Page 19 of The Biker and the Single Mom

After, wrapped around each other in the dark, she whispered it again.

"I love you."

"Love you too, sweetheart." I pressed a kiss to her forehead. "You and Luna both."

For the first time in three years, I fell asleep without nightmares.

Two days later, I was helping Rev tune a bike at Redemption Customs when Matt showed up.

Heard his voice before I saw him. "Where is she?"

I straightened from the engine, wiping grease from my fingers. The afternoon sun behind him cast his shadow long across the garage floor.

Matt stood in the entrance, backlit and tense. No uniform this time. Civilian clothes and a jacket that didn't quite hide the gun at his hip.

"You need to leave."

"Not without my family." He took a step forward, hand moving toward his waistband. "You think you can take what's mine? Think I'd let that happen?"

"She was never yours." I kept my tone calm, medic-calm, the voice I used on people about to do something stupid. "You can't own people, Matt. And she left you. It's over."

"It's over when I say it's over." His grip closed around his weapon. "Now where the fuck is she?"

"Bad move, cop."

Hammer appeared from the back of the garage, Diesel beside him despite the bandages under his shirt. Then Pope stepped through the side door, and suddenly the space was full of brothers—Rev, Jax, Ghost, all wearing their cuts and making it clear Matt had fucked up.

The temperature in the garage dropped twenty degrees.

"You're out of your jurisdiction," Pope said, his voice deadly quiet. "Threatening a man at his work. With a weapon."

Matt's hand froze on his gun. His gaze darted around the garage, taking in the brothers surrounding him. The odds that had shifted completely against him.

"This is between me and him," Matt tried, but his voice had lost its certainty.

"No." I stepped forward. "This is between you and reality. She left you. Got a divorce. She's with me now. And you showing up here with a gun to threaten me? That's not getting her back. That's proving she was right to run."

"You don't understand⁠—"

"I understand perfectly." Hammer moved closer, all muscle and menace. "You're a coward who used his badge to terrorize his ex-wife. Now you've got no badge here. No jurisdiction. No power."

Pope crossed his arms, blocking the exit. "You're surrounded, outgunned, and out of your depth. Walk away right now, or we handle this our way."

The words hung in the air. No mistaking their meaning. Matt was standing in an MC garage, surrounded by brothers, with his hand on a gun he'd never get drawn in time.

One wrong move and he'd disappear.

Matt's face went pale as understanding hit. His fingers slowly released the weapon, hands rising slightly.

"Smart choice." Pope's tone didn't warm. "Now get the fuck out of our town. And if you ever come back, if you ever contact her again, we won't be this generous."

Matt glanced around at the brothers closing in. At me standing my ground. At Pope's cold certainty.

Then he bolted.

Scrambled out of the garage like the coward he was, engine starting, tires squealing as he fled Saint's Hollow.

"Let him go," Pope said when Hammer moved to follow. "He's done. He knows it. We know it. And he knows if he comes back, we'll bury him."