Chapter 6 Rook #2
Her hand trembles. Just a little. Grimm takes one step closer. Hands still raised. Voice soft like smoke.
“Calla…It’s okay. You’re safe here. You both are.”
She looks at him. Then at me. Then down at the gun in her hand like she doesn’t quite remember how it got there. And slowly… she extends it toward Grimm. Grip first. He takes it gently. No sudden moves. No words. Just respect.
And the second his hand wraps around the barrel, she drops it. Wraps both arms around Beau like he might disappear. And I just stand there. Watching. Bleeding. Breathing in lightning and root beer and four years of lost time.
Grimm slides behind the bar like he’s done it a hundred times, takes Beau’s root beer, unscrews the cap, and hands it back with a wink.
“Go on, little man. Finish up, yeah?”
Beau nods like it's a mission from God.
Grimm ruffles his hair and points down the hallway. “Go clean up, sweetheart. Beau’s good. He’s safe. I’ll make sure he gets extra peppers if he wants.”
Calla hesitates. Eyes bouncing between Beau and me. Between the past and present. Then she nods. Silent. Tense.
She disappears down the hall, and I’m on her heels before the guys can say a word. I don’t ask, I just follow. Like I’ve always done with her. Like gravity.
She’s halfway down the hall when she hears my boots behind her and spins around fast, like she forgot I existed in the wake of everything else. Her mouth opens, but I’m already talking. Already unraveling.
“You came back to Berlin—to here—with my son, Calla?”
She flinches, but doesn’t look away. Doesn’t lie. Which almost makes it worse.
I move before I can stop myself. Boots echo against the floor.
Her breath catches as I close the distance, backing her into the nearest door.
She’s soaked, eyes wild, chest heaving like a woman on the edge of war.
She grabs the handle and twists fast. The door swings open, and she stumbles back into a small room, bare except for a metal desk and a dusty chair.
I follow her in and shut the door behind us.
“Why the hell didn’t you tell me?” My voice is ragged. Low and shaking. “You came back to Berlin—to my city—with my son. And you didn’t tell me.”
She spins. “I didn’t get the chance. I was locked away before I could—”
“You could’ve sent a message. A letter. Something.”
“I did!” Her voice cracks. “I wrote you. Over and over again. I called.”
I freeze.
She steps forward now, fury pulsing through her. “You blocked me. You changed your number. You disappeared. I sat in a locked, unwed mothers' home with my hands shaking and my belly growing, and I still wrote. I begged someone to find you.”
Rage twists in my gut. “That’s not possible. Your father told me you left. Said you didn’t want this life. Said you ran.”
She laughs. Bitter. Broken. “Of course he did. The Preacher never wanted me to have anything that wasn’t built in his image.”
Silence falls like a bomb between us. I don’t know what to believe. My heart’s pounding out of rhythm. My hands are shaking, fingers curling into fists at my sides.
“I waited,” she says. “I waited for you to come. And you never did.”
My breathing’s ragged. Jaw locked so tight it feels like it might snap. I can’t stop staring at her like she’s something holy and fucked all at once.
“I missed everything, Calla.” My voice cracks, but I don’t care. “His first word. His first steps. First fuckin’ tooth. All of it.”
She straightens like someone lit her spine with steel. “Yeah. You did.”
That hurts more than it should.
Her chin lifts, and she throws it like a punch. “And don’t you dare pin that on me,” she bites. “I begged the goddamn universe to let you find us. I stayed alive for him. You wanna be pissed? Fine. But don’t act like I stole him from you. I survived for him.”
I take one step forward. She doesn’t move. Doesn’t back down. Not anymore. She stands like she’s got fire in her veins and hell in her eyes.
“You think I don’t know what surviving looks like?” I snarl. “You think I didn’t die a little every fuckin’ day not knowing where the hell you were? And now you’re back, and there’s a kid—and he’s mine—and I’m just supposed to what? Shake your hand and say welcome home?”
Her laugh is sharp, bitter. “You don’t get to welcome me anywhere. This was my hell, not yours.”
She’s shaking. I’m shaking.
Her voice breaks. “I was sixteen. Sixteen, Rook. Locked away by my own parents when they found out I was pregnant. Stripped of everything. I gave birth alone. No one held my hand. No one fucking stayed. I was a baby having a baby! And all I could do was keep him safe.”
My stomach lurches. Guilt claws through my ribs like a goddamn beast. I don’t think. I move. I lunge. My hand wraps around her throat—not tight. Just enough. Just to hold her there. Just to feel her. Just to make sure she’s real. She gasps, lips parted—then I crash into her.
Our mouths collide in a bruising, breathless kiss.
It’s not gentle. It’s not sweet. It’s rage.
Regret. Five years of agony crashing down like a fuckin’ storm.
She moans, and I lose my mind. Her fingers twist in my kutte, yanking me closer.
My hand slips down her spine, anchoring her.
She bites my lip hard enough to draw blood.
I growl. I lift her up, my hands gripping her thighs as I set her on the desk. Papers scatter; a stapler crashes to the floor. I don't care. Nothing matters but her.
Calla wraps her legs around my waist, pulling me against her. Her jeans are soaked through from the downpour outside, cold and wet against my hands, but her skin beneath is burning hot. Her hair drips rainwater down her neck, trails disappearing beneath her collar.
"Five years," I growl against her mouth. "Five fucking years thinking you were dead."
She claws at my shoulders, her fingers digging in hard enough to leave marks. "I thought about you every day. Every single day."
The desk creaks beneath us. I push between her thighs, pressing her back until she's half-lying across the surface. A picture frame topples. Her breath catches when I drag my lips down her throat, tasting rain and salt.
"I hate you," she whispers, but her hands are in my hair, holding me closer.
"I know." My voice is wrecked. "I hate me too."
I tear at her clothes, blind with need, with years of phantom pain finally finding its target. Her shirt rips under my hands, buttons skittering across the floor. She doesn't seem to care, already working at my belt, yanking it free with a hiss of leather.
"Fuck you," she pants against my mouth, but her hands tell a different story, desperate and greedy on my skin.
"Yeah," I breathe, shoving her jeans down her hips. "Fuck me."
There's no finesse to it, no gentle exploration. We collide like we're trying to hurt each other, like maybe pain is the only language we have left. Her nails rake down my back, leaving fire in their wake. I bite her shoulder, tasting salt and rain and time.
The desk rattles beneath us as I thrust into her. She cries out, head thrown back, throat exposed. I wrap my hand around it again, feeling her pulse hammer against my palm.
"Look at me," I demand, voice raw. "Look at me, Calla."
Her eyes snap to mine, defiant even now. The hate there is real, but so is everything else—grief, relief, need.
Her eyes lock with mine as I thrust into her, rough and hard. No gentleness here, just pure need and fury colliding. She gasps, her head thrown back, exposing the pale column of her throat. I grip her hips tight enough to bruise, pulling her to the edge of the desk.
"Is this what you want?" I growl, driving deeper.
"Shut up," she hisses, clawing at my shoulders, leaving marks I'll feel for days. "Just shut up."
The desk bangs against the wall with each thrust. Papers slide to the floor; a pen rolls off the edge. Her legs tighten around my waist, heels digging into my lower back, urging me on.
It's brutal. Desperate. Everything we can't say crashing between us with each movement. Her teeth find my shoulder, biting down hard enough that I curse, the pain sharpening everything.
"Harder," she demands, voice breaking. "Make me feel something else. Anything else."
I obey, one hand tangling in her hair, pulling her head back so I can see her face. The hatred in her eyes is real, but beneath it—God, beneath it is everything we've both been drowning in for five years.
I feel her tightening around me, her breath coming faster, shorter. Her eyes go wide, locked on mine like she's seeing a ghost.
"Don't you dare look away," I rasp, feeling my control slipping. "Don't you fucking look away from me."
She doesn't. Something breaks between us. Not just the tension but something deeper, a dam neither of us knew how to breach. Her body seizes around mine, her back arching off the desk as she comes apart, a broken sound tearing from her throat that's half sob, half my name.
It pulls me under too, the sight of her undoing becoming mine. I bury my face in her neck as I follow her over, cursing against her skin, my whole body shuddering with the force of it. For one blinding moment, there's nothing but this—her and me and five years of emptiness finally filled.
When I can breathe again, I realize she's crying. Silent tears track down her temples into her hair. I'm still inside her, both of us trembling in the aftermath.
“Fuck.”
A hard knock at the door rips us apart. I nearly fall backwards, catching myself on the edge of the desk as Calla scrambles to pull her clothes together.
"Rook? You in there?" Ash, our club president’s, voice carries through the door, authoritative and impatient. "Open up."
"Shit," I hiss, fumbling with my belt. "Just a minute!"
Calla's eyes are wide, panic replacing the heat from seconds ago. She yanks her torn shirt closed, crossing her arms over her chest to hold it together.
"Now, Rook." The doorknob rattles. "We need to chat."
I toss Calla my kutte. "Put this on," I whisper, watching as she slides her arms through it. It swallows her, but covers what needs covering.
Another impatient knock.
"Coming!" I shout, running a hand through my hair. I glance at Calla, who's wiping tears from her face with shaking hands. "You good?"
She nods, though she's anything but. Her eyes dart around the room, taking in the scattered papers, the overturned picture frame, the evidence of what happened in here.
I open the door and there he is—Ash. Our fucking club pres. His gaze cuts to me. Then past me. To her. Calla. His brows lift, slow. Mouth pulls into a crooked smirk, more sarcastic than friendly.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” he says, voice dry as gunpowder. “Little Calla Lily Blake. All grown up and wearin’ a kutte that ain’t hers.”
She stiffens behind me, and I feel it, her tension, the way her nails dig into her own arms like she’s holding back a scream. But she doesn’t say shit. Ash looks between us again. Doesn’t ask. Doesn’t need to.
His tone shifts—low, flat. “You got five seconds to tell me why she’s here before I start drawing my own conclusions.”
“I got a son,” I grind out.
His expression doesn’t change. “No shit. He’s at the bar eatin’ fries with Grimm. I meant why she’s here.”
“She’s his mother.”
That wipes the smirk clean off his face.
Ash exhales slowly, scrubs a hand over his beard, then jerks his chin toward the hallway. “Get her cleaned up. And when you’re done playin’ house, we’re gonna talk. Like men.”
Ash turns like he’s done, but then pauses, glancing back over his shoulder. “She stays. Both of ’em,” he says, voice clipped.
Calla jerks like she’s been slapped. “Excuse me?”
Ash spins, steps toward her, slow and deliberate. “You heard me.”
“I can’t stay here,” she snaps. “This isn’t—this isn’t safe. I didn’t come here to—”
“You think I give a fuck why you came?” Ash says, voice low but sharp. “Trees are down, power lines too. Half the streets are flooded, and the highway’s already shut. You’re not goin’ anywhere tonight, sweetheart—and I’m not lettin’ a kid freeze in a rental with no heat or lights.”
She opens her mouth again, but he just lifts one brow. That’s it. No threats, no shouting—just that look. And it works. Calla falls silent, lips pressed tight, chest still rising like she’s holding back a scream.
She drops her gaze first. “It’s Hale now, not Blake.”
Ash nods, satisfied, then turns to me.“She stays in your room,” he says flatly. “Kid too.”
My jaw tightens. “You sure?”
His stare pins me like a goddamn nail. “I don’t repeat myself.”
Then he’s gone, leaving the door swinging shut behind him and Calla breathing like she might hyperventilate. Ash walks off without another word, heavy boots echoing down the hall. Calla doesn’t move. Doesn’t look at me.
She’s still wrapped in that silence like armor, but I can feel the heat rolling off her, the kind that says she’s barely holding it together. I scrub a hand down my face and take a breath that doesn’t help.
Then I nod toward the door. “I’ll sleep on the floor.”
Her eyes snap to mine. Wide. Distrusting. Tired. But she doesn’t argue. Doesn’t thank me either. Just turns her back and starts down the hall toward the bar. And I stare at the floor like it’s got the answers to every bad decision I’ve ever made.