Kimi
The room was small but clean, with worn pine floors, a window half-frozen shut, and walls lined with the ghosts of cigarette smoke from a decade ago.
A dresser stood in the corner of the room; the bottom drawer was slightly crooked.
She wondered who had used this room before her.
Someone’s sister or girlfriend, maybe, or one of the women downstairs who laughed too easily and drank like they were made of iron?
She wasn’t used to that kind of power. The men she knew before Cole, before she found herself in the mess she was in, were loud and reckless.
Cole had been so much worse than any of them.
He was a loud man pretending to be a silent wolf until he sank his teeth in.
Gorgon didn’t need to pretend as Cole had.
His silence wasn’t filled with empty threats—it was full of weight.
Growing up on the reservation, she had learned to trust her instincts, and they were screaming at her that she knew Gorgon, even though her mind couldn’t figure out what to do with that feeling.
She turned toward the window and noticed that the snow had started falling again, thick and heavy, layering quietly over every piece of evidence she’d brought with her—the tire tracks and the footprints.
But the story remained. Gorgon told her that he was going to want to hear her story in the morning, but would he believe her?
Her story was hers to tell, and even with his threat to force her to tell it, a little voice inside her was shouting to keep it in because no one would ever believe her.
“Only the ones the boss doesn't let leave,” Trudi quipped, setting the tray down on the table beside the bed. “Gorgon told me to bring this up to you, and if you haven’t noticed, when he gives an order, we all follow it. Besides, you look like you could use a good meal.”
Kimi’s mouth twitched despite herself. “So, it’s your job to feed the prisoners? Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
“Depends,” Trudi said, pulling a chair closer and sitting down backward on it. “Are you gonna test the whole theory about being a prisoner by planning to make a run for it?”
Kimi hesitated, then shook her head. “Not tonight.” The truth was, she didn’t know what she was planning.
If she had anywhere else to go, she would’ve gone there instead of wandering onto the Kings of Anarchy’s land.
If she had anyone to call, she would’ve already called them.
Instead, she was here, in a biker clubhouse in the middle of nowhere, being guarded like something fragile or dangerous—she wasn’t sure which.
Trudi studied her, resting her chin on the back of her hand. “What’d he say to you out there?”
Kimi blinked cautiously. “Who?” she asked.
Trudi arched a brow. “Don’t play dumb, sweetheart. There’s only one ‘he’ around here who makes the snow stop falling when he speaks.”
Kimi didn’t know whether to laugh or be afraid of the way that Trudi talked about Gorgon. “He told me to get some sleep. And that tomorrow he’d want answers.”
“Yeah,” Trudi said, smirking. “That sounds like him.” She leaned back, her gaze softened. “Whatever you ran from, whatever that piece of garbage in the SUV said you did—it doesn’t matter right now. You’re safe here. And until he decides otherwise, nobody in this place will lay a finger on you.”
Kimi’s throat tightened. “That’s the part I don’t understand.”
Trudi tilted her head. “What about being safe confuses you?”
“No, not the safe part.” Kimi looked down at her hands. “Why would he want to keep me safe? He doesn’t even know me, but he’s given me a place to stay and even had you bring me food,” she said, nodding to the tray that sat next to her bed.
Trudi considered her questions for a moment and then said, “Because, when something feels wrong in Gorgon’s bones, he tries to fix it.
And you—” she gestured loosely at Kimi, “walked up to that porch like every bad thing in the world was right behind you. That’s the kind of wrong in the world that keeps him awake at night.
” Kimi flinched because it was true. She was running scared, and Cole had everything to do with her fear.
She still didn’t understand why Gorgon would put himself and his club at risk by helping her.
He had no idea what he was getting involved in, but she was sure that Cole was going to let him know.
She knew that he wouldn’t give up easily, but from the look in Gorgon’s eyes, he wouldn’t either.
Trudi stood and pushed the chair back into the corner.
“If you need anything, just yell. I’m in the room two doors down.
If you want breakfast in the morning, just come down to the bar.
I make a pretty mean omelet.” Kimi nodded and smiled, not knowing what to say, as she watched the woman walk out of her room, shutting the door behind herself.
The silence that followed was heavier than before Trudi’s visit.
Kimi gathered the tray, setting the tea aside after one sip.
Her body wanted food, but her stomach protested.
She walked over to the window and stood there, looking down at the quiet yard.
The snow outside glowed faintly under the floodlights.
The world looked peaceful from up here—white and endless, like a clean slate.
If she hadn’t known better, she could have convinced herself that she hadn’t brought trouble to someone’s doorstep.
But then she saw him out of the corner of her eye. Gorgon sat on the porch, one boot braced on the step, elbows resting on his knees. Smoke curled up from his cigarette. He was staring out toward the road—the same direction she’d come from. Like he was waiting for something, or someone.
Four bikes were lined in the yard, with their engines dark, but she could sense the men nearby. They didn’t sleep easily here. She wondered what kind of loyalty could keep that many people awake on one man’s word.
She whispered to herself, “You don’t get to own me,” and Gorgon looked up at her window as though he had heard her declaration. She gasped and slipped behind the wall, letting the curtain fall back into place. Kimi hoped that he hadn’t seen her spying on him, but she was sure that he had.
The frost on the window blurred her reflection, and yet part of her still remembered standing outside on that porch when he said you’re mine now.
He didn’t sound angry when he said it. In fact, he made it sound like he was going to protect her and keep her safe.
Safe—the word tasted bitter on her tongue when she whispered it aloud.
She walked across the room and sat back on the bed, staring at the marks on her wrist. The bruise had turned darker, a sick kind of proof she didn’t want to carry.
Cole would say things like, “You made me do it,” or “You shouldn’t have pushed me.
” And for a long time, she believed him because believing it meant she still had some control over what happened next.
But taking that envelope from him—the one that was now locked in the trunk of her car—had been something else.
It had been the first choice she made for herself in months.
It was an act of defiance, and it gave her the strength she didn’t know that she had to run.
That’s what she did—she ran like hell, and now, she wasn’t sure if she had done the right thing.
With Cole, she knew what she was getting, but with Gorgon and his club, she had no idea what she had gotten herself into.
She touched her wrist lightly, her pulse steady beneath it. “You won’t win this time,” she muttered under her breath, but she wasn’t sure if she was talking to Cole, or to the darkness outside, or to herself.
Downstairs, faint music started playing—an old rock song muffled through the walls.
Voices rose, laughter spilling in waves.
The world seemed to start moving again, but Kimi stayed in her room, pacing like a caged animal.
She looked out the window again and watched Gorgon stub out his cigarette and stand, rolling his shoulders like a man who carried too much weight but refused to set it down.
He turned toward the side of the building, where the shop lights burned through the cold.
She couldn’t hear what he said, but she saw how the others moved around him—efficiently and silently. He gave orders like most men simply breathed. And they listened and followed orders like good little soldiers.
Her grandmother once told her that some men didn’t command others—they only had to whisper. And the land listened, the trees listened, even the crows tilted their heads when those men spoke. She’d laughed at that as a girl, but now, she wasn’t so sure that her grandmother was wrong.
Hours passed, and at some point, fatigue dragged her down.
She climbed into bed and dreamed—not the soft kind of dream that heals you but the jagged kind that reminds you of all the things you lost. She dreamt of Cole’s hands causing her pain that she hadn’t expected, and the sound of her own cry caught in her throat.
She heard the motel room door slamming when he got mad at her for the littlest things, and how she’d cower in the corner of the room, scared of even her own shadow.
Then, she saw Gorgon’s eyes—dark, steady, and impossible to look away from. He wasn’t threatening her. Instead, he was standing between her and something she couldn’t name.
And when he turned to her, she felt the strange, raw truth of it—he already knew too much about her, and telling him more might just get him and his men killed.
Kimi woke just before dawn. The room was gray and cold again.
The sound of a single engine outside cut through the stillness—a low, heavy rumble starting up.
She went to the window and saw Gorgon there, pulling his cut over his shoulders, frost clinging to his hair.
He swung a leg over his bike and sat there for a moment, looking up toward her window.
They locked eyes through the glass, but he didn’t smile at her.
That worked for her because she didn’t smile back at him, either.
But something in his gaze said you’re still here, and something in hers answered for now.
He looked away, kicking the engine of his bike fully awake, the sound splitting the morning wide open.
He rode off toward the tree line, and the snow swallowed him whole in seconds.
Kimi pressed her palm to the cold glass again as she watched him drive away.
She knew what would come next. He’d hunt down Cole, and he’d find out what was in the envelope.
He’d find out about her, about what she took from him.
He’d find out about why men like Cole didn’t just stop going after what they believed belonged to them.
He’d figure out that she was more trouble than she was worth, and then, he’d come back to the clubhouse to turn her loose.
She’d be on her own again, and with nowhere to go, would probably end up dead somewhere along the highway.
Maybe that would be for the best. She had made the choices that had led her into danger.
Maybe it was time for her to pay for those bad decisions.
One thing she was sure of was that when Gorgon realized what she had dragged onto his land—she wasn’t sure if he’d still think she was worth saving. Her voice was barely a whisper in the quiet room. “I didn’t mean to bring the storm here,” she breathed, “but I think it found me anyway.”
The radiator in her room hissed again, steady and relentless.
Kimi leaned her forehead against the cold window and watched the horizon swallow the dawn as the snow continued to fall.
It was as relentless as life had been to her, and she was sure that sooner or later, it would pile up around her, and no amount of shoveling was going to get her out of this storm.