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WRAITH

“ F uckers,” Butcher shouts as he storms toward me at the bar a week later. “We need a precautionary lockdown.”

A heady rush of adrenaline threads through me. “Why?”

“That was Wilder. The Bratva just raided our grow-op.” Butcher yells, “Atom! Do me a favor. Go grab Ember from home.”

Atom nods. “On it, boss.”

It must be serious if our enforcer has to retrieve Butcher’s daughter.

“Is everyone okay?” Catfish asks from behind the bar.

Butcher shakes his head. “Kong and Tap are both dead. The Bratva stole a whole bunch of weed. Shot up the lamps, cut down plants. Fucking destroyed the place.”

“Do we need to ride over there?” I ask.

Butcher sighs. “Wilder is gonna drag his ass to the hospital. They thought he was dead, so they left him on the ground. Overheard them discussing coming here next. He thought they decided against it. But it puts them about thirty minutes away if they are. Get everyone in, now. Just in case. This’ll be retaliation for the other evening.”

Butcher types the message that goes out to all the members suggesting they bring family with them as a precaution. Most do.

“I need to go.” I grab my phone off the bar. “Catfish, can I borrow your truck? I came in on my bike.”

“You aren’t leaving,” Butcher says.

Catfish tosses me his keys before he dashes out from behind the bar.

I spin the keys on my finger. “You and I both know I am. I need to go get Raven and Fen.”

“As sergeant at arms, it’s your job to make sure the Iron Outlaws are secure.”

As Butcher challenges me, I recall Spark’s words. To protect my club or King will find someone else to do it for me…even if Butcher won’t.

“I know what my fucking job is. And you’ll have my full attention once they’re both here. We’ll be back here in less than fifteen if you just let me get going.”

I spin on my heel to go, and Butcher grabs my arm roughly. His cheeks flame red, a sure sign he’s about to lose his shit with me. “There is no ‘we.’ It’s the club or nothing.”

“Don’t put either of us in a situation where we end up saying shit we can’t take back.”

“Raven and her kid aren’t part of this club. Unless you’re claiming her.”

I look down at the floor and scuff some imaginary stain with the toe of my boot. He doesn’t know the reason I didn’t go to Kansas wasn’t because he told me not to, but because of spending time in Raven’s orbit and that damn brush of lips. “I don’t know what I’m doing with Raven. She confuses the shit out of me. There are days I can’t think straight because I don’t want to let Hallie’s memory down. But the call you’re making right now might mean she doesn’t live long enough for me to find out if the Bratva hits the town. And I can’t let another woman and child die on my watch.”

“We don’t have the room for people who aren’t?—”

“They can stay in my room. I’ll grab extra food on the way back if I have to. But I’m going to get them, Butch.”

Butcher pulls his shoulders back. “What if I said if you leave, we won’t open the doors to let you back in?”

I shrug. “Then you aren’t half the man I think you are.”

Butcher growls. A weird sound of frustration and anger exploding from his lips. “Fine. Go get her and her kid.”

I rush out into the lot, scan for Catfish’s truck, and jump in. I don’t want to give Butcher a millisecond to change his mind. It’s been a week since I saw Raven. I avoided the diner. Hell, I avoided town completely. Didn’t want anything to remind me about the way she’d felt when my lips brushed hers. Fuck, I don’t know what I’d been thinking.

Yeah. I do.

I even played it out one night in bed. How she’d feel as I fucked her. How my hands would circle that tiny waist as I thrust into her. Came so hard, I saw stars.

But I call the diner as soon as I’m in the truck, praying she’s there.

“Hello, Rainbow Diner,” Raven says when she answers. There’s laughter in her voice, like she’d been joking around before she picked up the phone. Just her voice eases the churning in my gut.

I swerve around some slowpoke of a car and pull back into my lane. “I need you to tell Ma I said you have to leave. You need to run across the street and go pack a bag for you and Fen and be ready for me to pick you up in seven minutes.”

“What?” she asks. “I can’t just leave an hour before my shift finishes. And Fen is sleeping over at a friend’s house. He took his bags with him this morning.”

Shit. Should I tell her to grab him?

No. They’re coming for us. Not her. Not Fen.

Fuck. Why am I even mixing her up in this?

“Blue. Trouble’s coming. Not for you. For me. But people in town…they talk. They’ve seen me at your place. I don’t want it on my conscience if they get pointed your way. What I’m offering is to come get you, take you to my clubhouse, where I can protect you. If you don’t want to come, then I’m not going to force you. But I promise you, Ma will understand if you tell her trouble’s coming and I want you out of it.”

I hear the little gasp of breath. Can imagine those lips of hers open a little, her face pale with fear. And I want to pull her into my arms and tell her it’s all going to be okay.

But I stop shy of pleading with her. Because pleading says something altogether different. It says she may be more important than she has any right to be just yet.

“Hate to rush you, Raven, but I’m five minutes away. Are you coming or am I turning back to the clubhouse? I don’t want to leave you unprotected, but it’s your call.”

Everything in me wants to demand she come. I want to walk into that diner, fucking carry her across the street to that shitty apartment of hers and throw shit into a bag for her.

Don’t say anything more.

Don’t say anything more.

Don’t say anything more.

“Please, Raven. I need to know you’re safe.”

“Okay. Let me talk to Margie.”

It feels like a firework is going off in my chest. “I’ll be outside in five minutes.”

I dial Grudge, and my VP is out of breath when he answers. “What?”

“I’m in town. Anyone else still out of the clubhouse you need me to pick up? Any supplies we need?”

“Everyone’s accounted for. But Nola and Karlie were just saying we’re low on milk and creamer and shit. If you’ve got two minutes to pick some of that up, it would be helpful.”

“On it.”

I call Ma and ask her to put a few gallons outside the diner for me to grab. But when I get there, she’s outside with them at her feet. Her arms are folded, her lips thin narrow lines.

“You told me you weren’t interested in Raven,” she says as soon as I step out.

“I don’t owe you any explanation, Ma. Just need this stuff.”

I start to throw the gallon jugs of milk and cartons of half and half into the back of the truck.

“Doesn’t Hallie mean anything to you anymore?”

I stop what I’m doing and turn to face her. “I loved your daughter with every bit of my being. But I don’t owe you the rest of my life as a fucking walking memorial.”

Tears glisten in her eyes, and I feel like shit. First Butcher challenging me. Now her. All on top of me challenging myself.

“How can you say that? She was our everything.”

I don’t know how to explain this to people. Raven is muscling her way in without even trying. But I don’t want to evict Hallie from my heart, discard her like what we had didn’t mean anything.

“I can’t do this now, Ma. Trouble’s coming. I gotta go. Close early. Lower your shutters.” I pull a hundred bucks from my wallet and hand it to her, hoping it’s enough for the supplies. “Stay safe. We doubt they’ll come into town, but you never know.”

I hop back in the truck and drive across the street, pulling up beneath Raven’s apartment.

As I get to the door to knock, it pulls open. And as much as I hate to admit it, the sight of Raven’s face stills everything that’s churned up inside. The Russians. Ma. Butcher.

Just a glimpse of her blue eyes settles me. Her cheeks are flushed pink from hurrying around.

“Are you ready?”

She shakes her head. “I’m worried about leaving Fen. And I don’t know what to pack or for how long.”

I nudge her back inside and close the door behind us before pulling her into a hug to comfort both of us. “Where’s Fen at?”

“Should we go get him?” Her arms wrap around me, and she places her head against my chest. She’s fucking tiny in my arms, yet I feel utterly complete with her tucked up against me. “He’s south of River View Lodge. Those new homes west of the river.”

I do some thinking about directions and routes. “He’s even safer there. Complete wrong direction for town or the club. When’s he due back?”

“Tomorrow afternoon, but Jefferson’s mom, Sue, said he could stay the whole weekend if he wanted when I dropped his bag off.” She looks up at me. “Should I call her and ask?”

I shake my head. “Let’s decide that tomorrow.”

“Okay.” She releases me, and I find I hate it. But I watch her ass as she climbs the first two steps before turning to face me. “Why would I not be safer here?”

With her two steps up, we’re almost eye to eye. It’s cute. And in the small space, incredibly intimate.

I can’t help but reach and touch the wave of hair that’s escaped from her bun. “Look, it’s speculation that some trouble might be coming our way. And if they are, they might look for people familiar with the members of the club to use. I’ve been seen here, buying and fixing your locks. People may talk. I don’t want you exposed like that, even if the chances of something happening are slim.”

“But you and me. We aren’t…” She lets the sentence drift.

“Aren’t we?” I ask. The words are out of my mouth before I can think through what they mean.

And then I do something I haven’t done properly in two years, if you don’t count the quick brush of lips when I installed her new lock. I kiss a woman.

My heart races as I slip my arms around Raven and pull her slight frame against me. Despite our size difference, she fits against me perfectly. Her lips are soft as fuck on mine as I feel her body ease against me. I hold her tightly, firmly.

Nothing more than a kiss.

And the dam I built around my heart cracks a little.

I slip my tongue into her mouth, meeting hers. How did I not remember how good it feels to simply make out, fully clothed, standing in a stairwell?

She meets mine, tentatively at first, and her hands slip beneath my cut before they grip a hold of my Henley, and I’m falling fast into every second of it until Raven’s small fists shove against my chest. “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?” I ask, struggling to think, having been ripped out of the first real connection I’ve felt with someone else in two years. “Kiss you like we haven’t both been thinking about doing the same every day?”

“I’m confused, Wraith. Yes, I’ve thought about kissing you. It would be disingenuous of me to pretend otherwise. But I just escaped from a dangerous life. And this, being whisked away from my home, job, and life to be closeted away somewhere, even if it’s with you…I don’t know if that’s what I want in my life. Or Fen’s.”

My cock wants to argue. To convince her. But strangely, I understand what she’s saying. “You don’t have to decide, Raven. Not now, when trouble might be coming whether you like it or not. Trust me for tonight. Come with me. We can talk about this. It’s important, I know. But what matters right now is safety. And we don’t have much time.”

Raven’s cheeks are flushed, and I know an aroused woman when I see one. And the predator in me wants the chase. Ignoring everything I just said, I lean forward and kiss her again. Softly this time.

Tenderly.

And she melts into me, just like I knew she would, before pulling away quickly. “Okay. I’ll go finish packing.”