Chapter 6 Rook
The storm’s been gnawing at the edges of the sky all damn day, and now it’s finally snapped. Rain drums hard against the clubhouse roof, sheets of it washing the porch in waves. Lightning forks through the windowpanes, flashing the barroom in fits of cold light.
I nurse a whiskey like it wronged me. Elbow on the counter. Jaw clenched. The other hand spins the cap of my Zippo in slow circles. Click. Click. Click. Over and over. Anything to keep me from picturing her face.
Calla-fucking-Blake.
“Rook,” Wren calls from the corner. “You gonna play the next round?”
I grunt. That’s all I’ve got for him. He shrugs and sinks another shot on the pool table. Grimm’s half asleep in the chair by the stove. Someone’s playing outlaw country on the speakers. It ain’t loud, but it fills the space between the thunder and the bad thoughts.
I light the damn cigarette I’ve been staring at for ten minutes. Inhale. Exhale. Try to forget how her laugh used to sound in this place—like it belonged. Try to forget how she looked the last time I saw her—shaking, screaming, bleeding, gone.
Then the front door creaks open. Every instinct goes sharp. Boots hit the floor.
I shift off my stool, flick the ash from my cigarette, and turn to face the noise.
It’s a kid. A little guy. Maybe four, maybe five.
Dark hoodie. Camo pants. Bright yellow rain boots covered in mud.
He’s hugging a beat-up lunchbox in one hand and clutching a stuffed fox in the other.
Soaked from the storm. Hair plastered to his forehead.
Not scared. Just… calm. Like he’s supposed to be here.
The room freezes. Even Grimm straightens up. The kid looks around the room, eyes wide and curious, then walks in like he owns the goddamn place. Like he’s done it before.
Grimm’s the first to move. Always is. He crouches near the kid and says something low, gentle for a bastard like him. The kid nods and hands over the lunchbox without letting go of the fox. Grimm glances back at us, brows raised like, what the fuck, then leads the kid toward the bar.
Wren’s already sliding a root beer across the counter, expression soft. “On the house, little man.”
The kid spins on the barstool, kicks his legs once, then looks up at me with a crooked little grin. “Hi. I’m Beau. I’m four.”
I stare at him for a second. He’s soaked, mud smeared on his little face, and confidence in his voice.
“Hi,” I say slowly. “I’m Rook. I’m twenty-two.”
Wren snorts behind the bar, already entertained. “Where you from, little buddy?”
Beau shrugs like it’s classified information. “Around.”
I let out a low chuckle. Grimm does too. Kid’s got bite.
Beau hums to himself as he pops the lid off his dinosaur lunchbox.
Plastic creaks open like a damn time capsule, and I blink at the sight of a fried bologna sandwich sitting front and center.
White bread, edges charred just right, and a neat row of green pepper slices on the side like it’s a gourmet spread.
He picks up the sandwich, takes a bite, and then looks over at me. “Wanna bite?” he asks, casual as hell. Like we’re old pals on a school field trip.
I blink. “Huh?”
He holds it up. “It’s good. My mom makes ‘em with the crunchy bits.”
The kid grins like he’s letting me in on some family secret. I stare at the sandwich. My throat tightens. That sandwich. That fucking sandwich. I laugh. Except I don’t. It catches in my chest, strangled halfway up.
My eyes shift to his face. That grin. The messy hair. The sparkle behind those goddamn eyes. And suddenly, I can’t breathe. That smile. That face. That fucking smirk like mine…
It hits me like a sledgehammer to the chest. I know that sandwich. I know that look. I know that laugh. And I know exactly who used to make me that same damn thing, burning the edges just a little ‘cause she knew I liked it that way.
Holy fucking shit.
A crack of lightning splits the sky, followed by a boom of thunder that shakes the fucking clubhouse walls. The lights flicker. The pool balls clatter against each other on the far table. And then—
Boom. The doors slam open like the devil himself kicked ‘em in. Wind howls through the room, wild, wet, and cold, dragging sheets of rain in with it. A gust knocks over an empty chair. The air goes electric.
Beau jumps beside me, flinching so hard he nearly drops his sandwich. I move without thinking. Step in front of him. Arms slightly out. Muscle memory from a thousand brawls and one too many ambushes. Like I’m ready to shield him from whatever the hell is about to storm through that door.
And then I see her. Calla. Soaked to the fucking bone. Rain dripping off her lashes. Hair stuck to her face like a war mask. And in her hand—a gun.
Not shaking. Not hesitant. Just ready. Her voice slices through the chaos.
“Where’s my son?”
The room explodes. Chairs scrape back. Grimm curses. Wren fumbles his drink. Everyone fucking moves. But not me. I’m frozen.
Beau’s behind me. Silent. Small. Peeking past my leg. And I swear to God…I don’t breathe. Calla’s eyes lock on me. Then on the kid. Then back again.
My ribs feel like they’re going to crack from the pressure building in my chest.
Her son. No. No way. But—the eyes. The mouth. That goddamn sandwich. It clicks. All of it. Like a shotgun cocked straight to my fucking heart.
Beau bolts before I can stop him. “Mommy!”
His little legs fly across the floor, arms flung wide, sandwich forgotten on the bar. And every soul in the room turns to stone. No one breathes. No one moves. Not even the fucking rain dares to keep falling for a second.
She drops to her knees to catch him; her soaked arms wrapping around him like she’s been holding her breath for years just to do this. He buries his face in her neck. She holds him tighter.
And I…I feel the world split beneath my boots. My throat closes. My fists clench. And the floor drops out from under me.
“Calli?”
It’s not even a question. It’s a prayer. A ghost. A memory wrapped in my voice. But her head snaps up, eyes burning through me like hellfire.
“Don’t you dare.”
Two inches lower, and I’d swear she shot me with that voice alone.
“You kept him from me.”
My words taste like blood. Like betrayal. Like every night I sat wondering why she left and never came back. Her jaw trembles, but her eyes don’t flinch.
“I kept us alive.”
The silence cracks again, louder than the thunder that brought her in. And I get it. Not all of it. Not yet. But enough.
Enough to feel the hollow in my chest finally explain itself. Enough to realize the universe played me like a fucking fiddle. Enough to know I have a son. A whole damn son—and I didn’t even know his name until five minutes ago.
And Calla? She’s standing there with lightning in her bones and fire in her chest, daring the world to come for them again. And fuck me—she looks like a storm I’d let destroy me all over again.
I take a step. Just one. But she feels it like an earthquake.
Beau’s tiny hand is still wrapped in the fabric of her shirt when she rises, slow and sharp, like a blade pulled from a sheath.
She pushes him behind her with one hand.
The other? It raises the gun. Pointed right at me.
The metallic click echoes like a thunderclap in the stunned quiet.
“Easy now, sweetheart—” Grimm says, hands up as he backs away, eyes flicking from the muzzle to me and back again.
“Whoa—” Wren mutters, dragging his chair back with a scraping screech.
A few of the guys shift behind me, not aggressively, just that subtle club instinct to assess threat, protect, react. But no one steps forward. No one says a goddamn word. Because the threat?
Isn’t her. It’s me. It’s what I didn’t know. It’s what she’s been through. And, fuck me—I don’t move. Don’t breathe. Don’t even blink. Because I’m not staring down a gun. I’m staring down the wreckage of every choice I never got to make.
“Calla…” I say, softer now.
But she’s not soft. Not anymore.
“Don’t come near us.”
Us. Us. She’s shaking. Barely. But it’s there. In her wrists. In her voice. In the way she shields him like muscle memory. She’d kill me if I got closer. And maybe… Maybe I’d let her. Because I sure as hell don’t know how to survive this either.
Beau peeks around her legs. Big blue eyes. Sticky fingers. Still holding that goddamn fox like it’s the most precious thing in the world. He tugs on her arm, a small voice piercing the silence.
“Mama… I didn’t finish my root beer.”
Calla flinches. Like she forgot the world existed beyond the barrel of the gun and the storm outside.
I take a shaky breath. “Calla…” My voice is rough. Raw. “Whose kid is that?”
She doesn’t answer. Just keeps staring at me like I’m a ghost she never buried deep enough.
“Calla.” I step forward. Her spine goes ramrod straight. “I swear to god, don’t play dumb with me.”
She lifts her chin. Sharp and proud. “Mine.”
The word slices me open. I blink. My heart doesn’t. It just…stops. Mine. Mine. That little boy. Mine.
My jaw locks so tight it aches. “He’s mine too, isn’t he?”
She doesn’t answer. She doesn’t have to. It’s all there—in her eyes, in his face, in the fucking sandwich.
“You kept him from me.”
Her expression shatters. And then sets like stone.
“I kept us alive, Rook.”
The room buzzes. Air heavy with the smell of ozone, gun oil, and betrayal. I step forward again. She raises the gun higher. The hammer clicks.
The guys all tense—Wren half-standing, Vice cursing under his breath, Frost reaching for something behind his belt. But no one moves.
Not until Grimm does. Slow. Steady. No threat in his hands, just calm in his voice.
“Calla.”
She whips the gun toward him. He doesn’t flinch.
“It’s me,” he says gently. “You know me.”
“Stay back.”
“I will. I promise. But let’s all sit for a minute, yeah? Just until the storm passes. Let my little buddy finish his sandwich and root beer.”
Beau beams like it’s the best idea in the world. “Mama, I want to stay!”