Page 3

Pirate

“Are you going to let me in there?”

I folded my arms over my chest and planted my boots a little firmer into the hospital tile like I was holding a door to a fortress. “She’s resting.”

Mac raised an unimpressed brow at me. “You think I’m gonna walk in there playing the trombone? Got some cymbals strapped to my ass that’ll clang every step?”

I didn’t blink. “When she wakes up, you can see her.”

Mac stared up at me like she was trying to see into my soul—or maybe just planning the most efficient way to kick me in the balls. “What the hell is going on here, Jack Sparrow?” she asked, her voice suspicious as hell. “Let me in to see my friend.”

Before I could respond, I heard the familiar sound of heavy boots and lighter footsteps behind her.

“Jack Sparrow?” Poppy’s voice chimed in with a grin as she and Yarder appeared a few feet away. “Your name isn’t really Jack Sparrow, is it?” she asked, eyes wide and amused.

“It’s because his road name is Pirate, babe,” Yarder explained, and his lips twitched with amusement.

Poppy smiled wide and rolled her eyes. “I know, Yarder. I was trying to be funny.”

Mac wasn’t laughing. She looked at Yarder and Poppy. “Why don’t you two hang out with the door troll here? I’m gonna go sit with Saylor.”

She tried to step around me, but I didn’t budge. “She’s resting,” I said again, my voice flat but not aggressive. Just… final.

Mac stopped toe to toe with me, folded her arms across her chest, and mirrored my stance. She had fire in her eyes. I admired that about her, even if she was damn annoying for not listening to me. “Do you even know her last name?” she demanded.

“Murphy,” I grunted without hesitation.

Her eyes narrowed and studied me like I’d just pulled a rabbit out of a hat. “You saw that on her chart, probably.”

I had. But I’d remembered it. That had to count for something.

“Saylor Murphy,” Poppy said dreamily. “I like it. It has a nice ring to it.”

Yarder’s eyes scanned the hallway, then landed back on me. “What’s going on with her?”

“Doc said nothing’s broken. Just bruises, cuts, and a concussion. He said she could probably go home tomorrow if she stays stable.” I flicked a glance at Mac. “He also said rest was best for her.”

Mac glared up at me like she was seconds away from setting me on fire. “Did he also knight you as her protector while he was at it?” she snapped.

“Aw, you’re like her knight in shining armor,” Poppy sighed with a grin. She gave me a slow once-over. “Maybe her knight in worn leather on a Harley.”

Mac turned toward Yarder like she was bringing in reinforcements. “You’re the boss. Tell him to get out of my way so I can go see my friend.”

“You just want to get in there so you can figure out when you can start filming again.”

Mac glared at me. “I’ve talked to Don. He knows what happened. Shooting is paused for two weeks. He’s going to go over all of the footage and see if we really need anything more. I’m worried about my friend right now, not the damn TV show.”

That was surprising.

Yarder grunted and looked at me like I was barking up the wrong tree with Mac. I’m sure he was glad to hear that filming was suspended.

“She needs to rest,” I repeated.

“I promise not to blow my trombone,” Mac sassed with a smirk.

Yarder gave her a look like she’d completely lost it. “I would hope not.” Then he nodded at me. “Let her in. She can sit with her while we talk.”

Mac turned to me with a shit-eating grin lighting up her face. “Sidestep it, Jackie boy, you heard bossman.”

I growled under my breath, but I stepped to the side.

Mac didn’t hesitate. She slipped past me and into the room like she belonged there—like I hadn’t just spent ten minutes trying to keep her out. The door clicked shut behind her.

“You really had to give her the okay to go in there?” I muttered.

Poppy chuckled. “You’re acting like you’re guarding a room full of gold, Pirate.”

“Yeah,” Yarder said and stepped closer. “What the hell’s gotten into you?”

“Nothing’s gotten into me,” I said, a little too quick and a little too defensive. “Saylor needs to rest, and she can’t do that with Mac staring at her.”

Poppy grinned. “But she can rest with you staring at her?”

I grunted, not dignifying that with a response.

“The cops come by at all?” Yarder asked, as his tone shifted to something more serious.

Poppy smirked. “As if he would let them talk to Saylor.”

“No one’s been by except you guys and Mac,” I said. “Are the cops looking to talk to her again?”

Yarder nodded. “Yeah. She told them what happened already, but I guess they have more questions. The guy who attacked her took off, but she managed to get some hits in. They found his blood on the rock she used. Won’t have results for a few weeks, though.”

Jesus.

“You heard what the guy said to her, right?” I asked.

Yarder nodded again. “Dice let me know everything. Said the guy called her one of the ‘Iron Fiends’ bitches’ and claimed it was ‘for the asshole who keeps sniffing around.’” Yarder’s eyes darkened. “That shit’s too specific to be random.”

It didn’t make any sense. Saylor didn’t have ties to us. Not really. She worked on the show with Mac. That was it. She wasn’t patched in. She wasn’t dating anyone. Hell, she barely spoke to any of us.

“She really doesn’t have a connection to us other than the TV crew,” Yarder added, confirming what I was already thinking.

But that didn’t stop the guy from attacking her.

Yarder eyed me carefully. “What’s the deal with you sticking with Saylor?” he asked. “You got something going on with her?”

I shook my head. “No.”

He waited and gave me that look like he wasn’t buying it.

Poppy didn’t wait. “Then why the heck are you being her watchdog?” she demanded.

I looked at both of them, but I didn’t really have an answer that made sense. All I knew was I had to be here. That when I saw her on that stretcher, something had shifted. I wasn’t going to leave her side. Not until I knew she was safe.

“It’s our fault this happened to her,” I finally said.

Yarder shook his head. “This is Boone and Gibbs’ fault, not fucking ours. They’re the psychos that won’t leave us alone.”

“That’s true,” I admitted. “But I still feel a fuck-ton of guilt. If it wasn’t for us, she’d still be walking around without bruises on her face.”

Yarder frowned, but he didn’t argue.

“I’m not letting her out of my sight until this shit is over. Who’s to say the guy who attacked her won’t come back and finish the job? Someone has to make sure she’s safe.”

“And you decided that someone is you,” Yarder said flatly.

I nodded.

Poppy raised an eyebrow. “And Saylor’s okay with that? I don’t think I ever saw you speak a word to her before.”

“I didn’t ask,” I admitted. “But I’m sure she’d rather be safe than not have me around.”

Yarder rubbed his jaw, thinking it over. “If she’s anything like the other ol’ ladies, I’m sure she’s got a twisted opinion about you keeping her safe.”

Poppy immediately smacked Yarder’s arm. “What the heck is that supposed to mean?”

Yarder laughed and pulled her into his side with a grin. “It means sometimes you don’t see the danger staring you straight in the eye, and we need to be the ones who keep you safe even when you think you don’t need it.”

Poppy wrinkled her nose. “That’s not true.”

I scoffed under my breath, and Yarder chuckled again. They were a mess, but they worked. The way he protected her, teased her, held her close—it was the kind of thing I never thought much about. Not until now. Not until I found myself sitting in a hospital room like a damn watchdog, guarding someone who wasn’t mine.

But maybe that’s what made it worse.

Because I didn’t know what this was—why I felt the need to stay, to protect, to make sure she was okay—but I wasn’t walking away from it either.

Not yet.

“So what now?” Poppy asked.

That seemed to be the question we were always asking.

What now?

Shit had happened. The kind that left people bleeding and bruised. The kind that made your gut twist and your knuckles itch for a fight. And now, once again, we were standing in the aftermath trying to figure out how to stop it from getting worse.

The problem? We hadn’t been able to stop it. Not really. Boone and Gibbs were always a few goddamn steps ahead of us. Always slithering through the cracks before we could crush them.

I shifted against the wall outside Saylor’s hospital room with my arms crossed, jaw tight. “We need to find someone who doesn’t like Boone and Gibbs. Someone with dirt on them. Someone who wants to take them down as much as we do.”

“We’ve looked, man,” Yarder said with a shake of his head. “I can find people who don’t like Boone and Gibbs. Hell, I could fill a damn room. But none of them are willing to go up against them. Not out loud.”

He wasn’t wrong. Everyone had something to lose, and Boone and Gibbs knew how to collect debts and twist arms. Fear was their currency, and business was always booming.

“Maybe once we get the DNA results back from the guy who attacked Saylor, it can point us to someone who’d flip on them,” Poppy offered.

There was a chance—a small one. But the problem was that the DNA test was going to take weeks, and we needed answers yesterday.

“We need to tell Boone and Gibbs we don’t give a fuck about them and to leave us the hell alone,” I said.

“If only that would happen,” Yarder muttered and rubbed the back of his neck. He tipped his head toward Saylor’s closed door. “Just stay with her while she’s here. When she gets discharged, bring her back to the clubhouse. Mac, Mark, and Drew are gonna be staying there too.”

“Shouldn’t you just send them home?” Poppy asked. Her voice was hesitant, but she was thinking the obvious thing—get the civilians out of the blast zone.

I shook my head. “So they can go back to California and have Boone and Gibbs go after them there?” I asked. “They’d be sitting ducks. Seems like just being around the club makes them a target. We can’t just send the crew away to be slaughtered.”

Poppy winced. “Jesus. I hadn’t thought about it like that.”

Yarder wrapped an arm around her and pulled her into his side. “It’s okay, babe. As much as I’d love to just put them on a plane and forget this happened, we can’t. They’re wrapped up in it now. Whether they like it or not.”

He was right. Every one of them had unknowingly stepped into a war zone when they showed up to film our lives. They wanted drama for their show, and now they had it—just not the kind anyone wanted to air.

“I’ll keep you up to date on what’s going on here until Saylor gets released,” I said. “I’m sure the police will be by today to talk to her again.”

I didn’t want them near her. Every instinct in me said to keep them out, to keep everyone out. But I knew better. Getting in the way of the cops would only bring more heat. More attention. We couldn’t afford that right now.

Yarder nodded. “I’ll have a car brought up for you. We got your bike back to the clubhouse already.”

I nodded in return.

Yarder clapped a firm hand on my shoulder, giving it a squeeze—steady and strong. “We’ll figure this out,” he said.

Poppy stepped forward and gave me a quick hug—light but sincere. “I would say I want to see Saylor before we leave,” she said with a small smirk, “but I don’t think you’re gonna let that happen.”

“You can see her tomorrow at the clubhouse,” I grunted.

She laughed, kissed Yarder on the cheek, and together, they turned and walked down the hall. Yarder’s arm stayed around her shoulders as their voices were low as they disappeared around the corner.

Once they were gone, the silence returned.

Just me. Just the hallway. Just the soft beeping from Saylor’s room and the low murmur of nurses down the hall.

I stayed there for a moment.

Then I took a deep breath.

I didn’t know what the hell this was—what this thing inside me was doing. I didn’t understand why I felt so goddamn tethered to her all of a sudden. It didn’t make sense.

But I wasn’t walking away.

Not from her.

Something about seeing her on that stretcher, broken and bleeding, had flipped a switch in me I didn’t know existed. I couldn’t undo it. Didn’t want to.

I was going to keep Saylor safe, no matter what it took.

And we were going to put an end to Boone and Gibbs—once and for all.