9. Avery
AVERY
Saint refused painkillers until I threatened him.
The club medic put stitches in his side. I stood beside the narrow infirmary bed with my arms folded and watched the needle pull his skin together.
“You’re enjoying this,” Saint said.
“Immensely.”
The medic glanced between us. “She always this bossy?”
“Worse.”
“Good. You need it.”
Saint muttered something about disloyalty in the ranks.
By the time the bandage was taped in place, the compound had settled into the strained quiet that followed violence.
Pike was dead. Slate was being held somewhere I didn’t ask about.
The men who had tried to take me were no longer an immediate threat.
The larger danger remained.
Somebody inside Gravewater had removed its president and hired strangers to start a war.
That belonged to the club, but tonight belonged to Saint and me.
Mace stopped us outside the infirmary.
“Need a word.”
Saint shifted in front of me. “Say it.”
Mace looked at me instead. “You sure about him?”
Saint’s body went hard. I put a hand on his arm to stop him from saying something he shouldn’t.
“Yes,” I replied.
Mace nodded. “You might be the VP, but you need to tell Rook before he hears it from one of the idiots who saw you two in the main room.”
“You’re included in that category,” Saint said.
“I’m the idiot warning you instead.”
“You keeping it to yourself?”
Mace’s expression turned serious. “Until morning. After that, protecting the club means Rook hears the truth. The rest of us idiots don’t want to deal with the fallout from it.”
I liked him for drawing the line. He wasn’t a friend dispensing perfect advice. He was the sergeant at arms protecting his president while giving Saint one night to do the right thing.
“Morning,” Saint agreed.
Mace started away, then looked back. “It’s the rally next week, by the way.”
“You leaving town?”
“End of the week.”
“Gravewater attending?”
“Likely.”
Saint’s jaw tightened. “Don’t start a war.”
“I think it might be a bit late for that.”
He walked toward the garage, carrying the first hint of another collision with him.
Saint walked me to my room out of habit.
I stopped at the door. “Yours?”
“You need sleep.”
“So do you.”
“I’m staying outside.”
“Pike is dead though.”
“There could be others. This isn’t the end.”
“The compound is locked, there are armed men at every gate, and my brother is twenty feet away. If someone gets through all that, a chair in the corridor won’t save me.”
His jaw tightened. I placed my hand over the bandage beneath his shirt. “Come to bed.”
Saint opened his door.
It was the first time I entered his room without hiding. He still checked the corridor before closing us in, but he didn’t lock the door immediately. We stood in the middle of the dark room listening to the compound breathe.
“Tomorrow,” he said. “I’ll tell Rook.”
I turned on the bedside lamp. “Do you still mean what you said in the truck?” I asked.
“I won’t leave you.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
He sat on the bed. “The patch matters. The club matters. You matter more.”
“I don’t want to be weighed against it.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
He reached for my hand but didn’t pull me closer.
“I’ve spent my whole life proving loyalty by what I could deny myself. Sleep. Peace. You. Giving up the patch felt like the same kind of proof.”
“Love isn’t punishment though.”
“I’m learning.”
“Slowly.” I sat beside him. “So tell me what you want when nobody is shooting at us.”
Saint looked toward the closed door as if the answer might be waiting outside it.
“You.”
“That is flattering and deliberately incomplete.”
“A house.”
The word surprised me.
“Whose?”
“Ours.”
“Near the compound?”
“Near enough to get here fast. Far enough that your brother can’t hear through the walls.”
I laughed. “Practical.”
His thumb moved over my palm. “Garage for my bike. A room with light for your work.”
He had pictured it. Not merely me in his bed or wearing his patch. Me working. Me choosing. An ordinary future built from details he’d dreamed of.
“And if I want to keep my house?”
“I reinforce the doors.”
“If I want to sell it?”
“We find another.”
“If I don’t want to move in with you yet?”
The question cost him. I saw the instinctive answer. Keep me close, keep me where he could reach me before he forced it to become something better.
“Then I get used to driving.”
“No sulking outside my door?”
“No promises.”
“Saint!” I playfully tapped his chest.
“Fine. Limited sulking.”
I leaned my shoulder into his.
“You don’t get to call from the compound and expect me to abandon a client because club business made you lonely.”
“I’ll come bother you in person.”
“Excellent. And you?” I asked. “What do you keep that’s yours?”
“The garage.”
“Absolutely not. I’ll need storage.”
His mouth finally curved. “You negotiating square footage while I’m trying to get you naked?”
“This is how lasting relationships are built.”
“Thought it was trust.”
“Trust and adequate electrical outlets.”
He pulled me between his knees.
“Anything else?”
“Yes.” I touched the VP patch on his cut. “That stays yours unless the club takes it for what you did. You don’t throw it away to make me responsible for saving you.”
His expression sobered. “Understood.”
“Say what you want now.”
His hands settled at my waist.
“You. The patch. The house. All of it.”
“Good.”
“You gonna be a pain in my ass about everything?”
“For the rest of your life.” I smiled.
The corner of his mouth lifted, then fell as a serious thought took hold.
“I love you.”
This confession was nothing like the one that slipped out in the shower. Saint gave me the words fully clothed, sober and with no danger left to make them urgent.
“I loved you when you came home from college and told Rook his clubhouse looked like a prison cafeteria. I loved you when you dated that accountant and I had to pretend I didn’t care. I loved you every time you looked at me like you knew I was lying.”
My throat tightened.
“The promise didn’t stop any of it,” he said. “It only made me a coward about telling you.”
I stepped between his knees.
“I had a crush on you because you were my brother’s terrifying best friend.”
“Romantic.”
“You wore leather and hardly spoke. I was twenty-two. My standards were uncomplicated.” I touched the scar near his jaw. “But I love you because you listen when the answer hurts. Because you came when I called. Because you sat on my bedroom floor and let me be scared.”
His hands settled at my waist.
“Say it again.”
“I love you.”
He closed his eyes. For a man who carried violence easily, receiving tenderness looked almost unbearable. I kissed him. The kiss stayed soft until I climbed onto his lap. Saint groaned and caught my hips.
“Stitches.”
“I know.”
“You’re not riding me.”
“That sounded like a challenge.”
“Avery.”
I pushed him gently back against the pillows. “You’ve been in control every time.”
“You were in control in the shower.”
“For thirty seconds.”
“Memorable thirty seconds.”
I pulled my shirt off. His argument ended.
Saint watched while I removed the rest of my clothes and stood naked between his knees.
“Your turn.”
He stripped carefully, protecting his side. When his jeans came off, his cock was already hard. I placed a hand on his chest and guided him onto his back. I straddled his thighs and wrapped my fingers around him.
“Still want to argue?”
“Depends what you’re offering.”
I leaned down and licked the head.
His hips lifted.
“Stay still.”
His eyes narrowed. “You’re enjoying this too much.”
“Immensely.”
I took him into my mouth, slowly this time.
No desk. No brother outside the door asking questions.
I could taste him and listen to every sound he made.
Saint’s hand moved into my hair but didn’t guide.
He let me choose. I worked my mouth down his length until my lips met my fist. His abdomen tightened beneath my palm.
“Avery.” My name came out rough. “Come up here.”
I released him. “Ask nicely.”
“Not a fucking chance.”
I smiled and took him again. He swore with impressive creativity.
When I finally crawled up his body, his control was shredded.
He caught the back of my neck and kissed me deeply, tasting himself on my tongue without hesitation.
His hand slid between my thighs. He stroked me until I was wet enough to take him easily, but he refused to rush.
One finger became two. His thumb circled my clit while he watched my face.
“I’m supposed to be in charge,” I reminded him.
“You are. Tell me to stop, then.”
I didn’t. He brought me close, then slowed.
“Asshole.”
“You wanted control. Take it.”
I rose over him and guided his cock to my entrance. Saint’s hands rested open on the sheets.
I lowered myself one inch at a time. He filled me with a thick stretch I felt in every nerve. When I reached the base, I sat still and adjusted around him.
“Hands,” I said.
His palms covered my thighs.
“Where I put them.”
I moved one to my breast. The other I guided between my legs.
“Good?” he asked.
“Perfect.”
I began to ride. The position let me control the depth without pulling his stitches. I moved slowly at first, lifting until only the head remained inside me before sinking down again. Saint watched me. Not my breasts. Not where our bodies joined, but my face.
“What?” I asked.
“You’re mine.”
Possession heated my blood, but I held his gaze. “And?”
He understood. “I’m yours.”
“Better.”
His thumb found my clit. I leaned back, bracing one hand on his thigh, and moved faster. Pleasure built in widening circles. Saint’s jaw tightened as he fought the urge to thrust.
“You can move,” I said.
“Stitches.”
“Carefully.”
He planted his feet and met me with a measured lift of his hips.
The new angle struck deep.
I cried out.
He glanced toward the wall shared with the corridor.
“Quiet.”
“Old habits?”
“Your brother’s still out there.”
“Let him wonder.” Saint’s eyes darkened.
He sat up, one arm around my back, protecting his injured side. The movement drove him deeper. We held each other chest to chest while I rocked over him.
This wasn’t frantic like the first time or hidden beneath shower spray.
It was still dirty. Still hot enough to make coherent speech difficult.
But there was nowhere to hide emotionally.
“Tell me again,” he said.
“I love you.”
His mouth closed around my nipple.
I tightened on him.
“Again.”
“I love you.”
His fingers pressed harder over my clit.
The orgasm caught me suddenly. My body clenched around him in deep pulses. I buried my face in his neck, but he caught my jaw.
“Let me hear you.”
“Rook—”
“Let him fucking hear.”
I came with Saint’s name breaking from my mouth.
He rolled us carefully, putting me on my back without leaving my body. One hand cushioned my head. He thrust into me twice, three times, each stroke deep and controlled.
“Mine,” he said. His body locked. Heat spilled inside me as he came, forehead pressed to mine.
Afterward, he stayed over me without giving me his weight, though pain from the stitches made him wince.
Somewhere in the corridor, a door shut hard.
I started laughing. Saint dropped his face against my shoulder. “We’re dead.”
“Probably.”
“Worth it.”
“Definitely.”
He pulled me against his uninjured side beneath the covers. His cut remained visible on the chair.
Not surrendered. Not placed between us. It was part of the man I loved, no longer used as a weapon against himself.
For the first time since the attack, I slept without a locked door or Saint sitting guard outside it.
He slept beside me. I woke before dawn with his arm heavy across my waist. Saint slept like a man who expected trouble even in dreams. His breathing stayed shallow. One hand rested near the nightstand drawer where I knew he kept a gun.
I eased onto my side and traced the edge of the scar on his jaw.
His eyes opened.
His hand closed around my wrist before recognition entered them. He released me immediately.
“Sorry. It’s just instinct.”
“You didn’t hurt me.”
“Could have.”
“But you didn’t.”
He checked the clock. “Rook will be up.”
“Are you worried?”
“No.”
“Liar.”
“I’ve been shot at twice this week.”
“And?”
“This can’t be much worse.”
He touched the mark on my throat again. He had checked it so many times I’d lost count.
“Stop trying to make sure I’m okay.”
“Can’t.”
I caught his hand and placed it over my heartbeat.
“Then check here.”
His palm stayed.
We lay together while the compound woke around us, knowing that the next time we opened the door, secrecy ended.