Page 24 of Nomad: Violent Devotion

We veer off the main road. Gravel spits under the tires. The farmhouse emerges from the gloom, string lights, fresh paint, and a damn windmill. It’s too clean, too perfect, like someone’s trying to sell the lie that we’re safe. No one’s safe. Not with Walker and me inside these walls.

Walker kills the engine. Silence crashes down, brutal. We just sit, breathing, neither of us willing to be the first to break. The threat of violence between us is almost comforting.

He climbs off first, slower than normal, pain flickering across his face before he slams the door shut on it. The doctor’s warning echoes in my head, “Don’t tear those stitches. I’m not fixing your sorry ass again.”

He catches me staring. “What?”

“You shouldn’t be riding.”

He grunts. “No shit, Poppy. But my body’s not your fucking problem.”

Everything between us is stretched razor-wire tight. I swing off the bike, heels crunching gravel. We don’t touch. Don’t even look at each other. Walker grabs a key from above the porch beam, movements clipped and pissed off.

“You planned this?”

He almost smiles. “Not for this. It’s my grandmother’s place. I haven’t been back since she died, but I do pay someone to keep it looking alive.”

He disappears inside before I can answer.

When I step inside, the place reeks of dust, cedar, and ghosts. Furniture suffocating under sheets and a clock stopped at 3:17. Walker hits the lights, and nothing happens. Figures.

“Generator,” he mutters, vanishing out the back.

A minute later, the generator coughs awake, and lights flicker to life. The kitchen’s a joke. A big table, enamel sink, and yellow curtains faded to translucence. I don’t belong in places like this. Don’t belong anywhere, really.

Walker moves slow, careful of the stitches I helped put in him. Opens cupboards, grabs coffee, sugar, and mugs. He moves like he’s done it a hundred times, but I know he hasn’t.

“You come here often?”

He shakes his head. “My grandmother hated people touching her shit.”

“I think I’d have liked her.”

“You’d have driven her insane.”

“I usually do.”

His lips twitch. “I know.”

He fills the kettle and winces. Damn stitches.

I step forward. “Let me.”

He stiffens. “Keep your hands off me, Poppy. You’re not here to play nurse.”

The unintended barb lands harder than it should. “Walker...”

“You’ve done enough. Don’t make it worse.”

The kettle screams, neither of us moving. Walker pours two chipped mugs and shoves one in my direction, but I don’t touch it. He drops into a chair across from me, posture all don’t-fuck-with-me. Rain taps the glass like a warning while time drags. He’s waiting for me to start lying.

“So...”

“So.”

“You have questions.” Perfect, Poppy. Pointing out the obvious.

“I do.”