The clubhouse is quiet when I let myself back in, the kind of silence that feels loaded, like everyone’s waiting for the next shoe to drop and I’m about to bring it crashing down.
I take the stairs slowly, each step heavy. Upstairs, Katana’s door is closed but light spills across the hall from underneath. I push it open, expecting to see her in bed not braced against the dresser. Sweatpants hang loose on her hips, tank top tight against her skin. Pale. Swaying unsteadily, but standing.
Her eyes lock on me. “Where’d you go?”
I close the door, leaning back against it, “Business.”
“Bullshit.” She pushes off the dresser, pain flashing across her face but swallows it quickly. “What kind of business drags you out in the middle of the night?”
I should ease into it. Find a way to soften the blow. But I’ve never been good at anything but blunt. “It’s Riot.”
Katana’s whole body goes rigid. “What about her?”
“She’s been feeding Serrano intel.”
For a second she doesn’t move, doesn’t breathe. Then she’s across the room faster than she should be able, her fist connecting with my chest. Not enough to hurt me, but enough to make the point. Pain tears through her ribs and she bends forward clutching her side.
“Don’t you dare,” she spits, voice raw. “Don’t you stand there and throw her name around like that. Riot would never.”
I move on instinct, catching her before she topples. She jerks back, fury burning in her eyes even as her body betrays her with a wince.
“I don’t want to believe it either,” I grind out. “But there’s evidence. Calls. Movements. It lines up.”
Her lip curls. “You don’t know a damn thing about me or my club.”
I step in closer, my voice low, steady. “That’s where you’re wrong, Maya.”
She freezes, her breath catching in her throat. Her eyes flare, sharp and shaken all at once like I caught her off guard.
“I know you,” I push. “I know how you fight, how you carry the weight for everyone else. And I know it’s eating you alive that the person you trust most might’ve sold you out.”
Her chest heaves, every inhale ragged with pain and fury. She looks at me like she wants to rip the truth out of me with her bare hands. “Don’t you dare stand there and tell me I can’t trust my own family.”
“I know loyalty when I see it. And I know betrayal too.” My voice drops, “Trust me.”
Her laugh is bitter, sharp as glass. “Trust you? Why, because we fucked?” Her voice cuts deep, and I feel it like a blade. “Your word doesn’t mean a damn thing against my club.”
Her words tear through me, but I don’t flinch. I step closer, lowering my voice. “It means I wouldn’t lie to you about this.”
Her breathing shudders, shallow and painful. She studies me, eyes burning, searching for cracks. Then she shoves me back, weaker than she wants it to be, her face twisting as her ribs scream again. She hides the wince with a snarl.
“Get out,” she says, voice trembling but sharp. “Now.”
Every instinct screams to stay, to fight through this, but the fire in her eyes says if I push, I’ll lose her. So I turn, each step heavier than the last, and leave her standing in that room, her anger burning hotter than the hunger I can’t smother no matter how far I walk.
15
KATANA
The slam of the door still rattles through the walls long after Dante’s footsteps fade. I stand there in the silence, leaning against the dresser, ribs aching, fury chewing through me worse than the pain in my side.
Trust me, Maya,he said.
He leaves my bed in the middle of the night then waltzes back in here throwing wild accusations in my face and asks me to trust him over my club, my family? What the hell?
My fists curl tight at my sides. He doesn’t get to cut me open and then stay to watch me bleed out. I drag myself upright, every muscle screaming mutiny. Pain arcs sharp across my side and I bite it down. I won’t lie here like some wounded thing while the ground shifts under my feet. If he’s right, if there’s rot in my club, it’ll be me that finds it. Not him.
The pull across my side is white-hot, sharp enough to make my knees buckle. My hand catches the dresser before I go down. Sweat breaks quick along my spine, dampening the back of my tank. I stay there, hunched, waiting for the throb to settle into something I can manage. It doesn’t. But I shove it down anyway.
