Page 26 of Prospect’s Curvy Beekeeper

Oliver doesn't wait for a response. He doesn't ask Logan for permission. He turns on his heel, his boots echoing on the wood, and walks right back out the door. The iron panel slams shut behind him.

The finality of the Vanguard’s mandate settles over the table like concrete.

The club’s top enforcer, the man who dictates the tactical survival of the ridge, just endorsed Alas’s claim. He didn't order an evacuation. He didn't authorize a club-wide defense. He looked at the unpatched prospect standing over my chair and gave him the war.

Logan looks at the map Oliver left behind. He slowly leans back in his chair, folding his arms across his chest. The cold authority in his eyes shifts into something deeply respectful.

"You have your orders, prospect," Logan says quietly. "Hold the line."

Alas doesn't nod. He doesn't say thank you. He just steps back, his hand immediately returning to the nape of my neck.

"Meeting’s over," Alas says.

He pulls my chair back, his hand on my neck firm and unyielding, guiding me out of the seat. I stand up, keeping my shoulders square. I look Logan in the eye, giving him a single, respectful nod.

We walk out of the Chapel together.

The walk back through the clubhouse hallway feels different than the walk in. The oppressive weight of isolation, the crushing dread of fighting a faceless enemy alone, is gone. It’s been incinerated by the fire radiating from the man walking beside me.

We push through the front doors, stepping out into the cold mountain air of the compound yard. The sky has clouded over, a gray warning of an impending front moving down from the peaks.

Alas doesn't lead me to the truck.

He stops in the middle of the gravel yard, turns me by the waist, and backs me up against the passenger door of my grandfather's Ford. The cold metal bites through my flannel, but the massive, furnace-hot wall of Alas’s chest instantly traps me.

He crowds into my space. His hands come up, framing my face, his thumbs brushing over my cheekbones. His chest heaves, his breathing ragged and deep.

"You didn't run," he breathes, his voice dark and low.

"I told you," I say, my hands rising to catch the cotton of his t-shirt. "I'm not hiding. And I'm not leaving."

Alas’s eyes are black, consumed by an obsession so total it defies logic. He stares down at my mouth, the muscle in his jaw jumping frantically. He’s vibrating with the need to mark, to claim, to rip the world apart and rebuild it around me.

He leans down, pressing his forehead against mine. His breath is hot against my skin.

"I'm going to turn that south trail into a graveyard," he vows, the promise vibrating straight from his chest into mine. "They want a piece of paper? I'll bury them with it. Nobody touches you. Nobody takes your land."

I hold his shirt tighter, grounding myself in his strength. I spent two years believing I had to be a fortress. If I let anyone in, the walls would crumble and the farm would be lost.

I look up into the feral, devoted eyes of the most dangerous man in Pine Valley.

I don't have to be a fortress anymore. I have a man who stands the line for me.

"Take me home, Alas," I tell him softly. "We have a line to hold."

8

Alas

The brass deadbolt slides home with a sharp, metallic crack.

The sound echoes in the cramped hallway of the farmhouse. I stand on the inside of the door. Susan stands a few feet away. She wears a thick flannel shirt over her leggings. The sleeves are rolled up past her elbows. Her hair is messy from the truck ride back from the compound. She smells like warm beeswax and defiance.

She stood in front of the President of the Broken Halos MC today. She looked Logan Gunnar in the eye and refused to abandon her grandfather’s land. She refused to run. She anchored her boots into the dirt and claimed her territory.

She claimed me.

My chest tightens. A violent, white-hot pressure builds right behind my ribs. It’s a loaded gun with the safety snapped off. I’ve spent my life waiting for a target worth shooting at. A lifetime of aimless rage burning holes through my own skin because I had nothing to protect. I slept with a knife under my pillow in the prospect bunkhouse. I kept my knuckles bruised and my teeth clenched. I was an attack dog waiting for a reason to bite.