Chapter 2 — Roan
The light at Main turns green and Zoe is still talking about the cat.
How scared he looked, how gentle Carina was with him, how she didn't make Zoe feel stupid for not knowing what to do.
I make the appropriate sounds of agreement while my brain stays stuck on the moment our fingers touched and her breath caught loud enough for me to hear it across the exam table.
I felt it too. That's the problem.
I drive the familiar route home, hands steady on the wheel even though my head is somewhere else entirely.
This is tactical stupidity and I know it. She came through the wrong door, brought in by Zoe instead of arriving through any of the channels where I have defenses prepared.
Which means I can't decide she's a complication and simply not see her again, can't apply the distance I normally maintain, because Zoe already likes her and already trusts her and has already decided Carina is the person taking care of that cat.
I turn onto our street and pull into the driveway of the house I bought when Zoe was three months old, small and solid and nothing fancy but every repair ever done to it has been with my own hands.
We get out and the heat hasn't lifted even though it's after six, cicadas loud enough to drown thought.
Inside is cooler, the window units doing their job. Zoe drops her bag by the door and heads straight for the kitchen without needing to ask.
"Can we do spaghetti?"
"Yeah."
We fall into the routine we've had for years, no coordination necessary because we've done this enough times to know exactly how it works.
I fill the pot with water and set it on the stove while she pulls out the jar of sauce I made two weeks ago, the ground beef from the fridge, the pasta from the cabinet. The water heats and she browns the meat, and I lean against the counter watching her work while she talks about Carina's clinic.
How clean and organized it was, how there was another cat recovering in a cage, how Carina seemed to know exactly what she was doing without any hesitation or uncertainty.
"She's been there eighteen months," Zoe says, stirring the beef with the old wooden spoon. "I asked while you were parking. Moved from Harrisburg, bought the practice when Dr. Morris retired."
"You get someone's whole life story in five minutes now?"
She grins at me over her shoulder. "I'm friendly. You should try it sometime."
"I'm friendly when I need to be."
"You're terrifying is what you are." But she's still smiling, adding the sauce to the browned meat. "Carina wasn't scared of you though."
No, she wasn't. Nervous, I could see that in the way she fumbled the bills and the way her breath caught, but not scared. Just aware of me in the same way I was aware of her, and that awareness is what I can't stop thinking about.
The water boils and I add the pasta, set the timer.
The smell of sauce fills the kitchen, familiar and grounding, except it's not working tonight to center me the way it usually does.
We sit down to eat and Zoe talks about her day at the bookstore, about Mrs. Patterson coming in looking for a romance novel "with a little spice but not too much, you know what I mean dear" and how Zoe found her exactly the right thing.
She tells me about the paper she's writing on feminist interpretations of Shakespeare, about how her professor actually gave her real feedback instead of generic comments.
I listen and ask the questions she expects, the same way I've been doing for twenty years, but the whole time I'm thinking about blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail and dark green eyes that looked at me with equal parts caution and interest. About the curves I noticed under those shapeless scrubs, the soft fullness of her body that registered even when the fabric was doing everything it could to hide it.
Full breasts and wide hips and a softness that I haven't let myself notice in any woman for twenty years, and now I can't stop noticing.
"Can I ask you something?" Zoe sets down her fork and looks at me with that direct gaze that's been too perceptive for my comfort since she figured out at six years old that I don't always say everything I'm thinking.
"Yeah."
"Can I invite Carina to dinner tomorrow night?" She's already reaching for her phone. "I want to thank her for taking care of Hamlet and I thought it would be nice and you make really good spaghetti so—"
"Zoe."
She stops, phone in hand, waiting.
I should say no.
Should tell her that Carina's probably busy, that we don't need to impose on her time, that it's better to keep things professional and not blur the lines between veterinarian and client.
Should maintain the distance that keeps everyone safe and keeps the vulnerabilities manageable and keeps Marrow from having additional pressure points to exploit if things continue escalating the way they have been.
Except I can't think of a single reason to give Zoe that wouldn't require me to explain why I'm saying no, and explaining why would mean admitting that I'm attracted to a woman I met for ten minutes.
Which would lead to questions I don't want to answer and a conversation I'm not ready to have with my daughter about why I've been alone for twenty years and why this particular woman is different.
"You can ask her," I tell her.
Her whole face lights up. "Really?"
"If she wants to, yeah."
She's already texting, fingers flying across the screen faster than I can follow. I stand and start clearing the table while she composes what's probably a three-paragraph invitation, rinsing dishes and trying not to think about the fact that I just agreed to have Carina in my house tomorrow night.
"She said yes." Zoe looks up from her phone with a grin that's pure happiness. "Tomorrow at seven. She asked if she should bring anything and I said no, just herself. Is that okay?"
"That's fine."
"You're sure you're okay with this? I know we don't usually have people over but I really like her and I think you will too and—"
"Zoe." I dry my hands and turn to face her. "It's fine. I'm glad you found someone you like."
She studies me for a long moment with that assessing look she's been giving me since she was old enough to realize I don't show everything I'm feeling, then nods like she's satisfied with whatever she saw.
Goes back to her phone while I finish the dishes, wiping down the counters and putting everything away with the same methodical attention I usually give to engine work.
It's not helping tonight.
By eight o'clock Zoe has disappeared into her room with her laptop and textbooks, door half-closed in that way that means she's working but I'm welcome to interrupt if I need to.
I consider it for about thirty seconds, then head out to the garage instead because I need to do something with my hands that isn't sitting in the house thinking about tomorrow.
The Harley I've been rebuilding for the last three months sits on the workbench, engine half-disassembled, parts organized in the careful rows I always use.
I've been doing this long enough that I could rebuild a bike blindfolded, and the work usually empties my head and lets me focus on the immediate physical reality of metal and oil and precisely calibrated machinery.
Tonight it's not working.
I pick up a wrench and then set it down again, check the torque on a bolt I already checked twice this afternoon. Stand there looking at the engine and seeing dark green eyes instead of the cam shaft that needs my attention.
This is tactical stupidity and I know it.
I've kept my world deliberately small for twenty years, just Zoe and the club and the work, no one else to worry about and no one else to protect and no new vulnerabilities to manage.
The Marrow situation has been escalating for months now and Victor Crane is getting more aggressive, more personal, targeting families in ways he didn't used to.
Perry got beaten because of who his brother is, Ray ended up in the hospital because of Diesel, and the women are targets now in a way they weren't when I was twenty-two and stupid enough to think the club could stay separate from the rest of life.
Anyone I care about becomes a potential leverage point, and I've understood this for twenty years and acted accordingly.
Built a life that functions precisely because I don't give Marrow or anyone else additional pressure points to exploit.
And now I'm standing in my garage thinking about a woman with gentle hands and a calm voice who stayed steady even when Zoe was panicking, and the wanting is immediate enough and visceral enough that I can't categorize it or dismiss it or file it away under things that don't matter.
I force myself to actually pick up the wrench and use it this time, working through the next steps of the rebuild with deliberate focus and refusing to let my attention drift.
It works for maybe twenty minutes before I'm thinking about the way she looked at me when I asked if she did strays often, the brief flicker of something in her eyes before she answered.
Not defensiveness or pride, just honesty delivered plain. Often enough.
Like she's been doing this for a while and doesn't need credit for it, just does what needs doing because it needs doing.
I work until ten-thirty and accomplish almost nothing useful, finally admitting defeat and putting the tools away.
Wipe down the workbench and head inside, the house quiet now with Zoe's light off and her door fully closed.
I shower, standing under water hot enough to loosen the tension in my shoulders but not hot enough to stop me from thinking.
Get out and pull on clean boxers, head to the kitchen for a beer I don't actually want, and end up in the living room instead, sitting on the couch in the dark with the unopened bottle in my hand, staring at nothing while my brain works through what tomorrow means.
Carina coming here, to this house, to the space I've built for Zoe where I've kept her safe for twenty years and where everything is exactly the way it needs to be to function. And I want her here, that's the part I can't get around.
I want to see her in my kitchen and watch her interact with Zoe in a context that isn't professional and find out if the attraction I felt in that clinic was real or just some kind of momentary chemical reaction that won't survive a second encounter.
Except I already know it was real.
I felt it when our fingers touched, saw it in her eyes when she looked at me and I could read the awareness she was trying not to show.
She felt it too, which makes this more complicated instead of less because it means I'm not imagining things or projecting what I want to see.
The smart move would be to maintain distance tomorrow night.
Be polite, let Zoe have her dinner, make sure Carina knows I appreciate what she did for the cat, and then let it end there.
Don't pursue it, don't create the vulnerability, don't give Marrow another person to target if things continue going the direction they're going.
The problem is I don't want to make the smart move. I want to see what happens if I don't, and that wanting after twenty years of not wanting anything for myself that wasn't directly related to Zoe or the club is dangerous enough that I should be paying closer attention to it.
Should be, but I'm not.
I'm sitting here in the dark thinking about tomorrow and knowing that when she walks through my door, I'm not going to keep my distance.
I'm going to let whatever this is play out and deal with the consequences after, because I've been alone for twenty years and I'm tired of it in a way I didn't realize until I saw her standing in that clinic with gentle hands and soft eyes and a body I couldn't stop noticing.
I set the beer down unopened and head to bed, lie there staring at the ceiling while the house settles around me and the cicadas scream outside.
Thinking about the way she looked at me with that mixture of caution and interest, about the moment when our fingers touched and I saw everything she was trying not to feel written clear across her face.
Thinking about tomorrow, about her being here in my space, about what I'm going to do when I see her again and the attraction is still there and I have to decide whether to act on it or let it pass.
Except I've already decided. I'm letting her in, not because it's smart or tactical but because I've spent twenty years being exactly what Zoe needed and what the club needed, and I'm just now realizing that maybe I'm allowed to want something for myself.
Even if it's dangerous, even if it creates vulnerabilities I've spent two decades avoiding, even if it means opening a door I closed when I was twenty-two and decided that being Zoe's father mattered more than anything I might want for myself.
I close my eyes but all I can see is dark green eyes and blonde hair and the specific curve of her hip under those scrubs, and I lie there in the dark knowing with absolute certainty that tomorrow is going to change something and that I'm going to let it and that whatever happens next, I've already made my choice.