Total pages in book: 45
Estimated words: 41664 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 208(@200wpm)___ 167(@250wpm)___ 139(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 41664 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 208(@200wpm)___ 167(@250wpm)___ 139(@300wpm)
Kane didn’t chew me out. He asked me questions. Two minutes into the answers, he hired me.
He also made me finish high school. No negotiation. I still heard his voice in my head sometimes, “You don’t get to be vicious and stupid. Pick one.”
I attended class in the morning and spent the afternoon in a back room at a warehouse, learning systems that were so old they should have been in museums and systems that were so new they felt like rumors. Kane and Edge split time between Tennessee and Crossbend back then, but Drift only lived half an hour south. We hung out more and more, ate cheap pizza, and wrote bad code, then fixed it until it wasn’t bad anymore. When I left my parents’ house at eighteen, I moved into his spare room. And when Kane and Edge made Crossbend permanent, we did too.
My parents didn’t like it. They liked me not getting arrested, but they didn’t approve of the men who made sure I didn’t. Things got quiet and brittle until they broke. When I patched with the Redline Kings, they forbade Alanna from seeing me. She ignored that order more than she obeyed it, but we learned the rhythm—quiet meets, careful texts, and holidays threaded like wires through a wall.
“You’re far away,” Alanna observed now, reading my face like she always had. “Want to come back?”
I exhaled, a slow pull that loosened something between my shoulder blades. “Always.”
She shook her head, hair slipping loose from her bun, and leaned against the car again, like it might hold her steady. The last rays of the sun caught the curve of her cheek, painting her in the same gold that set the pines on fire. For a second, it almost looked like peace.
Her voice dropped quieter, and she sighed. “I miss this. I miss you. I hate that we have to meet like this—out in the middle of nowhere like it’s some big secret.”
My chest pinched. I shifted my weight, crossing my arms again, jaw working tight before I forced it loose. “I know. But I’m not giving our parents one more reason to hate me. If this is how it has to be, we make it work.”
She bit her lip and looked down. “It feels like I’m already losing them.”
I didn’t answer right away. Couldn’t. Because I’d seen it too—the way our parents grew colder the longer I wore the cut, the deeper I sank into the Kings. Alanna was still theirs, but the leash was tightening. One day, it would choke her, and she’d have to cut it herself. I saw the flicker of it in her eyes now.
“Then that’s on them,” I said finally, voice low. “Not you.”
Her throat bobbed like she wanted to argue, but she didn’t. She just looked at me for a long second, soft gray eyes steady.
She tipped her head toward my bike, her glasses flashing the last smear of light. Her lips tipped up in a clear attempt to lighten the mood. “You couldn’t have picked a coffee shop? Somewhere with air-conditioning? I look like humidity is my personality.”
“You look like you’re late for new tires.”
She kicked lightly at my boot toe. “If your strategy is to nag me until I love you more, it’s working.”
“Not a strategy. A lifestyle.”
“Uh-huh.” Her mouth softened, eyes scanning my face. “You look tense. More than usual.”
“It’s been a week,” I answered, keeping it vague.
“Work?” she pressed, not letting it go.
I shrugged, aiming for casual and hoping to change the direction of the conversation.
She tilted her head, not buying it. “You’ve always been a terrible liar.”
“Don’t start.”
“I’m serious, Jaxton.” Her voice cut sharp enough that I looked at her again. “Something’s going on. What is it?”
For a second, I considered deflecting harder. But she wasn’t wrong. I was stretched tighter than I’d been in years.
“Work,” I finally confirmed, then sigh-laughed because my sister wasn’t a wall I could bounce lies off and hope they stuck. “And…someone I’m looking out for.”
Her brows climbed. “A woman.”
I didn’t reply, which was an answer of its own. The pines hissed when the breeze pushed through them. Somewhere down by the creek, frogs started their evening chorus, and crickets chirped along.
“You’ve got…a look,” she added.
“What look?”
“I don’t know exactly. Like you’re already in too deep and pretending it’s an assignment.”
My jaw ticked, and I dragged a hand down my face, glasses sliding low before I pushed them back up. “She’s more than that. But she’s in danger, Alanna. Real danger.”
Her eyes softened, concern threading under the sarcasm. “Of course you had to step in.”
I let my head tilt back until the sky filled my lenses, a wash of gold pouring into violet. Finally, I said simply, “She’s mine.” The words landed heavier than I meant them to, but I didn’t take them back. Then, for the first time, I put a voice to my real fear. “I’ll protect her. But I might’ve triggered something that put her in even more danger than she already was.”