Chapter 2
Saint
I was out on club business when my phone buzzed through my vest.
I cursed and took the next pull-off. Engine off. Call answered.
“Saint,” Ghost said.
“What.”
“Wolves are circling the highway.”
My jaw locked.
“And Nadia Holland is on the road,” he added. “She’s a risk just by being alone out there. If they figure out who she is to us, it gets worse.”
I swung back onto the bike without another word.
Nadia was Ava’s sister. Ava was Viper’s woman. Family.
Which made Nadia family too.
Havoc, our prez, preferred strategy over spectacle. We picked our battles. We hit hard when it mattered.
This mattered.
So I went looking for trouble before it found her.
And when I found her, it wasn’t the Wolves that surprised me.
It was her.
Ava said Nadia was made of sunlight. I’d pictured someone soft. Breakable.
Someone I’d have to shield from the world.
What I got was a woman with shaking hands and a stare that didn’t flinch.
Curves built to wreck a man’s focus.
Dark hair a mess over her shoulders like she hadn’t had time to care.
Brown eyes full of fear, but not surrender.
She was scared.
She wasn’t broken.
And she was gorgeous in a way that made instinct slam into control, hard and fast.
Something low in me tightened. Something like possession. The brutal kind that doesn’t ask why.
It hit me all at once—
She was mine to protect.
And I’d kill anyone who made her flinch like that again.
By the time I got her moving again, the Wolves were gone, but I didn’t trust gone. I trusted patterns. Wolves didn’t sniff once. They circled back.
And I’m not letting them find her twice.
Getting her moving was the easy part. Keeping her safe is the rest.
I keep her in my mirrors and take the narrow road first, holding the lead. She follows in her car at a careful distance, headlights steady behind me.
Good.
She’s shaken, but she’s not reckless. She keeps her distance. She doesn’t rush. She follows my lead.
The cabin sits a few miles off the main road, tucked between pines like it’s trying to disappear. It’s an old hunting place the club keeps stocked for exactly this kind of situation. No neighbors. No cameras. No casual traffic.
A locked cabinet with supplies.
A second locked cabinet with solutions.
I pull up and cut my engine. Nadia’s car rolls to a stop behind me.
She doesn’t get out.
She just sits there with both hands on the steering wheel like she’s afraid if she lets go, the world will tilt.
I give her a few seconds. Then I walk back and knock lightly on her window.
She jolts so hard her shoulders hit the seat.
Her eyes find mine. Wide, dark, and furious about it. Like she hates that her body still startles. Like she hates that I saw it.
Damn it.
I should’ve called out first. Should’ve known better than to come up on her like that, especially after what just happened.
I step back and lift my hands in a silent question, jaw tight. After a beat, she unlocks the door and pushes it open. She swings her legs out and stands, but her knees go soft.
She sways.
I catch her elbow before she can hit the gravel.
Not a pull. Not a drag. Just a steady anchor.
Her breath catches. So does mine.
She’s warm under my hand, all soft curves over coiled muscle, like her body’s still deciding whether to collapse or run.
She smells like coffee and vanilla shampoo. Familiar, safe, the kind of normal that doesn’t belong anywhere near men like me.
And it hits too fast, too hard. A jolt low in my gut.
Not now. Not her.
She pulls away the second she finds her balance, chin lifting like she’d rather bleed than say thank you.
“I’m fine,” she says.
I’ve heard that line from people who are anything but.
“Good,” I say anyway, because pushing never helps in the first five minutes. “Let’s grab your things.”
Her gaze flicks to my vest, to the patch, to my face. The anger in her expression settles into something colder, sharper. Some sort of defense.
“So you’re Saint,” she says, voice steadier than her hands. “Do you always show up out of nowhere, or did I get lucky?”
My mouth twitches.
“Only when someone brings wolves to my doorstep.”
A breath of laughter escapes her, quick and surprised, like it slips out before she can stop it.
Then she moves around me to the back seat for her purse and a duffel. Her jeans shift when she bends, a bare sliver of skin flashing at her lower back.
I look away, jaw tight.
She’s twenty-two. Ava made sure we all knew that.
Too young. Too soft. Too fucking tempting.
I’m thirty-eight, Vice President of the Damned Saints, with blood on my hands and ghosts in my rearview.
I’m not here to notice the way a woman fits inside my space.
I’m here to keep her alive.
That’s the job.
Only my body never did learn the difference between a mission and a mistake.
“Let me take it,” I say.
“No.” One word. Immediate. Clean. “I’ve got it.”
The refusal is sharp, defensive. Not rude. A boundary.
Interesting.
I nod once and don’t argue. “Fine. Stay close.”
Her eyes narrow, like she wants to push back on the command.
Then she glances at the trees. The shadows. The empty road.
She falls in step behind me.
Inside, the cabin is one big main room with a kitchenette, a couch that’s seen better decades, two mismatched chairs, and a wood-burning stove. A bedroom and bathroom sit down a short hall.
I flip the lights on.
Nadia steps in and stops just inside the doorway, duffel in hand, scanning corners like she expects the walls to move.
Adrenaline crash. It hits everyone. It just hits some people quieter.
I toss my helmet on the counter and keep my voice even.
“Bathroom’s through there. Bedroom’s in the back. Door locks. Windows don’t open.”
Her brows lift.
“Comforting,” she says.
“It’s safe,” I correct.
Not the same thing.
I move to the kitchenette, fill the kettle from the jug, and set it on the stove. The routine steadies my hands. Gives my brain something simple to do besides replaying how close the Wolves got to her car.
“Tea or coffee?” I ask.
She blinks like she wasn’t expecting kindness to come in such a normal question.
“Tea,” she says carefully. “If you have it.”
“I do.”
I pull a tin from the cabinet and set it on the counter, along with a small metal infuser. Not fancy. Functional.
Nadia watches me with suspicion that keeps trying to turn into curiosity and failing by inches.
“Where’d you learn to make tea like that?” she asks, taking one of the stools at the counter like she’s choosing the position with the best exit path.
“Trial and error,” I say.
She snorts. “You’re telling me the Damned Saints vice president has a delicate little tea routine.”
There it is. The bite. Controlled, not careless.
“Don’t tell anyone,” I say. “Ruins my image.”
The kettle whistles. I pour water, fill the infuser, and slide a mug toward her.
I pause, then reach into a different cabinet and pull out a small bottle.
“Little rum?” I ask. Neutral. Not pushing. Offering.
Her eyes widen a fraction. Then she shakes her head. “No. If I drink right now, I’ll cry or flirt, and I don’t want to do either.”
A short laugh slips out of me before I can stop it.
“Fair enough,” I say, and nudge the tea closer. “Drink your tea. You’re in shock.”
“I’m not,” she starts.
I lift a brow.
She stops, then wraps her hands around the mug. Her fingers tremble, but she doesn’t hide it. That’s not weakness. That’s honesty.
She looks up at me over the rim.
“You’re not what I expected,” she says.
“Likewise.”
Her mouth twitches again, like she’s fighting a smile and losing.
“Ava always said the Damned Saints were rough but trustworthy,” she says after a beat. “I believed her. I just…” She exhales. “I’m not used to men showing up when I’m in trouble.”
That’s all she gives me. No confessional. No overshare. Just a clean truth.
It’s enough.
I lean against the counter, arms crossed. “We look after our people.”
Her brows lift.
“Am I your people?”
The question should be nothing. A nervous poke at a tense situation.
It hits anyway.
I step closer before I can stop myself, planting my palms on the counter on either side of her mug.
Not touching her. Not trapping her.
Close enough that her breath catches.
Freckles dust her nose. Her lashes are too long. Her eyes stay steady even as her pulse jumps in her throat.
She’s young. Innocent in the way that matters. Not naive. Not untouched by darkness, just unwilling to let it steal her whole personality.
I hate that I notice.
I hate how much I want to protect that part of her.
I make my voice stay level, even as everything in me strains toward her.
“Right now,” I say, low, “you’re under my protection.”
Her lips part, and I look away from them like they’re a threat.
“That means no one touches you,” I continue. “No one scares you. No one takes you anywhere.”
She swallows.
“And you?” she asks, soft but not meek. “Do you get to tell me what to do?”
Good. That’s the right question.
I hold her gaze.
“I get to tell you what keeps you safe,” I say. “You get to decide whether you trust me enough to listen.”
Silence stretches between us, tight and charged.
Then her stomach growls, loud in the small room.
Her eyes go wide, horrified.
I should not laugh. I do anyway, a short huff of sound.
She presses a hand to her stomach like she can muzzle it. “Traitor.”
Something warm sparks low in my chest. Familiar, but not. Like something I’d forgotten I could feel.
“I’ll feed you,” I say. “Sit.”
Her lips curve, and the smile lands like a hit. “Bossy.”
“Protective,” I correct, and turn toward the cabinets before I do something stupid like lean closer. “If I were being bossy, you'd already be in my lap and out of breath.”
I grind my teeth and focus on the cabinet.
Behind me, there’s a sharp inhale. No words. Just the kind of silence that means she heard every syllable.
When I glance over, her eyes are on the counter, but her grip on the mug is white-knuckled, and her cheeks are flushed.
She clears her throat, like she's dragging herself back to neutral.
“Fine,” she says, voice a little rougher than before. “Feed me. And maybe tell me why everyone calls you Saint when you talk like a sinner.”
Heat coils low in my gut at the way she says sinner, casual and sharp. The image of her saying it differently flashes through my head.
I shut the cabinet door harder than I need to.
“Another time,” I say, rougher than I mean to.
The safe house has a small propane fridge with a freezer compartment. Practical, not fancy. The kind of thing that keeps the basics alive long enough to matter. I pull a wrapped loaf from the freezer, then a vacuum-sealed pack of sliced cheese.
“For now,” I add, “grilled cheese is what you get.”
“Do you put mayo on the outside?” she asks.
I glance over my shoulder, surprised. “That’s the only way to get the crisp right.”
“Good,” she says, dead serious. “Because if you said butter, I’d have to reassess this entire rescue.”
The woman was surrounded on the side of the road less than an hour ago, and she’s threatening my credibility over sandwich preparation.
I shake my head and reach for a pan.
I’m used to women looking at me with fear or expectation.
Nadia looks at me like I’m a problem she hasn’t decided how to solve.
It’s unsettling.
It’s dangerous.
Because it makes me feel human, and I don’t have time for human.
I force my focus to the pan. To the heat. To anything but her.
Because wanting? That’s the easy part.
It’s control that takes everything.