“Leave the door open,” he says.

“Why? So you can watch?”

He threads his fingers with mine, and I find myself glancing down at our joined hands as he runs his thumb back and forth across the protruding bones beneath my skin.

“So I can make sure you’re not gonna hurt yourself,” he says.

“I’m a junkie, Tank. All I do is hurt myself.” I yank my hand free and walk away.

When I’m done rinsing my hair, I wash my face and shut off the water. Tank sits on the edge of the tub opposite me. I startle and snatch at the towel he holds out. It’s not that I’m worried about him seeing me naked—he’s had me every way a man can have a woman. There’s no modesty between us. It’s the fact that someone so massively large can move so silently that I had no idea he was even in the room.

“Listen, I know you don’t wanna be here, but I’m not giving you a choice. You’re not gonna let this shit beat you. You’re fuckin’ stronger than that.”

“No, I’m not. I’m weak, Tank. It’s how I got here in the first place, because I was weak. Because I wasn’t strong enough to—”

“Bullshit. How long have we known each other?”

“Three years,” I say, without having to think about it. I know exactly how long it’s been, because that’s how long I’ve been hiding from my father.

“And in that time I’ve seen you put up with more fuckin’ shit from my club brothers, with more shit from Kick, than any woman I know could handle.”

I shake my head and wrap the towel around my body. Stepping from the open shower recess, I stand in front of the basin, combing through the tangles in my wet hair. “I’m a whore, Tank. I sell my body for a fix and I fall in love with arseholes who use me up because that’s all I’ve ever known. That’s not strength; that’s surviving, and doing a piss poor job of it. I’m not strong.”

“Then I’ll be strong for you.” He reaches out and pulls me towards him, turning and drawing me against his warm body. I allow his big arms to engulf me because for once it’s nice to be held. It makes me feel as though I’m real. Whole. And not a dry, cracked husk upon the shore, hollowed out with no hope of getting back to the ocean once the birds have picked my meat clean. I press my hands against his chest and stare at my bony fingers.

“Why?” I ask, not meeting his gaze.

“Because sometimes we just need some other fucker to take the hit for us,” he says. “Sometimes we need a little bit of help.”

He tucks my hair behind my ear, smoothing the damp strands together between his thumb and fingers. He’s close enough to kiss, and his gaze stokes a fire within my chest. A fire I need to smother before the flames can engulf us both.

I step back out of his embrace, and look him square in the eye. Tank’s desire to help me reaches further than just Prez’s orders. I know it. He knows it. And yet he still can’t admit it to me. He can’t say those words. It’s the only time I’ve ever seen him back away from anything, and the fact that he won’t break, won’t bend even a little, makes me want to push him further.

“Why are you the one to help me?” I ask.

“Who else is gonna do it?” he says, and there is the horrible truth.

Who would do it?

Tank slips by me. I try to ignore the frission of heat that shoots through me as his arm brushes the side of mine. I tamp down the pang in my chest as I roll that question around in my mind. The truth is that no one would risk their neck to save my own. Not Jett, not any of the other club whores or the Savage Saints, and certainly not Kick. No one would help me. No one but Tank who, now that I think on it, has always been there for me in one way or another when I needed him. Even if it was just to spot me a hundred bucks for new clothes, or to bring me a sandwich when I was so high I wouldn’t have remembered to eat for days if left to my own devices, or to provide a warm body to curl up next to when the loneliness got too much. Tank’s always been the man watching my back, and short of fucking his brains out every once in a while, I acted like he didn’t exist.

He stands in the doorway, looking as if he regrets telling me he’s the only one who gives a shit, but he’s far too proud to apologise.

“Tank,” I whisper. “I owe you. A lot.”

He just shakes his head, and it seems as if he’s going to walk away, but then his eyes sweep over me from head to toe. Desire and some other emotion I can’t place are at war with one another in his gaze. “You really wanna repay me?”

I nod. Because I do. I owe him my life. I may hate him for taking the drugs away, for bringing me up here, and for treating me like a wilful little girl, but given my actions, that’s all I really deserve—to be chastised, reprimanded and spanked. Oh, if only he’d done that last part. I owe him more than thanks and a bad attitude, but it’s a debt I’ll never repay, because it isn’t safe.

“Then get your shit together, clean up, and stay the hell away from the club.”

My face falls. I feel it, and my heart hurts because that club is so much more than just safety to me. It’s my home. It’s the only place in the world where someone cares about me, about what happens to me within its walls. It’s the only place I can be what my father made me and still be in control of it. I can’t give that up, and the disappointment in his gaze says he knows it.

Tank shakes his head and walks away, leaving me to finish getting ready. Leaving me with a hell of a lot to think about.

We don’t ride on the back of the bike, but in a beat-up old Ute instead. Tank’s wearing a flannel shirt and he looks like a fucking lumberjack with his ratty jeans, his beard, and that huge hard, solid body. It’s the only time I’ve seen him out in public without his cut, but he’s still just as imposing as when he’s wearing it and holding a gun to some poor bastard’s head. He sings along to an old Johnny Cash song, and his voice is rich and deep. I smile at him, watching him with undeniable interest.

“Who are you?”

He chuckles, and his mouth turns up in a smile. The dimple in the side of his cheek comes out to play. “What? Just because I’m a biker I can’t hold a tune?”

“No, not because you’re a biker, but because you’re an assassin. You’re one motherfucking scary dude, and here you are singing along to some country shit and driving your truck into town looking like a farmer. All you need now is a straw hat and some tobacco to chew.”

“Hey, there ain’t nothin’ wrong with Johnny Cash.”

“Do the boys know about this?”

“Tell ’em you heard me singin’ and I will hurt you.”

“Promise?” I tease, but he frowns, and I know he’s thinking about earlier.

Tank leans over and turns down the radio. “I’ve never asked you to tell me about your dad. I’ve never really wanted to know—didn’t think I could handle that. But I’m askin’ now.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.” I lean forward and open the glove box, slamming it closed with my foot when I see the gun inside. I rest my feet up on the dash and pull my jumper down so the sleeves envelope my hands.

“Is he still alive?”

“I said I don’t want to talk about it.”

“All I need is a name, darlin’.” Tank glances at me, his eyes burning with bloodlust.

“I’m not giving you his name,” I say, and all the muscles in my body tense at once, because the thought of Tank, of any one I care about being anywhere near him, terrifies me. “That part of my life is done.”

“Right. Says the woman who can’t get off without having some arsehole put her in a fuckin’ chokehold.”

“Can we not talk about this now? Jesus, I’d rather be tied to Crazy’s bed while he dry-fucks my arse and threatens to burn all my hair off with his Zippo lighter.”

Tank’s eyes leave the road and they burn into me. “Crazy did that to you?”