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Dante snickered beside me.

“What the fuck is she talking about?” Danny grumbled.

“Melissa wants me to divorce you and marry her. Don’t worry, babe, she said I can keep you as a side piece.”

Amber barked out a laugh beside me as I smiled at Danny. The hairs on the back of my neck raised instantly when I heard the low growl behind me.

Looking at Dante, I winced. “Please tell me that’s my brother behind me.”

“’fraid not,Princess.” My eyes narrowed at the sarcastic glee in Dante’s tone.

Travis growled again, the sound immediately settling between my legs. My mind went back to the night we met and the way he growled and threatened the man who put his hands on me on the dance floor.

“What’d I tell you about playing with fire?”

My hands reached for the bar and in that second, I didn’t know if it was to spin me around to face the man behind me or brace me in place to prevent me from seeing the heat in his gaze. The choice was made for me when firm hands spun me around.

“Hi.”

“Get him, girl,” Dante whispered in my ear as I slid off the seat with Travis’ help. My eyes bugged out at my friend in a silent plea to save me from the growling man. Dante just laughed. When I looked past him at Danny, his eyes were focused in front of him, but the smirk on his face said he knew exactly what I was in for.

One look in Travis’ eyes and I knew what he had in mind. The raw hunger directed at me was enough to have me coming without even being touched. And if he got me alone and put his hands on me? It might just make it impossible to walk away from him when Danny and Dante went back to New York.

My hand in his, Travis all but dragged me from the room. I followed silently as we walked up the first flight of stairs, then the second to the third floor.

The only sound in the hallway was the squeak of the hinges as Travis opened his door, holding it for me to enter first. Letting go of my hand, he stood wordlessly while I grappled with the decision I had to make.

Stepping into that room right now meant accepting my fate. For ten years, I’d avoided bikers. At least, I thought I had. Knowing now that Zach had sent me numerous patients connected to the MCs was a bitter taste in my mouth.

Had my life ever really been my own? Had fate decided when I was born that this was to be my path, whether I wanted it or not? Could I trust this man, who waited patiently for me to decide if I wanted him, not to hurt me like every other biker in my life?

“There is no choice. The destination is inevitable. The only question is, how long will you fight fate?”

His words rang true.

A chance meeting in a filthy dive bar I never would have considered had it not been for the hard day at work. Receiving a call that a child I had testified for had been returned to his parents, only for the abuse that had been evident to continue, ending in his innocent life being cut short with a single blow.

I had needed an escape. Something to turn off the invasion of my every thought. Feelings of failure and inadequacy, of not being convincing enough to keep him safe from the abuse that he had suffered for years.

It had worked.

I had ignored every warning, every red flag that waved in my face when Travis caught my eye. Thinking only about him and the distraction he could provide in that moment.

Until I saw his bike. And I ran.

Only to find myself once again in the path of the man I couldn’t forget when I was given the responsibility of another child’s safety and well-being. Peering through the door, I knew what waited for me.

For the past two nights, I had slept in this man’s arms. I had experienced my own sense of safety and well-being wrapped in the cocoon of the one man I hadn’t been able to forget.

Fate was a cruel bitch. I wanted to believe the choice was mine. That I could decide to walk away. That I could control the trajectory of my path.

I was a fool.

Fight or flight. The answer was the same. I could fight against the attraction I had with this man, only to eventually be worn down and succumb to the passion that burned between us.

Or I could run away like I had before. Knowing that staying in Dani’s life meant being on the outskirts of the MC. Over and over our paths would cross until we burned the world down around us.

There was only one clear choice.