Page 80 of Malachi (Outsiders MC #1)

Candace

The sun is lazy today, spilling gold across the sidewalk in slow ribbons of melted honey, moving with the ease of something that has nowhere to be.

The air hums with a kind of quiet that only ever exists in small towns on Sundays, right after church bells stop ringing and just before the bars start filling up again.

Willowridge wears its stillness as a badge. A town on pause.

My heart isn’t still. It thumps a little too loud in my chest as I cross Main Street, the soles of my boots whispering against the uneven pavement. A breeze tugs at my curls, and I catch a whiff of honeysuckle and distant cigarette smoke. My stomach knots.

I don’t know what I expected. Some back alley rendezvous? A booth at the clubhouse? Not this.

Phoenix Stone is waiting for me in front of the nicest restaurant in town.

White tablecloths. Menu without prices. The kind of place where the forks outnumber your problems and people in my lane don’t usually get seated without a manager’s approval.

Yet, here he is. Not hiding. Not watching.

Just... being. Owning the space without needing to announce it.

He’s carved from shadows and precision, black tailored slacks, a slate-gray button-down that fits his frame with the ease of custom stitching, collar open just enough to hint at something dangerous beneath.

There’s a platinum watch on one wrist, rings on a few fingers, and sunglasses folded neatly beside his untouched espresso.

Not a single hair is out of place. Not a wrinkle or a weakness. He’s the kind of man who turns the air into something heavier just by breathing it in.

I feel static in comparison. He looks up as I approach, and those calculating eyes soften, just a notch, just for me.

“Wasn’t sure you’d show,” he says, voice low, deliberate.

“Wasn’t sure you’d ask again,” I reply, slipping into the seat across from him. The chair sighs beneath me. I don’t meet his gaze right away.

He gives a faint nod, the corner of his mouth twitching with a restrained smirk. “Touché.”

The waitress approaches, all nerves and wide eyes, until Phoenix gives a slight tilt of his head. Somehow, that’s enough. She straightens, no longer rattled, and without asking, she sets a coffee down in front of me, hazelnut.

I blink. “How’d you know?”

He just lifts his cup in response, as if that explains everything.

The weight of the ceramic warms my palms, helping me take a breath. The scent of hazelnut and burnt sugar curls upward, familiar in a way that startles me.

“I almost didn’t come,” I admit after a moment, the words feeling raw on my tongue. They hang there, delicate and unfinished.

Phoenix doesn’t flinch. “Why?”

I drag my finger around the rim of my cup. “Because everything about you screams power, control, strategy.” I shrug, even though the weight in my chest is anything but casual. “And everything about me... doesn’t.”

He leans in slightly, elbows on the table, gaze steady. “That’s not what I see.”

My eyes narrow. “No?”

“I see someone who didn’t flinch when hell knocked on her door. Someone who looked it in the eye and said, ‘Try me.’”

The lump in my throat rises too fast for me to swallow. My spine stiffens with old reflex, my body remembering what it means to be hunted and underestimated.

“Don’t romanticize it,” I whisper. “I survived. That’s all.”

His voice drops, heavy with respect. “Sometimes, surviving is the revolution.”

That? That undoes something in me. The silence that follows isn’t awkward. It’s earned. I breathe in the scent of roasted beans, old wood, and spring rain lingering on the air. The breeze dances across the back of my neck. My skin prickles.

I trace the rim of the mug again. There’s a beat pulsing beneath my skin, the kind that hums before a song starts.

“I don’t want anything from you,” I say finally, staring down at the swirling cream in my coffee, hoping the words will surface. “Not answers. Or apologies. Not... whatever you think this should be. I’m not here to dig up the past.”

Phoenix exhales, a small shift in his shoulders signaling the tension there eases just a bit. “Then what are you here for?”

I meet his eyes, and it takes everything in me not to look away. “To figure out what it means to have a family that doesn’t turn on you.”

For the first time, something cracks across his face. A flicker of something edged with pain, tucked neatly behind all that polish and poise.

“I don’t have a clue on how to be a brother,” he says quietly. “It seems we both had terrible fathers, and Alice...” He shakes his head.

I offer a half-smile. “Yeah,” I huff, the sound low, dry, but not without understanding.

We sit in it. The strange, heavy truth of shared blood we never asked for. The weight of it settles between us, a pact we never signed but carry anyway.

He clears his throat, business-like now. “I’m expanding into Willowridge, as you know. Quietly. The Outsiders won’t be running the show. Malachi made that clear, but they’ll be the muscle. Amelia’s going to help with the oversight. She knows how to keep things clean.”

“Amelia’s smart,” I say, wrapping my hands tighter around my cup. “And she doesn’t scare easy.”

“Neither do you.”

The words land carrying an unexpected gift. Not flashy. Just true.

“I fake it well,” I murmur.

“Faking it keeps people alive.” He looks at me with eyes that see every bruise I’ve ever had, emotional or otherwise, and doesn’t find a single one shameful. “I don’t expect this to be easy,” he says. “You and me. We’re not built the same.”

I nod. “No. But maybe that’s the point. We’re here. We survived. That has to count for something.”

He raises his cup slightly, the hint of a smile returning to his face. “To moving forward.”

I clink mine gently against his. “To the part that starts now.”

The smell of grilled meat and smoke clings to the warm air, a promise.

Someone rigged string lights between the clubhouse and the garage, giving the gravel lot a soft golden glow as dusk settled in.

The lights sway gently in the breeze, casting flickers of gold and shadow across denim, leather, and laughter.

A playlist shuffles through old-school rock, outlaw country, and, thanks to Ruby, several chaotic bursts of early 2000s pop.

I stand on the outskirts for a second, watching it all.

The clubhouse yard is overflowing. Outsiders in their cuts, Willowridge newcomers in casual-chic, a few dogs chasing each other through the grass, and Ruby and Bec trying to convince Nash to join their impromptu salsa line beside the grill.

East tried to help. Now he’s spinning Darla in lazy circles, both of them laughing with abandon.

She looks freer than I’ve ever seen her. His grin is soft.

Amelia stands with Frankie near the cooler, sipping a soda and swatting Kyle with a dish towel. He smirks at her, clearly enjoying it. There’s a quiet, familiar ease between them, something playful that feels like the first few notes of something new.

Frankie, meanwhile, keeps glancing at her phone.

She steps away for a second, muttering something too quiet to hear, then comes back without comment.

But the tension in her shoulders said otherwise.

Every so often, her gaze finds Arden across the yard.

Their conversations are brief. Private. Purposeful.

She carries herself with the stillness of someone waiting for a storm.

Phoenix is here. That still feels strange to say. My brother is here.

He’s standing a little apart, dressed in a crisp black button-down, the sleeves rolled to his elbows, slacks cut sharp to his frame, and polished shoes that clearly weren’t made for gravel.

Felix lingers near him. Quiet, observant, standing just close enough to be protective.

He hasn’t left Phoenix’s side since they arrived.

McKenzie is tucked into Phoenix’s other side, a glass of wine in her hand, the two of them watching the chaos unfold with identical expressions of amused detachment.

Phoenix is talking to Malachi, well, more nodding while Malachi talks, with that unreadable calm he always wears. Phoenix doesn’t blend in, he looms. He gives the impression of a mafia prince dropped into a biker bonfire. Yet... he was here. And that means something.

I step off the porch, letting the screen door slam behind me.

Malachi glances over from where he is, his eyes doing that thing where they drag over every inch of me, cataloging.

My stomach flips, sharp and fast, but I force myself to focus.

I’m not just Malachi’s girl tonight. I am someone’s sister. He’s here because of that.

The wind lifts the hem of my flannel shirt where it’s tied at my waist, brushing against bare skin. I feel exposed. Seen. Not just by Phoenix or Malachi, but by all of them.

“I give him ten minutes before Ruby ropes him into something illegal,” East mutters as he walks by with a plate stacked like a tower of Jenga.

“I heard that,” Phoenix calls smoothly without turning around.

McKenzie arches a brow, taking a sip of her wine. “Knowing you, you’d probably be willing.”

Phoenix tilts his head, eyes still forward. “Depends on who’s asking.”

She rolls her eyes but smiles, the kind that says she’s used to his charm and secretly enjoys it.

“Yeah, yeah. Eyes sharp as a hawk, ears tuned to hell,” East replies, grinning.

Olivia and Victor are holding court near the picnic tables, Olivia in a flowy black dress and sunglasses that make her look like a movie star.

Victor has one hand on her lower back, the other gesturing animatedly as he talks to Knox and James.

Sloane stands close beside Knox, laughing softly at something he says, her hand occasionally brushing his in that quiet way couples do when they’re still trying to close old distance.

Arden stands beside Olivia, sipping a drink and quietly scanning the yard in full detail, which, honestly, he probably is.

Arden nods toward Phoenix. “He makes me nervous.”

Victor smirks. “That’s because he’s smarter than all of us.”

“I’m right here,” Phoenix says without looking up from his conversation with Malachi.

Ruby breaks into an off-key rendition of “Livin’ La Vida Loca,” twirling a bottle of beer like it’s a microphone.

“Connor,” Julian groans from one of the long wooden picnic tables. “Tell them to stop before they summon Ricky Martin.”

Connor, who is flipping burgers with one hand and swaying his hips to the beat with the other, just grins. “Welcome to one of my world-famous BDSM parties, brother! Burgers, Drinks, Salsa Music.”

Julian drops his head into his hands. “I hate you.”

Bailey pats his back, hiding her smile behind her cup. “You love us.”

Bass walks past them with a tray of hotdogs and leans in toward Caroline. “Ten bucks says Ruby starts a conga line before dessert.”

“You’re on,” she replies, without missing a beat.

Bec appears next to Ruby, already laughing at some inside joke I haven’t heard. “Okay, but did you see Connor try to set up the grill? I swear he started choreographing the chicken.”

Ruby chokes on her drink. “Oh my god, I thought he was doing a summoning circle with the condiments.”

“Connor!” Bailey yells across the yard. “Stop dancing with the ketchup bottle!”

Julian groans and buries his face in his hands as Bec and Ruby cackle.

“I don’t even know why I come to these,” Julian mutters.

“Because your wife makes you,” Connor calls back with a wink. “And because you love me.”

Bailey grins as she bumps shoulders with Julian. “Deep down, he’s proud. Aren’t you, babe?”

Julian stares at his burger. “I plead the Fifth.”

“Lame,” Bec and Ruby say at the same time.

Ansley saunters up to Lincoln with a drink in her hand, eyes glinting with mischief. “You gonna tell me I’m not allowed to sit on the bar again, sheriff?”

Lincoln sighs, pure exasperation threaded with concern, but his eyes track her the entire time she climbs onto the bar. “You’re gonna fall.”

“Catch me, then,” she says, leaning back dramatically.

“I swear to God,” Lincoln mutters, stepping closer just in case.

I find myself drifting toward Phoenix, not sure what I’m going to say, just knowing I need to say something. Phoenix catches my eye as I step beside him and Malachi. He doesn’t smile, but his gaze softens just enough.

“Quite the crowd,” he says.

“Yeah,” I reply, crossing my arms as I watch Ruby convince Frankie to join the dance line. Frankie rolls her eyes but doesn’t say no.

Frankie’s gaze flicks to me once, subtle, lingering, and in that brief second, I feel it. She sees something I haven’t named yet. She moves through the crowd with a kind of awareness that’s all her own. Intuitive. Her presence carries the hush that follows a storm.

“They yours?” Phoenix asks. “This crew?”

I think about that. About Maggie’s cinnamon rolls. James sitting on the porch, shelling peanuts like he isn’t listening to every word within fifty feet. About Sloane sliding me a drink earlier and muttering, “Don’t overthink it. Just enjoy it.”

“Yeah,” I reply. “I guess they are.”

Phoenix nods once. “Then I’m glad I came.”

McKenzie smiles warmly at me. “We both are.”

For a second, I feel something strange stir in my chest. Something like peace.

A loud yell cuts through the moment. “Salsa train incoming!” Ruby shrieks.

Frankie grabs Bec’s hand and pulls her into the line Ruby formed as they barrel past, dragging a laughing line of people behind them. Nash, somehow, is near the front, his expression deadpan despite the ridiculousness.

“Save yourselves,” East calls as Darla shoves him into the line.

Malachi slides an arm around my waist. The heat of his body hits first, then the weight of the gesture. Possessive, sure. But something gentler pulses underneath it. A quiet tether.

“You dancing with them or hiding with me?”

“Hiding.”

He kisses my temple. Lips warm. Gentle. A touch that melts something inside me.

“Good. I prefer it when you hide with me.”

I glance back at Phoenix. He gives me a subtle nod, recognizing something unspoken. Family doesn’t always show up the way you expect.

And sometimes, just sometimes, the person who makes you feel safest isn’t the one you run to first. He is the one who never stops watching the door until you walk through it.