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“Anyway. I’m lucky that I’m alive. I can still work. When I think about that, it doesn’t make the rest of this so bad,” Dominic says.

“You damaged nerves?”

“Yeah. Broke shit, but the worst was the tendon and nerve damage. It’s made my right hand pretty much unusable. I’ve been doing physical therapy regularly, hoping I’d get something back, but you can probably already see how much it’s atrophied.”

I can, even from back here.

“My face is what it is. Not many people are going to see it anyway, so fuck it.” He hesitates.

“I have a friend who deals with most of the pickups when I sell a piece.” The pain he can’t keep out of his voice makes me wonder what kind of a friend this person is.

Someone who means a great deal to him, but it’s complicated and agonizing.

“She was supposed to be here today to show you around, but she had to cancel, so it’s just me. ”

“We’re honored.” Dravin rests his hand on Dominic’s shoulder. He doesn’t startle or draw back.

“I’ve thought about reconstructive surgery for my face, but it’s expensive. I’d have to sell a fair amount of work and that takes time. It’s easier if you get surgery right away. But you know that.”

Dravin nods.

“It wasn’t like I was model material before or anything, so it’s less of a blow. This is just another… uh… it is what it is.”

I’m not sure what Dominic was going to say, but whatever he’s remembering is so bitter that the taste practically lingers on my tongue.

“Could we see them? I might know of a few clients who would be happy to make large purchases. Maybe even order several commissions.”

That surprises both of us. The left side of Dominic’s face blanks. The right side remains in a sort of grimace, like that stone carved him an expression that is going to last forever.

“Yeah. Sure. Come in.”

Dominic flicks his eyes nervously to me.

He’s at home with Dravin because he talked to him already and got a good feel for him by his words.

He was immediately calmed by Dravin’s appearance and whatever magic he has simmering under his skin that I tried to pretend wasn’t there from the first moment we met, lest it creep inside of me and alter me forever.

Spoiler alert, I’m doing a terrible job of blocking it out.

Changing my mind just a little has altered my conscious a lot.

I cross the distance over to the gravel to the dome and offer my left hand to Dominic, mirroring Dravin’s earlier motions.

“I’m Kael.” I can’t bring myself to lie to this man who has been so incredibly open with us even though he’d planned on doing the exact opposite and having someone else deal with us.

I just leave it at my name. My real name. I didn’t even think about that.

Dravin only gives me side eye as we walk in. I pretend not to notice his censure.

The whole place is wide open, with an old wooden workbench on the far side that probably once held motors or car parts at one time, given the dark oil stains steeped into the battered wood, but other than that, it’s just stone. Stones of all colors, shapes, and sizes. And the sculptures.

Oh my god, the sculptures.

They’re incredible.

I don’t holy shit or start dropping compliments. The work in here is far too spectacular for mere words.

I edge close to a tall woman draped with a flowing veil of cloth so real that it’s shocking when I lift my hand and graze the stone with my fingertips, they come away cold.

I’ve been to galleries and museums when they had exhibits of ancient statues.

These are every bit as beautiful and well done.

They’re timeless. You can’t look at this and not understand how Dominic pours his whole being into them.

He gives new meaning to the term, breathing life.

He’s done more than breathe. He’s sweat, bled, grafted, suffered, and nearly died for his passion.

It’s clear that he can’t stop. He won’t stop.

“Holy fuck,” Dravin hisses, pretty much summing up everything I can’t say.

My emotions are so jammed up that I’m practically on the verge of a breakdown. It’s one of those laugh, cry, weep, explode moments where it happens altogether because you’re just not a big enough vessel to contain everything surging and swelling on the inside.

“Do you take commissions?”

“I mostly let the stones talk to me. I don’t try and force them into forms they don’t want to take.”

Dravin turns around, showing Dominic the bowed stone angel on his leather vest. I’d be lying if I said that it didn’t make me anxious as fuck seeing it.

I might know that the club is nothing like what Marcus was fucking around with.

I have proof that the people involved with it are legit some of the kindest, most decent souls I’ve ever met.

But when I first saw him wearing that vest with the club emblem, I couldn’t help the ball of anxiety that lodged in my throat.

I haven’t been able to dislodge either fully, since.

“Would you make something like this?”

“You’re a part of the biker club in Hart?”

I’m stunned that Dominic even knows about that. He basically told us he doesn’t really leave here. This is his corner of the world. Then again, most biker clubs get kind of famous, or infamous, state or even nationwide.

“I’m prospecting,” Dravin responds easily.

“They’d definitely pay you well to make something for the front of their clubhouse.

It’s an ass ugly brick building as it is and could use some beautification.

They’d probably pay for more too, or make sure that the town was gifted some incredible work for their parks or their library or downtown or something. ”

“If you’re just prospecting, how can you know they’d purchase anything?” Dominic searches Dravin’s face then snorts. “Please don’t give them a sob story about how I need money to get my face fixed.”

I can’t help it. I have to walk over. I stand beside Dravin, not touching, but close enough that our bare arms nearly brush together.

“I’m an artist. Sort of. I paint. I’ve seen tons of work from all over the world and all over history, and these are incredible.

Even if the club wanted to help you out, your work more than speaks for itself.

There aren’t any words that could give credit to what you do, so I won’t even try, but trust me when I say that anyone who ever saw it would be in awe. ”

Dominic’s jaw sets. He’s on the verge of saying no, but at the last second, he shakes his head wryly. “Okay. If one of these stones wants to be an angel, or if I ever meet one that does, I’ll consider it. I can’t make any promises though, and certainly not as to a timeline.”

“That’s fair,” Dravin says, eying up a few of the statues that probably aren’t spoken for.

I’ve always wondered how much money Dravin has. When you’re by yourself, trying to puzzle out anything about the man who dropped into your life at the behest of your dead brother, your mind travels strange paths.

I tended to think it was a lot when I thought he was being paid as some kind of bounty hunter, black of night, shadowy bastard that you wouldn’t ever want to run in with. Even if he’s working for the good guys, he’s probably well paid for those jobs.

If those statues are for sale, then they’re already sold.

It’s so obvious that from the minute Dravin met Dominic, he wanted to help. He’s the kind of man who sees a need and does his damn full best to try and meet it. To alleviate pain and make the world a better place, not a shittier one.

How many people can truly say that?

“Would you like to show us around?”

“Nah. You can just go out and look all you’d like. If you find anything, come let me know. I’ll just be working in here.”

“Will do.” Dravin’s hand creeps to the small of my back, guiding me outside. He shuts the door behind him, grabs our waters from the truck, and gets his business face on.

It takes me at least twenty minutes before I’ve worked out what’s in my head enough to give voice to it.

“Do you think…” He looks up from a pile of tangled metal that he’s been picking through.

I thought this was all junk, but the other word I used, boneyard, is much more apt.

There are pieces of antique bikes all over the place.

Assembling a whole one might be nearly impossible, but Dravin’s pretty much been oozing determination since we got out here.

“Do I think that Dominic is okay out here alone?”

God, he’s good. Always in my head, sifting through my thoughts easier than I can. “Yeah. He didn’t look sad, but it’s… heartbreaking.”

“Some people like being alone.”

“It was more the devastation in his eyes when he mentioned his friend. The woman who was supposed to meet us today, so he didn’t have to. He also told us all his family is gone. Some artists are reclusive and do like being alone, but I just think that we need to do something.”

“I will.” He speaks those two words with such quiet, unshakable confidence that I one hundred percent believe that everything will be okay.

I haven’t seen this from him, not in this way. He’s never told me that everything would be okay in the end because he never wanted to lie to me, but in this, he can be perfectly honest and sincere.

I struggle to contain another overwhelming surge of emotion.

“Maybe if we find a bike and you restore it, we could bring it back out here and show Dominic after, when it’s finished. Or keep coming back to scout for parts that we might not need.”

“I don’t know that we’ll have to fake a return trip just to give him some company.” He scans the area somewhat dubiously. “This is a big task.”

“Maybe I’ll learn to ride. You could build a second bike.”

I expect him to come down hard and forbid it, but he just snaps his head up incredulously. “You’d want to do that?”

“Want is a strong word.”

Flustered at the intensity of his expression, I bend over and start shoving random pieces of metal and old parts out of the pile at my feet. “You have a good heart.”

My hands freeze on the big rusty brown chunk of something that appears to have been a door.

“I used to be proud of that. I used to think it was the best thing to have in all the world despite all the hurts and the things that want to break it. That it was still there, this pure, loving organ that wanted to put good back into the world. If I was painfully anything, it was naive. Borderline pathetic too.”

“I don’t think that.”

My heart storms the gates in its eagerness to leap out of my chest and rush to him.

I keep my head ducked down. It’s easier to talk this way.

“But you do want to help. It’s in you to be a hero.

Even after everything, you haven’t lost it.

” He’s silent, so I keep going, even if it’s uncomfortable.

I think we’re past things like boundaries now.

“This is about you too, Dravin.” He shakes his head, but there’s no way I’m letting him offer a denial.

“Yes. It is. It’s about the club now too.

It’s about Dominic. It’s about the life that we’re making.

It was supposed to be fake, but it’s slowly becoming something else. ”

He might want to offer a denial to that too, but all he can do is stand stock still with a pained expression, so very beautiful in his imperfection.

Just like Dominic’s statues.

And just like Dominic’s work, I can’t keep the emotion of him, the very essence of his heart, from twisting around mine like thorns and digging in.