Page 108 of Vandal Unbound

Twenty minutes later, with dark hair all over the floor, the scars are right there for everyone to see, and somehow I look less like a man who’s been trying not to be looked at and more like the terrifying enforcer I used to be.

More, I look like a man I recognize.

The clubhouse is already loud when I pull in. Bikes are lined up out front, trucks are parked crooked, and music pulses through the walls. Classic old rock, which tells me Sunny is in charge of the playlist today. The building looks the same as always, squat and sun beaten, but I’m entering it a changed man.

I’ve walked through the door a thousand times, maybe more, but I still pause before I step into it today. Havoc sees me and jumps from his stool by the bar to join me by the step.

“This isn’t the first day of school, you don’t have to hold my hand,” I joke.

He rubs his hand over my short hair, rougher than he would’ve done two days ago. “I wouldn’t want to make Daisy jealous.”

Home is a strange thing. For years, this was the only home I trusted outside my mom’s. Then, after the attack, it became impossible to walk into it without feeling the echoes of what happened. Not because my brothers did anything wrong. Because Alvarez and his men took something from me, and every time I saw the club, I’d remember what it cost to belong.

But in spite of all that, it was my sanctuary when I felt like I couldn’t go home. When I was too scared to be on my own.

“I’m ready,” I say without further explanation.

“Then let’s get you inside and give everyone something new to be annoying about.”

The second I walk into the clubhouse, the room changes. The noise shifts and conversations catch. Someone near the pool table says my name, and then everyone turns at once. For an ugly heartbeat, my skin goes tight.

There are too many eyes on me, too much attention. Then Sunny sees my hair, and his entire face lights up.

“Oh, thank fuck you got it cut,” he says. “I thought we were going to have to stage an intervention.”

The room bursts into laughter, and just like that, the pressure and tension break.

Sunny comes around from the bar with a dish towel over his shoulder. “No, brother, I mean it. That weird half-grown thing you had going on was upsetting the women and confusing small children.”

Ridge leans back in his chair. “I thought it had charm.”

“You also wore snakeskin boots to a funeral once,” Sunny says. “So, nobody is asking you for fashion advice.”

Ridge looks offended. “They were expensive.”

“They were criminally ugly,” Reaper says.

Laughter rolls through the room, and I take it in.

The sound. The faces. The coffee that’s been left too long on the warmer. The smell of oil and leather and fried food.

Nothing has changed and yet everything has changed.

Knox steps out from behind the hall that leads to church, his expression steady as usual. His gaze tracks over my face, my hair, then back to my eyes. Then he smiles. “About fucking time.”

That means more to me than any welcome-home bullshit. I cross the room, and when Knox pulls me into a hard, brief hug, I let him thump my back once.

“You got there,” he says.

“Getting there. But I can be here, like fully here, while I do.”

“Church, now, for patched-in titled brothers only,” Knox says. “Van, stand by the door and greet ‘em in.”

I do as he says, and one by one, my brothers come at me.

Reaper’s first, gripping my hand before hauling me against him with a force to test the eye doctor’s no-fighting rule. Ridge grabs my shoulders and plants a playful kiss on my forehead.

North gives me one of his silent nods and a slap to the bicep.