Garrick's truck smelled like grease and old smoke. Corrie sat in the passenger seat with handcuffs on her wrists.
Garrick: Keep your hands where I can see them. Not because I think you did it.
Corrie: Then why?
Garrick: Because Cutter talks, and this club listens. You keep still and let me do the talking.
She looked in the side mirror. A gray wolf trotted behind them, steady as a bad thought.
Corrie: He'll follow. He always does.
The Gravel Hounds clubhouse sat behind a fence, and the gate swung open before the truck stopped.
Prue: You brought the freak to our gate?
Garrick: Open it, Prue. Then shut your mouth.
Bikes stood in a row. People came off the porch, and every face turned toward the truck.
Cutter: Look who's home. The bitch that cut Martin open.
Trixie: Killer. Fucking killer. She's got his blood all over her sleeve.
The words hit Corrie in the chest. She had heard freak before. Killer was new.
Trixie got to her before Garrick had the door all the way open. Her palm cracked across Corrie's mouth.
Trixie: Noreen's curse, that's what you are. Your mama killed a man, and now you finished the job.
Corrie's lip split. She tasted copper, and the crowd made a low, hungry sound.
Cutter grabbed her cuffed wrists and jerked her forward so hard her shoulder popped.
Cutter: You'll swing for this, you sick cunt. I'll put you in the ground myself and piss on the spot.
She believed him. Her legs went weak with it.
Garrick stepped between them and put his back to her. He filled the space like a wall.
Garrick: Touch her again and I break your hand, Cutter.
Cutter: She's a killer, and you're holding her hand like a fucking puppy.
Garrick: She's my problem. Back off.
Somebody in the crowd laughed. Nobody else did.
His hand closed over the marks Cutter had already left, and he pulled her toward the door.
The bar was dim and loud. Garrick walked her past the tables to the back hall.
Trixie: Lock the killer up! Put her in the garage with the trucks!
Garrick did not turn around. His grip on her arm did not loosen either.
He took her into a small room with a cot and a metal desk and shut the door on the noise.
Garrick: Sit.
She sat. The handcuffs rattled against her knees.
Something scratched the other side of the door. Low, patient and heavy.
Corrie: That's Nix. He'll take the door apart if you leave him out there.
Garrick: A wolf that bites through doors.
Corrie: He's the only one who ever came back for me.
Garrick opened the door. The gray wolf walked in with his head low and sat against Corrie's leg.
Garrick: He can stay. He keeps his teeth to himself, and so do you.
Garrick crouched in front of her with a wet rag and wiped the blood off her chin. His hands were gentle for hands like that.
Garrick: Who hit you first? Cutter or Trixie?
Corrie: Does it matter?
Garrick: It matters to me.
He stayed close. His thumb rested on her jaw, warm and rough, and her breath went shallow.
Corrie: You don't believe I'm a killer.
Garrick: I believe you touched a dead man and saw a red helmet. That's not the same as believing you're safe.
She should have been afraid of that. She was afraid. She also did not want him to move his hand.
Garrick: I'm going to find out who did this. Until then, this room is your whole world.
He clicked the lock on the way out, and the crowd outside roared like it had been waiting for her.
Corrie leaned into the wolf's warm side and wondered if a locked door made a man a jailer or a shield.