Chapter 10
The compound smelled like charcoal and summer.
Mandy stood at the kitchen window, watching the courtyard transform into something that looked almost normal.
Folding tables covered in checkered cloths.
A massive grill sending smoke signals into the blue sky.
Kids running between adults' legs while music drifted from speakers someone had rigged up near the garage.
A week ago, she'd been hiding in her cousin's apartment, convinced she was going to die.
Now she was making potato salad for a motorcycle club cookout.
Life was strange.
"You going to stir that, or just stare at it?"
Mandy blinked and looked down at the bowl in her hands. She'd been holding the spoon motionless for God knew how long, lost in thought.
"Sorry." She started mixing again. "Got distracted."
Kate hip-checked her gently as she passed, arms full of burger buns. "Thinking about anyone in particular? Tall, restless, can't stop staring at you from across the courtyard?"
Heat flooded Mandy's cheeks. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Sure you don't." Kate's grin was wicked. "That's why you've been blushing every time he walks by for three days."
Three days since the supply closet. Three days since that kiss had turned her world inside out. They hadn't talked about it—hadn't done anything about it—but the tension between them had become a living thing. Every accidental touch felt like lightning. Every shared look lasted too long.
She was going to combust if something didn't give soon.
"Leave her alone." Grace appeared with a stack of plates, her smile knowing. "We all remember what those early days feel like."
"Early days of what?" Mandy asked, even though she knew the answer.
"Of falling." Grace set down the plates and started arranging them. "That stage where you're not sure what's happening, but you can't stop thinking about him. Can't stop wanting to be near him. Can't stop wondering what it would be like to just... let go."
Mandy's hands tightened on the bowl. "It's complicated."
"It's always complicated." Grace's voice was gentle. "These men live complicated lives. We build complicated lives around them. But that doesn't mean it's not worth it."
Through the window, Mandy could see Riot helping Powder set up the basketball hoop in the far corner of the courtyard. He was laughing at something—head thrown back, whole body involved in it—and the sight made her chest ache in ways she didn't fully understand.
"How do you do it?" she asked quietly. "Build a life with someone who might not come home one day?"
Grace was quiet for a moment. Then: "You love them anyway. And you make every day count, because you know tomorrow isn't guaranteed." She touched Mandy's shoulder. "That's true for everyone, really. We just can't pretend otherwise."
Before Mandy could respond, Rachel swept into the kitchen with a cooler full of drinks. "Enough philosophy. The boys are getting hungry, and if we don't feed them soon, they're going to start eating each other."
The next hour was a blur of activity—carrying food to the tables, filling cups, making sure kids had plates before they vibrated out of their skin with hunger.
The compound had transformed into something that looked like any backyard barbecue in America.
Families laughing. Friends catching up. The smell of grilled meat and the sound of terrible music mixing together into something that felt like home.
Mandy moved through it with wonder in her chest. These were outlaws. Dangerous men who solved problems with violence. And here they were, flipping burgers and playing cornhole and chasing toddlers across the grass.
"Weird, isn't it?"
She turned to find Nicole beside her, plate in hand, watching the scene with the same bemused expression Mandy felt on her own face.
"What?"
"Seeing them like this." Nicole nodded toward the basketball court, where a game had started up—shirts versus skins, brothers trash-talking and shoving each other with casual violence. "They're so normal. Until they're not."
"Does that ever bother you? The... not normal parts?"
Nicole shrugged. "Powder blew up a guy's boat last month because the guy threatened a friend of the club.
Came home covered in soot, kissed me hello, and asked what was for dinner.
" Her smile was fond. "You get used to it.
The violence is part of who they are—can't love them without loving that too. "
Mandy watched the basketball game, searching for Riot among the chaos of bodies. He was easy to find—always moving, bouncing on his toes even when he wasn't directly involved in the play. All that restless energy channeled into competition.
Then he made a steal—darting in, snatching the ball, driving toward the hoop with an intensity that made the other players scramble to catch up. He moved like a fighter, she realized. Every motion economical, every step with purpose. Even in a game, he was dangerous.
He made the shot, landing with a grin that lit up his whole face. And then, like he could feel her watching, his eyes cut across the courtyard and found hers.
The grin softened into something else. Something private. Something that made her stomach flip and her skin feel too tight.
Three days. Three days of tension and wanting and not doing anything about it.
How was she supposed to survive this man?
The sun set in stripes of orange and pink, and the cookout shifted into something quieter. Kids were carried off to bed. Couples drifted toward corners for private conversations. Someone turned the music down, and the crackle of the firepit became the dominant sound.
Mandy found a seat on one of the benches surrounding the flames, a beer she didn't really want warming in her hands.
The day had exhausted her in the best way—all that normal activity, all those normal conversations, like she was just another woman at a family gathering instead of someone hiding from professional killers.
She'd almost forgotten what normal felt like.
"This seat taken?"
Riot's voice sent warmth flooding through her. She looked up to find him standing beside the bench, freshly showered from the basketball game, damp hair curling at his temples.
"All yours."
He sat close. Closer than necessary. Close enough that their shoulders pressed together and his thigh aligned with hers, the heat of him seeping through her clothes.
Neither of them moved away.
"Good day?" he asked.
"Surprisingly good." Mandy stared into the flames, too aware of everywhere they were touching. "I didn't expect... this. The families, the normal stuff. It's not what I pictured when I thought about motorcycle clubs."
"What did you picture?"
"I don't know. Fights and orgies and illegal activity twenty-four seven." She glanced at him sideways. "Not potato salad and basketball."
Riot laughed—that full-body sound that made her want to bottle it and keep it forever. "We do plenty of fights and illegal activity. But the club's also a family. Brothers, their women, kids growing up together. It's not just about the violence."
"What's it about for you?"
He was quiet for a moment, his shoulder shifting against hers.
"Purpose," he said finally. "Before the Sons, I was just..
. chaos. Fighting because I couldn't stop, hurting people because I didn't know what else to do with the noise in my head.
The club gave me somewhere to point all that. Something worth fighting for."
"And now?"
His head turned. She could feel his gaze on her profile, hot and intent.
"Now I have something else worth fighting for."
Mandy's breath caught. She made herself look at him, even though meeting his eyes felt like staring into the sun.
"Riot..."
"I know." His voice was low, rough. "It's too fast. Too complicated. You're still dealing with Trevor and the crew and everything that happened. I shouldn't be—"
"You should." The words escaped before she could stop them. "You absolutely should."
His eyes darkened. "Mandy."
"I'm tired of should and shouldn't." She turned toward him on the bench, their knees bumping.
"I spent three weeks being scared. Spent my whole life being careful, being practical, being the girl who didn't take risks because the foster system taught her that risks got you hurt.
" Her hand found his in the space between them.
"And then you walked into my life and started burning everything down for me, and I don't want to be careful anymore. "
"You understand what you're saying?" His fingers curled around hers, grip tight enough to anchor. "I'm not a safe bet. I'm not stable. I've got violence in me that doesn't always listen to reason."
"I know."
"I won't be able to let you go. Once this starts—really starts—that's it. You're mine. I don't do halfway."
"I know that too." She squeezed his hand. "Maybe I don't want halfway either."
The fire crackled between them and the night wrapped around them like a blanket. Somewhere in the compound, someone laughed. A bottle clinked. Normal sounds from a life she was starting to imagine for herself.
Riot lifted their joined hands and pressed a kiss to her knuckles—soft, almost reverent, at odds with everything dangerous in him.
"After," he said against her skin. "After Trevor's dead and you're safe and there's nothing hanging over us. We do this right."
"And until then?"
His smile was crooked, warm, devastating. "Until then, I stay close. Keep you safe. Drive you crazy with wanting." He lowered their hands but didn't let go. "Think you can handle that?"
"I think you're going to be insufferable."
"Probably." He shifted closer, shoulder to shoulder again, thigh to thigh. "But you like me anyway."
She did. God help her, she did.
They sat together in the firelight, watching sparks drift up toward stars that were just starting to appear. His thumb traced circles on the back of her hand—slow, hypnotic, somehow more intimate than the desperate kiss in the supply closet.
And somewhere in the quiet, surrounded by the family he'd found and the life he'd built, Mandy felt something shift inside her chest.
She wasn't just staying for safety. She wasn't just hiding from Trevor's crew, counting down the days until she could rebuild her old life.
She was staying for him.
For the man beside her with chaos in his veins and gentleness in his touch. For the promise of something she'd never let herself want before. For the terrifying, exhilarating possibility of not being alone anymore.
The realization settled into her bones like warmth from the fire, and Mandy let herself lean into Riot's shoulder.
He pressed a kiss to her hair without saying anything.
He didn't need to. They both understood.
Whatever came next, they'd face it together.