iron. "I’m obsessed with you, Tiff. I don’t just want you—I’ve branded you. You’re mine, in this life and whatever hell comes next."
She freezes. Then a smile breaks through the fear, radiant and blinding. "I know," she whispers. "I love you too, you crazy stalker."
I kiss her hard, sealing the oath. My eyes shift back to the monitors. Let them try.