Chapter Six
THE BATH HAD scrubbed the dirt away, but it hadn’t stripped the eyes from me.
If anything, it made them worse.
Before, grime had been armor. A shield that blurred my edges and dulled my shape. Ugly was safer. Ugly was forgettable.
But clean, I was… visible.
The common room stilled when I stepped out. The air thickened, heavy with silence that felt louder than any shout. Men watched. Some with curiosity, some with calculation. Their stares crawled over my skin like heat.
My stomach knotted. My fingers twisted the hem of the shirt Jewel had given me, tugging until the fabric cut into my palms.
Maul’s brows lifted, his beer pausing halfway to his mouth. Scyth leaned against the table, cue stick tapping slow against the floor. Rex muttered something under his breath that made Scyth smirk.
And then there was Throttle.
He didn’t look away fast like the others when Warden barked for them to mind themselves.
He leaned back, cigarette smoldering, smirk curved lazy across his mouth.
But it wasn’t cruel. Not hungry. His gaze lingered on me in a way that felt…
different. Curious. Like he was trying to figure me out, not strip me bare.
I tucked that away. Filed it in the place where I kept everything I noticed.
Because I remembered everything.
Ashen moved then, his broad shoulders stepping into the space between me and the room. His presence blocked half the light, half the stares, and the knot in my chest loosened by the smallest fraction.
“Let’s head into the kitchen,” he murmured.
I didn’t argue. Couldn’t. My feet carried me behind him, step for step.
The room parted as he walked, men shifting without him asking. Like they knew better. Like the weight he carried cleared the way. My shoulder brushed his arm once, a light touch, but enough to remind me he was real. Solid.
The kitchen was quieter. Smaller. The air warmer, filled with the scent of food. A pot steamed on the stove, the smell wrapping around me and pulling at something deep in my stomach.
Jewel stood at the counter, wiping her hands on a towel. She turned, eyes soft, a smile just for me. “There you are, baby. Sit. I’ve got something for you.”
Ashen pulled a chair out from the table, wood scraping the floor. The simple sound made my heart lurch. An invitation, not a command. Still, I froze in the doorway.
On the table sat a bowl, steam curling upward. Soup.
Real food. Hot. Waiting.
Not crusts tossed through a door. Not scraps left on a plate after someone else had eaten their fill. Not whatever Venom shoved at me when he remembered.
My lungs tightened. My hands curled. Eating meant noise. Eating meant vulnerability. Eating meant they saw you.
Ashen’s voice broke the storm in my head. “It’s just us.”
He said it like a promise. Like the words themselves were a shield.
I looked at him. At Jewel. Their eyes weren’t impatient. Just waiting.
But my silence had kept me alive. My silence had been my only weapon.
I stayed in the doorway, body trembling from the war inside me. Hunger screamed, loud and raw. Fear hissed quieter, but deeper.
Jewel’s smile softened. “You don’t have to eat if you’re not ready. The food will keep.” She set the towel aside, voice calm. “But you’re safe in this kitchen. I’ll make sure of it.”
The kept saying that, only I didn’t know what that meant anymore, but they didn’t understand. Still the word made something ache in my chest.
My gaze drifted back to the soup. The steam curled higher, carrying the scent of carrots and broth, herbs I couldn’t name. My throat ached with want. My belly twisted tight.
But still, I couldn’t move.
So I stood. Silent. Waiting.
And let them wait too.
Jewel’s eyes were warm. Ashen’s steady. Neither pushed. Neither demanded.
But they kept waiting.
Not just for me to eat. For me to speak.
I felt it in the air. The way Jewel’s hand stilled on the towel. The way Ashen’s shoulders tightened as though he carried the weight of my silence himself.
Did they wonder if I couldn’t talk? If my voice was broken? Or if I just wouldn’t?
The truth was, I didn’t know either.
Once, a lifetime ago, words had lived in me. They’d filled my chest, spilled out in laughter, whispered secrets with friends. But then Venom’s hands closed around my throat. Then his lessons carved into my skin: silence was safer.
Silence was survival.
And after enough years of swallowing every sound, of screaming only inside my head, I wasn’t sure if anything real would come out if I tried.
What if I opened my mouth and nothing happened?
What if I proved him right, that he’d stolen even that from me?
My hands curled into fists at my sides, nails biting my palms. My throat worked once, dry, but no sound followed. So I stayed quiet.
Because silence still kept me alive.
Because silence still kept me in control.
Ashen’s gaze caught mine, those green eyes searching, and unrelenting. For a heartbeat, I wanted to try—for him. Just to see what would happen, but my lips pressed tight, the words choking back down. But I owed them something.
My name pressed at the edges of my mind, splintered as shattered bone. I hadn’t said it in years, not out loud. Venom had tried to strip it from me, replace it with something cruel, with shame. But it was mine. Still mine.
I looked around the kitchen. A pen sat on the counter beside a stack of receipts, a notepad smudged with grease and handwriting.
Slowly, I reached for it. The pen felt heavy, clumsy in my hand, but the letters came anyway. Curved and careful, shaky but legible.
Wren.
I slid the pad across the table. Jewel’s breath caught. Ashen leaned forward, his green eyes locking on the word like it was something holy.
“Wren,” Jewel whispered, smiling soft. “That’s a beautiful name, baby.”
Ashen’s jaw tightened, but not with anger. With something else, something that made my chest ache to see.
For the first time in years, I was Wren again.