Chapter 19 #2
I looked down the bar again before my brain could tell me not to.
She was listening to something Tanya was saying, expression edged with amusement.
The safe key on her chain glinted when she shifted.
Her jaw had that stubborn set it got when she was trying not to show how tired she was.
Like if she just held herself at the right angle, the weight sitting on her wouldn’t show.
She must’ve felt me looking again, because her gaze flicked over, met mine for half a second. Not long. Just enough to register. Just enough to jolt.
I forced myself to look away and study the wood grain of the bar instead.
“Yeah,” I said. “She is.”
Miami made a low sound in his throat that I didn’t like.
“What?”
“Nothing,” he said. “Just enjoying the view.”
“Of what?”
“Of you,” he replied. “Making heart eyes at a woman in a different cut and pretending you’re not.”
“I’m not making heart eyes,” I said. “I don’t even know what that looks like.”
“You want me to draw you a picture?” he asked. “Because from where I’m sitting, it looks like you scanning a room full of armed men and landing on her every time like your neck’s got a homing beacon.”
“You’re imagining shit,” I said.
“Am I?” he asked.
I took a sip of my drink.
“She’s an ally,” I said. “She’s saved my ass. I’ve saved hers. She’s good in a fight.”
“Uh-huh,” he said. “That why you’re still wearing the same expression you had on your face when Quinn saw me walk into the clubhouse?”
I glanced at him. “What expression is that?”
“The ‘oh thank fuck, my safe place made it through the door’ one,” he said.
My grip on the glass tightened.
“It’s war,” I said. “You latch onto anyone who doesn’t make you want to punch a wall sometimes. Doesn’t mean anything.”
“Yeah. I call bullshit. I can feel the heat. I know you Evan,” he said as he leaned in to look at me. “I know you better than yourself. Don’t dismiss this. There’s more to it. I can see it in your eyes.”
I knew he wouldn’t believe me.
“Even if…” I hesitated, hated that my voice did the same thing. “Even if there was something there, it’s not simple. We’re both enforcers in two different clubs. Two different presidents. Two different sets of shit to answer to. It’s not like we can just ride off into the fucking sunset.”
“Nobody’s asking you to put her on your bike and drive away,” Miami said. “I’m saying the world is on fire and you’re acting like you’re scared to get burnt.”
“It’s not that—”
He cut me off with a look that shut my mouth more effectively than any hand.
“Look at me,” he said.
I did.
“Today, I’m standing in this room with a rebuilt leg, amongst my family, with another chance,” he said.
“Days ago, I was in the road with that bike in pieces and a hitman trying to finish the job in a hospital. You think I planned for any of that? You think I had time to make sense of it before it just happened?”
“No,” I said quietly.
“You think Raptor woke up and thought, ‘This is the day I bleed out on a club floor staring at the ceiling?” Miami asked. “No. Shit doesn’t schedule itself around your comfort level, Jersey. It just hits. And then either you’re still here or you’re not.”
He took another sip, winced as it went down, then continued.
“You care about her,” he said. “I can see it. She cares about you. I can see that too, even with my half-busted ass. She watches the door when you walk out like she’s counting the seconds until you come back.
She stood in our Church and put her reputation on the table for us.
She risked her life in Dante’s club for us.
Don’t stand here and tell me that’s nothing because the patches don’t match. ”
I stared at the bar.
“At some point, this war is going to end,” he went on.
“Either because we won or because we’re dead.
If we’re still breathing when the smoke clears, you really want to look back and realize the only reason you didn’t reach for the one good thing that came out of all this was because you were worried about fictional logistics? ”
“It’s not fictional,” I said, stubborn even as something in my chest twisted. “There would be logistics. Territory. Time. Who lives where. Who answers to who. What happens if the clubs ever end up on opposite sides of something. That’s not nothing.”
“Then you figure it out when it happens,” he said simply.
“You talk to Blackjack. She talks to Liberty. You make it work or you don’t.
But you at least try. Because if you don’t, someday you’ll be lying on your back staring at a hospital ceiling or a club floor or a fucking ditch and the only thing in your head is going to be ‘I should’ve done something when I had the chance. ’”
He let that sit.
“You can prep your routes. You can clean your guns. You can study ledgers until the ink blurs,” he said. “You can’t prep for the moment a bullet finds you. Or the moment it finds her. Life waits for no one. Not you. Not me. Not anyone in this room.”
My throat felt tight. I swallowed hard.
“You done?” I asked, but it came out softer than I meant.
“No. Not yet,” he said. “Because for the record? If Quinn had walked into my life in any other context, any territory, or any type of patch combination, and I knew then what I know now? I still would’ve put my hands on her and not let go from day one.
My only regret is that I wish I had found her sooner. You know why?”
“Because you’re obsessive,” I said, trying to take some of the edge off.
“Because she makes the noise in my head quiet,” he said, ignoring the jab. “Same way Valkyrie seems to for you. You think that feeling comes around twice?”
I didn’t answer. I knew he was right. I had feelings for her that were growing stronger every day, and that scared me.
She felt like gravity to me. Grounded me.
Or like the Sun, and I was orbiting around her.
I needed to focus on the now. We both needed to focus on the now.
And I know I’m worried about shit in the future that’s unpredictable.
But I didn’t want to be a distraction, or to hurt her.
Across the room, Tanya threw her head back and laughed at something Valkyrie said. Rebecca shook her head, smiling. Quinn laughed too, shared a glance with Miami. Valkyrie’s shoulders loosened for a second. Like she’d dropped armor she didn’t even realize she’d been carrying.
She glanced over again. Not searching. Just… checking.
We caught each other mid-look. There it was again—that small shock of recognition. Like two tuning forks humming the same note.
I looked away first.
“Miami—”
“You don’t have to convince me,” he said quietly. “I’m already sold.”
He tipped his glass toward me in a small toast.
“To short lives,” he said. “And not wasting them.”
I clinked my glass against his because doing anything else felt like a lie.
We let the silence stretch after that. Not a bad one. Just… full.
“What do you think Tesauro’s doing right now?” Miami asked eventually, the tone shifting back toward business.
“Counting money,” I said. “Planning. Maybe yelling at some Serpents for not dying in the right pattern at The Black Velvet.”
“He’ll come again,” Miami said. “He didn’t hit the armory, the bars, the clubs, and the Vipers just to pack up and go home.”
“No,” I agreed. “He’s waiting. Either for us to make a move he can exploit, or for Roman to play whatever card he may be holding so he can try to burn it out of his hand.”
“Roman worries me,” Miami admitted. “Not because he’s weak. Because he’s not. But men like that, when they finally admit something’s rotting in their house, they tend to swing the hammer way too hard.”
“You’re afraid he’s going to start a fire we have to walk through,” I said.
He shrugged. “Something like that. I trust Blackjack. I even trust Liberty. But Roman? I trust him to do what’s best for Roman. I just hope that lines up with what’s best for us long enough to get through this.”
I didn’t disagree.
A crack and a muttered curse pulled our attention toward the pool table again. 8-Ball had just sunk another ball with annoying precision. Blackjack straightened, narrowed his eyes at the table like it had betrayed him.
“You’re cheating,” he said.
“With geometry?” 8-Ball asked. “Yeah. Okay.”
“You’ve been practicing without me,” he accused.
“I practice while you’re on the phone with your boyfriend,” he said.
Blackjack punched his brother in the arm. The room shared a collective laugh.
My eyes slid to Valkyrie. She’d turned now, elbows on the bar again, listening to Quinn.
Tanya was saying something about wanting to see Liberty and Blackjack in the same room.
Quinn rolled her eyes, but there was a softness in her expression now that Miami was in sight when she looked around.
Rebecca nodded, adding in something about babysitting grown children in leather.
Valkyrie laughed at that, real and quick, before she caught herself.
Miami followed my line of sight and sighed.
“You’re hopeless,” he said.
“Shut up,” I replied.
He grinned, then winced, pressing a hand lightly against his side. The movement was automatic, the way men touched wounds without meaning to.
“You good?” I asked.
“Define good,” he said.
“Fuck you,” I said, echoing his earlier line.
“Love you too,” he said back.
The room buzzed around us—low music from the battered speakers, balls clicking on felt, quiet conversations. No kids’ voices anymore. They’d all been shipped out to safe houses. The absence was its own sound.
I let myself breathe for half a second. Just one.
Then Blackjack’s phone rang.
The sound sliced through the room in a way normal ringtones didn’t. Maybe it was just that everyone here had been conditioned to clock that particular tone. Maybe it was the way he moved when he heard it.
He straightened from the pool table, cue still in one hand, and reached into his pocket with the other. He didn’t automatically hit speaker this time. He glanced at the screen first.
Something in his shoulders changed.
8-Ball saw it. So did Snake Eyes and Spade, who were mid-game of darts nearby. So did half the room, even if they pretended not to be looking.
I watched him thumb flick the answer button. He brought the phone to his ear instead of setting it on the table. That alone said enough.
“Yeah,” he said into the receiver.
His gaze lifted, swept the room, found me without really trying. Found Miami. Found Valkyrie. Found the core.
He held our eyes for a beat.
“It’s Roman,” he said to the room.
Everything went a notch quieter. Not silent. Just… focused. Like all the air had leaned in.
I felt my spine straighten on instinct. Miami’s hand found the bar again, knuckles whitening. Valkyrie’s eyes cut from Blackjack to me, that unspoken question floating in the space between us.
Wherever this went next, we were about to find out.
Blackjack turned away slightly, voice dropping as he listened to whatever came through the other end of the line.
The war had just cleared its throat.
It was about to change volume again.
Whatever Roman was about to say, it wasn’t going to be small.