Since the night the hospital staff forced Violet back into her own room, I’ve felt lost, and with each step toward her, it’s like returning home.

Violet glances up at me, then at the open spot next to her. I ease down beside her, and the moment my shoulder brushes against hers, I close my eyes and take a deep breath as if I’ve been underwater for hours.

I extend my arm, hand up, and she laces her fingers with mine. Our thighs are locked tight and I lower our hands so that they rest on both my leg and hers. Peace. This is the closest I’ve felt to peace in months.

Are we together? I don’t know. I’d bet Violet doesn’t know either. Her father’s still dead. I’m still on track to join the club. All the problems we had before the kidnapping still exist.

“How’s your mom?” she asks.

The back of my head hits the wood of the house. “Fine.”

“Really?”

Violet was the one person I didn’t have to lie to. Even when telling the truth broke us up. She’s the type of person who demands bullshit be checked at the door. “No. She’s pissed.”

“Want to trade moms?”

A smile spreads across my face. This conversation is familiar and familiar feels good.

“They’re waiting on you,” she says. “Lots of guys ready to buy you beer. Pat you on the back. Tell you how wonderful you are.”

“They are.”

“You should go to them.”

“I will.” But not now. Especially since Violet hasn’t let go.

The bonfire crackles, and with a pop, burning embers dance into the sky. Violet flinches and I rub my finger along hers.

“We’re not safe here,” she says. “We’re never going to be safe anywhere ever again.”

I should tell her she’s wrong. That she’s safe here, surrounded by the club, but after sitting in that black, cold basement with her in my arms, wondering what the hell the sick bastards upstairs were going to do when they decided to return, I can’t promise her a thing.

The night’s too dark, the woods surrounding us too daunting, the knowledge I can’t do a damn thing about what actions other people take a kick in the gut. Can’t promise her the Riot won’t make another grab, can’t promise her some psychopath won’t make a Crock-Pot full of nails and take her out during a football game, can’t promise some nut job isn’t going to take a gun to school and shoot people in the cafeteria.

I can’t promise her any of that, but I can hold her hand. I can sit beside her now. I can be here, I can be with her, I can, just for a few minutes, just be.

Violet moves, a readjustment, and I expect her to pull away. But instead, she leans further into me, her head on my shoulder, and her sweet scent becomes a warm blanket.

No other place I’d rather be in the world right now. No place at all.

Violet

“VIOLET.” CHEVY’S DEEP voice vibrates against my temple and his fingertips graze along my arm. Warmth and fantastic goose bumps. His caress calls for me to cuddle closer to him and not to participate in any activity that would lead me away.

It’s not the first time he’s woken me up this way. Sometimes, I’d fake sleep just so he would brush his lips on my skin, mumble my name and send pleasing shock waves through my body. I’ve missed his voice. Missed his touch. Missed him.

“Violet, do you want me to carry you inside?”

My mind’s a fog and I’m slow as I lift my head from Chevy’s shoulder. The muscles in my neck are tight, and as I move, the rest of my body protests. Tingles in my arm, and my braced knee has become stiff and pulses with a dull ache. The cheek that was exposed to the air is now frozen and the other side of my face is hot and creased with the imprint of the folds in Chevy’s shirt.

I stretch my arms and his leather jacket slips from my body and onto my lap. My eyebrow rises and Chevy sheepishly shrugs. “Air temperature dropped.”

It has, but that hasn’t stopped the party raging in the yard. In the clubhouse, a group of men roar with laughter and then a woman’s cackle comes thirty seconds behind. That hyena giggle was too late and awkward and probably because she didn’t get the joke the first time. “What time is it?”

“After midnight. Mom texted. Bar shut down early. Busted water pipe in the bathroom.”

Which means he needs to pick her up.

“Want me to help you back inside?”

I run a hand through my thick mane of hair and use my fingers to comb out the tangles near the ends. The slight prick of pain from the pull helps wake me. Do I want to go back to sleep? If it means his warm body beside me in bed, then yes, but I’m not sure I’m ready for the fallout that admission would create. “Can I come with you?”

Chevy blinks. “To pick Mom up?”

“Yeah, I’ve gone with you before.” Multiple times. I had a strict curfew with my own mom, ten o’clock, but I had a fantastic loophole—Olivia. I’d tell Mom I was staying the night with her and Olivia never cared how long I stayed out or who I was with.

You’re a big girl and can take care of yourself, she’d tell me. Your momma would let a boy run around with no curfew, I can guarantee that. No reason for breasts to be seen as a limitation, because they aren’t.

Wonder if Olivia would feel the same way now.

“I’d like that.” He stands, and I grab my crutches before he has the chance to ask if I want to be carried to the truck.