The common room went quiet the second I walked in.
Eyes tracked me. Members at tables, a game frozen on the TV, someone with a beer halfway to his mouth. No one said my name, but I could see the questions all over their faces.
Is he okay? Is Saint? What happens now?
I didn’t have answers yet. That pissed me off even more.
“Prez?” one of the younger guys started.
“Later,” I said, not slowing.
They moved out of my way on instinct. I headed down the hall, trying to keep the tension in my shoulders from spiraling into something worse. The framed photos on the walls watched me as I passed—Saint laughing with his helmet in his hand, the row of us lined up on patch night, faces of men we’d buried.
On a normal day, I’d slow down and let that shit anchor me. Remind me why we built this club the way we did. Why we had rules. Why we protected our own and why we had a hard line about omegas—ours, theirs, didn’t matter. You don’t touch them, you don’t trade them, you sure as hell don’t look away when one of them is in trouble.
Not today.
Today it just reminded me how many men counted on me not to screw this up.
My office door was already open. Wraith—my VP—sat in the chair across from my desk. Arms folded. Dark hair pulled back. Face set in that cold, unreadable look he wore when he was braced for bad news.
“How bad?” he asked.
I shut the door behind me harder than I needed to. “Rowan’s a goddamn coward.”
“That bad,” Wraith muttered.
I pulled off my gloves and tossed them onto the desk. For a second I just stood there with my hands braced on the edge, head down. The room felt too small. Too quiet. I could still seeSaint’s body jerking when that Reaper swung that heavy tire iron—good for lug nuts or skulls.
“He wouldn’t even say the guy’s name,” I said.
Wraith sat up a little straighter. “You told him what happened?”
“Every detail.” My teeth clenched. “Told him his patch was at the street race. Told him Saint wasn’t looking for trouble, just saw some asshole in a Reapers vest dragging an omega between cars. Saint stepped in, did what he’s supposed to do, and got his skull split for it.”
Wraith’s jaw tightened. “And Rowan?”
“Shrugged. Said if one of his men had done something that stupid, he would’ve heard about it.” I lifted my head and met Wraith’s eyes. “He called Saint reckless.”
I waited for the anger to hit Wraith’s face. It came slow, like always. Controlled. His nostrils flared, just a little. That’s how you knew he wanted blood.
“Saint’s lying in a hospital bed,” I went on, voice low, “tube down his throat, doctors saying ‘coma’ and ‘wait and see,’ and that son of a bitch couldn’t even pretend to care.”
Wraith blew out a breath through his nose. “So he’s not giving us the guy.”
“He’s not giving us anything. No name, no apology, no offer to make it right. He thinks if he stonewalls long enough, we’ll get tired and drop it.”
“He should know you better than that.”
“Yeah,” I said. “He should.”
Silence settled between us. Heavy. The kind that comes right before someone throws a punch.
Wraith leaned forward, eyes locked on mine. “All right. What’s the play?”
Once, before we built this, back when I was young and dumber, I would’ve said we go loud. Roll up on the Reapers’compound with half the club and take it apart brick by brick. That kind of thing feels good in your twenties.
Saint had outgrown that thinking. He always said I should, too.
