23. Kate
Kate
Isat between Lucy and Maria at the bar, but my mind was still outside. My mother’s face kept flashing through my head.
The threats were normal, but the fear wasn’t. I’d never seen her back down from anything before, but the second Finn came storming out of the clubhouse, she’d practically thrown herself back into the car.
Lucy and Maria exchanged a look over my head, both too calm for what had just happened. Neither seemed willing to explain anything.
Not that I needed anyone to tell me why Finn had gone outside.
Somehow, he’d known my parents were there. The question wasn’t why he’d gone after them.
It was why he looked ready to kill them.
My mother had threatened me and Noah before, Finn knew that, but the fury on his face had looked personal. Like he wanted to hurt them for touching me.
The thought should have terrified me. Instead, it left me confused and aching all over again. Men didn’t get angry for me. And Finn had already made it very clear exactly what I meant to him.
Nothing.
My chest tightened painfully. Maybe I’d imagined all of it. The way he looked at me, the way he touched me and the way he held Noah like he already belonged to him. Maybe I’d been stupid enough to mistake protection for something more.
Minutes dragged by until the front doors slammed open hard enough to make me jump.
Boots thundered across the wooden floor and into the back room without even a glance at me. But not Finn.
My stomach twisted.
Music drifted through the clubhouse around us while people talked and laughed like the world hadn’t almost exploded outside twenty minutes earlier.
I couldn’t settle. Every time the front door opened, my eyes lifted automatically, looking for Finn.
Maria nudged a glass of water towards me. “Drink.”
I obeyed, mostly because arguing felt impossible.
Lucy leaned against the bar beside me, watching the crowd carefully. “He’ll calm down,” she said quietly.
I looked at her. “Does he always get that angry?”
Lucy and Maria exchanged another look.
“That depends,” Maria answered carefully.
“On what?”
“Whether someone deserves it.”
That didn’t really answer anything.
The clubhouse door opened again. This time, Finn walked in, followed by Reaper, Riot, Keno, and Spider.
Conversation around the room lowered slightly when people noticed him. Like everyone was checking his mood before deciding how loud they were allowed to be.
Finn barely looked at anyone as he crossed the room.
Then his eyes landed on me, and everything else seemed to disappear for a second. He changed direction immediately and headed to the bar.
Lucy slid off her stool beside me. “I’m gonna go check on Noah.” Maria followed her without another word.
Cowards.
Finn stopped beside me. Up close, he still looked furious. Not wild like before but controlled. “You okay?” he asked.
The question caught me off guard after everything that had happened. “I should probably be asking you that.”
One corner of his mouth moved slightly, but it wasn’t really a smile. “They touch you?”
I blinked. “What?”
“Outside,” he clarified. “Did they put their hands on you?” The way he asked made it obvious there was only one acceptable answer.
“No,” I said carefully, “they didn’t.”
Some of the tension left him. Just enough that he looked less like he might put someone through a wall.
I studied him quietly. “You scared my mother.”
Finn leaned one shoulder against the bar. “Good.”
The answer came so fast, I almost laughed. “You’re not supposed to say that.”
“She threatened you.”
“That doesn’t mean you should terrify her.”
His eyes met mine fully then. “Kate,” he said quietly, “your mother stopped being somebody worth protecting the second she helped people hurt you.”
I looked away first. Nobody had ever said something like that to me before.
Finn exhaled slowly beside me.
“Finn, church, now,” Reaper thundered.
They disappeared straight into the back room and the door slammed shut behind them.
Maria and Lucy appeared from the back corridor looking sheepish.
The shouting started almost immediately.
I froze and my breathing turned shallow as voices rose through the walls followed by a loud bang that made me flinch so hard Lucy noticed.
I hated yelling. Raised voices always meant someone was about to get hurt. I’d learned that young. Hide. Stay quiet. Don’t make it worse.
My hands started shaking beneath the table, so I tucked them underneath my thighs, trying to stop it.
“Don’t worry, Mija,” Maria asked, reaching over to squeeze my arm. “That is just how they work through things.”
Another crash sounded from the back room, and I swallowed hard. Maybe it was normal for them, but it wasn’t normal for me. Paranoia had kept Noah and me alive this long and now they knew where we were.
My mother had stood outside the gates. Watching. Which meant none of it was over.
The worst part?
A horrible thought kept crawling through my head. What if Finn regretted helping us now? What if I’d brought danger straight to their door and this was the moment they decided me and Noah weren’t worth it anymore?
I looked towards the hallway leading to the back room, heart pounding harder with every raised voice behind the door.
Despite everything he’d said, all I could think about was Finn.