Page 73 of Burned in Stone
Irun for the door before anyone else can move. I hear Kya shout my name, hear Steel’s boots pounding after me, but I’m already halfway across the clubhouse by the time the engine noise dies out and the front floodlights kick on. It’s not just one bike—it’s the whole club. Tank and Lee riding up front, Bones behind, and in the center of the pack a bike with two on it. For a half-mad second, I think they’ve failed. The head is slumped low on the passenger, body swaying loose as a rag doll.
But then the bike comes to a clean stop, and Stone is off before the engine’s out, bracing the passenger under the arms as Bones leaps in to help. My vision tunnels, and for a heartbeat all I see is the inside of a morgue. Then I shake it off and push through the crowd of hang-arounds, who part for me like I’m radioactive.
“It’s him!”
I’m running before I think about it, reaching them just as Bones gets Cash off the bike. His face is a mess—split lip, eye swelling shut, blood smeared down his shirt. But he’s standing. He’s alive.
“Angel,” he says, and I throw myself at him.
“Ow,” he groans, but his arms come around me anyway, holding me like I’m the only thing keeping him upright. “Fuck, ow—don’t stop.”
“You’re OK? You’re really OK?”
“I’m OK. They’re not, but I’m OK.” He grins through the split lip. “Fuckers thought it was a good idea to take my cuffs off. Showed them.”
He laughs, and then coughs, turning it into a wince as Bones helps him hobble toward the clubhouse. He sags into my side, sweat and blood and the sharp stink of adrenaline rolling off him in waves. “Sorry I missed dinner,” he mumbles, and I want to slap him and kiss him at the same time.
Because he’s here. He’s alive. He’s making stupid jokes even though he can barely stand. Gabriel tried to break him—tried to use all his authority and his badge and his violence—and Cash is still here, still whole, still mine.
This is what Gabriel never understood. You can’t break people who’ve already survived the worst. You can’t control people who’ve chosen love over fear. And you definitely can’t win against someone who has a family that will burn the world down to bring them home.
Gabriel lost tonight. Not just the fight. Everything.
The men surround us in a moonlit wedge, Lee and Tank flanking, Bones barking orders at the stragglers. Behind me, the prospect—Mouse, I think—snaps a salute and takes off running for the kitchen to grab an ice pack.
“Let’s get him inside,” Stone says, and his voice is the gentlest I’ve ever heard it. “Rest of you, perimeter sweep. One of those fuckers might still be out there.”
We stagger through the main room and down the hall to one of the back rooms that seems set up specifically for this kind of scenario with a raised bed and first aid supplies in easy reach. Cash never lets go of me, not even when Kya appears with towels and water and takes over. Josie’s right behind, already on her phone with someone in the DA’s office, half her attention on us and half on whatever legal firestorm she’s prepared to rain down on Summit and the Stoneheart PD by morning.
Cash collapses onto the edge of the bed, bracing his elbows on his knees. I stand in front of him, taking a towel from Kya and using it to blot the worst of the blood from his cheekbone. He grins at me—crooked and dazed, but it’s a real smile.
“You seriously beat all those guys up by yourself?” I ask.
He shrugs. Then winces, almost comically. “Didn’t plan it that way. They just forgot street rats don’t fight fair.”
Bones claps him on the shoulder, gentle enough not to make the injuries worse. “They were expecting an accountant, not a feral raccoon.”
Cash just grins, then hisses as Kya wipes blood off his eyebrow with an antiseptic pad. “You should see the other guys.”
“Brother, I don’t have to. You forget I’ve seen what you can do.”
For a while it’s just noise and chaos—a blur of bandages and biker banter, the din of the clubhouse at full alert. Someone brings Cash a bottle of Gatorade, but he barely takes a sip before leaning back and closing his eyes, letting me and Kya fuss overhim. His hands are steady, but the rest of him is trembling gently, a current I feel every time he leans his weight into me. His skin is hot, sweat beaded on his temple, even after we mop him down and get his shirt off.
I keep waiting for Cash to snap. To rage, or pace, or break something, because that’s what men like Gabriel do when they’re cornered. But all he does is blink slow, like he’s sleepwalking, and let me hold his hand while I wipe blood off his knuckles.
“You should tell him your good news,” Kya finally says, stealing a glance at me.
Cash’s eyes—well, eye—immediately pops open. “What good news?”
A smile spreads across my face as I take his hand in mine and meet his eyes. “Josie got Judge Martinez to push through the emergency decree. It’s done, Cash. I’m divorced.”
His good eye goes wide. “You’re—seriously?”
“Seriously. Gabriel has no legal claim on me anymore.”
Cash laughs, then groans because laughing hurts. “Holy fuck, we won. I mean, Gabriel’s gonna be pissed—a beatdownanda divorce in a single night? Jesus. That’s gotta sting. But right now, in this moment? We’ve fucking won.”
And he’s right. We have. Not just the divorce—though that matters, god does it matter. But we won because Gabriel tried everything tonight. He arrested Cash on fake charges. He took him somewhere secluded. He used his badge and his authority and his violence. And Cash still won the fight. I still got the divorce. The MC still brought him home.
