Prologue
Faster! Keep running!
The unexpected sleet cuts through the October air like tiny glass shards, each drop a frozen needle against my skin. My pajamas—a faded pink shirt a size too small, and long leggings with a raggedy hole in one knee—cling to my body like wet tissue paper. The thin cotton does nothing against the cold that seeps into my bones, but I don’t stop.
Can’t stop.
My lungs burn with each ragged breath, the frigid air slicing through my throat like broken glass. Every inhale is a struggle, choppy and painful, but I force myself to keep going. My stomach churns with terror, twisted into knots so tight I taste bile. The panic claws at my insides, making my hands shake and my vision blur at the edges, but the fear of what’s behind me is stronger than the fear of what’s ahead.
The cracked sidewalk bites at my bare feet with each slapping step, and I taste copper in my mouth where I’ve bitten my tongue. The street lights blur past in streaks of yellow, like fallen stars smeared across my vision. Houses huddle behind their neat little fences, windows glowing amber and gold. Here, on the richer side of town, families rest safely inside their perfect little homes.
It’s only a few miles from my own run-down trailer, and yet it’s a world away from the dank, dirty, and dangerous place I just fled.
The image of him—reeking breath, hand tightening around my wrist—flares in my mind like a flashbang. I shove it down, deeper.
Keep moving.
My pulse stutters wildly, hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird. Nausea churns in my gut, bile rising to coat my mouth with a bitter burn. The memory sends ice through my veins even as my skin burns with shame and terror. I shove it down, deeper.
Don’t think. Hurry!
I take a sharp left, nearly slipping as my foot hits a slick patch of leaves. The sleet’s coming harder now, icy needles lashing my face. But I see it. Emma’s house.
My feet carry me down the frozen sidewalk, past the park where we’d swing until our legs ached and talk about all the places we’d go together when we grew up.
That was before she left and everything changed.
Tears streak down my cheeks, blending with the sleet.
Fuck. I’m still here, trapped, counting down the days until my eighteenth birthday when I can finally escape this hell. Nine months, two weeks and three days.
The porch light’s on, music thumping inside, laughter spilling out into the storm like it’s just another Friday night. Motorcycles line the driveway—big, chrome beasts that gleam even in the dim streetlight. Harley-Davidsons mostly, with a few others I don’t recognize.
This isn’t the house I remember. Emma’s house was quiet, filled with the smell of her mom’s lavender candles and the sound of classical music drifting from the piano in the front room. This house thrums with masculine energy, all leather and motor oil and something darker that makes my pulse skip.
But I don’t have anywhere else to go.
The ancient oak that Emma and I climbed a thousand times is gone. Just a stump now, surrounded by sawdust that’s turned to mud in the rain. We used to shimmy up its thick trunk to Emma’s second-story window, spending countless nights whispering secrets and planning our futures. She was going to be a prima ballerina. I was going to do anything that made me enough money to get out of this hick town. We were going to be best friends forever.
I was so stupid.
Now I stand at the front door like a stranger, my hand shaking as I touch the knob. The porch light flickers, casting dancing shadows across the worn wooden planks.
It’s a party. I’ll just slip in and hide in the crush. If I can get to Emma’s room, I’ll be safe. It’s just for the night. One night. No one will even know I’ve been here.
The music pounds through the door, and I can hear voices—deep, rough laughter that makes something in my stomach flutter with nerves. These aren’t the high school or college boys who hang around the diner where I work. These are men. Real men, with callused hands and scars and stories I probably don’t want to know.
But it’s too late to run now. I’m soaked through and shivering so hard my teeth sound like castanets. If I don’t get warm soon, I’ll collapse right here on the porch.
I go to turn the knob, but the door is already opening. Warm air rushes out to greet me, carrying the scents of beer and cigarettes and something else—leather and motor oil and soap.
I stumble, nearly face-planting into a wall of muscle.
A wall of Harley “Lee” Armstrong. Emma’s older brother.
The original bad boy blueprint.
I nursed the biggest crush on him. The can’t-breathe, can’t-speak, write-his-name-in-the-margins-of-your-math-book kind.
But I never told anyone.
Not even Emma. Especially not Emma.
Lee had that lazy, untouchable energy that made you wonder if he even knew how attractive he was—or if he just didn’t care. He’d always been tall, lean, and ridiculously good-looking. Half the girls in our grade had dated him, and the other half had wished we were able to.
He had this way of looking through people, not cruel, just… unreachable. But every now and then, you’d catch his attention and it would be on you—completely. I lived for those moments, when he’d flash his sideways smirk, lazy and amused, seemingly impressed that you could engage his attention.
He could have easily been an ass, but for some reason that wasn’t who Lee was. He was the kind of guy who always slid me the last piece of pizza, seemingly knowing I was starving but too polite to take it. He’d been Emma’s champion, carrying her backpack when it was too heavy, and warning her about guys who weren’t good enough for his little sis.
He had this way of being quietly protective without making a big deal about it. Like the time Danny Morrison was giving me grief about being trailer trash. Lee just… appeared. He hadn’t said a word. Just stood there, all six-foot-two of controlled danger. Danny hadn’t bothered me again.
But when he got mad—really mad—it was like watching a summer storm. Not wild or explosive. Just focused. Controlled. Terrifying in the way distant thunder is, because you know the storm is coming, and you know it’s going to be biblical.
But that boy? He’s long gone.
My gaze drifts up, noting that he’s filled out, his shoulders now broad enough to block the porch light. His dark hair is shorter, military-neat but long enough on top that it falls across his forehead. A few days’ worth of stubble shadows his jaw, and there’s a hardness in his eyes that was never there before.
But it’s the leather cut stretched across his chest that stops me cold. Stoneheart MC arcs across his shoulders in bold white letters. Prospect is patched beneath it, marking him as someone working to earn membership in the club.
Damn and double damn.
Lee’s eyes go wide as they take me in. My soaked clothes cling to every curve of my too-abundant body. My bare feet burn with cold, and I’m painfully aware that I’m shaking so hard I can barely stand.
“Shit.” His voice is deeper than I remember, rougher around the edges. “Kya?”
The sound of my name on his lips hits me like a physical blow. I haven’t heard it said with anything approaching tenderness in so long that I almost start crying right there on his doorstep.
Instead, I turn away. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have—this was stupid. I’ll just—”
His hand closes around my arm before I can take a step, firm but gentle. His skin is warm against mine, and I can feel the calluses on his palm, the strength in his fingers.
“Whoa. Stop.” He tugs me back around to face him, his brow furrowed with concern. “What the hell happened to you?”
I open my mouth to answer, but nothing comes out. My jaw won’t work right, my teeth chattering too hard to form words. All I can do is stand there and shake like a leaf in a hurricane while he studies my face with those penetrating green eyes.
“Christ,” he mutters, and then his hand is on my back, guiding me through the door. “You’re frozen solid. Come on.”
The warmth inside hits me like a wall, and I gasp at the sudden change in temperature. The house is full of noise and bodies—men in leather cuts clustered around the kitchen island, a few women in tight jeans and barely-there tops draped over various pieces of furniture. Someone’s playing pool, the crack of balls echoing over the music.
They all turn to look when Lee guides me inside, and I want to disappear. I’m acutely aware of how I must look like a drowned racoon. Next to these put-together women with their perfect hair and confident smiles, I feel like exactly what I am, a scared little girl.
But Lee doesn’t seem to notice their stares. He keeps his hand on my back, steering me toward the stairs.
“Lee?” one of the men calls out—a guy with graying temples and a patch I can’t quite make out on his cut. He’s older than most of the men in the room, more weathered, but his eyes are kind when they land on me. “Everything alright?”
“Yeah, Duck. Just taking care of something.” Lee’s voice is carefully neutral, but there’s an edge to it that makes the other man nod and turn back to his conversation.
The stairs creak under our combined weight as Lee guides me up, his hand never leaving my back. The hallway at the top is dimmer, lit only by a small lamp on a side table. Family photos line the walls showing Emma at various dance recitals, Lee in his military dress uniform, the whole family at some long-ago Christmas.
He pushes open the bathroom door and flips on the heat lights.
“Shower. Now.” His tone brooks no argument. “Hot as you can stand it. I’ll grab you some clothes.”
I nod mutely, still too cold and shocked to protest. He starts to leave, then pauses in the doorway.
“Kya.” His voice is softer now, almost gentle. “You’re safe here. Okay?”
I nod again, not trusting my voice.
The door clicks shut behind him, and I’m alone with the sound of my own chattering teeth and the hum of the lights. I catch sight of myself in the mirror above the sink and wince. I look exactly as bad as I thought—pale and pinched, my lips nearly blue, with dark circles under my eyes.
The shower is a godsend. I step under the spray fully clothed, letting the hot water pound against my skin until feeling starts to return to my extremities. It hurts at first, pins and needles shooting through my hands and feet, but gradually the warmth seeps deeper, loosening the knots in my muscles.
I peel off the sodden clothes and let them fall to the shower floor with a wet slap. The water runs pink for a moment where my feet were bleeding. I must have cut them on the rough pavement.
Damn. That’s gonna hurt tomorrow.
I let myself sink down onto the shower floor, arms wrapped around my knees. The hot water streams over my head, washing away the last of the panic and leaving behind something else, a hollow ache in my chest that I’m afraid to examine too closely.
I can’t go home. I don’t have money. I don’t have a plan. I don’t even have shoes. God. What am I doing?
I’m seventeen, half naked in my former best friend’s brother’s bathroom.
This is insane.
And yet… I don’t regret coming here. Not for a second, because for the first time all night, I feel safe.
I step out of the shower as there’s a soft knock on the door.
“I’m leaving some stuff by the door,” Lee calls through the wood. “Hoodie, sweats. They’ll drown you, but they’re dry.”
“Thank you,” I manage to croak out.
“Take your time.”
I wrap myself in a towel as I hear his footsteps retreat down the hall. When I open the door, I find the promised clothes folded neatly outside the door. The hoodie is massive, navy blue with Stoneheart MC embroidered on the front in silver thread. It hangs to mid-thigh, the sleeves covering my hands completely. The sweatpants are equally oversized, soft gray cotton that I have to roll up three times at the ankles.
They smell like him—soap and smoke and something indefinably masculine. I bury my face in the fabric and breathe deeply.
You’re pathetic. You know that, right?
Shaking off my momentary insanity, I pad down the hallway, wincing as my feet protest.
The party has clearly wound down. The music is off, and most of the people I saw earlier are gone. Only a few remain, clustered around the kitchen island with bottles of beer and serious expressions. They look up when I appear in the doorway, and I freeze under their collective gaze.
Heat floods my cheeks at how I must look drowning in Lee’s oversized clothes. It’s embarrassing that they see me for who I am, a desperate girl with nowhere else to go.
I force myself to lift my chin, meeting each stare head-on. Whatever judgment they’re passing, whatever assumptions they’re making—I won’t give them the satisfaction of seeing me cower. This shame isn’t mine to carry.
Or so I tell myself.
Lee sits on the edge of the couch, elbows on his knees, hands clasped in front of him. When he sees me, he straightens, and something in his expression shifts.
“Come here,” he says, his voice low and steady.
I do, my bare feet silent on the hardwood floor. The other men watch but don’t speak, and I can feel them cataloging every detail. And I know exactly what they see.
They see my mother.
Everyone in this town does. She’s loud when she drinks, and she always drinks. She falls in and out of bars and men’s beds with the same careless grace she once used on stage in the high school musicals she never quite recovered from.
She used to be beautiful. Now she’s just a warning. A whispered “poor thing” at the grocery store. A snicker behind a hand. The kind of woman who forgets to show up to parent-teacher conferences but always remembers karaoke night at the bar.
And me?
I’m the one left picking up the bottles and cooking the eggs and dodging the guys who hang around too long in the kitchen.
People look at me and see what they expect to see. A girl with too much curve and not enough shame. The kind who’ll follow in her mother’s footsteps because how could I not?
They don’t see the straight A’s. Or how hard I work to disappear. Or how I never let a boy kiss me—not once—because I don’t want to give them one more thing to talk about.
They don’t see me. Just her.
Lee gestures to the chair across from him, and I sink into it gratefully. My legs feel like jelly, and I’m not sure how much longer they would have held me up.
“Let me see your feet,” he says, slapping a hand on his thigh.
“My feet are fine—”
“Kya.” The way he says my name brooks no argument. “Let me see.”
Before I can protest further, he sighs, sliding off the couch to sit in front of me. I open my mouth to argue but stop when his warm hands wrap around my ankles to place them carefully onto his lap. I wince as he examines the cuts and scrapes, his callused fingers surprisingly tender as they probe the worst of the damage.
“Jesus,” he mutters, looking up at one of the other men. “Duck, can you get the first-aid kit?”
“Sure, where is it?” Duck replies, already moving.
“Kitchen. Top cabinet above the fridge.”
Lee’s touch is impossibly gentle as he examines my torn feet. Duck hands him the kit and a bowl of warm water. Lee gently cleans the cuts, his thumb stroking soothingly along the arch of my foot when I flinch. The antiseptic stings, but his murmured reassurances and the careful way he dabs at each wound make the pain bearable.
“Nearly done,” he murmurs before applying the ointment.
When he wraps the bandages around my feet, his movements are precise and sure, as if he’s done this more than a few times. Which, considering his position in a Motorcycle Club, and his service history, I guess he might well have.
“Better?” he asks when he’s finished, his hands still cradling my bandaged feet.
I can barely speak past the lump in my throat. When was the last time someone took care of me?
“Thank you,” I whisper.
He nods once, then looks up at me with those piercing green eyes. “Now. Tell me what happened.”
I open my mouth, but the words stick in my throat. How do I tell Lee Armstrong—Emma’s brother, the man I used to have such an embarrassing crush on—that my own mother’s boyfriend tried to beat me?
“It’s okay,” he says, and his voice is gentler now. “You’re safe here.”
I stare at my hands, twisted together in my lap. “My mom was passed out,” I whisper. “Again.”
“And?”
“And her new boyfriend came over. Rick.” The name tastes bitter in my mouth. “He’s been staying with us for a few weeks now, and he… he looks at me sometimes. Says things.”
Lee goes very still. “What kind of things?”
Heat floods my cheeks. “Just… comments. About how I’m useless. A drain on them. Tonight he…” I swallow hard, forcing the words out. “He cornered me in the kitchen. He was drunk and—” I cut myself off, shaking my head violently.
One of the other men curses under his breath. Someone else mutters something I can’t quite catch, but it sounds angry.
Lee’s jaw is tight when I finally look up at him. “He hurt you.”
Just the one slap, but it was enough.
“I got away,” I say, avoiding his question. “I kneed him and ran. I didn’t know where else to go. Emma’s gone, and I don’t have any other friends, and I just… I remembered this place.”
Lee reaches out to catch my chin with his hand, turning my head to the left. I close my eyes, knowing he’ll see the handprint and slight bruise marked there.
“You did the right thing coming here.” His voice is controlled, but there’s a cold and dangerous bite lurking underneath. It makes my pulse quicken. “You’ll sleep in Emma’s room tonight.”
It’s not a request.
He lets me go, and I nod, suddenly exhausted. The adrenaline is wearing off, leaving behind a bone-deep weariness.
“Go to bed, Kya.” Lee says, his voice softer. “Get some rest.”
I stand on shaking legs, Lee’s clothes swallowing me. “Thank you,” I whisper. “For helping me. For not… for not turning me away.”
A strange look flickers across his face. “Kya,” he says, and my name sounds different in his mouth now. Careful. Important. “You never have to thank me for keeping you safe. Ever.”
The weight of his words settles over me like a blanket, and I have to blink back sudden tears. When was the last time someone said something like that to me? When was the last time someone looked at me like I mattered?
I turn, making my way back up the stairs before I do something stupid like cry.
Emma’s room is exactly as she left it before she moved to New York. The walls are still painted pale pink, with dance posters covering nearly every surface. Her desk is cluttered with old schoolbooks and jewelry, a thin layer of dust coating everything like snow.
It’s a time capsule to a girl who’s now living her dream as a principal ballerina with the National Dance Academy.
I crawl into her twin bed, pulling her lavender comforter up to my chin. I close my eyes and try to pretend, just for a moment, that she’s still here. That we’re still those innocent girls who believed in forever friendships and happy endings.
But then I hear the front door slam, followed by the rumble of motorcycle engines roaring to life. Multiple bikes, from the sound of it. I slip out of bed and tiptoe to the window, pushing aside the sheer curtains just enough to peek out.
Lee strides across the front yard toward his bike, three other men flanking him. Another two men are already on their bikes, waiting.
Even in the dim streetlight, I can see the tension in Lee’s shoulders, the way his hands are clenched into fists. He swings a leg over his Harley and kicks it to life, the engine’s growl echoing through the quiet neighborhood. Before he can pull away, his gaze lifts to Emma’s bedroom window.
My heart skips as our eyes meet across the darkness. His expression is serious, lethal, filled with a promise I don’t fully understand but feel in my bones. Even from this distance, I can see the controlled fury radiating from him, the deadly intent written in every line of his posture.
I don’t know for certain that he can see me until he jerks his chin up, offering me a half-smile. Then he revs the engine once more and disappears into the night with the others, leaving me standing at the window with my heart hammering against my ribs.
They disappear into the night, and I know—somehow, I know—exactly where they’re going.
I should feel guilty. I should be worried about what they might do to Rick, what kind of trouble this could cause. But all I feel is a strange, warm satisfaction in my chest. Someone cares enough to do something. Someone thinks I’m worth protecting.
Time moves strangely after that. I drift in and out of a restless doze, my mind churning with everything that’s happened. Every time I close my eyes, I see Rick’s face, feel the sharp crack of his hand on my face. But then Lee’s voice is there, soothing steady and sure.
You’re safe.
I’m not sure how long they’re gone, but I jolt awake when I hear the front door open again. I listen to heavy footsteps on the stairs, knowing it’s Lee. I slip out of bed and crack open Emma’s door, peering into the hallway.
Lee stands at his bedroom door, his back to me. His cut is gone, replaced by a simple black T-shirt that clings to the broad expanse of his shoulders. But it’s his hands that catch my attention—his knuckles are raw and swollen, streaked with blood that looks dark in the dim light.
He must sense me watching because he turns, and our eyes meet across the hallway. For a moment, neither of us speaks. The coldness in his expression should scare me, but it doesn’t.
“Is he gone?”
Lee nods once. “You’re now club property, Kya. You’re under the protection of Stoneheart MC.”
“What does that mean?” I whisper.
His smile is sharp, all teeth and shadows. “It means you’ll never be unsafe again, Kya. Anyone who even thinks about hurting you will have to answer to us. To me.”
A voice calls softly from behind him—feminine, sleepy. “Babe? You coming to bed?”
A woman appears in his doorway, barefoot and wearing nothing but one of his T-shirts. She’s beautiful in that effortless way some women are, with long blonde hair and legs that go on for miles. She exactly the kind of woman I’d expect him to have in his bed.
The sight of her hits me harder than it should. Of course he has a girlfriend. Of course someone like Lee wouldn’t be alone. I’m such an idiot for even—
“Hey, sweetheart,” the woman says, noticing me. Her smile is warm, genuine. “You okay? That bruise looks nasty.”
I nod, suddenly aware of how I must look in Lee’s oversized clothes, my hair probably sticking up at odd angles. “Fine,” I mutter, glancing away. “Just tired.”
She makes a noise of sympathy. “Get some rest, okay?”
Lee’s eyes never leave mine. “Night, Kya.”
Then he steps into his room, and the door clicks shut behind him, leaving me alone in the hallway with the memory of his bloody knuckles.
I slip back into Emma’s bed and pull the covers over my head, pressing my face into the pillow. I should feel satisfied. After all, I’m safe. And I do, mostly.
But there’s something else, too—a hollow ache in my chest that I’m afraid to name. I fall asleep thinking about green eyes and bruised hands.
I dream of motorcycles and leather cuts, of strong arms and bloody knuckles. I dream of a man who would burn the world down just to keep me safe.
And when I wake, I know what I have to do.
Chapter 1: Kya
Ten years later
“You know, by my late-twenties, I assumed I’d have my shit together,” I mutter, squinting at the trailer I once prayed to escape. “Not be jumping back into this toxic waste dump of a mess.”
Instead, I’m standing ankle-deep in patchy gravel, dressed in funeral black, staring at the ghosts of my childhood. The March air cuts through my thick designer coat—the one and only designer thing I owned. I’d bought it to prove I’d made it out.
Fat lot of good it’s doing me now.
The place hasn’t changed. The trailer still leans to the left like it’s nursing a perpetual hangover, and still smells like stale smoke and regret, even from out here. The wind whistles through the busted screen door, and I swear I can hear Mom’s voice, scratchy from too many cigarettes and not enough apologies.
Well, look who finally came home.
The irony isn’t lost on me. All those years I spent running from this place, building a life that was the exact opposite of everything it represented. Clean lines, neutral colors, a carefully curated existence where everything had its place and nothing reminded me of where I came from. And here I am, right back where I started.
Only now it’s mine whether I want it or not.
My mother—Patricia “Patty” Sullivan, serial heartbreaker and occasional karaoke queen—died in a car crash last Tuesday. I got the call from some bored state trooper who couldn’t even pronounce my name right, stumbling over the syllables like they were broken glass in his mouth.
“Kee-ah Sullivan?”
“Ky-ah,” I’d corrected.
“Kikah?”
“Ky-ah.”
“Right, well, I’m sorry to inform you, Ms. Sullivan, your mother has died.”
Sadly, it wasn’t grief or shock that hit me—it was a hollow recognition that I’d been preparing for this call for years. Mom had been slowly killing herself with alcohol and bad choices since before I could remember. Part of me was surprised it had taken this long. Hearing the news felt a little like hearing the final bell of a fight that had been over long before the referee counted to ten.
The rest of his words became a blur after that until he’d told me something that had brought reality crashing back into focus.
“She had just cashed a check,” he’d added casually, like it was an afterthought. “From the state lottery. A million.”
I’d laughed. Like, full-body, are-you-kidding-me hysterical laughter that probably made the poor guy think grief had cracked me completely. Of course she won the lottery. Of course she died before spending a cent. And of course she left it all to me.
Even dead, Mom was still capable of turning my life upside down. At least this time it was in a way that might help.
I sigh and drag my suitcase up the steps, the wheels thunking hard against the warped wood. The sound echoes across the trailer park like gunshots, and I half expect Mrs. Kowalski from next door to poke her head out and start asking questions I’m not ready to answer. But the park is quiet, most people already settled in for the evening with their TV dinners and beer and their denial that this is where dreams come to die.
I don’t plan on staying long. Just long enough to deal with the estate, sell what I can’t stomach keeping, and figure out what the hell to do with a million dollars that feels more like blood money than a blessing.
I fish the key from my bag and unlock the door.
The second I crack it open, the smell hits me.
Rot. Mildew. Garbage.
I gag, slapping a hand over my mouth as I push the door open wider with my foot. The air inside is thick, humid, and foul, like trash left out in the sun to fester. The scent wraps around me like a clawed hand, yanking me straight back to every awful night I spent in this place.
The carpet is stained. The dishes are still in the sink. There’s a half-eaten container of Chinese food on the coffee table, furred over in green mold. And the worst part? It’s not even surprising.
I stumble back onto the porch, gulping down the fresh air. My eyes sting. My stomach churns.
“Thanks, Mom.” I mutter, praying I won’t vomit.
When the nausea passes, I lock up the trailer, toss my bag back in my car and do the only rational thing.
I go in search of a drink.
Our small town has two bars—the country club on the far side of town, and Devil’s. The country club is member invite only, which leaves me with the only dive bar in fifty miles.
I pull into the parking lot, shaking my head as I park. It seems some things don’t change.
The sign still flickers with the word “Bar” in letters that have seen better decades. There’s still a dent in the left wall from where Tommy Hendrix crashed his motorcycle into it senior year.
I sit in the car for a moment, hands gripping the steering wheel, trying to work up the courage to walk through those doors. This is where Mom spent most of her evenings for the past thirty years, perched on a barstool, holding court with whoever would listen to her stories about the good old days when she was homecoming queen and the world was full of possibilities.
It’s also where I spent some of the longest nights of my childhood, waiting in the car for Mom to stagger out and drive us drunkenly home. It’s where I learned to swallow my pride and my shame in equal measure, to smile politely while helping my stumbling, slurring mother to the car as half the town watched, and the other half judged from afar.
But it’s the only place that feels right tonight. The only place where I can properly grieve someone who broke my heart long before she was gone.
I push open the door, and it sticks the way it always has, scraping against the frame with a sound like fingernails on a chalkboard. The smell hits me immediately—beer and grease from whatever passes for food in the kitchen, mixed with industrial-strength cleaner and the faint sweetness of spilled whiskey.
It’s like stepping into a time capsule, every detail exactly as I remember. The same jukebox in the corner plays some mournful country song about lost love and second chances. The same dartboard hangs slightly crooked on the far wall, just far enough from the pool table that no one would be injured. The same collection of neon beer signs casting everything in shades of red and blue, like the whole place is perpetually bathed in the glow of a police siren.
I don’t expect to see Devil—the man, the myth, the leather-wrapped institution himself—behind the bar. He’s older now, grayer, the lines around his eyes deeper and more pronounced. But he’s still built like a man who bench-presses monster trucks for fun.
When he looks up and sees me, a million emotions flickering across his face. Surprise, maybe, or recognition? But his expression settles quickly into that neutral mask I remember, the one that never gave away what he was thinking.
“Well, well,” he drawls, setting down the glass he was polishing. “Look what the cat dragged in.”
“Hey, Devil,” I say, sliding onto the barstool I used to sneak onto when my mom wasn’t looking. The vinyl is cracked in the same places, held together with duct tape that’s gone gray with age. “Hit me with something strong.”
He raises an eyebrow.
“Rough day?” he asks, reaching for a bottle of whiskey. The good stuff, not the rotgut he used to pour for my mother.
Guess he knows a designer coat when he sees one.
“Rough week. Rough year. Rough fucking decade, if I’m being honest.”
He pours without comment, sliding the glass across the bar with practiced ease. When the whiskey hits my throat, I close my eyes and let it burn.
“I heard about your mom,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry, kid.”
The word kid hits me harder than it should. That’s what he used to call me back then, when I was ten and thirteen, and seventeen, coming to collect my mother from whatever mess she’d gotten herself into.
I nod, not trusting my voice.
The silence stretches, while around us, the bar continues its eternal rhythm—the murmur of conversation, the crack of pool balls, the distant hum of the air conditioning that’s been on its last legs since the Clinton administration.
“You remember that night,” I say finally, “when I was sixteen? It was pouring rain, and you called to say Mom was ready to come home.”
Devil’s hands never stop moving, polishing glasses with the kind of muscle memory that comes from thirty years behind the same bar. But I see the slight pause, the way his shoulders tense just a fraction.
“Which night? There were a lot of them.”
“The night she’d been here since noon, and when I got here, she was passed out in the back booth. You were sitting with her, just… watching over her. Making sure nobody bothered her while she slept it off.”
His eyes meet mine briefly before returning to his work. “I remember.”
“You helped me get her to the car. She was dead weight, but you acted like it was nothing. Like it was just another Tuesday night.” I take another sip, smaller this time, letting the whiskey warm me from the inside out. “You could have just let her walk herself home. Could have looked the other way. But you didn’t.”
“Wouldn’t have been right.”
“No,” I agree. “But not everyone cared about what was right.”
Devil sets down the glass he’s been polishing and really looks at me for the first time since I walked in. His eyes are the same piercing blue I remember, the kind that seem to see straight through whatever mask you’re wearing to the truth underneath.
“Your mom was good people, Kya,” he says slowly. “She was fighting demons bigger than herself, but underneath all that pain, she was good people. And you?” His voice gets even gentler, almost fond. “You were just a kid trying to take care of someone who should have been taking care of you.”
The words hit me like a sucker punch, unexpected and devastating. I have to look away, blinking back the sudden sting of tears. In all the years since I left this place, no one has ever acknowledged what those nights cost me. No one has ever recognized the weight I carried, the responsibility that should never have been mine.
“She left me everything,” I whisper, my voice barely audible over the jukebox. “The trailer, all her debts, and apparently a million dollars from a lottery ticket.”
“Yeah, I heard about that.” Devil leans against the bar, crossing his arms. “Hell of a thing.”
“Is it, though?” I laugh, but there’s no humor in it. “She finally got everything she always wanted—enough money to start over, to be somebody new. And she died before she could spend a dime of it.”
“Maybe,” Devil says carefully, “it wasn’t meant for her.”
I look up at him sharply. “What do you mean?”
“Maybe the money was for you. Universe moves in mysterious ways.”
I snort, swirling my drink. “Yeah. Real mysterious.”
We sit in comfortable silence for a moment, both lost in our own thoughts. The bar has gotten busier while we’ve been talking—a few construction workers settling in at a corner table, some women my age sharing a pitcher and catching up on gossip. Normal Tuesday night stuff, the kind of ordinary human connection I realize I’ve been missing in my carefully curated Portland life.
“What’s your plan?” Devil asks eventually. “You sticking around, or just here long enough to tie up loose ends?”
“Not sure. I’m between jobs right now.”
I flip houses. Buy them cheap, fix them up, sell them to people with more money than taste. Turns out I’ve got a knack for breathing life back into things people think are ruined.
Not sure what that says about me, but I’m sure a therapist could make a pretty penny analyzing it.
Something shifts in Devil’s expression, becomes more thoughtful. He reaches for another glass, polishing it with the same methodical precision, but I can practically see the wheels turning in his head.
“A million gives you a nice cushion to take some time off,” he says, setting down the glass and really looking at me. “Gives you time to figure out what you want to do with the rest of your life.”
“What are you getting at, Devil?”
He’s quiet for a long moment, his eyes taking in the bar around us, the scarred wooden floors, the mismatched furniture, the neon signs that have welcomed the lost and lonely for decades. When he speaks, his voice is almost hesitant.
“I’ve been thinking about retiring, Kya. Thirty years I’ve been behind this bar, and I’m tired. My joints ache when it rains, and it rains a lot more than it used to. Been thinking it might be time to hand the keys over to someone younger.”
My heart skips a beat. “You’re selling the bar?”
“Thinking about it. Problem is, this place…” He gestures around the room, taking in the peeling paint and the cigarette-stained walls and the general air of beautiful decay. “It’s not just a business. It’s a lifeline for a lot of people. Your mom included.”
I remain silent at that comment.
“It needs someone who understands that this place is about connection. Someone who won’t just rip it apart and slap on some laminate flooring and a rustic fucking beer sign from some trashy website.”
I tilt my head. “Are you… warning me off?”
“Nope.” He meets my eyes. “I’m offering it to you.”
My heart stutters.
“You want me to take over Devil’s?”
He shrugs. “You flip houses. I’ve seen your work. You’ve got a good eye. Clean lines, strong bones. This place? It’s got the bones. It just needs someone to see past the nicotine stains and ghosts.”
I blink. “You’ve seen my work?”
“’Course. Your mom showed me.”
I file that tidbit away for future Kya’s consideration. I’m too raw right now to give it any sort of attention.
I look around at the bar. The worn floorboards. The dim lights. The jukebox that still somehow plays even when no one’s touched it in hours.
“You want me to flip your bar?”
“I want you to run it for six months. Clean it up, fix what’s broken, figure out if you want to keep it or flip it and go. I’ll hand you the keys right now, no cost—just sweat equity and time. After six months, if you want to buy it, I’ll give you a price no one else will match. If not, you walk and when I sell, you get a cut of the profit.”
It’s a business deal. A good one.
He leans forward, bracing his hands on the bar. “Come on, you’ve got time to kill and a million dollars burning a hole in your pocket. What else you gonna do?”
I look around the bar again, trying to see it through different eyes. The worn wooden floors that have absorbed a thousand stories. The chairs where people have shared their deepest secrets and wildest dreams.
It’s not glamorous. It’s not safe. It’s certainly not the life I planned when I was building in Portland.
But maybe that’s exactly the point.
“The town won’t like it,” I say finally. “Patty Sullivan’s daughter taking over Devil’s Bar? They’ll have plenty to say about that.”
Devil’s grin is sharp, all teeth and mischief. “Let them talk, sweetheart. You’ve got something they don’t.”
“What’s that?”
“Money. Power. And most importantly?” His eyes glitter with something that might be pride. “They’ll respect you, if you give them the chance.”
I drain my whiskey and set the glass down with a decisive clink.
It’s insane. Absolutely, completely insane. I should get in my rental car right now, drive to the nearest hotel, and spend the next six months figuring out how to invest a million dollars in something sensible. Index funds, maybe. Real estate in a town that isn’t dying. Something safe and boring and guaranteed to increase in value.
Instead, I hear myself saying, “Alright. I’ll do it.”
Devil’s smile could power the neon signs for a week. “I knew you would.”
“Don’t make me regret this,” I warn, but I’m smiling too.
Please, God, don’t let this be a stupid mistake.
“Wouldn’t dream of it, sweetheart.” He extends his hand across the bar, callused and warm and steady. “Welcome home.”
I shake it, thinking of how the town will react when they hear the news.
Let the town gossip. Let them whisper about Patty Sullivan’s daughter and her grand delusions.
Kya Sullivan is back, and this time I’m not leaving.
Devil holds up the bottle. “Another?”
I push my glass toward him. “Why not?”
