Oaks
The root cellar is thick with mildew, old bourbon, and the kind of secrets the Kings of Anarchy MC buries when they can’t stomach daylight.
Legend’s in front of Elijah, all a rage, asking about Sophie, the letters, Reverend Crowley, all of it, and I stay where I am with my back to the wall and my arms crossed, watching.
Elijah he keeps that church-boy calm wrapped around him like a clean shirt. He talks careful. Gives a little, holds a little. Says he was only there to scare, to “shake the branches,” like terror is just another Sunday chore if you soften the wording enough.
He swears on the Book with blood in his teeth. He drops the Reverend’s message like he’s delivering weather, not a threat. And the whole time, he keeps looking at Legend, never once acting like the dark down there scares him half as much as it should.
I remember that look later when I catch him too close to Brittany, standing polite by her car with his hands visible and his voice low, playing safe while Hell chews on her name.
Same posture. Same careful mismatched eyes.
Same clean edges over something rotten underneath.
She’s inside. He’s waiting for her. He starts to say her name, starts to step in like she belongs to him, and I move into him before he finishes the breath.
“Listen real close,” I tell him, low enough nobody else gets the words but him.
“I seen what you are when the room gets dark. You go near Brittany again, you look at her too long, you give her one more pretty warning with your church manners, I’ll put you in the ground and let your uncle preach over what’s left. ”
His jaw jumps, but I don’t give him time to answer.
“Break this off with her,” I order him. Just to be clear.
That’s how it starts, me trailing her so close. Because I know exactly how a man like Elijah works when he’s been sent to test a door before somebody else kicks it in.
That’s why I’m stretched out at Holler’s place, on the upstairs couch, boots off, cut folded over the back like I’m staying a night instead of trespassing in something fragile.
Holler told me I could crash here after Bethany threw a glass at my head and told me to get the hell out.
Lottie didn’t ask questions. She never does when it comes to club business.
It was a good excuse.
Place ain’t small, but it ain’t built for secrets either.
The floorboards creak like they got opinions.
The vents carry sound whether you want ’em to or not.
Mason’s white-noise machine hums down the hall like a tired generator, and somewhere in the basement Brittany’s breathing under a borrowed quilt in a room that used to store Christmas decorations.
Still don’t mean this feels right.
I don’t sleep much. Every time the house shifts, I open my eyes. Every time a car passes on the road out front, my hand flexes like I’m reaching for my weapon. I’m not worried about Bethany. I’m worried about the other thing.
Shit’s been nuts at the club.
The missing girls.
Three in the last year. All early twenties.
All with some kind of loose connection to Pearly Gates.
One body. No ransom. Just gone like the earth swallowed ’em.
And now they’re behind Sophie’s disappearance.
When we found her, we also found the Reverend’s in bed with our rival club, the Depraved Sinners MC.
Everything came to a head, and I’m just lucky Brittany was staying here and missed the action so completely that she’s oblivious.
Now, Royal’s got a prisoner down at the Lockup, Becki Crowley, Reverend’s daughter turned liability. Girl too close to Prez and our Secretary. I don’t trust her for nothing. And Royal’s at my throat because I tested her.
I roll onto my back and stare at the ceiling and tell myself I’m here because Bethany needed space.
That’s a lie.
I’m here because Brittany’s got nowhere else to go, the club’s too busy to watch her, Holler’s with them tonight, and I don’t like the idea of her sleeping in a house without somebody listening for trouble.
Around one in the morning, I hear it. The soft click of the basement door. Bare feet on stairs.
I sit up without thinking.
She moves quiet, but not quiet enough for a man who grew up listening for police sirens and gun safeties. I hear the refrigerator open. The faint clink of glass. Water running low like she’s ashamed to need it.
I stand and step into the kitchen doorway.
She freezes.
Brittany’s standing there in an oversized T-shirt that probably belongs to Lottie, and therefore Holler, hair loose around her shoulders, glass halfway to her mouth. The fridge light paints her in pale blue, makes her look like a ghost trying to be solid.
For a second, we just stare at each other.
“You scared the hell outta me,” she whispers.
“You move like you’re breaking into your own house,” I say, voice low so I don’t wake Mason.
Her mouth twitches. “I’m breaking into my own life lately.”
That lands heavier than she means it to.
She shuts the fridge with her hip and leans against the counter, arms folding tight like she’s bracing for impact. “I didn’t know you were still up.”
“I wasn’t asleep.”
“Do you ever sleep?”
“Sometimes.”
She studies me in that dim kitchen light like she’s trying to figure out where the cracks are, and whether she can see herself in ’em.
“You and Bethany…” she starts, then trails off.
“Don’t,” I say, not sharp, just tired. “Ain’t worth your breath.”
Her cheeks go pink anyway, like she hates that she asked.
We stand there with the hum of the fridge filling the space between us, the kind of quiet that keeps a person honest whether they want to be or not.
“You okay down there?” I ask finally.
“It’s fine,” she says quick. “Lottie put a space heater in. Mason thinks it’s my secret clubhouse.”
“You ain’t supposed to be in a basement,” I mutter before I can stop myself.
She lifts her chin. “Where am I supposed to be, Oaks?”
I ain’t got an answer that don’t sound like ownership.
So, I change the subject, because I’m good at that when something matters too much. “Royal’s in a mood,” I say.
“That why you’re here.”
I nod.
She frowns. “Why?”
“He thinks one of the brothers wants Becki.”
Her eyes widen. “The prisoner?”
“Yeah.”
“Does he?”
“Probably not,” I say. “He’s pushing her buttons, seeing what she’ll give up. Royal thinks it’s something else.”
“Like what?”
“Like maybe he’s soft.”
She blinks. “Royal? Soft?”
I almost laugh. “That’s the problem. He ain’t.”
I lean back against the opposite counter, arms crossed, eyes on the window even though it’s just dark glass. “Legend’s women is back,” I add.
Her expression shifts. “The one who disappeared?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s good, right?”
“In this town?” I shake my head. “Nothin’s just good.”
She swallows like she’s trying not to think about what that means. “And the girls?” she asks quiet.
The way she says it tells me she’s been thinking about it too, laying awake in that basement, hearing every little sound.
“We think it’s Pearly Gates,” I say. “Not officially. But the pattern’s there.”
Her fingers tighten around the glass. “Elijah says that church ain’t what people think.”
“Elijah says a lota things.”
Her eyes flash. “We fought about you.”
There it is.
“Yeah?” I keep my voice level.
“He said I don’t belong in your world.” She exhales like it hurts. “And Bethany told him she’s been seeing you around me.”
My jaw sets. “You told him the truth?”
“That there ain’t nothing going on?” She laughs once, soft and bitter. “Yeah. I told him that.”
“And?”
“And he looked at me like he didn’t believe me.”
Something ugly moves under my ribs.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
She studies me like she didn’t expect that word out of my mouth.
“For what?”
“For the trouble,” I answer honest. “For you catching heat for something that ain’t real.”
Her mouth parts slightly.
I shouldn’t say the next thing.
I do anyway, because I’m tired and she’s right there and I can’t keep swallowing it. “Sometimes,” I murmur, “I wish it was.”
Her breath catches. “What?” she whispers.
“I wish we actually had something going on,” I say, voice rougher than I mean it to be. “Might make all this worth it.”
The kitchen goes still.
She blushes slow, color climbing her throat into her cheeks. It ain’t flirtation. It ain’t coy.
It’s real.
“Don’t,” she says soft. “Don’t say things like that.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m trying,” she answers, eyes shining in that dim light. “I’m trying to do this right.”
“With Elijah?”
She nods.
“You happy?” I ask, and I already know the answer ain’t what I want.
She hesitates just long enough to tell me everything. “I’m… safe.”
That ain’t the same thing.
I push off the counter before I say something I can’t take back. “You need anything,” I tell her, “you come upstairs. Don’t matter what time.”
She nods.
I head for the couch, then stop.
“Brit.”
She looks up.
“You ain’t crazy. If you feel watched, you probably are.”
Her face goes pale.
I don’t soften it. She deserves truth more than comfort.
In the morning, I’m gone before she comes upstairs again. I ride straight to the Lockup.
Weeks pass.
The air in Hell shifts. One more girl disappears. Then another. The whispers stop sounding like gossip and start sounding like warning bells.
We call church on a Sunday afternoon.
The back room of the Lockup is thick with smoke and tension.
Cuts hang heavy on shoulders. Boots scrape concrete.
Nobody jokes. Legend takes the head of the table.
Royal stands off to the side instead of sitting, and that’s how I know it’s bad.
He looks like a man holding himself together with wire, dark circles under his eyes, jaw locked tight enough to crack teeth.
“Talk,” Legend says.
Royal don’t hesitate. “My sister didn’t just reappear.”
The room goes dead quiet.
“Cider was at Pearly Gates with us,” he continues, talking about him and Legend who were adopted by the community there. “She’s been gone for years. Not missing. But out of reach, we thought. Now that we’re onto the Reverend. She’s back.”
Every muscle in my body tightens.
“She says Reverend Crowley’s been moving girls through safe houses,” Royal says. “Not all at once. One at a time.”
The word don’t need said. It’s in the air, anyway.
Derby swears under his breath. Whiskey slams his palm against the table hard enough to rattle the ashtray. Legend’s face goes stone.
“You sure?” Legend asks.
Royal nods once. “She named names.”
My mind flashes to Brittany in a basement bedroom with a space heater humming. To Elijah’s clean hands and careful eyes. To a church full of people who talk about salvation while girls vanish.
The room feels wired tight enough to explode.
Legend’s gaze sweeps across us. “This ain’t rumor anymore,” he says. “This is war.”
Royal’s hands are fists at his sides.
And all I can think is, if Pearly Gates is taking girls and Brittany’s standing at the center of their attention, then this just stopped being about temptation.
It just became about survival.