Chapter 4
Jax stared at the boy in stunned disbelief, the sheer weight of what the child had just said washing over him like cold river water. Walking the shoulder of a western highway at eight years old, with a pocketful of loose change and a faded photograph, was a death sentence in this part of the country. The state was vast, empty, and unforgiving, filled with gravel-eating semi-trucks, scorching afternoon heat, and stretches of blacktop where nobody would spot a small figure in an oversized denim jacket until it was far too late.
"You walked?" Jax asked, the word tearing through his throat with a raw, disbelieving edge. He couldn't wrap his mind around the resilience—or the sheer, terrifying desperation—that drove a child to tackle the open interstate alone.
"The cars go fast," the boy said simply, nodding once to acknowledge the danger without letting it rattle him. "You just have to watch the shoulder and stay in the tall grass when you hear the big ones coming."
Jax closed his eyes for a brief moment, pressing the bridge of his nose with a thick, calloused thumb. The irony was almost suffocating. For ten years, he had lived as a ghost on two wheels, convinced that his absence was a noble sacrifice, a way to shield the world from his destructive nature. Yet here stood the living proof that absence didn't protect anyone; it only abandoned them to the wolves. The code of the road he had sworn allegiance to—every man for himself, ride hard, and leave no permanent tracks—suddenly looked like a coward's philosophy.
Martha stepped in, her maternal instincts fully engaged now. She reached behind the counter and pulled out a clean white mug, filling it to the brim with warm milk and dropping three sugar cubes into it. She slid it across the counter toward the boy. "Drink this down, sweetheart. You're skin and bones. What’s your name, anyway? We've been doing all this talking and you haven't even told us what to call you."
The boy wrapped both hands around the heavy ceramic mug, absorbing its warmth before taking a careful sip. "Leo," he said softly, a tiny milk mustache forming above his upper lip. "My mom named me after her grandfather. He drove the steam trains up in Montana."
"Leo," Jax repeated, testing the name on his tongue as if it were a foreign language he was trying desperately to learn. It felt heavy and real, anchoring him to the sticky counter of the diner far more effectively than any anchor chain ever could. He looked down at the faded photograph again, then up at Leo’s hopeful hazel eyes. The resemblance was uncanny, a mirror held up to his own youth before the booze, the fights, and the prison stint had hardened his features into granite.
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Across the diner, two burly men in leather vests bearing the insignia of the Iron Skulls club turned around in their booth, staring intently at the interaction. One of them, a scarred brute named Bull with a braided beard, narrowed his eyes and muttered something to his companion, earning a low chuckle. They recognized Jax, and they knew his reputation as a solitary wolf who didn't take kindly to strays.
Jax caught the reflection of the men in the grease-filmed window behind the counter. His jaw tightened instantly. He couldn't keep Leo here in the open, not with half the regional MC chapters drinking three booths down and looking for a fight to break the afternoon heat.
