Chapter 2: One Hour from Home

Sable

The office of the gas station was barely bigger than a closet.

Cracked linoleum floors. A buzzing overhead light. A box fan in the corner that did jack shit for the heat. It may be October but it doesn’t really get cold in the southwest desert states.

I sat hunched in a plastic chair behind a desk cluttered with receipts, a coffee-stained ledger, and a half-eaten bag of Cheetos.

The clerk—Andy, according to his name tag—peeked in every few minutes. I could hear him nervously explaining things to customers. That the back was off-limits. That inventory was being counted. That no, he hadn’t seen any girl, no matter how much money they offered.

I didn’t ask how much. I didn’t care.

My lip was split. My left eye was swollen shut, pounding with each throb of my pulse. The back of my throat tasted like metal, and my ribs ached with every shallow breath. I’d wrapped my arms tight around myself, not because it helped, but because it was the only thing I could hold that didn’t flinch.

I had three hundred dollars to my name, and none of it was clean.

If Hannah hadn’t picked up… I don’t know what I would’ve done. Burned the rest of me, maybe. Walked till I collapsed in a ditch. Disappeared.

But she had picked up.

And when I gave her the address, her voice changed. Got low. Dangerous.

Fifteen minutes later, headlights cut across the window. A familiar knock hit the metal door.

I opened it to find Hannah standing there in jeans, a tank top, and fury.

“Jesus, Sable,” she breathed, eyes wide as she took me in.

I didn’t cry.

I just stepped forward and fell into her arms.

We didn’t speak much on the drive.

She didn’t ask questions.

I didn’t offer answers.

We left town the back way—through dirt roads and forgotten streets that didn’t show up on GPS. Hannah drove like the devil himself was on our tail, but smooth, like she’d done it before.

Maybe she had.

The adrenaline faded somewhere around mile thirty. That’s when the cold set in. The kind of cold that settles into your bones after a fight. After you realize the fight isn’t over. That it may never be.

“I told that poor kid if anyone asked, he hadn’t seen me,” I murmured.

“He’ll keep his mouth shut. Kid looked like he’d rather swallow his tongue than deal with a gang war.”

“Good.”

Hannah glanced over. “You think they’ll come after you?”

I didn’t answer.

She didn’t push.

We crossed the city line a few minutes later. Not far, but far enough. Different jurisdiction. Different clubs. A different world if you squint.

Hannah pulled into the back lot of a brick building with blackout windows and a faded neon sign that read The Bullet.

“This is where I work,” she said, cutting the engine. “It’s quiet tonight. Come in with me.”

I hesitated. My reflection in the side mirror looked like roadkill.

“I look like shit.”

She arched a brow. “Come hang out at the club, you do look like hell.”

I gave her a tired smirk. “Better hell than hunted.”

What I didn’t say?

This might be the last place I wasn’t.

The Bullet was everything I remembered. Dark. Loud. Half hazed with smoke and attitude. A biker bar through and through—leather and grit and muscle.

But it was also familiar.

Safe.

Hannah guided me past a row of men playing pool, their laughter low and rough like gravel. No one stopped us. No one said a damn thing. But I could feel the eyes.

One guy—tall, inked, a scar through one brow—gave me a once-over like he was cataloging damage. I stared back, daring him to ask. He didn’t.

We ducked behind the bar. Hannah pulled me into the back room where lockers lined the wall and tossed me a folded-up tee and leggings.

“Here. They’ll be big, but clean. I’ve got wipes, too.”

I changed in silence, flinching when I pulled the tank over my ribs. Every movement felt like glass slicing under my skin. I used the wipes to clean the dried blood off my jaw. Couldn’t do much about the eye.

When I came out, Hannah was already behind the bar. She didn’t say anything—just slid me a ginger ale and pointed to a stool at the far end, near the wall.

“Sit. Drink. Breathe.”

I did.

The fizz burned in the best way.

The bar slowly filled—two guys from the garage came in, then a girl in heels way too high for this place. More bikes in the lot. The jukebox flipped to something gritty and low. I kept to the shadows and watched.

I’d been in places like this before. Rough edges. Broken rules. Testosterone and oil and liquor.

But this one? It ran different.

The men didn’t leer. The women weren’t ornaments. There was a structure here, a hierarchy you could feel in your spine.

And all of it pulsed with one name.

The Black Daggers.

A patch club. Outlaw. Ruthless.

And Hannah worked for them.

That part I hadn’t known.

She caught me watching a group of patched men near the corner table and came to lean beside me. “You’re not in danger here. Jarek runs a tight ship.”

“Jarek,” I repeated.

“Prez. He’ll leave you alone unless you give him a reason not to.”

I nodded slowly. “What about Luke?”

“What about him?”

I looked down at my hands. One knuckle was split open. Another was purple.

“If he comes looking—”

“Then he’ll answer to the wrong club,” Hannah said simply. “Daggers don’t take kindly to Vipers sniffing around.”

I gripped the glass tighter.

The Vipers wouldn’t just “sniff.” They’d search. Threaten. Bargain.

They’d find me.

Eventually.

Unless I disappeared first.

“You can stay with me,” Hannah said, softer now. “As long as you need. I’ve got a spare room. Couch if you’d rather. It’s not much, but it’s safe.”

My throat tightened. “You don’t have to do that.”

“I know.”

“But you’re doing it anyway.”

“Because I remember the girl who helped me clean up my first apartment after my ex trashed it. Because I remember who you were before all this.”

I blinked hard. “And who’s that?”

She didn’t smile. Just reached over and touched the side of my face.

“Someone who used to fight like hell. Not run.”

I swallowed.

Then I nodded.

I stayed in my corner, fingers wrapped tight around the sweating glass of ginger ale, watching the room.

It was like being a ghost in a world I used to know. Same smells. Same rhythm. Same kind of men. But I didn’t belong in it anymore. Not really. I didn’t know where I did belong. Only that it wasn’t with Luke. And it wasn’t in that basement.

Hannah moved up and down the bar with ease—grabbing bottles, pouring doubles, cashing out tabs like muscle memory. She kept glancing over at me, eyes sharp, protective. She was in her element. And somehow, still watching my six.

Eventually, she wandered toward a man at the far end of the bar—tall, broad-shouldered, arms folded over a leather cut that clung like it was born there. He didn’t look my way. Not at first. Just said something low to her as she handed him a beer. She nodded once, then slid two things onto her tray and made her way back.

When she reached me, she set them down in front of me without a word—a shot of whiskey and a cold bottle of beer.

I raised an eyebrow. “That for you?”

“Nope,” she said, glancing over her shoulder. “From the guy at the end.”

I didn’t have to look to know which one she meant.

“He told me to tell you…” Hannah leaned in, voice low, almost amused. “‘You look like you need it.’”