Forge's Awakening (Sons Of Liberty MC #20)

Chapter 1

The chapel doors closed behind Forge with a sound like a cell slamming shut.

He knew it wasn't the same. Knew the difference between oak and steel, between brotherhood and cages.

But five years at Graterford had rewired something fundamental in his brain, and the click of any lock still sent electricity down his spine—right along the scar where Damon Price had tried to gut him in the shower block.

Price was dead now. Heart attack in solitary, three years into Forge's stretch. Nobody mourned him.

Forge took his seat at the long table, third from the end on the right side.

His patch—Sons of Liberty MC, full colors, the patch he'd earned in blood and silence—sat heavy on his shoulders.

Heavier than the prison-issue denim he'd worn for five years.

Heavier than the weight of every day he'd kept his mouth shut while prosecutors dangled deals and cellmates tested his limits.

The patch was supposed to feel like coming home.

Instead, it felt like wearing someone else's skin.

"Brothers." Patriot's voice cut through the low murmur of conversation, and every man in the room went still.

The President stood at the head of the table, cold blue eyes sweeping his officers with the tactical assessment of a man who'd seen real war before he'd ever thrown a leg over a Harley.

"Let's get this done. I've got Grace holding dinner. "

Low laughs around the table. Forge didn't join them. Laughing still felt foreign—too loud, too exposed. In Graterford, you learned that noise drew attention, and attention got you killed.

"Territory first," Patriot continued. "Turnpike, what's the word on the Kensington expansion?"

The Road Captain leaned forward, Pennsylvania map tattoo shifting on his shoulders as he moved.

"Smooth so far. We've got the blocks from Allegheny to Lehigh locked down.

Local businesses are paying, no pushback.

There's a new crew running out of a warehouse on E Street—small-time burglary shit, nothing organized—but they're staying clear of our operations. "

Forge filed that information away automatically. Prison habits. Know the players, know the threats, know who might come for you in the dark.

"Keep eyes on them," Patriot said. "Small-time today, ambitious tomorrow. What else?"

The meeting rolled forward—finances, runs, a dispute with a supplier that Gallows would handle with his particular brand of diplomacy.

Forge listened to everything and said nothing.

The voices crashed over him like waves, too fast, too much, everyone talking and moving and existing at a volume that made his teeth ache.

Inside, time moved like syrup. Days bled into weeks, weeks into months, all of it measured in yard time and meal schedules and the slow crawl of a clock that never seemed to advance. You learned to match that rhythm or you went crazy.

Out here, the world moved like it was trying to shake him off.

"Forge."

His name—his road name, the one he'd earned before everything went sideways—snapped him back to the present. Patriot was watching him from the head of the table, and every brother's eyes had turned his direction.

"Yeah." The word came out rough, unused. He'd spent five years keeping his voice low and his words sparse. Some habits didn't break easy.

"You good?"

It wasn't a casual question. Patriot didn't do casual.

The man had founded this club on Revolutionary War principles—liberty or death, no kings, no masters—and he'd built it into a force that controlled half of Philadelphia's underground.

When he asked if you were good, he was really asking if you were useful.

"I'm good," Forge said.

Patriot held his gaze for a long moment. Testing. Evaluating. Looking for cracks.

Forge didn't flinch. He'd stared down men who would've slit his throat for his commissary, who would've turned him into a prison wife if he'd shown an ounce of weakness. The President of the Sons of Liberty MC was a dangerous man, but he wasn't the most dangerous man Forge had ever faced.

That honor belonged to Forge himself.

"Glad to have you back," Patriot said finally. Something that might have been approval flickered in those cold eyes. "Meeting's done. Drink up, brothers."

The tension broke like a wave crashing. Men pushed back from the table, voices rising, the sounds of brotherhood filling the chapel with a warmth that Forge couldn't quite feel yet.

Hands clapped his shoulders as brothers filed past—Gunner's heavy grip, Pounder's manic energy, Bayonet's silent nod that said more than most men's speeches.

They all treated him like he was made of something precious. Something that had survived the fire and come out harder.

He supposed that was true.

Gallows stopped beside him, the Sergeant at Arms' face showing nothing as usual. "Good to see you in that chair."

"Good to be in it."

"Liar." Gallows almost smiled—almost. "Give it time. The walls don't let go easy."

Then he was gone, moving toward the bar with the economical grace of a man who'd spent his career breaking other men down.

Forge watched him go and wondered if it showed that clearly.

The prison on his skin, in his bones, in the way he kept tracking exits and measuring distances and waiting for violence that wasn't coming.

The clubhouse filled with noise and motion as brothers scattered to the bar, to the pool tables, to the corners where old ladies waited with cold beers and warm smiles.

Forge stayed in his chair. The wood beneath him was solid, real, nothing like the metal benches of the Graterford yard. But his body didn't believe it yet.

Two months out. Sixty-three days of freedom. And he still woke up every morning expecting to hear the count.

"Walk with me."

Patriot's voice again, quieter this time. The President had materialized beside him with the silent approach of a combat veteran, jerking his chin toward the back door that led to the courtyard.

Forge rose without argument. When Patriot wanted a private conversation, you gave him one.

The courtyard was empty in the early evening light, shadows stretching long across the concrete.

The firepit sat cold and dark, BBQ area cleaned and covered, bikes gleaming in neat rows along the fence.

Beyond the compound walls, South Philadelphia hummed with its usual aggressive energy—car horns, distant sirens, the eternal argument of a city that had been fighting since 1776.

Patriot pulled a cigarette from his cut, lit it with a battered Zippo that had probably seen Fallujah. "You held up in there."

It wasn't a question, but Forge answered anyway. "Did what I had to do."

"Five years." Smoke curled between them. "Five years, and you never once pointed at the club. Never once tried to deal your way out."

"Nothing to deal. I killed the man. He came at Pounder with a blade, and I put him down." Forge shrugged, the motion feeling strange in clothes that weren't prison-issue. "That's what brothers do."

Patriot's eyes narrowed slightly. "Pounder knows what he owes you."

"He doesn't owe me shit. I made a choice. I'd make it again."

Something shifted in the President's expression. Respect, maybe. Or recognition. The look of a man who understood sacrifice because he'd made his own, in sand and blood half a world away.

"The patch was never in doubt," Patriot said. "I want you to know that. The second you went down, we voted. Unanimous. You were a Son before you ever walked out of Graterford."

Heat prickled behind Forge's eyes—the closest thing to emotion he'd allowed himself in years. He blinked it away, focused on the weight of the leather on his back, the patches that represented everything he'd protected through five years of hell.

"I appreciate that."

"But." Patriot took a long drag, held it, exhaled. "You need time. I can see it. The way you're watching the room, tracking movement, running calculations. That's prison thinking. That's survival mode."

Forge didn't deny it. Couldn't.

"Take what you need," the President continued. "Nobody's going to push you into rotation until you're ready. Nobody's going to question if you sit out a few runs. You earned the right to adjust at your own pace."

It was generous. More than generous. In the outlaw world, weakness got you buried, and taking time to adjust looked a hell of a lot like weakness to anyone watching.

But Patriot wasn't anyone. He was a man who'd come home from war with his own demons, who'd built an empire while fighting ghosts that nobody else could see. If anyone understood what Forge was carrying, it was him.

"I'll be ready," Forge said. "Just need to—" He stopped, almost laughed at the absurdity of what he was about to say. "Need to buy clothes first. Everything I own is five years old or prison-issue."

Patriot's mouth twitched. "That's your priority? Wardrobe update?"

"Can't exactly ride with the brothers in khaki scrubs."

"Fair point." The President ground out his cigarette under his boot. "There's a thrift store in Kensington. Second Chances, run by a woman named Dana. Good prices, decent selection. Some of the guys have used her for work clothes, stuff that won't draw attention. Might be worth checking out."

Forge nodded, filing the information away. A thrift store. Used clothes for a used man, starting over from scratch at thirty-five.

"Thanks for the tip."

"Thank me by getting your head right." Patriot's hand landed on his shoulder—heavy, grounding, real in a way that cut through the fog of dissociation that had been wrapped around Forge since he walked out of those gates.

"You did five years for this club. You've got a seat at the table for life.

But that seat's only worth something if the man in it is here, not still locked up in his head. "

The words hit harder than any fist. Forge felt something crack in his chest—not breaking, but shifting. Making room for something that wasn't just survival.

"I hear you," he said.

"Good." Patriot released him, stepping back. "Now go get a drink. Pounder's been dying to buy you one since you got out, and if you make him wait any longer, he's going to cry."

The mental image of Pounder—compact, manic, permanently singed eyebrows from one too many explosive experiments—actually crying was absurd enough to startle a sound out of Forge. Not quite a laugh, but close. Closer than he'd gotten in years.

"Can't have that."

"No, we can't. Club's got a reputation to maintain."

Forge turned toward the clubhouse, toward the noise and light and brotherhood waiting inside. At the door, he paused, looking back at the President silhouetted against the fading sky.

"Patriot."

"Yeah?"

"I didn't break." It needed to be said. Needed to be understood. "Five years, and they never got a word out of me. Not about the club, not about the brothers, not about anything. Whatever else prison did to me—I didn't break."

Patriot's smile was knife-sharp and proud. "I know, brother. That's why you're wearing that patch."

The door swung open, and the clubhouse swallowed Forge in a wave of sound and smoke and brotherhood. Pounder was already pushing through the crowd toward him, two beers in hand and a grin splitting his face, missing fingers and all.

"Finally! Thought Prez was going to talk your ear off all night. Come on, brother. First round's on me, and I don't want to hear any bullshit about not drinking. You've got five years of toasts to catch up on."

The beer was cold against Forge's palm. The noise pressed against his ears. Everything was too fast, too loud, too much.

But for the first time since he'd walked out of Graterford, something that felt almost like hope flickered in his chest.

He was home. The walls would let go eventually.

And tomorrow, he'd buy some new clothes.