Chapter 20
The clubhouse had never been louder.
Music blasted from speakers someone had dragged into the courtyard. Brothers clinked bottles and roared with laughter. Old ladies danced with their men under string lights that made the compound look almost magical.
And in the center of it all, Colleen Brannigan stood with a beer in her hand and wondered how the hell she'd ended up here.
Warren Driscoll is dead.
The thought still didn't feel real. Twenty-four hours since they'd watched his headquarters burn. Twenty-four hours since fifteen years of fear and pressure had gone up in smoke.
Twenty-four hours since she'd walked into Anchor's arms over a dead man's body and felt nothing but relief.
"You're thinking too hard."
She turned to find Grace beside her, Patriot's old lady holding a bottle of champagne like she'd stolen it from somewhere expensive.
"Old habit," Colleen said.
"Break it." Grace poured champagne into a cup and pressed it into Colleen's free hand. "Tonight's for celebrating. The thinking can wait until tomorrow."
"Is it always like this? After?"
"The big wins, yeah." Grace surveyed the party with the ease of a woman who'd seen dozens of these celebrations. "These men need to blow off steam. War takes something out of them—even when they win. The party puts it back."
Colleen watched Anchor across the courtyard.
He stood with Gallows and Turnpike, beer in hand, laughing at something Pounder was demonstrating with increasingly wild gestures. The tension that had lived in his shoulders for weeks was finally gone. He looked younger somehow. Lighter.
Happy.
"He's different with you," Grace said quietly.
"Different how?"
"Anchor's always been steady. Reliable. The brother everyone counted on because he never lost his cool." Grace sipped her champagne. "But he was closed off too. Kept everything locked down tight. Nobody got in."
"And now?"
"Now he looks at you like you're the only thing in the room worth seeing." Grace smiled. "It's a good look on him."
Heat crept up Colleen's cheeks. "We've only been together a few weeks."
"Time doesn't matter. Not in this life." Grace's eyes found Patriot across the crowd, something soft in her expression. "When you know, you know. And that man knows."
As if summoned by the words, Anchor's gaze found Colleen's across the party.
He said something to his brothers, clapped Turnpike's shoulder, and started moving through the crowd toward her. People parted for him without thinking—the automatic deference given to a man who'd just ended a war.
"I'll leave you two alone," Grace murmured, disappearing into the crowd.
Then Anchor was there, standing in front of her, filling her vision the way he always did.
"You're hiding," he said.
"I'm observing."
"Same thing." He took the beer from her hand, set it aside, and pulled her against his chest. "Dance with me."
"I don't dance."
"Neither do I." His arms wrapped around her waist. "But the music's playing and you're here and I want to hold you. So we're dancing."
She laughed despite herself. "That's not how dancing works."
"It is now."
They swayed together in the middle of the party, surrounded by brothers and old ladies and the chaos of celebration. Colleen pressed her face against his chest, breathing him in—leather and smoke and the warmth that was just him.
"It's really over," she said.
"It's really over."
"Warren's dead. Craig's dead. Everyone who threatened me is—"
"Gone." His arms tightened. "And they're never coming back."
She pulled back to look at him. His eyes were dark in the string lights, but there was something new in them. Peace, maybe. Or hope.
"What happens now?" she asked.
"Now we live." His hand found her face, thumb tracing her cheekbone. "We rebuild your shop. We figure out what this looks like when we're not fighting for our lives. We wake up every morning and choose each other."
"That simple?"
"That simple." He kissed her forehead. "I know you're used to complicated. Used to fighting for everything, expecting the other shoe to drop. But this—" He gestured at the party, the compound, the life surrounding them. "This is real. And it's not going anywhere."
Colleen felt something shift in her chest. The last wall she'd been holding up, the final defense against believing this could last—it crumbled.
"I want to stay," she said.
Anchor went still. "What?"
"Philadelphia. The compound. This life." She met his eyes.
"I spent six years building Independence Ink because I needed something that was mine.
Something no one could take away. But Warren burned it down, and I'm still standing.
Because this—" She pressed her hand against his chest. "This is what's mine now.
You. The brotherhood. Whatever we build together. "
"Colleen—"
"I'm not going anywhere." Her voice cracked, just slightly. "Philadelphia is home now. In a way it wasn't before. And you—" She swallowed. "You're part of what home means."
He kissed her.
Not gentle. Not careful. A claiming, right there in the middle of the party, in front of everyone. His hands gripped her waist like he was afraid she might disappear. Her fingers tangled in his cut like she was anchoring herself to him.
When they broke apart, she was breathless.
"Get a room!" Gunner's voice echoed across the courtyard, followed by laughter and wolf whistles.
Anchor didn't look away from her face. "Later."
"Later?"
"Right now, I want everyone to see." His voice dropped, intimate despite the crowd. "I want every brother in this compound to understand that you're mine. That you're staying. That anyone who has a problem with that can take it up with me."
"Nobody has a problem with it."
"Good." He pulled her closer. "Because I'm not letting you go. Not now. Not ever."
The words settled into her bones like warmth.
She'd spent so long being independent. So long building walls, protecting herself, refusing to need anyone. And then this man had crashed into her life with violence and patience and a love so fierce it had burned down everything she thought she knew about herself.
She should have been terrified.
Instead, she felt free.
"I love you," she said.
"I love you too." He pressed his forehead to hers. "My stubborn, brilliant, beautiful woman. I love every part of you."
The party swirled around them—music and laughter and the chaos of family celebrating victory. But in this moment, there was only Anchor.
Only him.
Only them.
Kate appeared at her elbow, champagne bottle in hand. "Sorry to interrupt, but the old ladies are demanding a toast."
"A toast?" Colleen blinked.
"To you." Kate grinned. "To the woman who told a loan shark to fuck himself and lived to tell the tale. Come on—you're the guest of honor whether you like it or not."
Anchor released her with visible reluctance. "Go. I'll be here."
"Promise?"
"Always."
Colleen let Kate pull her toward a cluster of old ladies gathered near the firepit. Rachel, Gunner's woman. Megan, Gallows's. Nicole and Allison, the others she'd met over the past weeks.
Women who'd chosen this life. Women who understood.
"To Colleen!" Grace raised her champagne. "Who walked into a war zone and came out the other side with a biker wrapped around her finger."
"To Colleen!" the others echoed.
They drank.
Colleen felt tears prick her eyes—happy ones, for the first time in longer than she could remember.
"Welcome to the family," Megan said. "It's messy and violent and nothing like the life you probably planned. But it's real."
"And these men," Rachel added, "will move heaven and earth for you. You've already seen it."
"I have." Colleen looked across the party, found Anchor watching her with that steady gaze she'd come to depend on. "I really have."
The celebration continued late into the night. Brothers drank and danced and told increasingly exaggerated stories about the war they'd just won. Old ladies laughed and gossiped and pulled Colleen into conversations that made her feel included in ways she hadn't expected.
Family.
That's what this was. Messy and violent and absolutely nothing like the life she'd planned.
But real.
So goddamn real.
By midnight, the party had mellowed. Brothers peeled off with their women. The music softened. The string lights cast everything in warm gold.
Anchor found her at the firepit, dropped onto the bench beside her, and pulled her against his side.
"Tired?" he asked.
"Exhausted." She leaned into him. "Happy."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah." She tilted her head to look at him. "I didn't know it could feel like this. Being part of something. Belonging somewhere."
"Now you know."
"Now I know."
They sat together in comfortable silence, watching the fire crackle, feeling the compound settle into peace around them.
The fear was gone.
For the first time in weeks—maybe years—Colleen didn't have to watch over her shoulder. Didn't have to calculate threats or plan escapes or wonder who was coming for her next.
Warren Driscoll was dead.
She was safe.
She was home.
"Ready to go inside?" Anchor murmured.
"In a minute."
"Take your time." His arm tightened around her. "We've got all night."
All night.
All the nights after that.
Forever, if she wanted it.
And God help her, she wanted it. Wanted him. Wanted this life, with all its violence and chaos and fierce, protective love.
Joy settled into her bones, warm and permanent.
The fear was finally gone.
And in its place—something better.
Home.