Page 39 of Grim’s Angel

“I see.”

Anxiety crawls into my chest. Grim feels my pulse jump beneath his fingers.

“Look at me, Angel.”

I turn toward him.

“You are surrounded by my men. Every road behind us is covered, and nobody enters the clubhouse without being seen.”

“You cannot promise nothing will happen.”

“No.” His silver eyes hold mine. “I can promise you will never face it alone.”

The honesty steadies me more than impossible reassurance could.

When we reach the clubhouse, Grim walks me directly to the medical room. Razor waits inside with fresh dressings spread across a metal tray.

“Razor checks you,” Grim says. “A prospect stays outside the door. I’ll be in the meeting room with Striker, Torch, Lock, and Hound.”

“I am not going anywhere.”

His gaze drops to my mouth. “That sentence does dangerous things to me.”

He kisses my forehead and leaves before I can recover.

Razor checks my wrists, examines the fading bruises, and makes certain the evacuation did not leave me with any injuries I failed to notice.

Nothing in his examination suggests Grim truly expected him to find one. He sent me here because medicine is something I understand, and understanding makes the walls feel less close.

Razor is returning supplies to the cabinets when a soft knock sounds at the door.

The prospect outside checks the visitors before admitting a woman in her fifties and a teenage boy whose forearm is wrapped in a blood-soaked dish towel.

Fear sharpens both their faces.

Razor’s attention settles on the boy, and any remaining edge leaves his voice.

“The shelter called,” he explains. “A tree limb broke one of the windows during the storm. He caught his arm on the glass while they were boarding it up.”

Razor removes the towel.

The cut is deep enough to need stitches.

“Want to assist?” he asks me.

“Yes.”

The answer comes without hesitation.

I irrigate the wound and help prepare the sterile field while Razor administers the anesthetic. He closes the cut with neat, even sutures, and I keep the boy talking until the last one is tied.

The familiar rhythm gives my mind somewhere useful to go. For several minutes, I am a nurse instead of a woman being hunted.

The boy watches me secure the dressing around his arm.

“Are you one of them?”

I glance toward the Sinner standing guard in the hallway. “I shot their president, so my membership application is probably in trouble.”