Page 9 of Steel's Secret
The bell above the café door jingles as I step inside. Warmth hits instantly. Espresso, cinnamon, laughter, and the noise soften the edge I’ve been carrying all morning.
Leah beat me to the café, which is how I know she’s about to give me hell. She’s sitting at our usual table by the window, two coffees already waiting, one black, one the complicated caramel concoction she swears is “therapy in a cup.”
She eyes me over the rim of hers as I slide into the chair opposite. “You look like someone just resurrected your past.”
“Close enough.” I wrap my hands around the cup, letting the heat sink into my palms. “I got a call from Draft.”
Her brows rise. “Saints Draft?”
“There’s another one?”
“God, Aria.” She sighs, leaning back. “What did the good boys of Mt. Pleasant do this time? Need a restraining order against reality?”
“Paperwork,” I say, too fast. “Just business.”
Leah’s grin sharpens. “Business. Right. That’s what we’re calling it now?”
“Itisbusiness.”
She stirs her coffee with the kind of precision I use on cross-examinations. “You mean you’re personally delivering said paperwork to Steel King, President of the Saints Outlaws MC, a man who looks like sin in denim and can’t emotionally regulate to save his life?”
“Leah.”
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
I glare. “He’s not…”
“Oh, he absolutely is.” She leans forward, chin in hand. “That man’s a storm you walk into on purpose.”
I can’t help my laugh. “You make it sound like I’m still.”
“Still what? In love with him?” Leah interrupts.
I choke on my coffee. “I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.” Her tone softens. “Aria, I know you. You win cases in heels that could kill a man, but when it comes to him…”
I stare down at the coffee swirling in my cup. “It’s been six months, Leah.”
“And you still talk about him like he’s a court ruling that ruined your life.”
She’s not wrong. I hate that she’s not wrong.
“He lost his father,” I say quietly. “He lost everything. I just…”
“You just can’t help wanting to fix him.”
“No.” I shake my head, but my voice betrays me. “I can’t help wanting toseehim. Just once.”
Leah sighs. “You ghosted a man at his father’s funeral, babe. That’s not closure, that’s trauma with heels.”
Her words land hard because she’s right. I left him standing in the rain because I couldn’t watch him drown, and I couldn’t save him either. It felt like mercy then. Now it just feels like abandonment dressed as self-preservation.
Leah exhales, all sass gone. “You’re stepping into a world that chews people up and calls it loyalty.”
I smile, small and tired. “I lived there once. I know how sharp the teeth are.”
She reaches across the table, squeezing my hand. “Then remember that before you get bitten again.”
