“Cops are involved, so the hope is it won’t come to that.”

“But you’re in danger,” she whispered.

“Potentially,” he hedged.

She fell silent.

“You’re not. This guy knows his beef is with the brothers,” he assured her.

“I hadn’t thought of that,” she muttered.

Fuck.

“Baby—” he began.

“I don’t want to offend you by making the comparison,” she said over him and kept going. “But Aaron defends criminals. You… don’t.”

That was good.

He thought.

So he gave her more in hopes of making her understand.

“Like I said, Club was tied to some nasty shit,” he told her. “Tack took over the Club, it was hostile, and he got them out. This was before me. But I hope it goes without sayin’, I would not be a brother if that’s where they were still at. That said, not sayin’ if I knew where Tack was leadin’ them, I wouldn’t be all in to get the Club where it is now. We got two missions. Keep the store and garage thriving, keep our patch clean so that shit can’t ever touch the Club again. I came on board knowin’ both and givin’ allegiance knowin’ it. Chaos is not a club I’m a member of, Carrie. It’s a part of me. That work is a part of me. And I need you to understand that.”

“Well, of course.”

It was then he was staring at her.

“That’s it?” he asked.

“What’s it?”

“You’re down with that?”

She shrugged. “If you changed my tire and took me to coffee, sharing all this, probably not. But now I know you. I know them. I know who you are. I know what you all stand for. And it isn’t the garage and the store and vigilantism. It’s family. So am I happy my new, handsome, manly man biker boyfriend and his brothers are in a power struggle with a bad guy? No. Am I okay with the fact that you take me as I am, all my baggage, the way my life was messed up, the unknown ways Aaron hopes to keep messing it up, and you don’t waver? Yes. A thousand times yes. So it wouldn’t say much for me at my first opportunity, I waver against you.”

Fuck, he loved her.

Straight up, down to his gut, for the rest of his life, loved her.

He didn’t tell her that.

He told her, “The manly man biker shit you spout is cute, Butterfly, but it’s also goofy.”

She grinned, pushed forward on her knees, then crawled to him where he sat on the edge of her bed, twisted to her. She got close, landed on her hip pressed to his, and put a hand on his chest.

“I’m not goofy,” she whispered.

She totally was.

“Whatever,” he whispered back.