Page 62 of T-Bone
Sunlight streamed through the windows of the diner on Steel City’s main street. The soft clink of silverware and the hum of lunchtime chatter surrounded us, but for me, all I could hear was the sound of Chloe’s laughter, light and real for the first time in years. Across the table, she sipped her iced tea while Gemma busied herself with coloring the paper kids’ menu, her tongue poking out the corner of her mouth in concentration.
You’d never know how much pain we’d all been through. If a stranger walked in right now, they’d think it was just a regular lunch date. Two friends catching up, or for those who looked closer and saw the resemblance, they might see us as sisters.
But we knew better.
Chloe looked good. Healthier. Her skin had color again and her hair was long and shiny, no longer dull and brittle from stress. She still looked over her shoulder sometimes, flinched at sudden noises. But she laughed more. Smiled more. Shelivedmore.
We all did. I’d thought she was dead for years, the thing that kept me going wasn’t trying to find her, it was trying to get justice and to find out what happened to my niece. The little girl now giggling happily as if she didn't have a care in the world. All the heartache and pain was worth it for moments like this.
“I’m still waiting for the part where you get angry at me for faking my death,” she said out of nowhere, her lips quirking in a half-smile, but I could see the worry in her eyes.
I smiled. “That ship sailed the moment Gemma yelled ‘Auntie Faith!’ and tackled me at the clubhouse.”
“I thought you’d hate me,” Chloe admitted, quieter now, her fingers worrying the edge of her napkin. “I thought you’d be furious.”
“I was,” I admitted. “But not for the reasons you think.”
She blinked, then tilted her head in that familiar way that told me to go on.
“I wasn’t mad that you disappeared. I understood that part the second I saw the look in Gemma’s eyes. You did what you had to do. I was mad at myself… for not realizing it sooner. For not saving you sooner.”
Chloe reached across the table and took my hand, squeezing tight. “You saved me the second you didn’t give up looking for Gemma.”
The thing about pain is that it changes people—but so does healing. I wasn’t the same woman I’d been four months ago. Neither was she.
“So how’s Gemma settling into her new school?” I asked.
“She’s doing great,” Chloe said with a soft smile. “Sometimes she forgets she’s allowed to be Gemma and not Amber. But kids are resilient. She’s making friends, she knows this time we’re staying put and we won’t be moving on after a few months.”
My chest tightened at that. The way kids fight to survive, to adapt—it broke your heart and stitched it back together all at once.
“And what about you?” I asked. “How areyoudoing?”
“I’m getting used to being me again too, I guess.” Her eyes flicked to the window, thoughtful. “I spent so many years living in fear, and even once I knew Marcus could never hurt me again, I was never free. It’s hard to explain.”
I understood more than she knew.
As a detective, I’d heard stories like hers a hundred times. I’d sat across from battered women with bruises blooming across their cheekbones and deadness in their eyes. I learned how to hold their stories without letting them crush me—but that kind of detachment was clinical. Necessary. When it’s your sister? Your blood?
There’s no detaching from that.
I reached for her hand and gave it another squeeze. “You’re doing great, Chloe. Really.”
She smiled again, this time wider, and she leaned forward conspiratorially. “Okay, your turn. How’s it going with your hot, sexy biker?”
I groaned, but I was already smiling.
“That good, huh?” she teased before I could even answer.
“It’s… honestly amazing,” I admitted. “I spent so much time overthinking it in the beginning. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. Kept telling myself it didn’t make sense—me, a former cop, falling for a man with one foot firmly planted outside the law.”
“But he’s not like Marcus,” she said.
“No,” I agreed. “He’s nothing like Marcus.”
T-Bone was a lot of things. Gruff. Protective. Stubborn as hell. But he was also kind and steady and safe. And I trusted himwith my life—because he’d already proven he would risk his own to protect it.
“Once I stopped seeing his world through the lens of my badge, I realized we’re not so different. Sure, the MC skirts the law sometimes, but everything they do is for each other, for the town. For the people they love.”
