Chapter 4 - Nora
Just for tonight.
I repeat it in my head like a mantra while I finish the chicken on my plate. Like if I say it enough times, it'll become true. Like I can compartmentalize this the way I've compartmentalized everything else in my life that's spun out of control.
One night. Then I'll figure out a real plan. Then I'll leave properly, smartly, the way Marcus said.
Then I'll stop putting him in danger.
I can feel him watching me from the corner of his eye while he eats. Not staring. Just aware. The way someone trained to notice everything would be.
"How did you get those scars?" The question slips out before I can stop it. I gesture toward his knuckles with my fork. "On your hands."
He looks down at them like he forgot they were there. Flexes his fingers slowly. The scars are old, layered. Some thin and surgical-precise, others rough and jagged.
"Fighting," he says simply.
"In the military?"
"Some." He sets his empty plate on the coffee table. "Most of them are from after."
"After?"
He's quiet for a long moment. I think he's not going to answer. Then—
"There's a place. Underground fighting ring called the Iron Pit. Hidden beneath the gym where I work." He says it like he's telling me about a hobby, not illegal cage matches. "I fight there."
I stare at him.
Underground fighting. Actual underground fighting.
"Is that legal?"
The corner of his mouth twitches. Not quite a smile. "No."
"And you just do it anyway?"
"Yeah." He leans back against the couch. "The gym owner, Rampage, he runs it. Ex-military like me. Gave me a job training people during the day, offered me fights at night. Turns out I'm good at it."
Good at it. I look at those scars again. At the one splitting his eyebrow. At the way he moves like violence is a language he speaks fluently.
"Does it hurt?" I ask. "Fighting like that?"
"Not really." He says it so casually. "Something happened overseas. I don't… I don't register pain the way I should. Can take hits that would put most people down and barely feel it."
That's not normal. That's not—
"Is that safe?"
"No." Honest. Direct. "But it makes me a hell of a fighter. Hard to knock out someone who doesn't know they should be knocked out."
I don't know what to say to that. Don't know how to process the fact that this man who stepped in to protect me, who invited me into his apartment, who's offering me shelter, fights in underground matches where he gets hurt and doesn't feel it.
"In the parking lot, when those men showed up, I saw you… You tilted your head. Like you were listening to something."
"Tinnitus. From an explosion in Kandahar. It's always there. Sometimes quiet, sometimes deafening. Fighting helps. When things get physical, it quiets down."
Oh.
Oh god.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be." He looks at me directly. "I'm not. It's part of who I am now. The noise, the fighting, all of it. I made peace with it."
Have you though? I want to ask. Because the way he says it sounds like someone who's learned to survive something, not someone who's healed from it.
But I don't ask. Because I'm not healed either. I'm sitting in a stranger's apartment hiding from men who want to drag me back to a life I'd rather die than live.
We're both just surviving.
"Your turn," Marcus says.
"What?"
"I told you something. You tell me something." He shifts on the couch, angling toward me. "Something real. Not about Castellano or running. Something about you."
Something about me.
I can't remember the last time someone asked. Can't remember the last time anyone cared about who I was beyond what I could do for them.
"I like books," I finally say. "Always have. When I was growing up, my parents paid all their attention to my sister. She was prettier, thinner, everything they wanted. So, I just disappeared into stories. Spent more time with fictional people than real ones."
"What kind of books?"
"Everything. Romance, fantasy, mystery. Anything that wasn't my real life." I tuck my hair behind my ear. "I brought three with me when I ran. They were the only non-essential things I packed."
"Which three?"
The question surprises me. Most people would move on. Would say something generic about loving books too. But Marcus is looking at me like the answer actually matters.
"Pride and Prejudice," I say. "Because I've read it so many times the pages are falling out. The Night Circus, because it makes me believe in magic. And a poetry collection by Mary Oliver because sometimes I need to remember the world has beauty in it."
He nods slowly. "My brother reads. Not as much as you probably, but he's always got a book going. Mostly horror. Stephen King, that kind of thing."
"What about you?"
"Field manuals, mostly." A ghost of that almost-smile again. "Not exactly literature."
"But you remember what your brother reads. Pay attention to it."
"He's all I've got." Simple. True. "He matters."
I envy them. No one's ever said I matter like that. Like it's just a fact. Like there's no question.
"You're lucky to have each other," I say quietly.
"Yeah." He picks up our plates, stands. "We are."
I follow him into the kitchen. The space really is too small for two people but I can't seem to stay on the couch while he cleans up dinner I made.
"You don't have to—" I start.
"You cooked. I clean. That's fair."
"That's very domestic."
He glances at me. "Don't get used to it. This is a one-time thing."
Right. Just for tonight. I lean against the doorframe and watch him rinse the plates. His movements are military efficient. Nothing wasted. Everything purposeful.
"Thank you," I say. "For letting me stay. For all of this."
"Stop thanking me."
"I can't. You're helping me and I don't even—"
"Nora." He turns off the water. Looks at me directly. "You don't owe me anything. Not thanks, no explanations, nothing. You needed help. I'm helping. That's it."
That's not it though. It can't be that simple.
"I should let you sleep," I say, because standing in his kitchen while he looks at me like that is doing something dangerous to my resolve. "Where should I—"
"My room." He says it before I can finish. "You take my bed. I'll take the couch."
"I'm not taking your bed—"
"You are. It's not up for debate." He moves past me into the living room. Opens a closet and pulls out a pillow and blanket. "Bathroom's down the hall, second door. Take whatever you need."
"Marcus—"
"Nora." He looks tired suddenly. Not physically. Something deeper. "Please just let me do this. Let me help without fighting me on every detail."
I close my mouth.
Because he's right. Because I've been fighting for so long that I don't know how to stop. Don't know how to let someone help without assuming there's a price.
"Okay," I whisper. "Thank you."
He doesn't tell me to stop thanking him this time. Just nods and starts making up the couch.
His bedroom is exactly what I expected. Sparse. Functional. A bed with dark sheets, a dresser, a window with blackout curtains. Nothing personal. Nothing that says who Marcus really is beyond a man who needs a place to sleep.
I find a t-shirt in the dresser. He won't miss one and I change in the bathroom. It falls to mid-thigh on me, swallowing my frame. It smells like detergent.
The bed is comfortable. More comfortable than mine. I sink into it and stare at the ceiling, listening to Marcus move around in the living room. The couch creaking as he settles. The TV turning on low, volume barely audible.
He's giving me space. Privacy. Safety.
Things I haven't had in a week.
I close my eyes.
Just for tonight.
Tomorrow I'll figure out a real plan.
Tomorrow.
Hours later…
The knocking pulls me from sleep so suddenly I don't know where I am.
For one terrible moment, I think I'm back at my parents' house. That everything—running, Blackwater Falls, Marcus—was a dream.
Then I hear his voice.
"Nora." Calm. But urgent underneath. "I need you to wake up."
I'm out of bed before my brain fully catches up. My heart's already racing, already knowing something's wrong.
I open the door. Marcus is standing there fully dressed in dark jeans and a black hoodie. His face is stone.
"What happened?"
"Three cars just pulled up outside. Black SUVs, same as the ones from earlier. Men getting out. At least a dozen."
No.
No no no.
"I was sleeping," I whisper. Horror crashes through me. "I was sleeping and you were—"
"Keeping watch." He says it like it's obvious. Like of course he wasn't sleeping. "Get dressed. Shoes on. We might need to move fast."
I'm already moving, grabbing my jeans from where I left them, pulling them on under his shirt. My hands are shaking so badly I can barely work the zipper.
"I'm sorry," I say. "God, Marcus, I'm so sorry. You should have woken me, you should have—"
"You needed sleep." He's not looking at me. He's looking at his phone, typing something fast. "I didn't."
"That's not—you can't just—"
"Nora." He looks up. "Focus. We don't have time for apologies right now."
Right. Focus.
I shove my feet into my shoes. Follow him back into the living room. He's moved to the window, staying back from the glass, watching the street below. I can see them now. Three SUVs parked at angles that block the street. Men in tactical gear moving with purpose toward the building.
Toward us.
"They know which apartment is mine," I whisper. "They'll start there."
"Yeah." Marcus is still typing on his phone. "Gives us maybe five minutes before they realize you're not there and start looking harder."
"We need to run. We need to—"
"We're not running." He hits send on whatever message he's typing. Looks at me. "We're getting help."
"Help from who? Marcus, you can't—"
His phone rings. He answers immediately.
"Rampage." His voice is military-crisp. Professional. "I need the Savage Riders."
The Savage Riders?
"Who are—" I start.
Marcus holds up one hand. Listening.
"Yeah, it's serious. Woman being hunted by a man named Castellano. His men just showed up with three cars and at least twelve bodies." Pause. "No, I'm not joking."
I grab his arm. "Marcus, who are the Savage Riders?"
He covers the phone. Looks at me. "Motorcycle club. They own Blackwater Falls. Protect the Iron Pit and everyone connected to it."
A motorcycle club.
He called a motorcycle club.
"You can't, that's not—"
But he's already back on the phone.
"My building. Third floor. They're coming in now." Marcus watches the window. "How fast can you get here?"
More silence.
"Good. I'll hold until then." He hangs up.
I stare at him. "You just called a motorcycle club to fight off Castellano's men."
"The Savage Riders run this town. They protect their territory." He meets my eyes. "I fight in their Pit. That makes me theirs. You're under my protection. That makes you theirs too."
"This is insane. You can't just—"
"Too late." He moves away from the window. "They'll be here in ten minutes. We just need to stay out of sight until then."
"A motorcycle club," I repeat, because apparently my brain has broken. "What the hell did I get into?"
"Nothing you can't get out of." His voice is steady. Certain. "But right now, they're the only thing standing between you and those men."
A door slams somewhere below us. Voices echoing on the stairwell.
They're inside.
Marcus moves fast. Grabs my hand. His is warm, rugged, steady while mine shakes.
"Stay close to me," he says. "Stay quiet. And trust me."
Trust him. Trust this man I met four hours ago. Trust him with my life while a dozen armed men hunt me through a building and a motorcycle club rides to our rescue.
This is insane.
This is beyond insane.
But Marcus is looking at me with those dark eyes, solid and certain, and I realize something terrifying.
I do trust him.
God help me.
I do.