I could pretend this was heaven. If it weren’t for the rooster. The first morning, I thought it was kind of quaint when he screeched at five forty-two a.m. The second morning, I realized he wasn’t kidding. Groaning, I turned to my side. Axle only snorted once, and turned toward me, still sleeping soundly.

“Are you kidding?” I whispered, nuzzling closer to him. With the window open, a chill had come into the room. Sleeping next to Axle was like having my own personal-space heater. I could get used to this. The speed at which I’d already gotten used to this scared me a little. As he slept, I put a gentle hand to the side of his face. He looked even rougher and scruffier now with three days of his beard grown in. It tickled my fingers as they played along his jaw.

I didn’t know what to make of any of this. Never in my life had I had a stretch of peace and quiet longer than a day or two. With Axle on his grandmother’s farm, it was as if we stepped through a time warp. Everything was slower here, simpler. We were both starting to settle into a routine. We woke just after six. I helped Grandma Hart with breakfast. After we ate, Axle would head down to the barn. There were about a dozen projects she had for him. Most of them involved fixing portions of the fence, working on her car, and various other household maintenance she needed to be done.

For my part, Gran (as she insisted I call her), showed me around the property. It was a small farm, or so she told me. She leased the wheat crops behind her to other local farmers. She just tended to the animals and a garden behind the barn. She had two cows; one had just given birth to a spotted calf. Other than the rooster, the calf made the most noise of all the animals. She had a chicken coop and delighted in showing me how to collect eggs from them every morning. Along with a motley assortment of barn cats and three mutts, two horses rounded out Gran’s livestock.

I couldn’t imagine what it would have been like growing up in a place like this. Monroe wasn’t exactly a thriving metropolis, but I was a city girl. Axle soon figured out I didn’t have the wardrobe for a place like this. Gran, it turned out, was also a bit of a pack rat. She had closets full of clothes for me to pick from.

The rooster crowed again. This time, the sleeping bear beside me stirred. His dark eyes popped open. For an instant, Axle didn’t know where he was. Red rimmed his pupils and his fists curled.

“Axle,” I whispered, running my hand through his hair. “It’s me.”

He sucked in a breath and rolled to his back. I wanted to ask him what terror haunted his dreams, but part of me was afraid of the answer.

“Sorry, baby,” he said, his voice groggy.

“Mmm.” I wiggled closer to him. “Come here.”

He did. Axle gathered me into his strong arms and kissed me. Then he nuzzled his face between my bare breasts, making me giggle as he licked me there. That familiar, heated ache flared between my legs. God, how could he do that? How could he make me respond to him with just a simple touch?

Axle was already working his way down the column of my throat. His long hair tickled my chest, making me squirm.

“Axle!” I let out a harsh whisper, afraid his grandmother might hear us. She occupied the bedroom directly below us and woke early. Hell, I wasn’t sure if she ever slept.

“Shh,” he warned. “Hold still.”

With what he did next, that was impossible. Flipping me to my back, Axle gripped my thighs and spread them. Reaching up, I grabbed the headboard to stop myself from bucking upward. Any rhythmic creaking of the bed would surely carry one floor below. Biting my lip, I fought to stay still. Holding my thighs wide apart, Axle flicked his tongue over my clit. I gasped as a shock of pleasure speared through me. He paused, then did it again. Oh God. It was such a tiny movement with the tip of his tongue. But Axle knew exactly where to touch me for maximum pleasure. It was torture. Sweet, delicious torture.

I couldn’t help it. My hips betrayed me. I thrust them up and down and up again, searching for Axle’s tongue. His low, naughty laugh did me in. In just a few seconds, he’d made me throb for him, my swollen sex glistening. All the blood seemed to rush straight between my legs. My skin tingled as he finally sucked me with expert skill, drawing out that little nub of pleasure until I gasped.

Just when I didn’t think I could hold on a second longer, my orgasm ripped through me. Axle slid his hands beneath my buttocks, holding me in place while he worked me with his lips and tongue. It felt so good. I kept hold of the headboard with one hand and raked the other down his back as I came hard.

Axle hissed. When I’d crested that point between pleasure and pain, he flicked me with his tongue one last time, sending a shockwave through me. Only then did Axle let me go. Smiling, he moved up, keeping my legs spread wide. He stroked himself then slid into me, ready to take the pleasure he’d so richly earned.

I wrapped my legs around his hips and wound my fingers through his hair. I settled back into the mattress. There was no help for the creaking bed now. I just hoped Gran had already gone out to the barn or down to the kitchen.

Throwing my head back, I closed my eyes.

“No, baby,” Axle warned. He brushed his thumb along my brow. “Eyes open. Look at me.”

I did. Axle locked his gaze with mine as he redoubled his rhythm. Groaning, I hooked my ankles together around his waist, bringing him into me even deeper as he found his release. Axle came hard and deep, exploding inside of me. His eyes flashed with lust and darkness, then went still and calm. He pressed his forehead to mine. I released him, bringing my legs down. Axle hovered over me, holding his weight on his elbows as he leaned down to kiss me.

“Time to move,” he said. “Gran’ll be on my ass in about thirty seconds if we don’t get down there.”

“Mmm. She’s a slave driver, that one. I like her. I mean it, Axle. I’ve never met anybody like her.”

Axle’s soft laugh sent a trickle of excitement through me. I loved hearing it. But he threw the covers off the both of us and a blast of cold air hit my skin. He couldn’t help himself from tweaking my puckered nipple. I batted his hand away and headed for the bathroom, looking both ways down the hallway before venturing out.

We showered and dressed in record time, just as Gran started bellowing from the kitchen for us to get a move on. Axle grabbed four pancakes; folding them like a taco, he shoved them into his mouth. Gran gave him a disapproving stare and swatted at him with a wooden spoon, but he dodged her, then leaned in for a kiss on her forehead. It made her melt. Smiling, I realized Axle’s kisses had a similar effect on me. Then he was off, slinging a tool belt over his shoulder.

When it was just his grandmother and me, I helped her clear the dishes. Her mood was bright as she hummed a song. I washed, she dried. As she stacked the breakfast plates in her cupboard, she turned to me.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen him like this.”

Axle’s grandmother wasn’t much of a talker. But in just two short days, I’d learned when she did have something to say, she got right to the point, no matter how uncomfortable it made her listener.

“Well, I’ll admit, I haven’t known Axle very long, so I’ll take your word for it.”

“He hasn’t been a happy man, Maya. You should know that.”

I shut the faucet off and turned toward her. Leaning with my back against the counter, I waited for her to explain. The tone of her voice made me feel her message was part revelation, part warning. As in, if he was happy now, she didn’t want me to wreck it. Or maybe she meant I shouldn’t count on it to continue. Either way, the air seemed to thicken. I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear what might come next.

“How much has my grandson told you about his past?”

I gestured toward the cupboard where Gran kept the coffee mugs. She nodded. I took two down and poured each of us a cup. She sat across from me at the kitchen table and ran her finger around the rim of her mug.

“He doesn’t say much,” I said. “But we really are just getting to know each other.”

“Hmm,” Gran said, blowing steam off the top of her coffee. “He doesn’t let too many people in. You should know that too. You seem like a nice girl, Maya. You might even be good for him. But it’s not easy when your man is part of that club.”

My man. Is that what Axle was? I’ll admit, I hadn’t allowed myself to really think beyond the moment where Axle was concerned. I’d spent my whole life overanalyzing every move I made. Since I made the decision to leave Monroe, I’d been trying to change that. Axle was a big part of that. But he was something else too. What, I wasn’t sure.

“You raised him?” I asked. Axle had hinted as much, but I knew there was a story there. I felt a little uncomfortable asking Gran directly. I didn’t like the idea of talking behind Axle’s back. On the other hand, she’d started this conversation.

“No,” she said; there was bitterness to her tone. “Mostly, the state raised him. His mama was never in the picture. She was an addict. His daddy was too. I don’t relish saying it, but it’s the truth. Alex, my son ... he was a no-good drunk. And mean. He was born that way. I tried with him. Honest to God. If it had been up to me, he never would have gotten mixed up with Doreen, Axle’s mother. The two of them brought the worst out in each other. They weren’t together very long. She abandoned Axle. Two days after he was born. She walked right out of the hospital and never came back.”

My heart lurched. Axle had only spoken in generalities where his upbringing was concerned. I hadn’t pried. In part, because I wasn’t sure I was ready to spill all of my family secrets in return.

“How awful,” I said. “Do you know what happened to her? To Doreen?”

Gran shrugged. “She’s dead, honey. OD’d a long time ago. Axle was already in the system by then. I tried to find him. Things weren’t good between my son and me. I raised him by myself and I’m ashamed to say I didn’t do a proper job of it. It’s no excuse but I was on my own. His granddaddy, Hiram, got killed in Vietnam when my boy was too little to even remember him. I went kind of numb for a lot of years after that. Anyway, he got in the way of me trying to do right by Axle. Then he died. Axle was about seven or eight. That left me as his next of kin. I tried to get him out of foster care, but they said I was too old. Finally, after it was clear how much he’d suffered, they let me take him home. He was twelve years old.”

How much he’d suffered. My breath seemed to burn my lungs. Gran had a picture of Axle hanging in a frame in her foyer. It was probably taken around the time he came to live with her. He was a beautiful boy with those striking dark eyes and strong jaw. But even through a photograph, he held pain in those eyes. It was as if he were an old man in a boy’s body, grappling with whatever horrors he’d endured before his grandmother finally slew the bureaucratic beasts to bring him home.

“You saved him,” I said, reaching across the table to take her hand. “You fought for him. That had to mean everything.”

Gran leaned forward. She had the same dark, fierce eyes as her grandson. There was no doubt in my mind that she too had endured horrors that settled that darkness there. Like Axle, she’d survived it. So had I. My demons weren’t physical pain. Well, just that once. But here we all were.

“The club saved him,” she said. “For years I fought him on it. I don’t know what you know about the Dark Saints, honey. I suppose the less you know, the better. But Axle, he hurt. He hurt deep. He’s never told me all of it and he didn’t have to. I know when he’s in that place, in his mind, I mean. I thought he was going to end up like his father. He was sure heading that way. Almost to the point I was fixing to kick him out when he was fifteen. But then, he found his way to those boys and those bikes. I mean, I could fight for him. He knew that. But he also knew I’d lose more than I’d win. He’d seen it happen time and again in the courts. The Saints though? Their reach is long. And any one of those boys would kill or die for Axle. He never had that in his life until they took him in. So, I had to make my peace with that life for him. I had to lose him a little to keep him. Do you know what I mean?”

She squeezed my hand. Hers was thin and frail, but her grip was still strong. She leaned back hard in her chair and let go of me.

“I think I do,” I said. “I think you’re asking me not to make him choose.”

The hint of a smile creased Gran Hart’s eyes. “Yeah. I guess I am. Maybe. But also, there’s going to come a point real soon where you’re going to have to choose.”

“What do you mean?”

Gran’s eyes misted. She looked toward the window. Out there beyond it, Axle worked in the barn. I could hear his rhythmic hammering. She had him working on one of the stall latches.

“I told you, he’s never once brought a woman here. And I see the way he looks at you. He’s lost and found in you, if that makes sense. But that club. There are things about it you’ll have to make peace with if you want Axle in your life. I’ve had to. You learn when to ask questions and when not to. And there might come a time, more than once, when Axle will need you to do something without asking questions. You need to be ready. I have what he calls a bug-out bag.”

“A bug-out bag?” I took a sip of coffee.

She smiled. “You know, when it’s time to bug out and don’t look back. I keep it in my room in case Axle ever tells me he needs me to take a trip for a while.”

Her eyes were serious, and I tried to cut the tension. “That sort of sounds like what I did when I left Michigan. I bugged out and didn’t look back.”

Gran hesitated, biting her bottom lip. Then she trained those wise old eyes on mine again.

“Honey, if you care about my grandson. If you really plan on having some sort of life with him, have a backup plan. There might come a time when you have to make yourself scarce for a while. There’s heat that follows that club and sometimes, people around them get burned by it.”

“I’ll remember that,” I said.

“There’s something else though. Something’s on his mind. I know that boy better than he thinks I do. He’s hiding behind the work and even behind you a little bit. But something’s gnawing at him. Cuz he never comes out here alone anymore.”

“What do you mean? He didn’t come alone.”

Gran waved her hand. “Well, no. I guess he didn’t. You were a surprise, I’ll tell ya that. A nice one. Like I said, he’s never brought a woman here. Not once. But since he moved out, he’s never come back to see me without one of those biker boys. Sometimes two or three. I just worry. That’s all.”

Smiling, I rose and took my coffee mug to the sink. I had to take Gran’s word for it. I thought the opposite. To me, he seemed more content than anything else. But Gran knew him better than I did and I suppose it was strange that he wasn’t talking about the club. Then again, I’d kept my secrets too. The specter of what happened to Cory Kline hung over me. Axle had to know about it by now and he’d never said a word. I hadn’t either.

“Thank you.” I turned toward Gran, resting my hands behind me on the counter. “I care about Axle. You should know that. I think he’s worth caring about.”

“Oh, he is. But don’t kid yourself, honey. My boy is who he is. None of us can change him.”

I’m not sure what she meant by telling me that, but I didn’t get a chance to ask. Gran had apparently said all she was going to on the subject. She smacked her hands against the table, rose, then waved behind her as she headed out the back door.

“Strange, marvelous woman,” I whispered. One of her barn cats meowed at the door as if he agreed with me. Shaking my head, I wiped my hands on a kitchen towel and headed out for the barn. Gran had already made her way to the garden so it would leave me a few minutes alone with Axle before I joined her and she gave me my marching orders for the day. I wanted to get done early so I could submit my last paper and call the semester done.

My blood heated as I caught sight of Axle. He was hunched over, pounding a nail into a loose floorboard near one of the horse’s stalls. His naked back glistened with sweat as his muscles rippled. He’d tied his hair back with a leather strap and it hung over his shoulder.

I made deliberate noise before going to him. Axle froze, holding the hammer in mid-air. Then he turned to me.

“Hey, baby,” he said, tucking the hammer into his back pocket. He pulled a handkerchief out of another pocket and wiped his brow.

“How’s it coming along?” I asked.

“I’m about done in here. What’s the old bat got you doing this morning?”

Laughing, I swatted his backside. “Manners.”

Axle caught me, sliding his arms around my waist. God, he smelled so good, clean and musky at the same time. He kissed me. My head spun and for a moment, I could almost forget why I came out here. But as I pulled away, I saw something swirl behind his eyes and it occurred to me it might be the very thing Gran was trying to warn me about.

“Is everything all right?” I asked. Axle stiffened in my arms.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I love it out here. You know that. But you asked me something one of the first times we met. You wanted to know what I was running from.”

Axle narrowed his eyes. “As I recall, you never really gave me an answer.”

He was right. It was a cop-out, but I wasn’t ready to now either. Though it was unfair of me, I asked him again anyway. “Don’t change the subject. What’s going on, Axle?”

“Gran got to you,” he said, still not answering my question.

“Axle.”

He let out a heavy sigh and dropped his hands from my waist. “Listen,” he finally said. “There’s some stuff going on with the club.”

“I suspected as much. Does it have anything to do with Cory Kline?” The last bit just kind of spilled out of me. But Axle’s reaction startled me. He went rigid. A muscle jumped in his jaw and he clenched his fists.

“Don’t ask me that,” he said. “I mean, baby, I can’t tell you everything where the club’s concerned. You’re just going to have to trust that it’s for your own protection.”

“Okay, I get that.”

“And there is something I’ve been meaning to bring up. You’re not going to like it. Hell, I don’t like it. But there’s some business I gotta take care of it. I’ve put it off as long as I can, but …”

“But now you can’t anymore. Okay. I get that too. So, when do we have to leave?”

Axle took a step back. He rubbed one thumb across his palm on the other hand. “We don’t.”

“Come again?”

“Maya, I need to ask you something. I gotta leave for a little while. A couple of days at most. I gotta deal with something.”

I crossed my arms, not liking where this was going. “Axle, you’re scaring me.”

He stiffened and took a step toward me. “Baby. I need you to do something for me, okay?”

“What?”

He put his hands on my shoulders, towering over me. “I need you to stay here.”

“Why?”

His eyes flicked over me. He clenched his jaw and his grip on my arms tightened a little. Then he softened, taking a step back. “I can’t tell you that, okay? I just need you to listen. I need you to hang out here with Gran. Hopefully, it’ll just be a couple of days and I’ll sort all this out.”

“Hopefully? Axle, what’s going on?”

“Nothing. Just ... nothing. Can you trust me though?”

Some of the things Gran said echoed in my thoughts. He’d do anything for the club. Never make him choose. Right now though, the intensity with which he stared at me unsettled me deeply. If I had to name it, Axle seemed scared. I shuddered, trying to imagine what could scare him. If I knew one thing, I knew that Axle Hart was the thing other people were supposed to be scared of.

“Okay,” I heard myself say. The fear went out of his eyes and he pulled me back against his chest.

“Good girl,” he whispered against the top of my head. “Thanks, baby.” Then he kissed me one more time before leaving me alone in the barn.