Page 32 of My Wild Biker

"Fair enough." Clint looks at Chuck. "Get her settled. Meeting in two hours to go over approach."

We leave the office and Chuck guides me to a back room with a bed and a door that locks. My suitcases are already there. He must have brought them in while the women were cleaning my face.

"You should try to sleep," he says.

"I won't be able to."

"Try anyway." He pulls me close and I wrap my arms around his waist, press my face against his chest, feel his heart beating steady. "I'm sorry, Isla. I'm so fucking sorry."

"You saved me."

"I almost didn't get there in time."

"But you did." I lift my head to look at him. "You got there and you stopped them. That's what matters."

He cups my face, avoiding the bruised side. "I need to go to the meeting. Figure out the approach for dawn. You going to be okay here alone for a couple hours?"

"The other women are here?"

"Yeah. Sydney, Katherine, all of them. They'll check on you."

"Then I'll be okay."

He kisses my forehead, my unbruised cheek, my mouth so gently I barely feel it. Then he's gone and I'm alone in this small room with my suitcases and the memory of two dead men and the knowledge that in a few hours Chuck is riding into danger that might kill him.

I lie down on the bed fully clothed and stare at the ceiling. My face throbs where I was hit. My wrist aches where the man grabbed me. My whole body is shaking with adrenaline crash.

Around midnight Katherine knocks softly and comes in with tea and crackers. "Thought you might need something."

"Thank you."

She sits on the edge of the bed. "First time seeing club violence?"

"Not exactly. I saw Chuck beat someone unconscious last night. But this was different."

"Because you were the target."

"Yeah."

She's quiet for a moment. "It doesn't get easier. Watching them go into danger. Knowing they might not come back. But it does become part of your normal if you choose to stay."

"Is it worth it? The fear?"

"For me it is. Because Holt makes me feel seen and safe and loved in ways I never have before. Because Louis needs me and I love him like my own. Because the family here is real." She pauses. "But you have to decide for yourself whether Chuck is worth the fear."

"I've known him three days."

"And? You feel what you feel. Time doesn't make feelings more or less valid."

I think about that. About how much I've felt in three days. How much has changed. How I'm supposed to be leaving for Millbrook tomorrow but instead I'm lying in a clubhouse bedroom with a split lip and the memory of Chuck killing two men to save me.

"What if I stay and it doesn't work? What if I'm not strong enough for this life?"

"Then you'll find out. But at least you'll know instead of spending your life wondering what could've been." Katherine stands. "Try to sleep. Dawn comes early."

She leaves and I'm alone again.

Around one-thirty I hear the meeting breaking up. Voices in the hall, boots on floors, engines starting outside. Some brothers leaving to handle something, others staying.