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CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

I BOLTED UPRIGHT in bed, my breath ragged, my throat tight with the scream I hadn’t let out. My skin was slick with sweat, the nightmare clinging to me like a second skin. My pulse pounded in my ears, drowning out everything but the suffocating grip of the past.

Beside me, Spinner was awake in an instant. Years of club life, of listening for the wrong kind of silence, had sharpened his instincts. He didn’t ask questions right away, just reached for me, his grip firm, solid. Real.

“Lucy?” His voice was rough, thick with sleep but filled with concern.

I couldn’t answer. My lungs were working too fast, my hands fisting the sheets like they could hold me here, tether me to something that wasn’t the past. The room felt too small, the darkness too thick, pressing in like walls I couldn’t break through.

“Hey,” Spinner murmured, his arms tightening around me, pulling me against the heat of his bare chest. “You’re alright, darlin’. It’s just a dream.”

I flinched, still tangled in the nightmare’s grip, but the warmth of his body bled through the terror, grounding me. I blinked hard, forcing myself to see him, to recognize the jagged scar near his collarbone, the steady rise and fall of his breathing.

Reality.

“I… I couldn’t stop it,” I whispered, my voice breaking as I fought the tears burning my eyes. “I tried, Spinner. But I couldn’t stop it.”

His fingers skimmed my back in slow, steady circles. “Couldn’t stop what?”

I swallowed hard, my teeth sinking into my bottom lip to keep it from trembling. “Her. My sister.” The words barely made it out, brittle and raw. “I was there again. She was screaming, and I couldn’t— I couldn’t get to her.”

The sob I’d been choking back broke free. I pressed my hands over my face, my whole body trembling. “It’s always the same. She’s crying for me, and I’m useless. Weak.”

Spinner’s arms tightened, his whole body going rigid, like the weight of my words hit him square in the chest. His past had its own ghosts, but he shoved them aside. This wasn’t about him. It was about me. And he’d be damned if he let me drown in it alone.

“You’re not weak.” His voice was steel, cutting through the haze of grief and guilt clawing at me. “Not then, not now. You hear me? Whatever happened, whatever you couldn’t do, that wasn’t on you.”

I dropped my hands, lifting my tear-streaked face to him. “But it was. I should’ve been watching her. I should’ve done something.”

His jaw tightened, eyes blazing as he brushed damp strands of hair from my face. His touch was soft, but there was fire in that gaze, raw and fierce . “You were just a kid, Lucy. A damn kid. This weight? You’re not bearin' it by yourself anymore, you hear me? I'm here. I'll shoulder that burden with you, every damn piece of it.”

The air between us thickened, raw and heavy, but his words chipped away at the jagged edges of my guilt. Slowly, I nodded.

Spinner leaned back against the headboard, pulling me against him. I didn’t fight it. My head found its place on his chest, my ear pressed over the steady, unshaken rhythm of his heart. His arm curled around me, strong, immovable, like he’d hold me together even if I shattered.

His lips brushed the top of my head. “I’ve got you.” His voice was low, a promise. “No nightmares gonna take you from me. Not tonight. Not ever.”

I didn’t answer, but my fingers curled into his side, holding on like he was my last grip on solid ground.

And maybe he was.

Spinner’s body was warm, comforting—his steady heartbeat the only thing keeping me from slipping back into the nightmare’s grip. I lay against him, my breath still uneven, my body tense with the memories of the past.

His fingers trailed slow circles on my back, his touch grounding me, but it wasn’t enough. The dream still clung to me, sinking into my skin like a brand I couldn’t scrub away.

I needed more.

I needed him to make it fade.

I lifted my head from his chest, meeting his eyes in the dim light. They were dark and steady, watching me but not pushing. Spinner didn’t do that, he just stood strong, solid like a rock. The kind of guy you could lean on and know he wouldn’t let you fall.

But I needed more than this kind of comfort tonight. I needed something stronger to drown out the ghosts biting at my ribs.

I slid my hand up, fingers brushing over the ridges of his scars, over the ink stretched across his skin. His jaw clenched beneath the scruff lining it, but he didn’t stop me.

“Lucy,” he said, my name rough on his tongue, more of a warning than a question.

“I don’t want to think,” I whispered, my fingers tightening against his chest. “I don’t want to feel anything but you.”

His breath came slow and measured, but I saw the fire flicker in his gaze, banked but waiting. He wanted me. He always did. But this wasn’t about just want.

This was about what he thought I needed.

“Darlin’,” he rasped, his fingers grazing the nape of my neck. “You sure that’s what you need right now?”

I swallowed, my throat tight. “Yes.”

No hesitation. No second-guessing.

His eyes searched mine, his fingers tightening where they rested against my skin. “I’ll give you what you need,” he said, his voice husky and firm, unshakable. “And you’re gonna know exactly where you are and who you’re with.”

I sucked in a breath, his words hitting somewhere deep in my heart.

“It’ll always be you,” I whispered.

The second the words left my lips, his control snapped.

“Come here,” he growled, rolling me beneath him in one fluid motion.

The heat of him was everywhere, caging me in, pushing out the cold remnants of my nightmare. He didn’t kiss me right away—just hovered, his breath ghosting across my lips, making me wait.

Spinner never rushed. Not when it mattered.

His fingers traced my jaw, down the column of my throat, slow, deliberate. “Say it again,” he murmured.

I swallowed, my pulse thrumming beneath his touch. “It’ll always be you.”

His mouth crashed against mine, a wildfire sparking in the darkness.

There was nothing soft about the way he kissed me, no hesitation, no careful restraint. Just raw, unfiltered Spinner. He tasted like heat, like whiskey and midnight air, like everything he had ever made me feel since meeting him.

His hands roamed, mapping me, owning me, reminding me that I was alive. That I wasn’t trapped in that endless, suffocating nightmare.

And I let him.

I let the fire of him consume me.

I let him burn every dark memory to ash.