Page 2 of Fallen Dove (Fallen Lords MC 2nd Gen #1)

Mason

I wiped the bar with a hot rag, and watched the sheen spread across the wood until it caught the overhead lights.

Two hours before we opened, and already I had a list in my head: tables twelve through sixteen needed wiping, a couple of coasters were curled and had to be replaced, and the salt and pepper on table thirteen were running low.

The Social Club had a rhythm, and if you didn’t stay ahead of it, the place ate you alive before last call.

I looked around the room with a manager’s eye.

Pinball machines hummed along the left wall, their neon lights casting lazy pulses across the floor.

The pool tables sat down the middle with cues racked neat and straight.

Cornhole boards leaned against the back wall, waiting for the first group of loudmouths to get competitive.

The giant beer pong setup, trash cans painted red with scuffed dodgeballs stacked in a crate, waited for a bachelor party to turn it into chaos.

And the axe-throwing lanes at the far end? Fresh paint on the targets, with pine boards already scarred from practice.

The whole place smelled like lemon oil, cold beer, and fryer grease that refused to leave no matter how many times we scrubbed.

It was any other day.

Except it wasn’t.

Because today, Adley started waitressing.

Two weeks ago, Slayer had dropped it on me.

“Kid’s moving home. Needs a job at the Social Club until she figures out her next step.”

I’d swallowed the shock and answered like it was no big deal. As far as he knew, I didn’t have an opinion. And that was how it was going to stay. No one but Adley and I knew about the kiss fourteen years ago. Nobody else ever would.

The front door opened with a quick creak, and Thorn strolled in like he’d been born to work this place. Brinks and Cora’s kid carried his apron slung over one shoulder, and his hair styled to look careless but probably took effort. He dropped onto a stool at the bar, spinning once before planting his elbows on the wood.

“You look like your exhaust fell off your bike, brother,”

Thorn said with a grin.

I fixed my face so I didn’t look as pissed off as I felt and kept wiping.

“Just thinking about inventory next week.”

He groaned loud enough to echo off the pinball machines.

“Please don’t remind me. Maybe we could have Adley take care of that from now on? Or at least next week. Once she does it, she’ll know why we shoved it off on her.”

I chuckled and shook my head.

“Pretty sure since I manage the Social Club, I should be the one to do inventory.”

“Then why the hell do you always make me help you?”

Thorn shot back.

“Because you’re the low man on the totem pole.”

“And now Adley is,”

he insisted, with a smirk like he’d won the argument.

I tossed the rag into the basket under the bar.

“We’re not piling inventory on Adley her first week. She’s here to learn the floor, not get buried in back counting cases.”

Not to mention, inventory meant two people stuck in the walk-in together for hours. No way in hell I was letting that happen. Not with her. Not with me.

Thorn raised a brow but didn’t push it. He leaned back on the stool, and drummed his fingers against the counter.

I had rules, and they were set in my head: No staring.

No closer than five feet.

Only talk about work.

And absolutely no thinking about her when I was supposed to be thinking about this place.

Rules kept me alive, and I liked being alive.

Before I could fire back at Thorn’s smirk, the door opened again.

I didn’t have to look up to feel it. The air shifted, lighter and sharper at the same time, like the room had been holding its breath.

Shoes tapped across the entry mat.

I lifted my head.

Adley walked in.

Blonde hair with dark roots, half-up, half-down so the shorter pieces framed her face.

She wore a cropped olive-green sweater with a cropped Lords Social Shirt under it that flashed a sliver of skin when she moved.

Blue jeans that fit like they were made for her, and black sneakers that had seen some miles.

She stopped just short of the bar.

She took in the whole place with a sweep of her eyes, steady and calm, like she was already figuring out how she fit into it.

My heart dropped clean to my feet the second I saw her.

It wasn’t that I didn’t like Adley.

Hell no.

That was never the problem.

The problem was that she was Slayer’s daughter.

That fact alone was a brick wall between us.

One I couldn’t climb over without getting buried alive.

Respect, loyalty, the code.

It wasn’t just words to me. It was survival. Slayer was my brother, and my family. Crossing that line would be the same as betraying him.

I told myself it had been fourteen years since that night, fourteen years since she kissed me.

Time was enough to change everything.

She should have forgotten about me and that kiss.

She had been in Chicago.

The city of every opportunity at her fingertips.

She had brought up the kiss at Christmas, but I was hopeful I had shut her down again.

But standing there, I couldn’t lie to myself.

Adley wasn’t a kid anymore.

She’d grown.

Every curve of her was filled out, and her confidence wrapped around her like armor.

Drop-dead gorgeous.

Curvy in all the ways that made a man’s blood run hot. God damn.

“Adley!”

Thorn shouted, and jumped off his stool like he’d just won a prize.

“Just the person I was thinking about.”

He strolled right over, slung an arm around her shoulders like he owned her space.

“How do you feel about inventory?”

Jesus Christ. These damn Fallen Lords kids did whatever the hell they wanted.

Before Adley could even answer, the door swung open again and more voices filled the space. Bay, Calla, and Penny strutted in like a storm of youth and noise.

Speak of the devil. The rest of the Fallen Lords kids that I relied on to keep this place running. Calla, Nickel and Karmen’s daughter. Penny, Maniac’s spitfire kid. Bay, best friends with Fox, Wrecker’s boy.

“Thank goodness it’s finally your first day,”

Calla said, and lifted her hands like Adley had just saved her.

“I’m glad to see you survived a week with Alice and Meg.”

Adley laughed, and nudged Thorn with her elbow until he finally backed off a step.

“You know it’s always an adventure when Alice and Meg get together.”

She grinned.

“Did you hear about the turtles?”

Calla’s brows shot up.

“No. Did Alice try to free one from the petting zoo?”

“That would be normal,”

Adley said, deadpan.

“And it wasn’t Alice doing it.”

“Meg?”

Calla asked.

“Nope,”

Adley said again, popping the P.

“It was King.”

Thorn laughed so loud it bounced off the pool tables.

“The crazy wore off on him.”

“The same thing’s happening with Wrecker,”

Bay chimed in.

“Fox was telling me about him talking to Priscilla in the pasture the other day.”

“I think the crazy has reached all of the OGs,”

Penny said with a smirk.

“OGs?”

I asked, voice sharper than I intended.

They all turned toward me at once. My eyes went straight to Adley. I couldn’t stop them. She looked… grown up. Standing there next to Bay, Calla, Penny, and Thorn, she didn’t just look older; she looked like a woman.

“Our moms and dads,”

Penny said, and tipped her head to the side.

“And I guess you and Junior. You guys are getting old, too.”

The group broke into laughter, except Adley. She met my gaze instead. For a second too long, our eyes locked, the air between us stretching tight. My chest tightened with something I didn’t want to name.

I shook my head, and forced myself to remember the rules. No staring. No closer than five feet. Only work.

“Enough talking,”

I said firmly.

“We open soon, and this place isn’t ready. Tables need wiped down, Bay. Axe alleys need reset, Thorn.”

Thorn groaned like I’d sentenced him to death.

“Why can’t Arlo do that? He loves hanging around the throwing lanes.”

I ignored him. He could complain all he wanted; he’d still do it.

“Penny, give Adley the rundown of everything, then help Bay.”

Penny saluted, with a grin wide.

“You got it, old man.”

I rolled my eyes. They all called me that. I was a good fifteen years younger than their parents, but that didn’t stop them from treating me like some grandpa one slip away from breaking a hip.

Penny looped her arm through Adley’s and steered her toward the kitchen. They disappeared through the swinging door while Penny talked a mile a minute. Adley was listening with that small smile on her face.

Bay grabbed a rag from behind the bar and came over to me.

“I don’t see why I need to wipe down all the tables when they’re just going to get messed up in two seconds.”

“Wipe ‘em down, Bay,” I said.

She rolled her eyes like only a twenty-something could and headed for the closest table, dragging the rag with her.

I leaned against the bar, and my eyes trailed the door Adley had just gone through. Fourteen years. A lifetime. And yet here she was, standing in my bar, about to work under my watch. I told myself the rules again: no staring, no close, only work. If I kept my head straight, the day and night would go smooth.

God, I hoped the rest of the day and night went smooth.