Page 8 of Wilder’s Mistake

In St. Louis, I load our bags into the black SUV I left at the airport. The drive south takes us from flat fields into the green hills around Ransom. Lucy watches the river appear and disappear between trees, quiet for the first hour.

“What does being your wife mean inside the club?” she asks. The question matters more than the paperwork, and for someone who panicked about being accidentally married, it takes me by surprise.

“It means you are under Kingdom Come’s protection.”

Her mouth tightens. “Protection can sound a lot like ownership.”

King used the same word for both and Kane has spent the last year drawing a line between them.

“You keep your work, your house and every part of your life you want,” I say. “Anybody tries to take that from you, I deal with them.”

“That’s almost romantic.”

“Don’t spread it around, I’ve got a reputation to keep.”

That earns the smallest smile. She turns toward the window again, and I watch the reflection of her face in the glass. She isn’t frightened of me, never has been. The problem is everything attached to me that cannot be left in a hotel room. The gates, the weapons and the men who know my voice on a radio and move because of it.

Lucy built a life where danger has no place. Mine doesn’t promise that every threat stays outside. I can only promise that when it crosses the line, it finds me waiting. I’ve wanted her long enough to know that wanting doesn’t guarantee she can live with that.

We reach Ransom after sunset. The river air sits heavy over town, carrying wet earth and cut grass. Some storefronts are closing early along the main street. The church steeple stands black against the last orange light, and the river flashes between old warehouses at the edge of town.

Lucy has lived here long enough to know the compound road but not long enough to stop watching it when we pass. Townspeople lower their voices when they say Kingdom Come. She’s never seen what sits behind the gates.

I take her to the neat two-bedroom house she bought last year, and her porch light comes on when we pull into the driveway. I carry her suitcase to the door and set it inside.

“You can stop escorting me now,” she says.

“I could, yeah.”

“But you aren’t going to stop?”

“Nope, you’re my wife.”

She stands just inside the doorway with one hand on the frame. Behind her, shoes sit in a basket and keys hang from labeled hooks. Everything has a place.

“We need to talk about this,” she says.

“Tomorrow.”

“I could call an attorney before then if you’d like?” I don’t answer, because I’d have to tell her it’s the last thing I want her to do.

Her gaze drops to my hand. “You really intend to keep wearing that?”

“Yeah. I do.”

“Why?”

I want to tell her. Six years of watching her arrive beside other men. The relief of waking with her in my bed and finding the marriage felt right before I even opened my eyes. But she’s exhausted, uncertain and still recovering from a night neither of us can fully assemble. The truth deserves better than this porch. Instead, I step closer.

“Wilder.”

“Tell me to leave.” But she doesn’t. Instead, I put one hand gently behind her neck and kiss her. Her mouth opens at once. She grips my shirt and pulls me over the threshold, giving back every bit of pressure. I taste the same hunger that wrecked the hotel room.

I press her against the wall. Her leg slides between mine. My hand cups her ass, and she kisses me harder until my cock is rigid between us. I want her in her bedroom. I want one night neither of us will have to reconstruct in pieces. I want to tell her the ring has not left my hand because I have no intention of pretending the marriage was meaningless while she decides whether it can become real.

If I take her upstairs now, she’ll wake tomorrow wondering whether this was another mistake. I need her to come to me when she knows it isn’t.

So I release her slowly. Her pupils are wide. “Why did you stop?”