3. Lucy
LUCY
It’s Monday morning. I leave the wedding ring on the bathroom counter, but by the time I’ve finished my coffee, it’s back on my finger.
The rhinestone catches on my blouse and taps against my phone when I answer one work email.
I tell myself I kept it because I’m driving to the compound to discuss the marriage, and appearing without the ring would make a statement I am not ready to make.
The explanation is so weak that I can’t pretend otherwise.
I barely managed to sleep after Wilder left me against the wall with my mouth swollen and my body aching for more.
Monday was supposed to be the first of two quiet days before I return to work.
Instead, I drive beyond Ransom toward the Kingdom Come gates, rehearsing an adult conversation with a man who can wreck my composure in one look.
The compound lies where the road narrows between thick oak and hickory. A high steel fence surrounds the property. Cameras turn above the gate, and a prospect steps from the guard shack before my car reaches the painted line.
Motorcycles stand beyond him in two ordered rows. Men in black cuts move between a long garage and the low clubhouse. An engine roars inside an open bay, vibrating through the buildings.
I lower the window.
“Who are you here for?”
“Wilder.”
“Is he expecting you?”
“Not really.”
The prospect waits. He isn’t opening the gate without more.
I glance at the ring on my hand. “Tell him his wife is here.”
His eyes drop to the rhinestone, then return to my face. “His wife?”
“That’s what I said.”
He presses the radio at his shoulder. “Wilder, front gate.” Static crackles.
“What?”
“Got Lucy Dawson here. Says she’s your…wife?”
After a pause, Wilder answers, “She is. Let her through.” The steel gate begins to move.
The prospect points toward the clubhouse, still looking as though the morning has become far more interesting than expected. I drive in beneath the club insignia welded across the gate.
Men look up as I drive in. One stands near the garage, broad and motionless beside a workbench. Another speaks into a phone on the clubhouse steps. Two brothers carry a long wooden crate through the open garage bay, where a pair of steel boxes sit on a pallet.
An older man with a heavy gray beard notices my ring.
“Road Captain get married?”
The man on the steps lowers his phone and looks at my hand. “Looks that way.”
Another older brother turns from the engine he is working on, his long hair tied at the back of his neck. His attention moves from me to Wilder, who is crossing the yard.
“Club hears it from the front gate before it hears it from you?”
Wilder doesn’t slow. “I found out around the same time she did.”
The bearded man laughs. “I don’t think I want to know.” The other turns back to the engine, clearly unimpressed.
Wilder reaches my car.
Here, he wears his cut over a black T-shirt with a ROAD CAPTAIN patch on the front. The band from the chapel remains on his left hand.
He closes my car door for me. “Morning.”
“You could have warned them.”
“And you could have called.”
“You’d have met me outside.”
“Yeah.”
“I wanted to see it properly before I decided whether I wanted to come in.”
His attention sharpens. He closes his hand around mine and draws me away from the car.
The yard smells of fuel, hot metal and damp woods. Wilder greets one brother with a touch to the shoulder and tells a prospect to replace a worn tire on a waiting bike while walking me toward the clubhouse. Nobody questions him. Men older than he is listen and move.
A pair of motorcycles rolls through the gate behind us.
Wilder steps aside without looking, placing me on the protected side of his body as the riders pass.
It is a small movement, automatic enough that he probably doesn’t even know he did it.
One of the riders touches two fingers to his brow.
Wilder answers with a nod and keeps walking.
At Nora’s wedding, he was the dangerous man in a suit.
Here, I see the responsibility threaded through it.
His attention never settles in one place.
Gate. Garage. Men. Me. He carries the whole compound at once, and everybody around him trusts that he will notice what they miss.
Somehow, his competence and authority affect me in a way I didn’t expect.
The common room has a long bar, scarred tables and the Kingdom Come insignia painted across the far wall. Old photographs line one side. The place is rough, but clean and watchful.
“We can talk here,” I say.
“Not here.”
“Why not?”
“Because half the club is pretending not to listen.”
I glance around the room and see how unsubtle some of the guys are. “Fair.”
Wilder leads me down a corridor to his room. A wide bed fills most of it. Boots sit beside a narrow dresser. A map of southern Missouri covers one wall, marked with black pins and inked routes. His gun belt lies on a chair within reach of the bed.
He closes the door behind us and his gaze drops to my hand. “Thought that might be gone.”
“I didn’t have time,” I lie.
“Takes about three seconds.”
“I had a difficult morning.”
“Thinking about last night?”
The memory returns in a rush. His mouth. His hand at my ass. The hard length of him between my thighs. “Among other things.”
He steps closer. “How many of them involved me?”
“Most,” I admit.
“Good.”
My pulse trips. Why does he always manage to do this to me? “Waking up married has changed nothing for you?”
“It changed plenty.” His gaze makes the answer physical.
I move toward the wall map because distance gives me a better chance of speaking coherently.
“Vegas involved too much alcohol and terrible judgment.”
“You knew you were marrying me, though.”
“Yes, but…”
“You knew you wanted me.”
“That was never the confusing part,” I confess.
Wilder leans against the closed door. “Then what is?”
“You. This place. The fact that Nora is my best friend and you are not a man I could sleep with once, regret quietly and avoid at Christmas.”
“Good thing I wasn’t offering only once.” The blunt certainty catches me.
“You spent six years acting as if every filthy comment meant nothing.”
“No. You have that wrong. It meant everything. I liked watching you react.”
“That is a terrible defense.”
“Good thing I wasn’t defending it.”
“You knew.”
“Yeah.”
“And you kept doing it anyway.”
“A look. A few words. I never crossed the line.”
“Because of Nora.”
“Same reason you didn’t.”
The answer strips away the easy version of our history. Wilder didn’t stay away because he felt nothing. He stayed away for the same reason I did.
“Did you think I’d make you choose between us?” I ask.
“No. I thought if I touched you and it went wrong, she would forgive me before I forgave myself.” The honesty is quieter than anything filthy he has ever said to me. It makes the room feel smaller.
“And if it didn’t go wrong?”
His gaze drops to my mouth. “That was the dangerous part.”
“We were drunk,” I say, though it no longer sounds like an argument.
He pushes away from the door. “We’re not now, though.”
Each step brings him closer until the backs of my knees touch the bed.
“Last night has gaps,” he says. “But this time won’t.”
I catch the front of his cut and pull him down. Our mouths meet hard.
Wilder catches my hips and turns us, driving me back against the wall beside the map. One thigh presses between mine and pleasure flashes at the contact.
“You came here to talk,” he says against my throat.
“Suddenly, I’ve changed my mind. Don’t make me regret it.”
His teeth graze the place where my neck meets my shoulder. “Not a chance.”
He kisses me until the thought breaks apart. His hands move beneath my blouse, palms dragging over my waist and ribs before closing around my breasts through the lace.
I arch into him. “Still blaming tequila?” he asks.
“Shut up.”
He opens my blouse. One button snaps free and strikes the floor.
“You owe me a button.” I laugh against his mouth.
“I’ll buy the whole shirt,” he says, barely taking his mouth off mine.
Then my bra is gone and his mouth closes around one nipple.
The first pull sends heat straight between my legs.
I hold his head against me while his tongue circles and his teeth add just enough pressure to make me gasp.
His hand covers the other breast, thumb moving in time with his mouth until every nerve feels tuned to him.
He switches sides without hurry, watching my face as he takes the second nipple between his lips. I have imagined this man losing control with me for years. I never imagined the patience. The way he learns what makes my breath hitch and repeats it until my knees weaken.
“Bed,” I say.
“Too far.”
He lifts me.
My skirt rides to my waist as I wrap my legs around him. He pins me against the wall, the map rattling behind my shoulders, and reaches beneath the hem.
His fingers find wet lace.
“Fuck, Lucy.”
He pushes the fabric aside. The first stroke over my clit makes my hips jerk. The next is harder. Two fingers slide inside me while his thumb keeps circling.
I cry out before trying to quiet myself.
“It’s okay,” he murmurs. “Concrete walls.”
“Then nobody can hear me.”
His eyes darken. He curls his fingers and proves me wrong about how much sound I can make.
I cling to his shoulders, suspended between his body and the wall while he works me closer. His cut brushes my bare skin. The restraint in his face is almost gone.
“I want you inside me.”
He lowers me long enough for us to strip the rest of our clothes away. His belt hits the floor. I open his jeans and free him, thick and hard in my hand.
A flash of the hotel returns. Wilder above me. My knees high against his sides. His control breaking when I tightened around him. I stroke him once and his jaw locks.
Heat streaks through me. He lifts me again. I guide him between my legs, the broad head pressing against my entrance.
Wilder looks at me. “Tell me what you want.”
I hold his gaze. “My husband. Against this wall.” The word breaks the last of his control.
He drives inside and the stretch steals my breath. He fills me in one deep thrust, then holds still while my body adjusts around him.
He pulls almost free and drives back in. The map knocks against the wall, and a pin drops near his boot. Wilder takes me hard, one arm locked beneath my ass and the other braced above my shoulder. I meet every thrust, dragging him closer when he tries to give me space.
The wall presses cool against my back while his body burns everywhere else. He shifts his hold beneath me, opening my thighs wider, and the next drive lands so deep I lose the shape of his name halfway through saying it.
His mouth moves over my throat. His jeans scrape the backs of my thighs. The hot, relentless drag of him inside me wipes away everything except this room and the man who has spent years pretending he could leave me alone.
“All those men,” he says against my skin.
“Jealous?”
His next thrust is harder. “Of every single fucking one.”
“You could have said something.”
“I’m telling you now.”
He changes the angle. Pleasure strikes deep enough to tear a cry from me.
“There?”
“Oh God, yes. Again.”
He gives it to me until pressure gathers fast and fierce. One hand moves between us, his thumb finding my clit.
“Come for me.”
My body locks around him. I come with my mouth against his, pleasure tearing through me in hard waves while he keeps driving. His rhythm breaks. A rough curse leaves him as he thrusts deep and comes inside me.
For a moment, neither of us moves. Then Wilder carries me to the bed and sits with me across his lap, still holding me close. His palm moves over my back in slow passes while the last tremors leave my body.
I rest my face against his neck and listen to our breathing settle. Sweat cools along my skin. The wall map now hangs crooked beside us, one black pin still on the floor beneath it.
“You all right?” he asks.
“Very much so.”
His mouth touches my temple. It is the first gentle thing he has done since I entered the room, and somehow it unsettles me more than the hard sex against the wall. Desire is easy to understand. Care asks what happens after, and nothing about wanting him is unclear now.
“We still need to talk about the fact that we’re married,” I say.
“Yeah, I guess so.”
“Do you want an annulment?”
His arms tighten once around me. “No. I don’t.”
The answer comes too fast to be anything but true.
“You never considered it?”
“I only considered whether you would ask for one.”
I search his face for panic, regret or the careless arrogance of a man who thinks a legal tie gives him possession. I find none of them. Wilder looks as if the marriage is a fact he intends to understand rather than escape.
“Then what do you want?” I ask.
Wilder’s phone vibrates on the dresser before he can answer.
He reaches for it, and the change in him is immediate. His expression hardens, every trace of heat disappearing behind the focus I saw in the yard.
I sit up. “What is it?”
He doesn’t answer. I shift closer and read over his shoulder.
NEW WIFE. WOODEN RIFLE CRATES. TWO STEEL CASH BOXES. MIDNIGHT.
Beneath the message is a photograph of my car passing through the Kingdom Come gate.
Cold moves across my skin. Somebody watched me arrive. They saw the ring, heard what I told the prospect and sent the message within hours.
“They know about me.”
Wilder studies the photograph, enlarging the edge of the frame before checking the number. Then he forwards the message.
“Kane?” I ask.
“Yeah.”
He’s already reaching for his jeans when a hard knock lands against the door.
“Church,” Judge calls from the corridor. “Now.”
Wilder stands and pulls on his clothes with controlled speed. The man who held me against this wall disappears beneath the Road Captain his brothers follow.
I gather his shirt around me. “Because I’m your wife.”
His attention returns to me.
“They think that makes you leverage.”
“Does it?”
He fastens his weapon at his hip, then crosses the room and takes my face between both hands.
“It makes you mine to protect.”
The words should feel possessive. Instead, the care in his grip makes the threat outside the room feel suddenly real.
“Stay here,” he says.
“Wilder—”
“Inside the compound. Until I know where this came from.”
He presses one hard kiss to my mouth, reaches for his cut and opens the door.
Judge waits in the corridor. Wilder steps out beside him without looking back.
The door closes, leaving me in his bed, wearing his shirt and the cheap ring that has just put a price on my head.