Page 13

Chapter Thirteen

Crow

P ain tears through me like white-hot metal. Broken ribs. Bullet holes. All of it nothing compared to the gut-punch of seeing Ryker's blade pressed against Maya's dress, those damn sequins catching the light while her eyes caught mine.

I drift between consciousness and darkness, fragments of the warehouse playing behind my eyelids. Maya's voice cutting through the chaos. The expression on Quinn's face when I refused to stay down. Granite's unexpected intervention. The bullets tearing into my flesh.

Maya's hands are on me now, gentle yet firm as she digs for the bullet in my shoulder. The sting of antiseptic. Her quiet instructions to someone helping her. The clubhouse reeks of blood, overlayed with her vanilla and wildflower.

"Hold him down," she instructs, her doctor voice steady despite everything. "This is going to hurt."

Hands press against my chest and legs—too many to count. My brothers holding me still while she works. The pain spikes as she probes deeper, and I fight the roar building in my chest.

"Got it," she says.

Metal clinks against a bowl. The bullet. Evidence of how close I came to losing everything.

I force my eyes open to find her leaning over me, surgical mask hiding half her face, but not the exhaustion in her eyes. Blood—my blood—spatters the evening gown that clings to her body. The sequins catch firelight, transformed from elegant to battle-worn. She's never looked more beautiful.

"Hey," I rasp, my voice like gravel through a wood chipper.

Her eyes snap to mine, widening. "You're awake."

"Hard to sleep with someone digging around in my insides."

A small smile curves her lips beneath the mask. "I gave you enough sedative to put down a horse. But I suppose orcs metabolize differently."

"We're stubborn that way."

She turns away, dropping the bullet and forceps into a metal bowl with a clatter. I catch her wrist before she can step back, my fingers smearing blood across her skin.

"You came for me," I say, the words inadequate for what burns in my chest.

"Of course I did." She peels off her gloves and tosses them aside. "You'd have done the same."

"Without hesitation."

"Then we understand each other."

The room tilts, darkness creeping into my vision like oil spilling across water. I fight it, needing to say more, but my body betrays me. The last thing I see is Maya's face, mask pulled down, lips forming words I can't hear as I slip under again.

When consciousness returns, the pain has dulled to a persistent throb, like some bastard's using my insides for a punching bag. Nighttime shadows fill the clubhouse room, broken only by a small lamp in the corner. Maya sleeps awkwardly in a chair beside my bed, her ruined gown exchanged for what looks like borrowed sweats and a t-shirt several sizes too big. Her face is slack with exhaustion, dark circles beneath her eyes stark against her skin.

She saved me. Not just my life, but something more vital, the part of me I thought died in the camps.

The door opens with a soft click. Ash enters, carrying a tray of food, his movements silent despite his size. His eyes find mine in the dimness, widening slightly before his expression settles into careful neutrality.

"Welcome back to the land of the living," he says, setting the tray on the nightstand.

"Barely," I mutter, taking inventory of my injuries. Bandages wrap my shoulder and abdomen, both wounds throbbing in time with my heartbeat. "Quinn?"

Ash glances at Maya's sleeping form, then back at me. "Dead."

"Granite?"

"In the wind. The kid realized Quinn set him up to be the executioner. Turns out orcs don't appreciate being used as weapons against their own kind." Ash's mouth quirks. "Took Quinn out before disappearing. Smart move.He's got enemies on both sides now."

Relief washes through me. "Maya's safe then."

"For now. We've got brothers watching just in case, but without Quinn..." Ash shrugs. "The threat's gone. Permanently. Hammer's putting out feelers to help the kid find somewhere to start fresh. Young blood like that shouldn't go to waste."

I close my eyes, letting the knowledge settle into my bones. For the first time since crossing the Rift, something like peace spreads through me. Maya is safe. Quinn can't use her against me again. We might actually have a chance.

"Did Diesel send a message?" I ask, remembering the sucker punch I delivered before leaving.

Ash snorts. "Said no hard feelings about you knocking him out. Didn't expect less and he's glad you finally pulled your fat head out of your ass."

A laugh escapes me, then turns into a groan as pain shoots through my abdomen. "Sounds like him."

"Idiot was ready to tear New York apart brick by brick looking for you." Ash nods toward Maya, respect clear in his expression. "Until she found us. Doc's got bigger balls than most of our brothers."

"Don't I know it." I look at Maya, something fierce and possessive burning in my chest at the sight of her in my t-shirt, surrounded by chrome and leather and the hard edges of my life.

"She hasn't left your side," Ash says, watching my reaction. "Not even to clean up. Had to force her to change out of that blood-soaked dress."

I grunt in acknowledgment, unable to form words around the swell of emotion threatening to choke me. Emotions were beaten out of us in the camps—weakness that gets you killed. But Maya dragged them back to the surface, forced me to feel things I'd buried beneath violence and anger.

"You got a second chance," Ash says, moving toward the door. "Don't waste it being a stubborn asshole."

He slips out as silently as he entered, leaving me alone with Maya and thoughts I've spent a lifetime running from.

I watch her sleep, memorizing every detail I'd almost lost forever. The slight furrow between her brows even in sleep, the way her hair falls across her face, the steady rhythm of her breathing. This woman had seen the worst of me and hadn't run. Had witnessed the beast in all its fury and still looked at me like I was something worth saving.

As if sensing my thoughts, her eyes flutter open. For a moment, she looks disoriented, then her gaze finds mine and sharpens instantly.

"How long have you been awake?" she asks, straightening in the chair and wincing at what must be stiff muscles.

"Not long."

She's on her feet immediately, doctor mode engaged as she checks the bandages on my shoulder, fingers probing gently around the wound. "Any dizziness? Nausea? Pain level on a scale of one to ten?"

"I've had worse."

"That's not a number." Her professional mask slips, and for a second I glimpse the fear she's been hiding. "Dammit, Crow, I need you to take this seriously. You nearly died."

I capture her hand as it moves to check my abdomen. "I know."

"Do you?" Her voice cracks slightly. "Because from where I'm standing, you seem determined to throw your life away at the first opportunity."

"Not anymore." The words scrape my throat, raw but honest.

She stills, studying my face like she's looking for signs of a lie. I let her search, keeping my expression open in a way I never have before.

"Why go to Quinn's alone? Why not tell Hammer? Tell someone?" The questions rush out of her.

"Because he had you." The answer is simple, stripped down to its barest truth. "He had pictures of you at the bungalow. Watching you pack. He knew where you'd be, what you'd be doing."

Understanding dawns in her eyes. "So you sacrificed yourself. Again."

"Yes."

"That wasn't your decision to make."

"It was the only one I could live with."

She pulls her hand free, anger flashing across her features. "And what about what I couldn’t live without? Did you consider that?"

I hadn't. Not really. The realization must show on my face because her expression softens.

"You still don't get it, do you?" She sits on the edge of the bed, careful to avoid my injured side. "You think you're just a weapon. But last night proved you wrong."

"I am a weapon," I insist. "I've been one since the camps."

"If that were true, you'd have killed Granite the moment he stepped into that ring." She shakes her head. "But you didn't. You protected him from Quinn's manipulation, the same way you protected me."

The observation hits hard. I'd been so focused on survival, I'd missed seeing my own choice—the decision not to destroy the orc who'd been set up as my executioner.

"It wasn't your fighting that saved us," she continues, her voice gentler now. "It was your heart, Crow. It's always been your heart."

The word sounds foreign when applied to me. Hearts are for humans, for those who didn't have compassion and weakness beaten out of them as children. Not for orcs like me, carved into weapons by camps and combat.

Yet as I look at Maya—this fragile human who fought her way to my side, who defied Quinn, who stitches me back together with the same hands that brought me back from the edge—the beast inside me settles, not with a roar but a sigh. The beast that's driven me for so long settles, sated not by violence but by her presence.

"What happens now?" I ask, the question encompassing everything—us, Shadow Ridge, the future I never thought I'd have.

She looks down at our joined hands, her fingers tracing the scars that mark my knuckles. "I'm going back to Shadow Ridge. My clinic needs rebuilding."

"Just like that? What about your parents? That fancy job?"

A small, sad smile touches her lips. "I called them while you were unconscious. It didn't go well."

"I'm sorry." And I am, even though part of me, the selfish, possessive part, rejoices at the knowledge she's not leaving.

"Don't be. They can't understand, but I don't need their approval or their money. Shadow Ridge needs a doctor more than Long Island needs another concierge physician." Her eyes meet mine, unwavering despite the vulnerability in them. "For the first time since Jamie died, I know exactly where I belong. The question is, will you be there too?"

The last of my defenses crumble under the weight of that question. With careful movements, mindful of my injuries, I pull her down beside me on the bed. She comes willingly, curling against my uninjured side like she belongs there. Like we've been doing this for years, not just weeks.

"I'm not good at this," I warn her, fingers tangling in her hair. "At being... whatever normal people are."

She laughs, the sound vibrating against my chest. "Have you met me? I'm the woman who told off an entire hospital board, then ran away to a town nobody's heard of to work with a motorcycle club." Her hand rests over my heart, the heat of her palm seeping through bandages to my skin. "We're both broken in all the right places to fit together."

Something locked inside me gives way—a tension I've carried for so long I'd forgotten it wasn't part of my skeleton. The beast is still there. It will always be there. But for the first time, it feels like a strength rather than a curse. A protector rather than a destroyer.

"I'm not running anymore, Maya." I tip her chin up to meet my gaze, needing her to see the truth in my eyes. "Not from this. Not from you."

She rises up to kiss me—gentle at first, mindful of my injuries, then deeper as need outweighs caution. I thread my fingers through her hair, holding her to me as something foundational shifts and locks into place. This is what I've been fighting for all along, I realize. Not just survival, but the right to build something worth living for.

When we break apart, she rests her forehead against mine, breath warm against my lips. "Good," she whispers. "Because I'm not letting you go again."

In the quiet of the clubhouse, with pain throbbing through my wounded body and Maya's weight anchoring me to the present, I finally understand. I've spent my life defining myself by what I can destroy—in the camps, in the pits, on the streets. But destruction was never my purpose. It was just the only language I was taught to speak.

Maya has given me new words. New possibilities. A future where I am not just the weapon but the man. Not just the beast but the heart.

And for the first time since crossing the Rift, that future feels like more than just surviving.

It feels like living.