Page 21

Ghost

W hen I wake up the next morning, the bed is quiet behind me.

After a few minutes, I hear her shift once.

She makes a barely audible sound and then settles down again.

She’s still sleeping. Good. She deserves to sleep a bit after last night.

After the week she’s had. Hell, the life she’s had over the last few years.

I crawl out of bed, use one of the guest bathrooms, and get dressed.

Since I’ve promised everyone breakfast, I get right on that bright and early.

I like to make the biscuits first and get them in the oven along with the bacon.

I’m still gearing up with a cup of coffee when the oven dings that it’s preheated.

Moving through the kitchen barefoot, I’ve got coffee in one hand, a pan of bacon in the other.

I shove the bacon in the oven with the biscuits, take a sip of coffee, and start cracking eggs into a metal bowl.

I can already smell the biscuits slowly rising in the oven.

I’m not a chef, but being a prospect has taught me how to feed my club brothers. And last night, they pulled a cold, quiet watch outside this house just to make sure no one got close. Just to make sure Heather and her unborn child could rest easy. They earned a hearty breakfast.

I’m halfway through flipping sausage when I feel her behind me.

“Do you always cook like this after sex?” she asks, voice still drowsy.

I glance over my shoulder, and fuck me if that sight doesn’t hit me right in the feels. Heather’s wearing my old flannel pajamas. Her hair’s a mess, and she’s barefoot too.

“Only when it’s worth the calories.”

She walks closer, bare feet quiet on the hardwood. “Are you feeding a football team or just carb-loading for round two?”

I huff. “The prospects were on shift last night. Least I can do’s feed them.”

She pauses. “I forgot they were here.”

I grin at her as she ambles over to make herself a coffee. I bought some decaf especially for her, Patch said it was okay for her to drink regular coffee in moderation, but she said she wanted to be as healthy as possible. “They stayed alert all night. You didn’t hear ‘em, did you?”

“No. After all the bed sport, I slept like a rock.”

My chest swells with pride that she slept so well in my bed. The bed sport, as she calls it, was an amazing bonus.

A knock at the back door breaks the quiet. Patch’s voice follows. “If there’s bacon, I might be your new best friend.”

“Get in here before I change my mind and hog it all for myself,” I call.

The back door creaks open, and boots stomp in—Evan, Levi, and Patch all file through, smelling like cigarettes, damp leather, and sleep deprivation.

“Morning, Ghost,” Levi says, nodding. Then, to Heather, “Ma’am.”

She stiffens a little at the title. I shoot Levi a dark look. “She’s not your principal, man. Drop the ma’am.”

Patch leans in like he’s whispering, but his voice carries. “That shirt’s got better curves on her.”

I shoot him a glare. “Try that again and I’ll serve your plate straight into your lap.”

He grins, shameless, and grabs a fork. He’s becoming more like us every single day and less like the pompous doctor he once was.

They settle around the big reclaimed-wood table I built last year with Dutch. We fill our plates and make sure everyone has coffee before the conversation gets started. Heather hovers for a second, unsure, until I tap the chair beside me.

“Sit beside me. I can’t trust any of these fuckers not to steal you away from me.”

She chuckles at my antics and drops down into place beside me.

Heather doesn’t say much, but she listens. The prospects are rough around the edges, but she lets it all wash over her. She smiles at the way they rib each other, shift to protect the weaker seat at the table, the way they fall silent anytime the wind outside changes direction.

She’s watching them and learning more about club culture every day. I’m so fuckin’ proud of her. I catch Levi studying her across the rim of his cup. He’s autistic and probably trying to understand social cues.

“Did you sleep okay?” he asks her.

She nods. “Yeah, and it was the best rest I’ve had in a while.”

“Good,” he says. The worry clears from his young face, and that’s the end of that.

I slide a hand along her thigh under the table. Nothing big. Just enough to remind her she’s safe here, with the prospects, in the middle of my world.

The food disappears fast. They rinse their plates without being told. It’s habit—part of the social responsibility the Legion teaches, a matter of respect. There are no egos or barking orders. Just men who know how to be respectful to one another.

They head out a few minutes later, engines firing to life one by one. Heather watches them through the window. Not long after, Crow and Tusk pull in. Siege promised round-the-clock protection, and he’s a man who always keeps his word.

“You always feed the men who stand guard for you?” she asks.

“They’ve never stood guard for me before last night. It just seemed the right thing to do, particularly since I was cooking for you anyway.”

She turns towards me, arms crossed over her chest, with each hand stuffed in the opposite sleeve of the flannel pajamas to keep her hands warm. Her bottom lip is caught between her teeth for a brief moment before she smiles at me.

“You’re a really nice, decent man. You know that?”

Ignoring her question, I tell her quietly, “I like waking up to you.”

She looks at me for a long second, searching, like she’s testing the weight of the words. Then she smiles.

“I like waking up here.”

And damn if that doesn’t make my chest ache in a way I don’t see coming.

I smile at her, genuinely enamored with everything about her. “Want to cuddle up on the sofa and talk?”

“Absolutely.” Heather follows me to the living room and curls up on the couch beside me. She brings her coffee cup and takes a sip as she gazes at me, smiling.

We just enjoy a quiet moment together as I wait for her to pick a conversation. I don’t rush her because it feels like it would be rude. Instead, I let the silence stretch. And eventually, she starts talking.

Clearing her throat, she says softly, “I didn’t tell the whole story about Jerry and what he did to me. He didn’t hit me. Not always.”

I set my empty coffee cup down. “He shouldn’t have been hitting you at all.”

“He never had to get physical. He used intimidation to make sure I thought he would.”

I try not to let my fury show. “That’s a kind of violence too. Terrifying people is mental abuse.”

She swallows another mouthful of coffee before continuing. “When we were in public, he always stood too close. Talked low so no one else could hear. When I said no, he made it sound like I didn’t mean it. Like I was just being cute or dramatic.”

I clench my jaw, but I don’t speak. This asshole truly deserves every fucking thing I plan to give him.

Her voice sounds fragile when she speaks.

“He figured out what I was afraid of and used it against me. For instance, when he found out I was afraid of the dark. He started turning off the lights when we argued,” she whispers.

“Told me to find my way out if I was going to walk away. Said if I wanted to leave, I had to do it blind.”

My fists curl in my lap and I lock my jaw because this sweet woman needs to talk about what she’s been through. She doesn’t need to deal with my anger on top of her own trauma.

“I realized somewhere along the way that he tried to keep me scared, lost, and disoriented. It was his way of ensuring I didn’t have the courage to leave. He was good at figuring out ways to make me stay put. It worked for far too long.”

She pulls her knees tighter, staring at the couch cushion as her mind drifts back to her former abuse. When she doesn’t say anything, I do.

“But you left,” I point out. “You got yourself out.”

“Because I was worried that he’d be the last man I ever dated. That things would escalate to the point that he crossed that last boundary into physical abuse. Jerry is obsessive about everything, and I knew he’d be obsessing about hurting me if and when he got comfortable with it.”

“Thank God you didn’t give him the chance.”

She gives a broken laugh.

“I didn’t tell Siege and Rigs everything. I was too embarrassed.”

I nod again. “You don’t have to share anything with them that you don’t want to.”

Her eyes flick up to mine. “Do you mind if I tell you? I’m comfortable with you, and I feel like if I don’t tell someone, it’s going to eat me up inside.”

“Yeah. You know you can tell me anything. I won’t ever judge you.”

She studies me like she’s trying to decide if I’m really safe. Then she says something I’m not ready for.

“I never told anyone about the photos.”

I go still. At first, I think he’s taken nude pictures of her—then I learn it’s much worse than that.

She licks her lips. “Sometimes when I left the house, even for a short period of time, I’d come home and things would be off.

Nothing was missing, so I knew it wasn’t a break-in.

Things were just touched, moved slightly.

Who breaks in just to reposition objects in someone’s home?

It didn’t make any sense. I started marking the edges of drawers with sticky notes to check. He was coming inside.”

My blood turns to ice. Because this level of psychological manipulation is how truly psychotic people act. They get off on terrorizing others.

“It took me forever to realize that he was taking photos of everything—the inside of my house, my balcony. He even had photos of me sleeping in my own bed. They were from before I moved in with him. I think he started taking them through the window at first. Then he somehow started getting inside my apartment.”

“That’s really terrifying, Heather.”

“Yeah, it was. I even found pictures he’d taken from under my car.”

“What the everlovin’ fuck was that about?”

Shaking her head, she says, “I don’t know. I only found them when I started packing to leave. He never meant for me to see them.”

“Do you still have them?”

Her voice is barely a whisper. “No. I burned them. I didn’t want evidence. I was just desperate to be gone and free of him.”

That hits me harder than I expect. This poor woman has survived a relationship with an unhinged lunatic.

She starts rambling, “I should’ve told the police, but I couldn’t stand the idea of some guy at a desk passing them around. Besides, if I’d gone to the police it would have meant I’d have to stick around.”

“You did what you had to do to survive,” I say, voice low. “You don’t have to explain that to me.”

She exhales like she’s been holding her breath this whole time. “I don’t want to be scared anymore, Ghost.”

“You won’t be,” I promise her.

“You say that like it’s easy. You don’t know how crazy he can make a person. I started to question if I was losing my mind.”

“Those pictures were proof that you weren’t. I never knew him, but my club brothers who did said he was a nasty piece of work. You managed to get free of him. None of us know how strong we are until we’ve been tested.”

She finally looks at me full-on, eyes rimmed red. “Why are you being so kind to me?”

I don’t answer right away. I lean forward, elbows on my knees, let her see that I’m not playing mind games, and tell her, “Because I like you, and now you’re mine to protect. And I don’t take that lightly.”

Heather blinks once, then nods. Tears begin to fall, and she wipes them away with the sleeve of my pajama shirt.

Then she crawls towards me, like she’s drawn to my strength in her moment of need. When she curls into my lap, I hold her without saying a word. Because right now, my silent strength is what my woman needs.