Chapter 20: The Lot

Mara's POV

I was foiling a client's highlights at my chair on Main Street when the bell over the salon door rang.

Gage walked in with his hands open.

He had not shaved in a week, and his eyes were red.

The client in my chair stopped turning the page of her magazine.

"Mara," he said. "Come outside. Two minutes."

"No."

"Please."

"Whatever you have to say, you can say it here."

The other stylists had gone quiet at their stations.

Gage looked around the salon at the mirrors, the women, and the sign on the wall that said my name.

His jaw moved.

"Outside," he said, "or I say it here."

I put down the brush.

"Stay put," I told my client, "and don't let that foil get cold."

I walked out ahead of him into the sun.

His borrowed pickup sat at the curb with its door hanging open.

A duffel bag lay on the seat, and a dark shape sat on top of it that I made myself not look at.

"Dad took my rank, and the table took my name," Gage said. "I have no bike, no truck, no club. I've got a house that smells like her perfume."

"I'm sorry for that."

"No, you're not."

"No," I said. "I'm not."

He took a step closer, and I smelled whiskey on him in broad daylight.

"Come home," he said. "Come home, and Dad takes it all back. The vote, the patch, everything. He wants you in the club, you know that. He said so."

"He said it to me, too. I said no."

"Then say yes to me."

"Gage."

"I'll be better." His voice cracked. "I'll fix it. I'll send her away and I'll be the man you thought you married."

"I never thought you were a man who'd carry me out of a room."

His face changed.

He grabbed both my arms above the elbow, hard, and pulled me against his chest.

"You're my wife," he said into my hair. "You don't get to walk away from me."

"Let go."

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