Ty straightens himself, flexing his jaw as Axel rears back for another, but Ty lifts a warning hand. “You get one.”
While Ty’s entire stance is fierce, conveying the threat he just extended, Axel is undeterred. I’ve never witnessed him lose it like that. While that’s concerning, it takes a back seat to Ty’s battered face. I lunge between them so it doesn’t escalate, and Ty immediately coils himself around me like a protective shield before nudging me under his arm toward Ivy and Gage.
The room detonates into an upheaval of pure madness. Cussing and screaming and gangster posturing. In a blink, guns are drawn and pointed in every direction.
It’s ludicrous. Such overkill. I shout that sentiment again and again, but they all ignore me. I’m apparently the guest of honor, but also uninvited to this barbaric testosterone party. Although as I glance to my left, I see Ivy’s gun is drawn too.
What the hell?
It’s Axel’s broken voice that secures my attention though. “Howcould you do that to her? Trap her like that? Does she even understand what you’ve done?” Then, he casts his leer on Wells. “You knew about this? After ever—”
“No,” Ty breaks in. “He didn’t. None of them did. This was all me.”
“It’s fucked up, man,” Cash mutters, and Maddox echoes a similar sentiment with, “This shit crosses the line. Off-fucking-limits.”
“For all the bullshit you spew about protecting women, Ty?” Ryker snarls, baring his teeth, his finger dancing over the trigger as he glares atmy husbandand considers shooting him.
“Untrigger that finger, Ryker,” Ivy says in a calm yet stern command, “or things are gonna get ugly real fast for all of us.”
Ryker groans but listens because Ivy is a hero in his eyes, but he returns his triggerless wrath to Ty. “You couldn’t find anyone else’s life to fuck up? You go after the one young and innocent girl, who you knew thought the world of you and would blindly trust you. Jesus, I loathed you for the way you hid Mercy from me, but respected that you were an honorable guy. Putting her needs above mine. Fucking hypocrite. Get your shit, Rena.”
“What?” I gasp. “No. I’m not leaving. I’m a grown woman. And I didn’t blindly do anything. I married him willingly.”
“Only because he’s not telling you everything,” Axel counters.
“And you are?” I volley.
Axel’s remorseful eyes land on me, subduing my anger, but it’s Jax who sidles up to my side and clutches my hand, urging me to walk away.
“C’mon, sis,” he pleads. “Let’s go talk.”
I squeeze his hand back, but I don’t move. I’m frozen, cemented to this floor as a tornado of deceit and lies and clandestine dealings whips through my life, shattering all the relationships that glued me together.
“Get your shit, Rena. We’re going home,” Ryker barks. “Now.”
“Not gonna happen,” Gage says.
And Wells follows up with, “It’s too late. We’ve already called it in.”
I have no idea what that’s code for, but it has Ryker losing his shit and Axel grunting. Maddox, Cash, and Jax all appear to be as lost on the meaning as me.
“Let’s all take a deep breath,” Ivy suggests, her tone a soothing warble. “There’s a lot to discuss. It’s complicated.”
“Call it off,” Axel demands to Wells, blatantly ignoring Ivy before staring at Ty. “I don’t know what your goddamn game is. She’s a pawn for something. I can see it. You’re not imprisoning our sister for some fucked-up, self-serving transaction.”
“Axel,” Wells says with firm compassion, “it’s not what you’re thinking.”
“It’s not a fucking prison,” Liam argues. “No more than La Lune Noire life was for her. Let’s not be dramatic. Ty’s the best man in this room. And we all care about Rena.”
“She may be your sister, but she’s my wife now,” Ty reiterates in a gravelly tenor, eyes firm on Axel. “You need to respect that.”
Despite the turmoil, that unleashes a swarm of butterflies in my stomach.
Axel shakes his head in disbelief, his ash-brown hair tousled. Betrayal slithering around him. “I did not raise her, shelter her, protect her the way I have so she could end up in a goddamn morgue. As of late, I am well versed in the peril that organization poses. Sadly, I’m not being dramatic, and you all know it. If you cared about her even a little bit, you would have waited for us. Talked to me.”
His anguish is gutting. But my focus shifts to my husband, gnawing on his cheek and spiraling to somewhere dark and distant. There’s a two-second pause when I witness the unraveling. When the air grows stagnant and the room pulsates.
Ty glances at me, and his lips quirk into a tentative smile, but it buckles under the pressure. Waning in both its vibrancy and conviction. The spark just fizzles. Is it our spark? Am I watching thefire be snuffed out of my dream romance that has been real for all of four freaking days?
