Chapter 20
The compound had never felt so alive.
Music poured from speakers someone had hauled into the courtyard. Grills smoked with enough meat to feed an army. Brothers moved through the crowd with beers in hand and grins on their faces, the weight of the Messer operation finally lifted from their territory.
And Ivy stood at the center of it all, Mae on her hip, being embraced as family.
"You did good." Rachel appeared at her elbow, pressing a cold drink into her free hand. "The intel you provided—half those families would still be under Messer's thumb without it."
"I just told them what I knew."
"You told them what mattered." Rachel's expression was warm. "That's what old ladies do. We see things the brothers miss, notice patterns they're too close to catch. You've got the instincts for this life."
Old lady.
The phrase still felt foreign, but less so than it had a week ago. Less so than it had that first night in the compound, when she'd been too terrified to think past the next hour.
"Is it always like this?" Ivy gestured at the celebration around them. "After a... after something big?"
"Not always. But when the club takes down someone who's been hurting people for years—someone who targeted families like ours—yeah." Rachel's smile carried an edge. "We celebrate. Because the work matters, and the wins deserve acknowledgment."
Beth joined them, Tyler trailing behind with Diana and Mae's attention immediately captured by whatever game the older boy was proposing.
"Go play, baby," Ivy said, setting Mae down. "Stay where I can see you."
"Okay, Mama!" Mae was gone before the words finished, absorbed into the cluster of compound children with the ease of someone who'd found her tribe.
Beth watched her go with a soft expression. "She's adjusting well."
"Better than I expected." Ivy's throat tightened. "A month ago, she was having nightmares every night. Watching the door like she expected monsters to walk through it. Now she's..."
"Home." Beth finished the sentence with quiet certainty. "She found her home. So did you."
Before Ivy could respond, the music cut off.
Reaper's voice carried across the courtyard, commanding attention without raising volume. "Brothers. Old ladies. Family. Gather around. We've got business before we get too drunk to handle it."
The crowd shifted, forming a loose semicircle around the area that had been cleared in front of the main building. Ivy let herself be guided to a spot near the front, Beth on one side and Rachel on the other.
She saw Splinter standing near Reaper, his expression carefully neutral but his eyes—those eyes found hers across the crowd and held.
This is it, she realized. The patch vote.
"Seven months ago," Reaper began, his voice carrying easily, "a prospect walked through our gates. Quiet. Kept to himself. Did the work without complaint and never asked for more than he'd earned."
Ivy felt her heart hammering against her ribs.
"In those seven months, he's proven himself in ways that matter. Stood against men who threatened our territory. Protected a woman and child who had no one else to turn to. Killed when killing was required and showed mercy when mercy was earned."
Splinter stood perfectly still, but she could see the tension in his shoulders, the careful way he held himself like he was afraid to hope.
"Church voted this morning." Reaper reached into his cut and withdrew something that caught the afternoon light—a patch, the full Reaper colors that marked a man as family. "Unanimous. Splinter's earned his place at this table."
The cheer that went up from the brothers was deafening.
Ivy watched, tears streaming down her face, as Splinter knelt before Reaper. The president placed the patch against his chest with a solemnity that spoke to years of tradition.
"Rise as a brother," Reaper said. "Mountain Reaper, full member. Whatever comes, we ride together."
Splinter rose.
And then Mae was there—breaking free from the cluster of children, running across the cleared space with the single-minded determination only five-year-olds possessed. She stopped in front of Splinter, head tilted back to look up at him, expression deadly serious.
"Are you a knight now?"
The laughter that rippled through the crowd was warm, affectionate. Splinter crouched to Mae's level, the patch clutched in his hands.
"Something like that."
"Knights protect people."
"Yeah. They do."
"Are you gonna protect me and Mama?"
"Every day." His voice was rough. "For as long as I live."
Mae considered this with the gravity of a small philosopher. Then she nodded once, apparently satisfied, and threw her arms around his neck.
Splinter caught her, held her, and when he looked up at Ivy across the crowd, his expression said everything words couldn't.
Yours. Both of you. Forever.
The celebration continued around them, but Ivy barely noticed.
She'd retreated to a quieter corner of the courtyard, needing a moment to process everything—the patch ceremony, the way the brothers had welcomed Splinter as one of their own, the look on his face when Mae called him a knight.
He found her there, Mae still perched on his hip, the patch now sewn onto his cut where it belonged.
"Hey."
"Hey yourself." Ivy reached out, traced the edge of the patch with her fingertips. "Looks good on you."
"Feels good." He shifted Mae's weight, and the little girl yawned against his shoulder. "Feels like something I've been working toward my whole life without knowing what to call it."
"Belonging?"
"Family." He caught her hand, pressed it flat against his chest where his heart beat steady and strong. "You. Mae. The brothers. All of it."
Ivy's eyes stung. "Splinter—"
"I want to make it official." His voice dropped, low and intense, meant only for her. "The claiming. You and me, in front of everyone who matters. I want the world to know you're mine and I'm yours and nothing's ever going to change that."
"Are you asking me—"
"I'm asking you to be my old lady." He pulled her closer, Mae nestled between them like a bridge connecting their hearts.
"Officially. Permanently. With all the rights and protections that comes with.
I'm asking you to wear my patch and carry my name and build a life with me that looks nothing like either of us expected but everything like what we both deserve. "
Ivy's heart felt too big for her chest. "I already said yes once."
"Say it again." His eyes burned into hers. "Say it where I can hear it. Where Mae can hear it. Where it becomes real and permanent and ours."
"Yes." The word came out strong, certain, everything she felt condensed into a single syllable. "Yes, I'll be your old lady. Yes, I'll wear your patch. Yes, I'll build a life with you and fight beside you and love you until neither of us can remember what lonely felt like."
Splinter's breath caught. "Ivy—"
"Yes." She kissed him, soft and fierce and full of promise. "Yes to all of it. Yes forever."
Mae stirred between them, lifting her head with the bleary confusion of a child who'd almost fallen asleep and was now discovering something important happening.
"Mama? Are you crying?"
"Happy tears, baby." Ivy wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand. "The best kind."
Mae looked between them—at Ivy's tear-streaked face, at Splinter's expression of barely contained joy, at the way they were holding each other like nothing could tear them apart.
"Does this mean Splinter's gonna be my daddy now?"
The question hung in the air.
Ivy's throat closed. She looked at Splinter, saw the same overwhelming emotion reflected in his eyes—the magnitude of what Mae was asking, what it would mean to say yes.
"That's up to you, little one." Splinter's voice was rough, cracked. "If you want me to be. I can't replace anyone—wouldn't try. But I can be here. Every day. For as long as you'll have me."
Mae's brow furrowed with concentration. "Would you read me stories?"
"Every night."
"Would you make me more animals?"
"As many as you want."
"Would you stay forever and not leave like other daddies do?"
The words hit like a physical blow. Ivy saw Splinter flinch, saw the pain flash across his face at the casual mention of abandonment that had shaped her daughter's entire understanding of fathers.
"I'm not going anywhere." His voice was fierce now, a vow rather than a promise. "Not ever. You're stuck with me, Mae. You and your mama both."
Mae studied his face with the unnerving intensity only children could muster. Whatever she saw there must have satisfied her, because she nodded once—decisive, final.
"Okay. You can be my daddy."
She said it like she was granting permission rather than receiving a gift. Like the choice was hers to make and she'd made it.
Splinter gathered her closer, pressing his face into her hair, and Ivy saw his shoulders shake with emotion he couldn't quite contain.
"Okay," he whispered. "I'll be your daddy. Thank you for letting me."
"You're welcome." Mae patted his cheek with a small hand. "Can I have ice cream now?"
The laugh that escaped Splinter was wet, overwhelmed, the most genuine sound Ivy had ever heard from him.
"Yeah, little one. You can have ice cream."
He looked at Ivy over Mae's head, and everything they'd been through—every threat, every fear, every moment of wondering if this would work—condensed into a single shared look.
We made it. We're here. We're family.
Ivy reached out and took his hand.
"Let's get our daughter some ice cream."
Our daughter.
The words felt like coming home.