Cleo

I t was so good to be cozy.

The first thing I noticed was the blanket—soft and warm and nothing like the scratchy Army surplus one at my place.

For three heartbeats, I floated in that drowsy space between sleep and waking, where nothing hurt and nobody could find me.

Then my eyes snapped open to exposed brick walls and morning light slanting through unfamiliar windows, and everything crashed back like a semi through a guardrail.

The Serpents. Their hands reaching. Gold teeth gleaming in the rain.

My body jerked upright before my brain caught up, heart hammering against ribs that suddenly felt too small.

The living room materialized around me—hardwood floors, organized bookshelves, that lingering scent of vanilla and good coffee.

Dex's apartment. I was in Dex's apartment because three Serpents had tried to grab me and he'd—

Water running. Somewhere down the hall, a shower hissed against tile.

He was in there. Naked. Washing off whatever the night had left on his skin while I sat on his couch wrapped in a blanket that smelled like dryer sheets and something distinctly male. My cheeks burned hot enough to fry an egg.

Stop it. Just stop.

But my traitorous brain had already started painting pictures I didn't want to see.

The solid wall of his chest when I'd pressed against his back on the bike.

How his muscles had shifted under leather as he'd navigated those flooded streets.

The careful strength in his hands when he'd checked my pulse, touch gentle as morning rain.

I glanced at my phone. It was 11am. I’d overslept. Then I remembered I didn’t have a shift at the diner to get to. Maybe I could stay and get a little closer to D—

"Shit." I pressed my palms against my eyes hard enough to see stars.

What was wrong with me? A lifetime of hating everything about motorcycle clubs, and one night was all it took to start going soft?

One rescued-damsel routine and suddenly I was having shower fantasies about a man who probably had a body count higher than his IQ?

Except that wasn't fair.

Nothing about last night had been routine.

The way he'd made cocoa from scratch, explaining about his grandmother's recipe like it mattered that I knew.

How he'd seen me almost suck my thumb—God, the humiliation still made my stomach clench—and hadn't laughed or leered or tried to use it against me.

Just said everyone had coping mechanisms, voice careful as cracked glass.

My father would have mocked me for weeks. Would have called me a baby, told me to grow up, used it as another reason why I was too much trouble to keep around. But Dex had just . . . accepted it. Like it was nothing. Like I was worth protecting even with all my sharp edges and stupid habits.

The shower shut off.

Panic sliced through me sharp and sudden. In a few minutes, he'd walk out here with damp hair and that steady gaze, and I'd have to look him in the eye knowing I'd been thinking about—

No. Absolutely not.

I threw off the blanket and stood too fast, blood rushing to my head in a dizzy wave.

My clothes from last night sat folded on the coffee table, dry now but still carrying the memory of rain and fear.

I grabbed them, clutching the fabric like armor against whatever stupid thing my heart was trying to do.

He was a biker. That was the only truth that mattered.

Leather jacket, motorcycle boots, patches that marked him as part of a world that chewed up families and spit out broken pieces.

It didn't matter that his hands had been gentle or his voice kind.

It didn't matter that he'd given up his bed without being asked, that he'd wrapped me in soft blankets while I slept.

The bathroom door opened down the hall. My whole body went rigid, fight-or-flight instincts screaming.

I needed to get out. Now. Before I did something catastrophically stupid like start believing Dex was different.

Before I let those careful brown eyes convince me that some bikers knew how to stay.

Footsteps in the hallway. Getting closer.

I pressed my clothes against my chest and tried to remember how to breathe. In through the nose, out through the mouth.

Just get through the next few minutes. Get to the van. Get away from leather jackets and gentle hands.

He emerged from the bathroom like a normal person—no fanfare, no swagger, just damp hair and bare feet padding on hardwood.

The towel around his neck caught water droplets before they could darken his plain black t-shirt.

Without the leather jacket, without the patches and attitude, he looked like someone's older brother. Someone safe.

That was a problem.

"Coffee?" He moved toward the kitchen with the same easy confidence he'd shown on his bike, navigating his space without conscious thought. "I've got a French press. None of that instant garbage."

"I need to get to my van." The words came out steadier than I felt. Professional almost, like we were concluding a business transaction instead of whatever this was. "I have things to do today."

My hands clutched my folded clothes against my chest like a shield. Things to do. Right. Like what? Sit in my soon to be ex-apartment re-reading the same three books? Count my dwindling cash for the hundredth time? Drive circles around Ironridge pretending I had somewhere to be?

He paused at the kitchen counter, fingers resting on the French press. Those dark eyes found mine across the room, and I watched him catalog everything—the defensive stance, the white knuckles, the way I'd positioned myself closer to the door than to him.

"The shelter doesn't open until five." Casual observation. Not calling me a liar outright, just laying out facts. "Library's closed Sundays."

Heat crawled up my neck. Of course he'd know the volunteer schedule.

Of course he'd see right through my pathetic attempt at having a life.

But I couldn't back down now, couldn't admit that my grand plans involved sitting in a broken-down van trying not to think about how his hands had felt checking my pulse.

"I have errands." I lifted my chin, daring him to push it. "Grocery shopping. Laundry. Normal people stuff."

Something flickered across his face—amusement maybe, or disappointment. He turned back to the coffee supplies, movements deliberately slow like he was trying not to spook me. Water into the kettle. Grounds into the press. Each action precise and unhurried.

"No problem. I'll walk you." Not a question. Not a request. Just simple statement of fact, like gravity or sunrise. "Those Serpents might still be around."

"I don't need—"

"Yeah, you do." He turned to face me fully, and there was steel under the casual tone. "You interfered with club business. Helped one of their assets escape. That's not something they forget."

"Fine." The word tasted bitter. "But just to my van."

His jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. For a second, I thought he might argue. Might insist on shadowing me or something dumb. Or worse, might say he’d changed his mind and didn’t want to walk me after all.

Instead, he reached for his jacket.

The leather whispered against itself as he shrugged it on, patches catching the morning light.

Heavy Kings MC. Colorado. Road Captain. Each emblem a reminder of who he really was under the gentle hands and careful voice.

The transformation was instant—from approachable to dangerous, from someone's brother to someone's nightmare.

He moved toward the door, and I stepped aside to let him pass. But the apartment was small, the space by the door narrow. His hand brushed the small of my back as he reached for the locks—barely a touch, just his fingers ghosting over the borrowed t-shirt.

Fire raced up my spine. Every nerve ending lit up like Christmas, and I hated myself for it.

"Sorry." He pulled back immediately, but I caught the way his fingers flexed. Like maybe he'd felt it too. That electric wrongness of wanting something we shouldn't.

I couldn't speak. Couldn't trust my voice not to betray exactly how not-sorry I was. How some broken part of me wanted him to do it again, wanted to know what it felt like to be touched by someone who might actually give a damn.

Stupid. So monumentally stupid.

He worked through the locks—deadbolt, chain, a complicated one I didn't recognize.

Each click echoed in the narrow space. I studied the wall beside the door, counting water stains in the plaster.

Anything to avoid looking at the way his hands moved, confident and sure.

Anything to avoid remembering how those same hands had cradled my face last night, checking for fever like I mattered.

"Ready?" He held the door open, careful to keep distance between us this time.

"Yeah." I forced my feet to move, to carry me through the door and away from dangerous warmth. "Let's go."

M orning steam rose from the wet pavement like ghosts, the storm's aftermath painting everything in that too-bright clarity that made my eyes water.

I kept my arms crossed tight over my chest. Six blocks. That's all. Six blocks back to my van, back to my life, back to pretending last night was just some weird fever dream brought on by too much stress and not enough food.

A woman pushing a stroller crossed to the other side of the street when she saw us coming.

Her eyes locked on Dex's patches, face going carefully blank in that way people did when they wanted to be invisible.

I wanted to tell her he wasn't dangerous.

That he made cocoa with real vanilla and gave up his bed for strangers.

But that would have been a lie, wouldn't it? He was dangerous. Just maybe not to me.

"Almost there," Dex said quietly, like he could sense my spiraling. "One more block."

One more block until I could lock myself in my van and pretend none of this happened.