Page 8 of Gonzo’s Grudge (Saint’s Outlaws MC: Dreadnought, NC #1)

IvaLeigh

C ollege wasn’t supposed to feel like this. When I left Tennessee for school in North Carolina, I told myself this was my new start. New area. New people. New me.

But walking into my apartment that night, backpack slung over one shoulder, the only thing I felt was the kind of gut-punch you can’t study your way out of.

The door creaked open and the sound hit me before the sight did—breathy little moans, muffled laughter, the squeak of my mattress springs.

My mattress.

Then the sight.

Darla—my roommate with her too-perfect hair and her too-loud laugh—arched back on my bed, straddling Collin.

Collin.

The first person to ever make me feel less than for wanting to take things slow.

I wasn’t a prude, we had done things beyond kissing, but I didn’t go the distance.

It was our first real date. We had hung out casually before so maybe he thought we had been dating.

I didn’t know how he defined things. I only knew that from the minute I said no, he was a different person and I had become his number one enemy.

Their limbs tangled in the sheets I’d just washed that morning.

Her painted nails digging into his shoulders.

His mouth pressed to her neck, the same way he used to press to mine when he thought no one was looking and we were supposed to be studying.

I could still feel the heat of his breath on my skin.

My lungs locked up. The air thinned until all I could hear was the blood roaring in my ears.

Collin’s eyes flicked up, catching me frozen in the doorway. For a split second, guilt flashed across his face. Then nothing. He didn’t stop. He didn’t move. He just turned back to Darla like I didn’t exist.

That was worse than all of it.

I didn’t scream. Didn’t cry. Didn’t demand explanations I already knew would be lies. I just backed out, shut the door quietly, and walked away.

The library was lit up like a beacon against the night, its tall windows glowing gold. I buried myself in a corner with my books, pretending to study, though the words on the page blurred with every blink.

I tried not to see Darla’s smug little smile, the way she’d swing her hair like every boy belonged to her. I tried not to hear Collin’s voice from back when he used to swear I was the only one who mattered. I tried not to think about how small I’d felt standing in that doorway.

So I read. I wrote. I underlined words I didn’t even comprehend. Anything to keep from feeling.

When the lights flickered, I realized I was the last one there. The librarian cleared her throat gently, offering me a sympathetic smile. “We’re closing, sweetheart.”

I shoved my notes into my bag, muttered thanks, and stepped out into the cool night.

The clock on my phone said almost eleven. Too late to want to go back to that room, back to those sheets, back to Darla’s voice filling the air.

So I didn’t.

Instead, I pointed my car toward Tennessee, the back roads pulling me closer to home even though I didn’t know if I wanted to face that either.

The night was thick, the road empty except for the occasional flash of headlights in the distance. I rolled the windows down, letting the cool wind slap against my damp cheeks. I hadn’t realized I’d been crying until the air stung.

And then it happened—sharp, loud, the car jolting hard. The steering wheel yanked sideways in my hands. One tire blew, then another. My SUV fishtailed before I got it to the shoulder.

Two tires shredded. On a back road through Dreadnought. Seriously, why was this my luck? I cursed under my breath, smacking the steering wheel with both palms. The silence after the engine shut off was deafening just the steady clicking of my hazard lights filled the space.

My phone showed one bar of signal. A bar that it couldn’t seem to stay locked to as it would occasionally blink to SOS mode.

I dropped my forehead to the wheel and let the tears fall hot and fast.

That’s when I heard it.

The low rumble of an engine in the distance, growing closer, deeper, like thunder rolling over the hills.

I wiped at my face, squinting down the road. A single headlight cut through the dark. The closer it came, the more my chest tightened.

The bike slowed, then stopped a few feet behind me. The engine growled, steady and commanding.

And then I saw him.

Gonzo.

Leather cut, broad shoulders, dark hair glistening with small flecks of gray shining through his beard.

The outlaw who’d helped me before when my car’s battery cable had come loose on a different back road not far from here.

The one who had stopped to check on me made it right without asking anything in return.

The man who followed me to the safety of my gated community before returning back to what he was doing before finding me.

He swung one leg off his bike, boots crunching on gravel. His eyes scanned me, sharp even in the dark.

“You’re cryin’,” he said, voice low and rough. Not a question. Just fact.

I shook my head quickly, embarrassed, brushing at my cheeks. “No, I—my car—two tires blew.”

He glanced at the shredded rubber, then back at me. “Back roads at night. Not safe. Yet, you keep takin’ them and ended up on the side of a curve. Bad luck, girl.”

“I didn’t have anywhere else to go,” I whispered. “Needed air.”

For a second, his gaze softened. Just a flicker, like a storm breaking far out on the horizon. He jerked his chin toward the bike. “Hop on. I’ll take you home.”

Home. The word made my stomach twist. Home wasn’t an apartment where my roommate was in my bed with my ex.

Home wasn’t Tennessee, where my mom would see my red eyes and ask questions I wouldn’t answer because she didn’t think college should be about education more than experience.

She should have been Darla’s mom, they were a perfect match.

“Anywhere but home,” I squeaked, voice small, but certain.

His eyes searched mine. He nodded once, like he understood more than I’d said.

“All right. Anywhere but home. I can do that.”

The bike loomed, chrome and leather gleaming even in the dark. My heart raced. I’d never been on one before. He must’ve seen the hesitation, because his voice softened just enough. “Swing your leg over. Hold on tight. Trust the man and the machine.”

My hands trembled as I climbed on. The leather seat was warm from the engine. When he settled in front of me, solid and steady, I hesitated before wrapping my arms around his waist.

The second I did, the world shifted.

The engine roared to life, the vibration rattling through my entire body. The wind whipped my hair back as we shot forward, the night breaking open around us.

And just like that, I wasn’t crying anymore.

The road curved, trees blurring on either side, the stars overhead smeared into silver streaks. The hum of the engine, the heat of him, the raw freedom of flying on two wheels—I couldn’t think about Collin, or Darla, or anything else. It was just motion. Just release.

Freedom I had never felt before.

I held on tighter, burying my face against his back, breathing in the leather and smoke and something steady, something completely him.

I never wanted it to end.

It didn’t end at my home. Just as I asked.

When the bike slowed, it wasn’t to my apartment, not that he knew where that was. Nor did he land me at my mother’s driveway. It was a cabin tucked into the woods, its windows glowing faint gold.

He shut off the engine. The night fell silent.

“This isn’t…?” I started.

“My place,” he remarked simply. “You’ll be safe here.”

The cabin wasn’t what I expected.

When Gonzo pushed the door open and motioned me inside, I braced for chaos—empty bottles, ashtrays overflowing, maybe the smell of stale beer and smoke clinging to everything. That was what I thought an outlaw’s home would look like.

Instead, it was… clean.

Not sterile-clean like a place ready for sale, not prissy-clean like Darla always fussed over. But solid. Lived-in. The kind of clean that came from respect, not fear of judgment.

The floor was dark wood, scuffed and worn but shining faintly like it had been swept and mopped.

A heavy leather chair sat by the fireplace, the kind of chair a man could sink into after a long ride.

Books stacked along one wall, not just thrown in piles but lined on a shelf.

Not textbooks. Real books—novels, histories, even a few that looked like poetry, their spines bent from use.

A jacket hung on a hook by the door. I watched him move. His cut draped over the back of a chair. Boots lined up neatly against the wall. It was his space and he was comfortable and confident in it.

He gestured toward the bedroom. “Bed’s through there. You should get some sleep.”

I hesitated in the doorway, my hand gripping the strap of my bag. Every instinct screamed caution. I was in the cabin of a man I barely knew, a man twice my age, a man with outlaw ink crawling up his arms.

But he didn’t crowd me. Didn’t smirk. Didn’t look me over like every other man who’d ever tried to get close. He just waited.

“I don’t want to take your bed,” I whispered.

He shook his head. “See the look in your eyes, baby. You need it more than I do. Whatever weight the world put on your shoulders, go sleep it off. I got a man getting your car and we’ll get the tires on it in the morning. For now, sleep.”

Simple. Final. Like there was no argument worth having.

I stepped into the bedroom.

The bed was wide, the sheets clean, the blanket heavy.

A lamp glowed on the nightstand, its shade dented but steady.

On the dresser sat a single photograph in a cheap frame—faded, but still remarkable.

A man younger but unmistakably him, standing beside another man in a cut, both of them laughing with beers in their hands.

Pop Squally. I recognized him from the stories whispered around town, the legend of the Saint’s Outlaws MC.

The picture hit me harder than I expected. Here was this man who looked larger than life on the back of a bike, who had just scooped me out of my wreckage like it was nothing—and on his dresser sat proof that he was human. That he had people he loved, people he lost.

I laid down, pulling the blanket up to my chin. For the first time in weeks, maybe months, I felt safe.

From the living room, I heard the couch springs creak. Then silence.

He was giving me space. Giving me peace.

And it undid me.

When I woke, sunlight filtered through the curtains, painting the room golden. For a split second, I forgot where I was. Then the smell of coffee drifted in, rich and warm, and I remembered.

I padded barefoot down the hall. Gonzo stood in the kitchen, broad shoulders filling the space, pouring coffee into two mugs.

He wore gray shorts and no shirt, the colors of his tattoos dancing under the morning light.

He looked the same as the night before—calm, solid—but in the daylight I noticed details I hadn’t before.

The silver threaded through his beard. The scars across his knuckles.

The lines etched deep into his face from years of squinting against the sun on the road.

He slid a mug toward me without a word.

“Your car’s at the shop already got the bad tires off,” he said, like it was the most ordinary thing in the world.

“Tow truck came last night. Two new tires’ll be on by lunchtime.

You got class, I’ll get you there. You wanna stay here, that’s fine too.

Got shit to do though so I’ll have to head out. ”

I blinked, mug warming my hands. “You… did all that?”

He shrugged. “Couldn’t leave you stranded.”

Just like that. No strings. No expectations.

I swallowed past the lump in my throat. “Thank you.” As much as I wanted to skip class, skip life, I couldn’t. “I would appreciate the ride to class. I can get someone to pick me up later and get me to my car.”

He met my eyes, steady. “Don’t thank me yet. Gotta get you to class first.”

The ride back in the daylight was nothing like the night before. It was louder, brighter, sharper. Cars moved aside when they saw us, the thunder of the bike clearing a path. My arms wrapped around him, the world rushing past in blurs of green and gray.

And for the first time, I thought—maybe this was what freedom felt like.