Chapter 9
The compound gates opened, and Reagan drove into another world.
She'd expected something rough. Biker gang headquarters, whatever that meant—picnic tables and beer cans, maybe, or a run-down warehouse with motorcycles parked outside.
What she got was a converted fishing resort sprawling across a private cove, all weathered wood and lake views and a kind of organized chaos that spoke of permanence.
The main lodge dominated the property, smoke drifting from its chimney. Cabins dotted the hillside. A massive garage was built into the slope, and she could see the gleam of chrome inside—bikes lined up like soldiers. Dock stretched into the water. Fire pit. Covered pavilion.
Bigger than anywhere she'd lived since she left home at seventeen.
Reagan's hands tightened on the wheel.
Channel's bike pulled up beside her truck, and he killed the engine, swinging off with the easy grace she was starting to associate with him.
Behind her, Limestone and Cottonmouth peeled off toward the main lodge, their voices carrying across the gravel as they called out to brothers gathered by the fire pit.
"This is home," Channel said, appearing at her window. "For now, anyway."
"For now?"
"Until Farris is handled." He opened her door, offering a hand she didn't need but took anyway. "You're safe here. Nobody gets through those gates without the club's permission."
Reagan stepped out, letting his hand linger in hers for a moment longer than necessary. The compound sprawled around her, impossibly large, impossibly organized. This wasn't a gang hideout. This was a community.
She didn't know how to feel about that.
"Come on." Channel's hand settled on the small of her back, guiding her toward one of the smaller cabins. "I'll show you where you're staying."
The cabin was simple—single room with a bed, dresser, small bathroom through a narrow door. Clean, though. Maintained. The kind of space that suggested someone cared about the people who stayed here.
"It's not much," Channel said, watching her take it in. "But it's yours for as long as you need it."
"It's more than my back room."
"That's not a high bar."
Reagan turned to face him. He was still wearing last night's clothes, blood dried brown on his jacket, exhaustion carved into the lines around his eyes. He'd killed a man for her. Held her while she shook. Led her through the dark to this place that felt nothing like anywhere she'd ever belonged.
"Thank you," she said. The words felt inadequate.
"Don't thank me yet." His mouth curved. "You haven't met the welcoming committee."
Before she could ask what that meant, footsteps sounded on the porch. Female voices, carrying the particular cadence of women who knew exactly where they were going and what they were doing.
Three of them appeared in the doorway.
Reagan's street instincts kicked in immediately, cataloging details the way she'd learned to survive.
The first woman was tall and sturdy, with the kind of presence that commanded attention—she moved like someone who ran things and expected them to work.
The second was smaller, darker, with sharp eyes that missed nothing.
The third had flour dusted on her apron and a warmth to her expression that didn't quite hide the assessment underneath.
They looked at Reagan the way she'd looked at hundreds of consignment pieces. Evaluating. Pricing. Deciding what she was worth.
"Ladies." Channel stepped back, giving them space. "This is Reagan. She's with me."
"We heard." The tall one smiled, but her eyes stayed sharp. "Cottonmouth said you held a back door against two armed men."
"One got the bat," Reagan said. "One got the gun."
"That's what he said." The woman extended her hand. "I'm Maggie. Still's old lady. Welcome to the compound."
Still's woman. The president's. Reagan filed that away and shook the offered hand. "Thank you for having me."
"You're not a guest." Maggie's grip was firm, businesslike. "You're under club protection. That's different."
"Different how?"
"Guests leave." The smaller woman stepped forward. "Women under protection either run or they stay. We're here to figure out which one you are."
Reagan met her gaze without flinching. "I don't run."
"That's what they all say." But there was something like approval in the woman's eyes. "I'm Carmen. Proof's old lady."
"Darcy." The one with the flour-dusted apron smiled warmly. "Current's. I run a bakery in town—let me know if you need anything."
Three women, three sets of assessing eyes, three brothers' old ladies who'd clearly been sent to take her measure. Reagan understood the game. She'd been sized up by landlords, bosses, customers, men who wanted things she wasn't selling. These women were different, but the principle was the same.
Show them what you're made of. Don't blink first.
"I appreciate the welcome," Reagan said. "But I've got inventory to unpack."
"We know." Maggie's smile warmed slightly. "We're here to help."
"I don't need—"
"Honey, nobody here needs anything." Carmen cut her off with the ease of a woman who'd learned to speak her mind. "But that's not how this works. You're under Ridgerunner protection. That means the women take care of each other, whether we need it or not."
Reagan looked at Channel. He was leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed, watching the exchange with something that might have been amusement.
"They're good people," he said. "Let them help."
It went against everything she'd learned since she was seventeen. Don't take help. Don't owe anyone. Don't let people close enough to hurt you when they leave.
But she was standing in a compound full of bikers, covered in another man's blood spatter, with a baseball bat in her truck and a prospect who called her his. Normal rules had stopped applying somewhere around the time she'd shot a man through her cabin's back door.
"Fine," she said. "But I'm organizing. Nobody touches the jewelry without asking."
Maggie laughed—a real laugh, warm and surprised. "I like her."
"Told you," Channel said.
They carried her boxes from the truck in a line—Channel and the three old ladies, working together with the easy rhythm of people who'd done this before. Reagan directed placement, her hands twitching to sort, to organize, to impose order on the chaos of the last few days.
When the last box was inside, Channel kissed her forehead and stepped back.
"Church in an hour. I need to report to Still." His eyes held hers. "You okay here?"
"I'm fine."
"That's not what I asked."
Reagan looked at the three women watching them with knowing eyes, at the boxes of inventory stacked against the walls, at the cabin that wasn't hers but somehow felt safer than anywhere she'd slept in years.
"I'm okay," she said. "Go. Do your prospect thing."
"My prospect thing." His mouth twitched. "Right."
He left, and suddenly Reagan was alone with three women who'd been watching her every move since they walked through the door.
"So." Maggie settled onto the edge of the bed, making herself comfortable. "Farris's crew."
"That's the situation."
"How much do you know about them?"
Reagan opened the nearest box and started sorting. Her hands needed the work. "Enough to know they're dangerous. Burglary crew, forced fencing operation, willing to burn out businesses that don't cooperate."
"And you told them no."
"I told them I'd rather lose everything than become a fence." Reagan's fingers found a vintage brooch, checking for damage. "Seemed like a good idea at the time."
"It was the right idea." Carmen moved closer, watching her sort. "These men—the brothers—they respect backbone. You fold under pressure, they'll protect you, but they won't trust you. You stand up?" She shrugged. "Different story."
"I'm not trying to impress anyone."
"Didn't say you were." Darcy pulled up a chair. "Just explaining how things work around here."
Reagan focused on the jewelry, sorting by type, by value, by condition. The familiar work steadied her, gave her something to hold onto while these women circled.
"The prospect," Maggie said after a moment. "Channel. He's serious about you."
"We've known each other less than a week."
"Doesn't take long. Not with these men." Maggie's voice was matter-of-fact, no judgment. "When they decide something, they decide it. And that boy decided on you the minute he walked into your store."
Reagan's hands stilled on a strand of vintage pearls. "He said I was his. In front of Culver. In front of his brothers."
"Did he."
"Like he had the right."
Maggie exchanged a glance with the other women. Carmen's mouth curved into something that wasn't quite a smile.
"Let me tell you something about Ridgerunner men," Maggie said. "They're possessive. Territorial. They see something they want, they claim it, and they don't let go. It can feel suffocating if you're not ready for it."
"I've been on my own since I was seventeen. I don't need someone deciding I belong to them."
"No," Maggie agreed. "You don't need it. But needing and wanting are different things." She leaned forward, her expression turning serious. "These men will move heaven and earth for the women they claim. They'll bleed for you. Die for you. But they won't apologize for being who they are."
"I'm not asking him to apologize."
"Good. Because he won't." Carmen moved to help sort, her hands surprisingly gentle with the delicate pieces. "The question isn't whether he'll keep claiming you. He will. The question is whether you want to be claimed."
Reagan didn't answer. She didn't have an answer.
She thought about Channel's hands on her face, steady and warm. About the way he'd said mine while driving a knife into Culver's throat. About the desperate, terrifying feeling of wanting to lean into someone else's strength after nine years of standing alone.
"I don't know what I want," she admitted quietly.
"That's honest." Darcy smiled. "More honest than most women are when they first come here."
"What I know," Reagan said, setting down the pearls, "is that I've got a store in pieces, a burglary crew that wants to burn me out, and a prospect who looks at me like I'm the only thing in the room. I don't have time to figure out feelings. I need to survive first."
"Survival." Maggie nodded slowly. "We understand that."
Something passed between the three women—a shared understanding that Reagan couldn't quite read. She had the sense that each of them had their own stories, their own reasons for being here, their own paths to becoming old ladies. But those stories weren't hers to know.
What mattered was they were here. Helping her sort inventory. Taking her measure without demanding she pass some impossible test.
"Thank you," Reagan said. "For the help. And for... not treating me like an outsider."
"You're not an outsider." Carmen's hand brushed her shoulder, brief and warm. "You're just new. There's a difference."
They left after another hour, promises of food and clothing and whatever else Reagan might need trailing behind them. When the door closed, Reagan stood in the middle of her borrowed cabin, surrounded by boxes, and tried to remember the last time anyone had helped her with anything.
She couldn't.
So she did what she always did when the world got too big. She sorted. Organized. Priced the pieces she'd saved from her store, laying them out across the cabin floor in careful rows.
Order. Control. The only things she'd ever been able to count on.
Her hands moved without thinking, finding patterns in the chaos, and somewhere in the rhythm of the work, the shaking finally stopped.