Chapter Seven I Shouldn’t Have Answered

Mara

I told myself the reason my hands were shaking had nothing to do with him.

It was the bills folded inside my purse. The daycare reminder. Evan’s name lighting up my phone twice that afternoon and me letting it ring both times. It was exhaustion layered over fear layered over the kind of loneliness that crept in when the apartment went quiet and stayed that way.

That was all.

It had nothing to do with the biker.

So when I saw his bike outside The Iron Halo again, parked at the curb like it had always belonged there, my chest tightening was purely coincidence.

Purely.

I almost kept walking.

I should have.

Lily was asleep at a friend’s place down the block, sprawled across her couch with a cartoon still playing to an empty room. My friend had offered dinner and a sleepover, and I had said yes too quickly, relief making me careless.

Careless enough to walk back toward the bar instead of away from it.

The door swung open before I could change my mind. Noise spilled out. Heat. Music low and heavy, vibrating through my ribs instead of my ears.

I stepped inside and immediately felt it again.

That awareness.

Not the room. Him.

He stood near the bar this time, not lurking, not watching from the edges. He wasn’t drinking. His attention wasn’t scattered. It was focused, like he was waiting for something he hadn’t decided he wanted yet.

Me.

I stopped just inside the door.

He noticed. Of course he did.

His gaze met mine, steady and unreadable, and something uncoiled in my stomach. Not fear. Not comfort either. Anticipation, sharp enough to hurt.

I should have turned around.

Instead, I walked toward him.

“I didn’t plan this,” I said when I reached him, keeping my voice low.

“Neither did I,” he replied.

That wasn’t reassurance. It was honesty.

The space between us felt charged, like one wrong word would snap it open or shut it forever.

“You own this place,” I said, more statement than question.

He nodded. “Yeah.”

“Figures.”

He almost smiled at that. Almost.

“You looking for a drink,” he asked, “or a reason to be here.”

The question landed too close to the truth.

“I’m not staying long,” I said.

“That’s usually how it starts.”

I frowned. “You always talk like you’re already halfway out the door.”

“I don’t like getting comfortable,” he said. “Comfort makes people sloppy.”

“I don’t have that luxury,” I shot back.

He studied me for a moment, eyes dropping to my hands, my posture, the tension I couldn’t hide no matter how hard I tried.

“No,” he said quietly. “You don’t.”

That should have ended the conversation. Sympathy was a line I didn’t let men cross. It was too easy to mistake it for understanding. Too easy to lean into it when you were tired.

“I’m only here because I needed air,” I said. “And this was… open.”

He glanced at the door behind me. “You can still leave.”

I hated that part of him. The part that didn’t chase. Didn’t push. Didn’t try to corner me with charm or pity.

It made the choice mine.

“I know,” I said.

I didn’t move.

Neither did he.

The bartender cleared his throat awkwardly nearby. He lifted two fingers, a silent signal, and the man retreated without question.

“You shouldn’t be alone here,” He said.

“I’m not helpless.”

“I didn’t say you were.”

“You implied it.”

“I implied you’re carrying too much,” he replied. “There’s a difference.”

I crossed my arms. “You don’t know me.”

“Then tell me to stop paying attention.”

The words settled between us, heavy and dangerous.

I opened my mouth.

Nothing came out.

That scared me more than anything else.

“Come sit,” he said after a moment. Not a command. Not a plea. An offer.

“I don’t—”

“One drink,” he interrupted. “Soda. Lime. Same thing you ordered last time.”

My pulse jumped.

“You remember that.”

“I notice things,” he said.

Against every instinct I had honed over years of disappointment, I nodded.

We sat at the far end of the bar, not touching, not leaning in. The space between us was deliberate, respectful. It shouldn’t have felt intimate.

It did.

“I’m Mara,” I said after a while.

“I know.”

I blinked. “You do.”

“You paid with a card once,” he said. “I didn’t look it up. Just saw the name.”

That should have bothered me.

It didn’t.

“I didn’t ask your name last time,” I said.

“Cole.”

I turned the glass slowly in my hand. “You always this quiet.”

“Only when I’m listening.”

“That sounds like a lie men tell to seem deep.”

He huffed a soft laugh. “Maybe.”

Silence stretched again, but it wasn’t awkward. It felt like standing on the edge of something and not quite stepping off.

“I shouldn’t be here,” I said, more to myself than him.

“No,” he agreed. “You shouldn’t.”

“Then why does it feel like I can breathe better.”

He didn’t answer right away. When he did, his voice was lower.

“Because no one’s asking you for anything right now.”

The truth of it hit me hard enough to sting.

I swallowed. “I have a daughter.”

“I know.”

“You saw her.”

“Yes.”

“She’s six.”

“She’s observant.”

“She comes first,” I said. “Always.”

“As she should.”

I watched his face for any sign of irritation, any hint that he would flinch at responsibility that wasn’t his.

There was none.

That scared me too.

“I don’t want complications,” I said.

“I don’t offer simple,” he replied.

I laughed quietly, shaking my head. “That figures.”

We sat there longer than I meant to. Minutes blurred. The music shifted. The crowd thickened, then thinned again.

I checked my phone. No new messages. No emergencies.

Just space.

“I should go,” I said finally.

He nodded. “You should.”

I stood. He didn’t reach for me. Didn’t ask for my number. Didn’t even follow me toward the door.

That restraint wrapped tighter around my ribs than any touch could have.

At the door, I hesitated.

This was the moment. The one where I either walked away clean or made things messy.

I turned back.

“Cole.”

He looked up.

“I don’t do this,” I said. “Whatever this is.”

“Neither do I.”

“But tonight,” I continued, heart pounding, “I don’t want to go home and sit alone with my thoughts.”

Something shifted in his expression then. Not triumph. Not hunger.

Understanding.

“Come with me,” he said.

It wasn’t an order.

It was a choice.

I should have said no.

Instead, I nodded.

And as I stepped back into the night with him beside me, the weight of what I was about to do pressed in hard and fast.

I didn’t know yet that loneliness could be louder than fear.

I was about to find out.