Page 25 of Burned in Stone
MERCY
Saturday nights at Devil’s Bar are always chaos, but tonight feels different. Maybe it’s the number of MC brothers drifting in—Hawk with Andi, Axel at the pool table even though Poppy’s home with the baby, Duck nursing a beer instead of staying in with Maggie. They’re trying to look casual, but I’ve worked here long enough to know when something’s up.
Maybe it’s because Cash hasn’t left his spot at the end of the bar since he showed up at six and helped me finish prepping. His knuckles are bandaged—something that happened after he left last night but he refuses to tell me how.
Whatever it was, it’s changed something in him. In us.
But even more than that, it feels like something is coming, like they’re all on high alert.
But maybe that’s just me. Maybe I’m imagining it because all I can think about are the packed bags back at my apartment, and the fact that I have to lie to my boss, myfriend,and tell her I need time off for a family emergency before I just…disappear.
I glance over at Kya. The plan sits in my stomach like a stone. She’ll understand the lie. Tell me to take a week, maybe two. I’ll thank her, give her a tight hug, then go straight to the ATM, withdraw what little cash I have, then get in my car and leave. I don’t know where I’m going. I’ll figure that out on the road. I’ve gotten good at running—it’s the only thing I’ve been good at since I left Gabriel. But this time feels different. This time, I’m leaving something behind that matters.
My eyes drift over to Cash.
I don’t know how I’m supposed to say goodbye to him…
“Two IPAs and a whiskey neat,” the guy in front of me orders, sliding a twenty across the bar. I pour on autopilot, muscle memory taking over while my mind races. The crowd’s thick tonight, filled with locals, college kids who drove up despite finals week, and enough leather cuts to make it clear this is MC territory.
I’m halfway through the order before I realize my fingers are trembling. I chance a glance at Cash, and of course, he’s watching me. Has been all night, tracking my every movement with an intensity that’s different from his usual flirting. This is protective. Possessive. Like he knows what I’m planning.Fuck.
I focus on counting out the change, but the register keys blur and clack under my fingers. The problem with Cash is that he makes me want things, and I can’t figure out if this feeling in my ribcage is dread or hope. Both feel like popping a blood blister between your teeth—sharp, metallic, a little bit sick.
I shouldn’t have let it get this far. Shouldn’t have let myself believe I could stay in one place long enough to want someone.
But that’s the problem with wanting—it always ends the same way.
At least this time, I get to choose when it ends.
He’ll hate me for leaving, but that’s better than watching him get dragged into my mess.
“Hey beautiful, how about you and me get out of here?” A drunk college boy leans too far over the bar, breathing beer fumes in my face.
Before I can respond, Cash materializes at his shoulder. “You’re done for the night.”
The kid starts to argue, takes one look at Cash’s cut and the cold promise in his eyes, and backs away with his hands up. “Yeah, OK, man. Didn’t realize she was yours.”
I don’t even have to ask what Cash is doing. He’s staking territory the only way he knows how: like a wild animal who’s decided home is wherever you are. The kid scurries off, and Cash leans over the bar, his jaw working, his fingers drumming the sticky surface. For a second I think he’s about to say something to me, but instead he glares at the next guy in line until the man audibly loses his nerve and decides to order from the new guy instead.
“You don’t have to do that,” I murmur, wiping condensation off pint glasses in a mindless rhythm.
He shakes his head. “Do what?”
“Hover. Act like you’re about to drag some dude out by his throat just because he talked to me.”
This time, his lips tug in a crooked near-smile. “Then he shouldn’t try to touch what doesn’t belong to him.”
“Belong?” I echo, the word catching in my throat. I should push back, remind him that I don’t belong to anyone. But that primal part of me, the one that’s been living on adrenaline and fear for too long, goes soft at the sound of his voice. The part that craves safety whispers, just let him.
He doesn’t move closer. He doesn’t have to. The space between us crackles with all the things we aren’t saying—me planning to disappear before dawn, him already claiming me in ways that make it impossible to leave clean.
He leans over the bar, dropping his volume. “Suppose that’s up to you.”
The words shouldn’t make my pulse jump, but they do. After the life I fled, hearing any man talk like that should send me running. A year ago, it would have. But now—after months orbiting the MC, months of watching how these men protect what’s theirs—it makes me wonder what it would feel like tobelongto someone who doesn’t want to own me, just guard the space around me. What Cash wants isn’t control. It’s faith. The kind that says if I said yes, he’d burn the world down to keep me safe.
But that kind of loyalty isn’t just dangerous—it’s contagious.
If I let Cash stake his claim, my fight becomes the club’s fight. And they’ve already got Summit breathing down their necks, city officials in their pockets, and cops sniffing around for excuses to shut them down. If Gabriel drags his badge into this mess, he won’t stop at ruining me—he’ll bury them too.
