“I mean, I would take exile over staying in a club under Jaeger’s rule. It’s blindingly obvious he did more to Genni and Vic than we know. There’s more to the story, and he’s been hiding it to serve his purpose all along. I will be laying down my Road Captain status today.”
“He was going to ask you to be the new Sergeant at Arms,” I tell him in a hushed tone. “We talked about it. Laith, you could never join the March. Malik will kill you.”
“Then I won’t be in a club,” he replies with a shrug. “But I will fight for her if she’ll have me.”
“Jesus,” I groan as I grip my long hair in my fingers. “This is all getting out of hand.”
“What is?”
Her voice shatters every anxious feeling I’m having, and I slowly turn to face her. She’s always been so fucking breathtaking, but right now, in her leather cut and baggy track pants, she’s fucking stunning.
“Don’t look at her,” Malik snaps as he steps forward. He stands at her side, not in front of her, as if to show he doesn’t need to protect her. They’re equal. “Don’t breathe on her.”
Diego is at her back, looking at me over her head, taunting me with a smirk.
“We need to talk,” is all I manage to say when her eyes narrow in on mine.
“Obviously. Your false President andbrotheris locked in the basement and I would assume is thirsty and hungry, and all kinds of pissed off. So we’ll have to make it quick so I can get back down there. I have a few questions for him, and I would like to attempt his interrogation technique. Bound wrists and hanging from a hook.” She strides past me toward the Church door, making it clear who she thinks she is and what we all should regard her as.
“She needs to cool it,” I murmur to Malik as he moves to step around me. “The men here don’t want a female President and if she keeps acting as though she is, she’ll be putting herself in danger.”
Malik does nothing but snarl at me as he continues past, which honestly I expected worse, but Diego stops and looks around. “Whatever happens to her while we’re here, I will make sure it happens to you. I already have urine and bondage on my list. It might sound kinky, but I’m sure it’ll lose its appeal once we get started.”
He follows behind Malik and I’m left stunned when Laith’s hand hits my shoulder. “Listen to what she has to say and then figure out what it is you need to do.”
“Sounds like you’ve made up your mind already,” I say as the three of them disappear inside the room, leaving me and Laith outside.
“I had my mind made up the day I learned she was taken from her home and Vic was found with a bullet in his head.” Then he walks into the room with no hesitation even though his brother, who shot him in the face, is sitting in there and armed.
Vsits in her father’s old seat, her eyes misted over and her throat working on keeping her emotions at bay. A Hell’s March cut sits on her shoulders, the leather new and oiled, and I couldn’t miss the President’s badge sitting there under the name she was given, Dragon Slayer. There’s no mistaking the darkened specs of blood decorating the lettering. Her hard sigh fills the room as she stares down at the table. I can’t imagine what it must feel like when she’s faced with nostalgia after what happened to her and Vic. Her fingers brush over the gavel and wooden table with awe as she blinks rapidly.
“Luckily the gavel was saved from the fire,” I inform her as I take my seat across from my brother and Quinton takes his to my right, across from Diego. “We lost a lot that day.”
“Still, it will never amount to what I’ve lost,” she whispers hoarsely. “Was anyone injured?”
“No. We got out of the way of the blasts.” I can see she’s still compassionate, even though she has hardened. So much like her father.
“Six months before I was taken by Hell’s March, my father told me I would become President of the Steel Dragons. He wanted the Varga line, not a stand-in.” Her throat works on a swallow as she clears it, then she leans back in her chair as Quinton sucks in a breath. “Jaeger was his son on paper only.”
“Can I ask you something?” I inquire as I lean my arms on the table, aware of my brother’s and Diego’s stare. She inclines her head,allowingme to speak. “Did he tell you when you would become President? Or why?”
“No,” she grounds out as she shakes her head, those chipped nails still moving over the gavel. “I thought I had time to learn and time to win over my brother. I knew he would hate my father’s decision, but I had to trust that somewhere inside that man there was a soul.” Her fingers clench into a fist around the handle of the gavel as her face hardens with the memories. “I thought he felt the way I did. Family above all else, but I was wrong and naïve. Jaeger only ever saw me as a nuisance, and even more so when he learned of my father’s plans.”
“The night you showed up here,” I pause to shoot a warning look at Quinton. “I could see you were troubled, and the next day when I came by your house, you admitted someone was hurting you. Was that Jaeger?”
“Other than the fact that I found Quinton with his little dick inside a stripper the same night he took my virginity?” she hisses as Malik straightens in his seat. My hand drifts to the gun at my waist, hoping I can best his draw time if need be. “Yes, Jaeger had taken it upon himself to make sure I knew he hated me, but I still had hoped he would come around. I was his little sister, or so I thought. All of that changed that same night when he pinned me to the brick wall outside and kissed me.” She drops a bomb with nothing more than a shrug of her shoulders and I’m left with a sour taste in my mouth. This situation with her and Jaeger seems to be more twisted than I thought.
“What?!” Quinton bellows as he stands, his hands flattened to the tabletop. “There’s no way. Jaeger wouldn’t do that! He’s your brother.”
Malik has his head tipped back as his gleeful laugh shatters the tension. “Not by blood, Chino. That dog! Lusting after his baby sister.”
Diego sits quietly as he listens, his ticking jaw the only lingering reaction to V’s admission.
“He was drunk that night, and I will admit I kissed him back,” V confesses. Quinton’s hands hit the table as he leans over it, his head hanging down.
“Was it because of what happened that night between me and you?” Chino asks, his voice sounding tortured. “Were you trying to get back at me?”
“It would be so much easier if that were the case,” V murmurs. “But no. I just reacted and then I just wanted to get home as fast as I could. From the moment his mouth was on mine until I pulled into my driveway, you were the furthest thing from my mind.”
