Brick’s Claim (Devil’s Crown MC #3)

Chapter One

Cole “Brick” Maddox stood on the clubhouse’s front steps like a stone statue. He’d been in this exact spot for nearly an hour, arms crossed, boots planted, gaze sweeping the parking lot and the road beyond it.

Most of the brothers thought he liked doing door watch duty.

Truth was, Brick didn’t like anything. Not in the way normal people did. He existed, he protected, he enforced. He was the wall King leaned on when shit needed breaking or guarding. Talking? Socializing? Laughing?

He left that for men who were wired for it. Brick was wired for silence. So when the small blue sedan rolled up the gravel road and came to a hesitant stop, his first thought was annoyance. Outsiders were almost always trouble.

Outsiders arriving unannounced were always King’s problem. And outsiders pulling up with optimism practically radiating from their vehicle? That was a new level of headache. The woman who stepped out proved it.

She wore a bright sundress and cardigan. Her dark hair was braided loosely and fell down her back. It was already coming undone from the breeze, strands catching the sunlight. She had big dark eyes, warm and open in a way that made Brick’s chest go tight.

It didn’t help that she was curvy everywhere and Brick always had a weakness for curvy women. She also wore a wide, trusting and unguarded smile that looked too damn sincere for a place like this.

She looked like she belonged in a community garden, laughing with neighbors and bringing people cookies. Not standing on the cracked asphalt in front of the Devil’s Crown MC clubhouse with its oil stains, cigarette smoke, and men who could end someone with a look.

Every instinct in Brick snapped alert. She looked like prey. Hell, she looked like she didn’t even understand what kind of wolves’ den sHe’d wandered into.

Still, she didn’t look afraid. Not even a little. That, more than anything, rattled him.

She lifted a hand and waved at him. She actually waved, like they were neighbors sharing a yard. Brick didn’t move. Didn’t answer and he didn’t do anything but stare.

The woman didn’t falter. She kept walking, each step confident, not cautious, like sHe’d decided fear was optional today. A wild conclusion, but she wore it like a badge.

“Hi!” she said as she reached the bottom of the steps, bright as the sun sHe’d apparently swallowed for breakfast.

Brick said nothing. After ten seconds of silence, silence that normally sent people scrambling, she cleared her throat. “Are you ... uh ... Mr. Brick?” she asked.

If He’d been a man capable of choking, he would’ve.

Instead, Brick tightened his jaw. A single vein ticked in his temple.

She smiled wider, clearly mistaking his lack of expression for confirmation. “Okay, good. I talked to King on the phone. I’m Tessa Hart. I’m the youth caseworker assigned to—”

“Stop.” Brick’s voice came out rough, ground over gravel. “No one calls me ‘Mr. Brick.’”

“Oh.” She blinked, then tilted her head like she was studying a strange bird at the zoo. “What do they call you then?”

“Brick.”

“Just Brick?” Tessa asked.

He gave a single nod.

She beamed like that answer somehow delighted her. “Good. I like it. Simple.”

He didn’t want her to like anything about him. He especially didn’t want to notice the way her eyes warmed when she smiled. Or how her voice wrapped around his ribs and squeezed something tender he didn’t even know existed anymore.

Damn it. He shifted his weight, uncomfortable in his own skin.

Her scent drifted upward. Something soft, maybe vanilla, maybe just her, and Brick felt a faint, unwelcome tightening in his chest. Then, worse, lower. Fuck.

He forced his posture even stiffer. “You’re here for the kid.”

“Yes, Dillon.” Tessa nodded, expression turning serious. “He’s been missing appointments, skipping school. Child Services flagged it. I followed the paper trail to King, and he said the club would cooperate. Especially because...”

She hesitated, then added quietly, “Dillon’s father was a member here. One of yours. Before he passed.”

Brick sighed. That was why King had agreed. Dillon wasn’t just another at-risk kid caught in the crossfire of the Serpents’ bullshit. He was the son of a fallen brother. Blood by bond, even if not by birth, and the Devil’s Crown didn’t abandon their own.

Brick didn’t like the idea of her anywhere near the mess the Iron Serpents had created with that boy. Didn’t like her stepping into shadows she had no damn idea how to navigate.

Brick also hated the protective heat curling through him at the thought of her getting hurt. He hated how instinctive it felt. How instant, wrong, and how impossible to shut off.

“You shouldn’t be here alone.” His voice came out harsher than intended.

Her eyebrows shot up. “I wasn’t aware I needed an escort to do my job.”

“You do here,” he pointed out.

She opened her mouth to argue but was cut off by the front doors swinging open behind him.

King stepped out, immediately locking his gaze onto Tessa. “You must be Ms. Hart.”

“Tessa,” she corrected cheerfully.

King gave a polite nod, then turned a look on Brick that said, inside. Now.

Brick stepped back, giving Tessa a wide berth. He didn’t want her brushing against him. Didn’t want an accidental touch. Didn’t want the jolt he knew it would send through him.

Inside, the clubhouse was quiet. Most of their MC brothers were out on jobs at this time of the day. King led Brick to an empty table. He just waited for Brick to sit. Then he got right to it.

“We’re escorting Ms. Hart while she works with Dillon,” King said.

Brick’s reaction was immediate. “No.”

King’s brows rose. “Didn’t realize that was up for a vote.”

Brick leaned back in his chair, shoulders knotting. “She’s not club. She’s not trained. She doesn’t understand how dangerous the Serpents are.”

“That’s exactly why we escort her,” King pointed out.

“Give it to one of the prospects,” he argued.

“Prospects don’t go toe-to-toe with the Serpents.”

Brick glared. “Why me?”

King didn’t flinch. “Because you’re the one I trust. And because if shit goes sideways, no one stands a better chance of getting her out alive.”

Brick felt something ugly twist inside him.

This wasn’t about the job. This was about how he reacted when he saw her. King had seen it, and King was pushing him straight into the fire.

Brick clenched his jaw hard enough his molars tingled. “She’s not my responsibility.”

“Today she is.”

Brick curled his fists against his sides. He could break bones, crack skulls, crush windpipes without blinking, but the idea of being alone with that soft, bright woman, of trying not to feel anything while she smiled at him like he wasn’t the monster everyone else saw?

That felt damn near impossible.

King stood. “Brick, this isn’t optional. You escort her. You keep her safe. You make sure the Serpents don’t get a chance to use her to get to the kid or to us.” Then he paused, eyeing him. “Problem?”

Everything inside him said yes loudly.

Brick stood anyway. “No, President,” he mumbled.

“Good.” King clapped him once on the shoulder. “Let’s bring her in.”

When Tessa stepped into the room, her gaze bounced between the patched leather vests, the heavy table, and Brick. Her stare lingered on him just a second too long. He didn’t like how that pause felt.

“Brick here will be your escort,” King said.

Tessa looked at Brick again. Smiled.

That smile hit him harder than any bar brawl ever had.

“Thank you,” she said softly. “I appreciate it.”

He didn’t answer, Brick simply couldn’t. Because the last thing Brick needed right now was for her to hear how uneven his damn heartbeat had become.

It made no sense. None. He was a grown man, a patched member and the club’s Sergeant-at-Arms. He’d lived through enough blood, brutality, and back-alley chaos to be carved from stone. He’d taken bullets without flinching.

He’d stared men in the eye as they begged for mercy.

He’d gone through women who wanted a night of danger or the thrill of a man who didn’t talk much.

He’d slept with every type. Bar girls, townies, club hang-arounds, women who liked him silent, women who didn’t care who he was as long as they got what they came for.

Never had his body betrayed him like this. Not for a smile. Not for a braid slipping loose over a curvy shoulder. Not for a pair of warm, dark eyes looking at him like he was safe. Like she wasn’t standing in front of a man who could break bones without breaking a sweat.

But Tessa Hart? One damn look and his heartbeat was behaving like it belonged to a teenager noticing a girl for the first time.

Brick was pathetic. This was unacceptable and dangerous. He didn’t react like this. He didn’t lose control. He didn’t let anything, especially a woman, slip past the walls He’d spent his entire life fortifying.