Page 5 of Torgash

"I didn't holster it because I trust you," she fires back without hesitation. "I holstered it because I decided not to put a bullet in your leg. Yet."

My respect inches higher. No flinch. No retreat. She's got steel in her spine and fire in her blood, exactly the kind of woman who could destroy everything I've built.

The kind who makes me want to burn it all down myself.

I move a half-step closer, testing boundaries. "You always aim first and ask questions later?"

She doesn't budge, doesn't retreat from my advance. "Only when the predator outside the bar looks more dangerous than the ones inside."

A laugh escapes me, quiet, genuine, surprising us both.

"Guess we'll see what kind of orc I am."

"We will," she says flatly. "Eventually."

Then she turns her back on me, a deliberate power move that speaks volumes, and walks away as though she owns not just this parking lot but the whole damn world.

I watch her go, my body torn between following her and putting as much distance between us as possible. Because she's right about one thing, I am dangerous.

Just not in the ways either of us expected. And I haven't even shown her my worst yet.

Chapter Two

Nova

The uniform should make me untouchable.

Pressed khakis, polished badge, regulation boots that click with each step across Greene's Diner's worn linoleum. I've worn this armor for eight years, through Atlanta's worst precincts and courtroom cross-examinations that could break careers. It's never failed me before.

So why can I still feel the burn of his stare on my skin?

I slide into a corner booth with my back to the wall—muscle memory from too many nights when backup was twenty minutes out and death was twenty seconds away. The place has that small-town charm the tourism board probably markets hard: checkered tablecloths, pie cases that actually hold pie, coffee strong enough to raise the dead. Normal. Safe.

A sharp contrast to what I witnessed last night.

The waitress appears before I can flag her down. She has kind eyes that miss nothing, and her name tag reads 'Helen' in faded letters.

"Coffee, honey?" she asks, already reaching for the pot. "You look like you need it."

"Please." I arrange my hands flat on the table, fighting the urge to flex my fingers. They're steady now, but they remember the tight grip I had on my Glock and the way my finger hovered over the trigger.

Helen pours coffee, dark and bitter, steam curling between us. "You settling in alright? I know Sheriff Dawson left quite a mess behind."

"I've seen worse." The lie comes easier than it should. I'm not sure what I've walked into yet, or who I can trust, so I keep my answers vague. I take a sip of coffee and let the bitter heat burn away the memory of amber eyes and controlled violence.

"I bet you have." She doesn't move to the next table. Instead, she refills my cup that's barely half empty. "Atlanta PD, right? Shadow Ridge must be quite a change."

The truth is, Shadow Ridge already feels more real than eight years of city patrol. More dangerous—not because of the corruption I'm here to clean up, but because of what happened in that parking lot when everything I thought I knew about control went out the window.

Helen sets the coffee pot on my table and slides into the opposite seat without invitation. She's younger than I expected, mid-forties with laugh lines and capable hands that speak of someone who's built a life through hard work and service.

"I heard there was some trouble at Murphy's last night," she says. "Word is you handled yourself well. I hope those drunk idiots didn't give you too much grief."

My spine straightens. "Where'd you hear that?"

"Honey, this is Shadow Ridge. News travels faster than gossip, and gossip travels at light speed." Helen's eyes crinkle at the corners, but there's steel underneath the friendly act. "Especially when it involves our boys and the new sheriff."

Our boys. The way she says it—protective, proud—tells me everything about where this town's loyalties lie, not with badges, laws, or the system that sent me here to clean house, but with the Ironborn MC.

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