He stands, waiting while I shift back against the pillows. I can tell he expects me to lie down and dismiss him to the chair, where he’s been spending most nights pretending not to sleep. Instead, I reach for him again.
Saint looks at my hand. “What do you need?”
“You.”
His face goes still. I don’t give him time to turn that into something complicated. I curl my fingers around his wrist and tug. “Come here.”
Saint sits on the edge of the mattress, his eyes searching my face for the catch. Before, our room had rules he understood too well. Bed meant heat, control, my body going soft under his hands until both of us had somewhere to put the things we didn’t say. Now the heat is still there, but it’s quieter, threaded throughwith bruises and exhaustion and the strange ache of wanting something gentle from a man who’s learning gentleness like it’s a foreign language.
“I’m not asking for that,” I say.
“I know.”
“Do you?”
His eyes lift to mine. “I’m trying to.”
I shift carefully, making space for him and then pat the bedding. “Lie down,” I tell him. When he doesn’t move, I just sigh. “Saint.”
His jaw tightens as his eyes flick between the space I made for him and my face. “You’re hurt.”
“So are you because you never let Harlan look at you properly.” A chuckle forms on my lips as his face contorts.
I just reach for him again and this time he comes, lowering himself onto the mattress with careful, awkward obedience. I shift him into the position I need, Saint facing away from me as I curve myself around his back. My ribs pull, and I have to pause with my forehead nearly against his shoulder, breathing through the sharp little burst of pain.
“Sín.”
“I’m fine.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“I’m not. I’m handling it.”
He softens a fraction as my hands wander to settle across his stomach. Saint gently places his hands over mine, threading our fingers together. “I don’t know how to do this,” he mumbles.
His voice is low enough that I could pretend not to hear it if I wanted to spare him. “I know,” I push out, keeping my cheek against his back. “But you are doing it.”
His fingers tighten carefully around mine. “Feels like I’m not doing anything.”
“That’s the point.” I squeeze my fingers around his. “I never meant you to stop touching me altogether. I just wanted you to mean it.” I press a soft kiss between his shoulder blades.
Saint lifts one of my hands from his stomach and pulls it to his lips, pressing soft kisses to my palms. “It feels like I’m starving for something, Sín. For you, for this.”
It’s almost a confession, a step in the right direction. In time, I know we’ll get there. The silence stretches around us, full of everything else unsaid, and for the first time, it feels like there might be enough room for all of it.
Saint
TheRoguedispositionquestionhits my table at nine in the morning, which is too early for mercy and just late enough for everyone to pretend they’re awake enough to have principles.
Moth lays out the numbers first revealing twelve captured from the eastern corridor. Five from the compound. Three patched up enough to be questioned again today. Two are still unconscious. Most of Canon’s officers are either dead, bleeding under Obsidian watch, or scattered far enough that Moth has men tracking phones, bikes, bank activity, and every known girlfriend stupid enough to answer a call from a Rogue burner. Varina is the only Ward left with enough name recognition to gather what remains, which makes her either a problemor an opportunity depending on how badly she wants to keep breathing.
There’s only one step left, now that I’ve been given enough time to think. The captured men fold into Obsidian, or they die. A broken club leaves pieces behind, and pieces either become useful or become a future ambush. That’s the calculation I was raised on. Absorb what strengthens you. Kill what might rot. Call the result order because order sounds better than fear when you’re the one holding the knife.
And with my father mercifully absent over the last week, I’ve been able to run the club the way it’s needed with minimal pushback.
Everyone now knows my father’s transgressions from that evening and even if they don’t agree with the way I’m running things, my father’s definitely not the one they want. The one thing he taught every member of this club has now come back to bite him—that loyalty is to the club, not the person.
Bricks, Moth, Pike, and Demo are settled around me, Oisín three seats down from me when he should be in bed.
