Unbroken

Hunter stared at him for several moments, and then he nodded once at whatever Shane said. At seeing the nod, Leo disappeared into the building, and I couldn’t see him anymore.

Hunter packed my suitcase in the backseat and then slipped into the front, blowing heat into his cold hands. “Ready, Nugget?”

I nodded, still concerned by what I saw. “What did Shane want?”

“Leo wants him to tail us all the way back, just to be sure you made it.”

“What did you say?”

Hunter looked at me, his face bright, his smile spreading large. My breath knocked out of me as I saw a happiness in him I’d been longing to see. “I’m alright for him to do that.”

Relieved, I smiled back. “You’re happy, Hunter Dawes.”

He stared at me heatedly. “I get to have you, don’t I?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“So I’m happy,” he said softly.

He drove down the path with Shane’s black car following, and then we were on the roads, moving in the direction of town.

“Where are we going?” I asked him.

“To my place,” he answered.

I didn’t know until a half hour later that his place was the Warlord clubhouse.

They had officially initiated him, after all.

*

There was a snow warning in effect, so the way there took longer than expected. Brown Bay was expanding quickly with new residents, and traffic was heavy in the centre of town.

“You live there?” I asked Hunter curiously, feeling a little anxious that we’d be around others, especially bikers.

“Until I have my own place—a proper place,” he replied with ease. “I should be set up the next time I have you.” He added quietly, “That’s the goal, anyway.”

When I didn’t answer straight away, he glanced at me, his expression dropping a little. “You’re not happy with this arrangement.”

“It’s not that,” I quickly said, taking his free hand into my own. “I just don’t know what I’m getting myself into.”

Stopping at a red light, he turned to look at me fully. “They’re good guys. Nothing like what you might think.”

At least one of those guys wanted to put him in a mental institution once upon a time, I wanted to say. Instead, I smiled brightly at him. “You know what you’re doing, and I trust you.”

I did trust him.

He wouldn’t put me in harm’s way.

He was also right. I knew nothing about the club, or its members. All I had to go off was Leo’s disparaging words of them, but that was back when he butted heads with Hunter, and he hadn’t scorned them since.

“Do they know I’m coming?” I asked stupidly.

“Yeah,” he answered. “They’re excited to meet you.”

I swallowed down my anxiety and fixed my gaze out the window.

When we finally made it there, Hunter parked the car behind the clubhouse, next to other trucks and motorcycles. Nerves fluttered like tiny butterflies in my stomach as I removed my seatbelt and stepped out.