Chapter Three
Friday night, and Bethany was alone with her grill and her thoughts.
The empty lot behind the abandoned warehouse wasn't her usual closing spot, but her usual spot had felt too exposed after three days of looking over her shoulder. Here, at least, she had walls on two sides and a clear sightline to the street.
Not that she was paranoid or anything.
She scraped down the grill with more force than necessary, taking out her frustration on grease and char.
The brisket guy had been back. Every single day since Tuesday—the quiet prospect with the sun-bleached hair and the eyes that saw everything.
He'd order a sandwich, eat it at the edge of her crowd, and disappear before she could decide whether to thank him or tell him to stop hovering.
She'd caught him watching her twice. Both times he'd looked away like he hadn't been staring at all.
Men didn't eat brisket five days in a row because they liked brisket that much.
"Stubborn bastard," she muttered, securing the propane tanks. "Could just tell me he's playing bodyguard."
But that would require actual conversation, and Grit didn't seem like the talking type. He'd said maybe twenty words to her since Tuesday, most of them variations of "brisket sandwich" and "thanks."
The rumble of engines cut through her thoughts.
Not motorcycles. Trucks. Multiple trucks, by the sound of them, coming from the direction of the main road.
Bethany's hands stilled on the propane valve.
They'll be back, Grit had said. You might want to think about whether that truck's worth dying for.
She'd thought about it. Had decided the answer was yes, because her father had believed in her and this truck was proof his faith wasn't wasted, and she wasn't going to let some thug with soft hands and hard eyes take that from her.
But thinking about it in daylight, surrounded by construction workers, was different than standing alone in an empty lot at nine PM with the sound of engines getting closer.
The trucks appeared at the edge of the lot. Two of them, headlights cutting through the darkness like searchlights hunting prey.
Four men got out. She recognized the one in front—Gravel Voice from Tuesday, the one Grit had stopped from climbing through her window. Kenny something, she'd heard one of the workers say. Hoyt's favorite attack dog.
He was smiling. That was the worst part. Smiling like a man who'd been looking forward to this all week.
"Beth's BBQ." He spread his arms wide as his guys fanned out behind him. "We've been looking for you. You're a hard woman to pin down."
"Funny, I thought I made my position pretty clear." Her voice came out steady. Good. "The answer's still no."
"See, that's the thing about answers." Kenny stepped closer, and his smile got sharper. "Sometimes people give the wrong one. And then Mr. Hoyt has to... explain things more clearly."
The other three men were circling now. Flanking her truck. Cutting off her exits.
She was trapped, and they all knew it.
"Your boyfriend isn't here tonight." Kenny's eyes flicked around the empty lot. "No bikers coming to save you this time. Just you and us and a long conversation about respect."
Bethany's hand found the knife on her belt. The one she used for slicing brisket, sharp enough to cut through gristle and bone. It wasn't much, but it was something.
"I don't need anyone to save me."
Kenny laughed. "Sweetheart, you have no idea what you need."
He lunged.
And then he stopped, because someone had materialized from the shadows behind her truck and put a hand around his throat.
Grit.
He'd been here. Watching. Waiting. The whole time she'd been closing down and cursing his name, he'd been ten feet away in the darkness.
"She said no." His voice was quiet. Almost conversational. But his grip on Kenny's throat wasn't gentle at all. "You should've listened."
Kenny's guys charged.
What happened next was fast and brutal and nothing like the movies.
Grit threw Kenny into the first attacker, sending both of them sprawling. The second guy came at him with a knife, and Grit caught his wrist, twisted, and drove an elbow into his face hard enough that Bethany heard something crack. Blood sprayed. The man went down screaming.
The third attacker tried to flank while Grit was engaged. Bethany didn't think—she moved, putting herself between her truck and the threat, her brisket knife in her hand.
"Don't," she said.
The guy looked at her knife. Looked at Grit, who was methodically taking apart his second opponent with fists that knew exactly where to land. Looked back at her.
He ran.
Kenny was back on his feet, face red with rage, pulling something from his waistband—
Grit hit him like a freight train.
They went down in a tangle of limbs and fury. Kenny got one punch in, snapping Grit's head back. Grit answered with three in rapid succession, each one landing with the wet sound of meat being tenderized.
"Stay." Crack. "Away." Crack. "From her."
Kenny stopped fighting. Not because he was unconscious—his eyes were still open, still full of hate—but because his body had decided it was done taking punishment.
Grit stood slowly, chest heaving. Blood on his knuckles. Blood on his face from where Kenny's punch had split his lip.
And those pale blue eyes, fixed on her like she was the only thing in the world that mattered.
"You hurt?"
"No." She hadn't lowered the knife. Couldn't make her hand unclench. "I'm not hurt."
"Good." He looked at Kenny, who was groaning on the ground. At the two men who weren't getting up at all. At the truck that had carried the third one into the night. "They'll bring more. Hoyt's going to hear about this, and he's going to send everyone he has."
"Let him." The words came out fiercer than she felt. "This is my truck. My business. I'm not running."
"Not asking you to run." Grit stepped closer, and she caught the scent of leather and sweat and something metallic that was probably blood.
"Asking you to be smart. You can fight them here, alone, and maybe win once or twice before they catch you without backup.
Or you can let us help. Regroup. Figure out how to end this instead of just surviving it. "
Us. The Steel Sentinels. The motorcycle club that everyone in Blackridge knew not to cross.
"Why?" She finally lowered the knife, because her arm was starting to shake and she refused to let him see weakness. "Why do you care what happens to a food truck?"
Something flickered in his eyes. Something that looked almost like pain.
"Because you built something. On your own. From nothing." His voice was rough. "And I know what it feels like to watch that disappear. To lose everything you worked for because someone with more power decided they wanted it."
She stared at him. This rangy, quiet man who ate brisket every day and watched her from the shadows and just put three men on the ground without breaking a sweat.
"The farm," she said slowly. "That's what you lost."
He didn't answer. Didn't have to. The truth was written in the tight line of his jaw and the old grief buried in his eyes.
"Your truck is your father's legacy." It wasn't a question. "I heard you tell the workers. The money he left you. What he wanted you to build."
"You were listening."
"I was watching." No apology. No excuse. "You're worth watching."
The words landed somewhere in her chest and stuck there, warm and sharp at the same time.
On the ground, Kenny groaned and tried to roll over. Grit put a boot on his chest without looking, pinning him in place like an afterthought.
"Hoyt's going to come for you," Grit said. "Tonight, tomorrow, soon. And when he does, you can either be alone in an empty lot with a brisket knife, or you can be somewhere safe with people who know how to stop him."
"People who fight for free?" She couldn't keep the skepticism out of her voice. "What's the catch?"
"No catch." His eyes held hers, and she saw nothing there but honesty. "You told his guys to go to hell when you could've just paid up. Stood your ground when most people would've folded. That kind of backbone..." He trailed off, shook his head. "It matters. It's worth protecting."
She should say no. Should tell him she didn't need his help, didn't need the Steel Sentinels, didn't need anyone.
But she thought about her father in that hospital bed, pressing a check into her hands with fingers that shook. Do something for yourself, Bethie.
This truck was the something. And these men wanted to take it from her.
"If I come with you," she said slowly, "what happens to my truck?"
"We secure it somewhere safe. Hoyt's guys won't find it."
"And tomorrow? I've got a lunch crowd. Brisket that needs smoking."
Something that might have been a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. "We'll figure it out."
She looked at her truck—her future, her proof, her everything. Looked at the men on the ground, at the blood drying on Grit's knuckles. Looked at the empty lot that had felt like freedom three days ago and now felt like a trap.
"Fine." She sheathed her knife and grabbed her keys. "But I'm following you, not riding with you. I don't know you well enough to get on a motorcycle."
"Fair enough."
He helped her lock up the truck with quick, efficient movements, checking windows and doors like he'd done it a hundred times before. When they were done, he looked at her for a long moment.
"You did good tonight. Standing your ground. Not flinching."
"I had a knife."
"Against four men." That almost-smile again. "Still counts."
She didn't know why his approval mattered. Didn't want to examine it too closely.
But as she climbed into her pickup and watched him mount his motorcycle in her rearview mirror, she couldn't deny the truth:
He'd showed up every day this week without being asked. Had watched over her without demanding gratitude or explanation. Had put himself between her and danger like it was the most natural thing in the world.
That kind of consistency meant something.
She just wasn't sure yet what she wanted it to mean.