Chapter 10
MASON
The clubhouse smelled like roses and cheap regret.
Regan had gone full fairy-tale on the place.
Tulle hung from every rafter like someone had mugged a wedding planner.
Strings of fairy lights blinked overhead, soft and twinkling and completely out of place in a room that usually smelled like motor oil and spilled whiskey.
Roses everywhere—red, white, pink—stuffed into vases on the bar, scattered across tables, even taped to the goddamn pool cues.
All of it for Tank’s bride. Surprise rehearsal dinner number four.
Or maybe five. I’d lost count. The wedding was still a few days away yet.
I stood at the far end of the bar, nursing a beer I didn’t want, watching the brothers laugh and clap Tank on the back while stories got louder and champagne corks popped like gunfire.
Tank looked happy. Really happy. The kind of settled that made a man believe forever wasn’t just a word on a tattoo.
I was glad for him. Tank had earned that.
But weddings always did this. Dug up shit I thought I’d buried under six feet of desert dirt.
Like the shoebox in the back of my closet.
The one with the ring I’d saved for six long months—every extra shift, every overtime run, every dollar I didn’t spend on beer or bail.
Rylee’s ring. The one she never wore because she’d sold club secrets to the highest bidder and left me with two dead brothers and scars that still pulled tight when the weather turned cold.
I set the bottle down harder than I meant to.
Tarak caught my eye from across the room. River stood next to him, arms crossed, watching the whole circus like he was already calculating how many more nights of this we had left. I jerked my chin toward the door. No words. They didn’t need any.
I shoved off the stool and headed out.
Edge fell in step beside me before I reached the parking lot. “I hate this shit too,” he muttered. “Let me watch your six.”
I almost said yes. Almost.
Then Regan appeared out of nowhere, stepping between us with that look she got when she was about to lay down the law. Hands on her hips, eyes narrowed. “If you cut and run with him, Edge, no nooky. For a month.”
Edge stopped dead. His shoulders dropped. “Shit,” he drawled, long and defeated.
I kept walking.
The night air hit me the second I stepped outside—still warm from the day’s sun, carrying the faint smell of creosote and distant rain that would probably never come. I swung a leg over the bike, fired it up, and let the engine rumble through my chest like a second heartbeat.
The road was mine.
Concrete baked from twelve hours under a brutal sun, familiar cracks and patches I could ride blindfolded. I opened the throttle and let the wind strip away the fairy lights, the toasts, the stories, the champagne. Just me, the bike, and three hundred miles of nothing if I wanted it.
Plan was simple. Ride out to the land I’d closed on last week—forty acres of raw desert scrub I’d been eyeing for two years.
Walk the dirt, clear my head, maybe sit on the tailgate of my truck and stare at the stars until the knot in my chest loosened.
But first I needed food. Real food. My favorite steakhouse on the edge of town—quiet corner booth, iced Longneck stout so cold it hurt your teeth, a ribeye cooked medium-rare, and zero conversation. Alone.
I took the exit, rolled into the lot, and killed the engine. The neon sign buzzed overhead. My stomach actually growled for the first time all night.
Then I saw her.
Rylee.
Stepping out of the new Italian place next door on the arm of some clean-cut guy in khakis and a pressed button-down.
Dentist smile. Perfect teeth. Wedding band gleaming gold on his hand.
The kind of guy who probably had a 401k and never once had blood on his knuckles.
She looked good. Relaxed. Laughing at something he said.
Our eyes locked across the twenty feet of asphalt.
For half a second the old picture burned behind my eyelids again—her in my bed, her wearing my ring, her smiling right before she sold us out.
I looked away first.
Appetite gone. Stomach tight as a winch cable.
I swung the bike around without killing the engine and pointed it two blocks over to the dive bar instead.
The Rusty Nail. Happy hour in full swing.
Neon beer signs flickering in the windows, country music leaking out the open door, the low roar of too many voices and too much laughter.
I parked, killed the motor, and walked in.
The smell hit first—stale beer, fried pickles, cheap cologne, and desperation. I scanned the room out of habit.
And there she was.
Sienna.
Standing at the far end of the bar, back ramrod straight, face carved in that same mix of irritation and fire I remembered from the desert.
Some asshole in a pink polo shirt had both hands on her waist, fingers digging in like he had a right.
Dock shoes. Expensive watch catching the light.
The kind of guy who thought throwing money around bought him permission to touch whatever he wanted.
She slapped his hands away. Hard.
He laughed like it was cute. Leaned in again.
I didn’t think.
Didn’t plan— my fist was already moving.
The crack of my knuckles against his jaw cut through the music like a gunshot. His head snapped sideways. Blood sprayed—bright red, glistening—coating his teeth and dripping down his chin in a thick crimson streak. He staggered back into a table, knocking over two beers.
The bar went dead quiet except for the jukebox still twanging about lost love and back roads.
Sienna’s eyes snapped to mine. Wide. Shocked. That same look she’d given me the second she realized I’d felt her nipples against my back on the bike.
I flexed my hand once. Blood already drying across my knuckles.
“You good?”
She stared at me like I was a problem she hadn’t decided whether to solve or set on fire.
I didn’t wait for her to answer.
Dropped two hundred-dollar bills on the bar hard enough that the bartender flinched. Covered the trouble, the spilled drinks, the blood on the floor, whatever the hell else. Didn’t look back at the pink polo asshole still groaning against the table.
My hand closed around Sienna’s elbow—firm, not rough—and I steered her straight for the door. She came with me. Not because she wanted to. Because her feet moved before her brain caught up.
The night air outside hit us like a slap. Still warm, still carrying that baked-concrete smell and the faint dust of the desert that never really left this town. The door swung shut behind us and cut off the jukebox mid-song.
Sienna yanked her arm free the second we cleared the sidewalk. She spun on me, eyes flashing under the neon glow of the Rusty Nail sign.
“You embarrassed me in there,” she hissed. Her voice was low but sharp enough to cut. “My coworkers were at that bar. Your coworkers. Jesus Christ, Mason.”
She realized it at the same second I did. The Royal Bastards owned half this town. Half the people in that dive had probably seen the punch. Word would travel faster than the blood dried on my knuckles.
I opened my mouth to answer, but my eyes flicked past her shoulder.
Rylee and the dentist were walking down the sidewalk maybe thirty feet away. Arm in arm. Laughing about something. She glanced over, saw me, and her step faltered for half a beat. Same small smile. Same knife in the ribs.
The clubhouse fairy lights and champagne toasts and that goddamn ring in my closet all crashed together in my chest at once.
Behind me the bar door creaked open again.
“Sienna? You good?”
Some dorky-looking guy stepped out. Wire-rimmed glasses. Button-down shirt tucked in nice and neat like he thought a dive bar was business casual. Coworker. The kind who probably had a spreadsheet for his weekend plans.
I’d had enough.
Clubhouse bullshit. Rylee on another man’s arm. Pink-polo hands on Sienna’s waist. And this woman right here setting my blood on fire every single time she looked at me like I was a problem she couldn’t solve.
“Yeah,” I growled. “She’s good.”
I took her by the chin. Not gentle. Not rough. Just enough to tilt her face up so those eyes locked on mine. Then I kissed her.
Right there on the sidewalk.
Her mouth was soft at first. Surprised. She softened for a heartbeat—body leaning in, lips parting like she’d been waiting for this since the stash house and we both knew it. Then she stiffened again, hands coming up to my chest like she might push me away.
I slid my tongue inside her mouth and wiped it slow and deep across hers.
She tasted sweet. Lime and lemon drops and dark chocolate. Something she must have had at the bar before the asshole put his hands on her. The flavor hit me like a shot of whiskey and I groaned low in my throat.
The kiss went on and on.
Not polite. Not careful. Hungry. Messy. Her fingers curled into my shirt instead of pushing.
My free hand slid to the small of her back and pulled her closer until there was nothing between us but denim and thin cotton and the heat rolling off both of us.
I could feel her heart hammering against my chest. Could feel the exact second her knees went a little weak.
I was hard as hell. Painfully hard. The kind of turned on that made the rest of the world disappear.
“Fuck,” I breathed against her mouth when we finally broke apart.
Sienna blinked like she’d just woken up from a dream. Her lips were swollen and shiny. She looked around slow—first at me, then past my shoulder. Her coworkers were standing in the bar doorway now, three of them, mouths open, staring like they’d just watched a car wreck in real time.
“I… this is…” She trailed off, voice wrecked.
I slid my arm around her waist and tucked her against my side like she belonged there.
“We’re kind of seeing each other,” I told the group. My voice came out rough, final. “Come on, babe. Walk me home so I can change out of this shirt.”