Page 72 of Logan
And when she finally turns, walking off the makeshift stage with her chin high and her back straight, she doesn’t just move like a woman who survived. She moves like the queen she is.
I make a silent promise to her, the woman who just crowned herself in front of a room full of warriors.
No matter what tomorrow looks like, I’ll be there.
Not to lead.
Not to follow.
But to walk beside her.
Because that’s where a king belongs.
Next to his queen.
***
The engine rumbles under me like a living thing, low and steady, the kind of vibration I can feel all the way in my bones. It has always been my second heartbeat, the rhythm I trust when everything else feels uncertain. But it’s not the bike that makes this moment feel right.
It’s her.
Mac stands beside me, sliding on her helmet. The leather she wears hugs her frame like it was made for her, thebraid in her hair neat and strong down her back. She looks ready to take on the world, and maybe for the first time, I know without question that she can. That she already has.
Because she is not the same woman who once trembled in my arms, afraid she might never stand on her own again.
I’ve seen her broken.
I’ve seen her bleed.
I’ve seen her fight for air when the weight of the past tried to crush her.
And now, I get to see her free.
She swings her leg over my bike, sliding in behind me. That space has felt empty without her there, like the machine itself never breathed fully without her body pressed to mine. These past months, she has grown into her own independence, into a fire that doesn’t need anyone else to stoke it. She’s driving herself forward, no brakes, full throttle, like the road is finally hers to claim.
I grin under my helmet, can’t help it. Pride surges through me, hot and fierce, until I can barely hold it in.
Her arms tighten around my middle, steady and sure. She gives me one small nod.
We don’t need words.
We never really have.
I fire up my bike, the growl cutting through the quiet, echoing off the clubhouse walls. In the mirror, the building shrinks behind us until it’s nothing more than shadow and memory. We roll out onto the open road, the sun hanging low, slanting through the trees like it knows it’s part of something sacred. The light is golden, soft, and it paints the moment like ascene out of a film, unreal in its beauty yet real enough to make my chest ache.
One bike. Two souls. No sound but the wind and the engine.
We ride together.
Not leader and follower.
Not protector and survivor.
Just Logan and Mac.
Man and woman.
Every time I glance back, she is there. Her helmet tilts just enough that I catch the lift of her head, the looseness in her shoulders, the curve of her mouth. It is a smile I haven’t seen in too long, the kind that carries no weight, no performance.
