Total pages in book: 61
Estimated words: 63608 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 318(@200wpm)___ 254(@250wpm)___ 212(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63608 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 318(@200wpm)___ 254(@250wpm)___ 212(@300wpm)
“You got every right to be scared,” I say quietly. “But you’re not facing any of this alone.”
Her grip tightens. “I know.”
I force myself to look away from her, because the way she’s looking at me right now—Like she’s already halfway in love with me again and doesn’t know it—It’s too much.
We drive another ten minutes before turning down a dirt path almost invisible in the storm.
Branches scrape the sides of the truck. Mud splashes the wheels. The road disappears entirely for a moment, but I keep going until a dark mound of earth rises ahead.
Kelly’s brows knit. “This is a hill.”
“It’s a gate,” I correct.
I stop the truck, step out, and hit a latch hidden beneath a rock. The ground shifts with a groaning hum, revealing a steel-reinforced garage door.
Kelly’s eyes widen. “What is this?”
“Somewhere safe,” I answer. “Safer than anywhere else.”
Once we’re inside the underground garage and the door seals behind us, the sudden quiet is shocking. No rain. No thunder. Only the low hum of generators.
Kelly looks around concrete walls, steel beams, pallets of supplies, two bikes tarped in the corner.
Then she looks at me.
Really looks.
“You’re shaking,” she whispers.
I freeze.
I didn’t notice it, but she’s right. My hands are trembling slightly. The adrenaline crash. The fear spike. The sight of her face when she thought something might’ve happened to me.
I try to shove it down, hide it, bury it.
But she steps closer.
Then closer.
Then she places both palms flat on my chest.
Warm. Soft. Steady.
“Ledger,” she whispers, “it’s okay to be scared too.”
I close my eyes, jaw clenching.
“You almost lost me,” she says softly, “and I almost lost you.”
“You didn’t,” I choke out. “You won’t.”
“But that’s why you’re shaking,” she says gently. “Because it was close.”
I open my eyes.
Her face is inches from mine.
Her breath warm on my skin.
Her voice trembling with truth.
“You matter to me,” she says quietly, fiercely and it knocks the wind out of me. “And I matter to you.”
Every part of me wants to grab her and kiss her until she remembers everything.
Every part of me wants to hold her until the shaking stops.
Every part of me wants to hide her from the world until it earns the right to get close to her again.
But I can’t lose control.
Not now.
Not when danger is breathing down our necks.
Not when she’s still remembering.
“Kelly,” I rasp, “you can’t say things like that right now.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’ll believe you.” My voice breaks. “And I can’t afford to believe anything tonight.”
Her breath catches. She lifts a hand and touches my jaw, slow, delicate, careful, like she’s done it a hundred times before.
And maybe she has. I just didn’t pay attention because I was too busy denying what we have.
“Ledger Masters,” she whispers, “I’m already choosing you.”
My heart stops.
For a split second, the storm, the danger, the underground hideout it all fades.
Then my phone vibrates. We both jump. I check the screen.
Nitro.
Got a hit on the guy in the trees. Sending location now. Might be connected to Bratok’s last lieutenant.
My vision tunnels.
My breathing slows.
My rage sharpens.
Kelly grabs my wrist. “What does that mean?”
“It means,” I say quietly, “we’re done running.”
She pales. “Riot.”
I step close, closer than before, and lower my voice to a promise.
“They came for you once. They got you. The keep coming for you to get me. They won’t get a second chance to have you again.”
Her eyes widen. “What are you going to do?”
I cup her cheek.
“Whatever it takes.”
Her breath shudders not in fear, but something deeper.
“Don’t go,” she whispers.
“I’m not leaving,” I promise. “But someone’s gotta bleed before sunrise, sunshine.”
She closes her eyes.
When she opens them again, the fear is still there but so is something else.
Trust.
Even without her memories, she trusts me with everything she has left.
And that?
That terrifies me more than the men hunting us.
Because now I know with bone-deep certainty if I lose her again,
there won’t be enough of me left to bury.
Eighteen
Kelly
Fear is loud but the Kings and Riot are louder.
* * *
The underground safehouse hums with quiet power — generators somewhere beneath the concrete, faint vibrations running through the floor, the low thrum like a heartbeat.
I stand in the middle of the dim-lit interior, arms wrapped around myself, staring at the steel door Riot disappeared through less than a minute ago.
I feel the echo of his touch everywhere.
On my cheek. On my jaw. On my heart.
Because whatever this is between us, whatever we were, feels terrifyingly close to love.
Maybe it already was.
Maybe it still is.
I inhale, sharp and shaky, pacing a small circle. The air feels heavy here dense with tension and fear and everything we’re not saying yet. Riot told me not to be scared.
But he looked almost frantic when he said it.
As soon as that text from Nitro hit his phone, Riot changed. Not into someone different but into a version of himself that feels closer to a storm than a man.