Ashes & Asphalt

Chapter One - The Hole Left Behind

The Cage was running like a machine—but one running with a missing bolt.

And Jax Maddox felt it in every turn of the gears.

Ghost’s seat at the table was still there. Still empty. Still untouched.

“Someone’s gotta step up,” Mason said, arms crossed as he leaned back in his chair across from Jax in the office. “You can’t do it all. And you sure as hell can’t keep that chair a ghost shrine forever.”

Jax didn’t lift his head from the papers. “We’re not filling that seat.”

“Jax—”

“I said what I said.”

The conversation ended there. Just like every other time.

Outside the office, life went on. Engines revved in the garage. Laughter echoed down the hallway from the younger recruits. Club girls flirted, music pumped, whiskey bottles clinked. The club had survived worse. It was surviving now. But the weight that had settled since Elias’s death—and Taylor’s departure—clung to the air like dust that refused to settle.

Ghost was more than just second-in-command.

He was Jax’s right hand.

His balance.

The only person who could shoulder the darkness without ever flinching.

And Taylor...

He didn’t let himself go there.

That afternoon, while reviewing accounts and inventory in Elias’s old ledger, Mason poked his head back in. “We’re hitting up The Barrel tonight. You should come.”

“No.”

“C’mon. We need to show face. Recruits are watching. Members are getting twitchy. They need to see you still lead with more than blood.”

Jax looked up at him sharply. “That’s the bar where I met her.”

Mason flinched, but didn’t back off. “You think Ghost would want you running from the one place that made you feel something real?”

He didn’t answer.

A knock came at the door. One of the club’s runners, barely twenty, stood there sweating and holding a bruised-up envelope. “This came from one of our regular suppliers in town. He says someone’s been asking around about Cage shipments. Loudly.”

Jax took the envelope and opened it.

A photo fell out. Grainy. Taken from a distance. But the figures were clear—one of their suppliers being cornered by a man he didn’t recognize. Not a face from around here. Not a street name anyone claimed.

A threat, printed in red ink, was scrawled across the back:

“You’re not the only ones who know how to haunt a place.”

Jax stared at it. His jaw locked. His shoulders tensed.

“Something’s coming,” he muttered. “And I’m not walking into it blind.”

He stood.

Mason straightened. “You going?”

Jax slid the photo back into the envelope. “The Barrel’s where the trouble starts. We meet it there.”

And just like that, the man who had been avoiding ghosts was about to walk straight into them.

The second Jax stepped inside, the scent hit him.

Spilled beer. Cheap perfume. Burned grease.

And something sharper. Memory.

Red glitter.

Red heels.

Double whiskey. No ice.

That was how Taylor had entered The Barrel—a storm in sequins, mascara streaked, heartbreak thick in her throat and fire behind her eyes. He remembered every inch of that night. How her laugh sounded forced. How her heels clicked like a countdown. How he watched her down both glasses like she had nothing left to lose.

And now?

The place looked the same, but nothing about it felt right. Too quiet. Too dim. Too wrong without her.

Mason was already at their usual table near the back. “You’re late,” he muttered, more casual than annoyed.

Jax didn’t answer. Just sat. Arms crossed. Eyes scanning.

And then he saw her.

At the bar. Blonde. Hair long and soft, curling over her shoulders in beachy waves. She wore a worn leather jacket and a pale blue dress. Something about her posture was too put together for this place—like she didn’t belong but didn’t care either.

She was sipping something dark from a lowball glass, ankles crossed, relaxed as if she didn’t have a single place to be except right there.

When her eyes lifted, they met his.

Blue. Not soft. Not sharp.

Curious.

Jax looked away almost instantly.

She didn’t have Taylor’s edge.

Didn’t crackle like lightning.

Didn’t send his blood humming or his jaw clenching.

But she was pretty. And poised.

And she didn’t seem to mind that he hadn’t smiled back.

“You see that?” Mason muttered under his breath. “Girl’s been watching you since she walked in.”

“She’s not from here,” Jax replied flatly.

“She’s not scared of you either,” Mason added. “That’s rare.”

Jax didn’t comment.

She didn’t feel like a mistake waiting to happen.

She didn’t feel like a spark, either.

And maybe that was the problem.

The house lights dimmed.

Not that The Barrel had much of a stage. Just a worn-out platform up front and an old mic that squealed half the time someone touched it.

But when she stepped onto it, the room hushed like it meant something.

The blonde had traded her leather jacket for a guitar, and her drink for the mic.

She perched on the stool like she’d done this a thousand times in places just like this—half-full bars with sticky floors and aching hearts.

No introduction. No theatrics.

Just her, the strings, and a breath before sound.

Her voice was smooth, haunting.

Not sugary. Not country-pop.

It was the kind of voice that made people put their phones down. The kind that carried grit and grace in the same breath.

Jax didn’t mean to turn his head.

But he did.

The lyrics weren’t about love. Not exactly.

More about leaving. Losing. A kind of heartbreak that wasn’t loud, just deep.

Her eyes didn’t scan the room.

They landed on him.

Only him.

Jax stiffened in his seat.

Not because of what she looked like—but what she sounded like.

Like someone who’d lived through something.

She wasn’t Taylor. Not even close.

But she was something.

And it was the first time in months that his chest tightened for a reason that wasn’t grief.

Mason leaned over. “She’s not from around here. Tour stop or something. Name’s Lark.”

Jax kept his eyes forward. “How do you know that?”

“She told the bartender. Might’ve asked who the brooding guy in the corner was too.”

“She’s not my type.”

Mason gave him a look. “No one is anymore. That’s kinda the point.”

Jax didn’t respond.

But he watched her finish the song.

And for the first time since Taylor left, something new began to pull at the threads inside him—quietly, insistently.

As the final chords of Lark’s song faded, Jax was already on his feet.

He didn’t wait for applause, didn’t look back at the stage.

He walked straight through the bar, cutting past the crowd like smoke—barely there, impossible to catch.

Mason called after him once, but Jax didn’t stop.

He needed focus. Control.

Something to anchor him.

The office at the back of The Barrel was the same as always—smelled like old whiskey, leather, and bad decisions.

Jax didn’t bother knocking. He never did.

The manager, Brent, sat behind the desk, chewing on a toothpick and pretending to work.

“You know who these guys are?” Jax dropped the printed photo Mason gave him onto the desk like it was a bullet casing.

Brent picked it up, squinted.

Grainy surveillance still—two men near one of the dock warehouses. The night of the missing shipment.

“Where’d you get this?”

“Don’t worry about that. Recognize them or not?”

Brent tilted his head, thinking.

“Yeah… maybe. The one on the right—he’s been in here before. Couple times. Keeps to himself, but always asking the wrong questions. About routes. Schedules.”

“You get a name?”

“Nope. But I know who might. They hang around Denny’s garage on the edge of town. Sketchy types. That crew's been sniffing around lately.”

Jax nodded once. “Don’t mention this. Not to anyone.”

Brent raised his hands. “Didn’t hear a thing.”

He left the office just as quietly as he entered. But as he stepped into the hallway, he caught the tail end of Lark’s voice again—softer now, behind him. Talking to someone. Laughing.

It would’ve been easy to look.

But Jax didn’t.

He moved like a man on a mission.

Because he was.

His world didn’t leave space for soft voices or songs about heartbreak.

Not anymore.