"Whatever you want. We could get you more clothes, get some real food, just hang out here. Your call."
"Can we just... stay here for a while?" She sits on the edge of the bed. "I'm not ready to face the outside world yet. Is that okay?"
"Yeah. Of course." I sit next to her and pull her against my side. She fits perfectly there, her head on my shoulder. "We've got all the time in the world."
"Thank you," she whispers. "For everything. For saving me. For protecting me. For wanting me."
"You don't have to thank me for any of that."
"Yes, I do. Because nobody else did. Nobody else cared enough to help." Her voice cracks slightly. "You barely know me and you've already done more for me than my own family ever did."
I tighten my arm around her. "They don't deserve you. Never did."
"I'm starting to realize that." She looks up at me. "Can I ask you something?"
"Anything."
"What happens next? After tonight, after I meet the club. What's the plan?"
"The plan is we keep you safe. We make sure Derek can't find you. And we figure out the rest as we go."
"That's not much of a plan."
"No. But it's honest." I turn to face her fully. "I don't know what happens next, Savannah. I don't know if this thing between us is gonna last a week or a year or forever. But I know I want to find out. And I know I'm not letting you go back to that life. Not ever."
"I don't want to go back. I want..." She trails off, like she's afraid to say it.
"What do you want?"
"This. You. A chance to figure out who I am when I'm not being hurt or controlled or told I'm not good enough." She takes a breath. "Is that too much to ask?"
"No. It's exactly the right amount." I kiss her, slow and deep. "And I'm going to make sure you get it."
We spend the rest of the day in bed. Not fucking, just being together. Talking. Learning each other. She tells me about her childhood, about dreams she gave up when Derek came into her life. I tell her more about the club, about my brothers, about the life I've built here.
Around three in the afternoon, I order room service. We eat in bed, feeding each other fries and laughing when she gets ketchup on her chin.
It's domestic. Simple. Perfect.
Everything I never knew I wanted.
"I could get used to this," she says, curling into my side after we finish eating.
"Yeah? Being waited on hand and foot by a biker who can't keep his hands off you?"
"Exactly that." She laughs. "Is this real? Or am I going to wake up and find out I'm still standing in that bridal suite?"
"It's real. I promise." I pull her closer. "You're safe. You're here. And you're mine now. That's as real as it gets."
She kisses me then, soft and sweet, and I feel something shift in my chest. Something I haven't felt in... ever, maybe.
Hope. That's what it is. Hope that maybe I can have this. That maybe I deserve someone who looks at me like I hung the moon. That maybe I'm not too broken, too damaged, too much of a disaster to build something good.
"Ryan?" she murmurs against my lips.
"Yeah?"
"I think I'm falling for you."
