Derby stops inside the gate and turns his head.
Waiting.
Not patient exactly. Derby doesn’t look like a patient man. He looks like a man who would rather lift the truck with his bare hands than wait on me to decide whether I’m done being scared.
For reasons I don’t understand, that helps.
Wildcat drives through.
The gate shuts behind us with a heavy metal clang.
It sounds final.
Wildcat parks where Derby points, beside a row of bikes that shine like black beasts under the floodlights. My truck gives one last pathetic rattle on the trailer behind us like it’s been waiting for permission to die.
For a second, no one moves.
Men stand around the yard and porch, half in shadow, half in light. Some smoke. Some drink. Some watch. There are women too, not many, but enough to keep me from feeling like I’ve stepped into a prison yard. One woman sits on the porch rail in cowboy boots and a dress, laughing at something a man whispers against her neck. Another stands near the door with a shotgun tucked casual against her shoulder like it’s a broom she might use if company gets too rowdy.
This isn’t just a clubhouse.
It’s a kingdom.
A rough one. A dangerous one. One built out of iron bars, bourbon breath, grease, smoke, and men and women who look like they’ve never apologized for taking up space.
I don’t belong here. The knowledge is immediate and brutal.
I’m not one of these women with their loud mouths and steady hands. I’m not soft enough to be pitied or hard enough to be respected. I’m a mother with twenty-seven dollars in cash, a maxed-out credit card, and a dead man’s name tucked under my tongue like a prayer I’m not sure I believe in.
Still, when Wildcat opens my door, I lift my chin before I climb down.
It’s ridiculous.
I know that.
My truck is broken. My boxes are strapped to a trailer. My son is sleeping in a tow rig. My underwear is in my purse because it almost murdered a biker on Hell Road. There is no dignity to salvage from that.
But I lift my chin anyway.
Some women get diamonds.
I have posture and spite.
Derby swings off his bike and walks to my door before Wildcat can offer me a hand. Wildcat backs off with both palms lifted, like Derby has given an order without speaking.
I hate that Derby is good-looking.
That feels unfair on top of everything else.
The man should be ugly. He should have one eye and a limp and maybe a personality built entirely out of old tobacco spit. Instead, he is tall and broad with tattoos disappearing under his sleeves, a swanky beard, and a mouth that looks cruel until it almost smiles. There’s not one hair on his shaved head, but he has the kind of body a woman notices even when she has more important things to worry about, which only makes me resent him more.
He opens my door wider before I can push it closed again.
I glare at him because it’s easier than saying thank you. “I can open a door.”
“I can see that.”
“Then why did you do it?”