“They saved me!”
“Nae! Ye saved them. And I wasnae putting yer safety in their hands again. I trusted them once, and they left ye sitting in a van alone with Samuel breathing down yer neck while theywent running off to do fuck all. Yer mine. Mine to care for. Mine to protect. They proved incapable the first time. I willnae give them a second.”
I stare at him, my mouth open and eyes so wide they feel close to splitting at the corners. Everything drains from me, leaving me feeling like an empty shell as all the air in me escapes in a soft huff.
Standing, I fold my arms across my chest and walk away.
He’s wrong.
They saved me. They’re my friends, and they saved me.
Right?
I pace back and forth, questioning everything. My friendship with Everly, and her guys, and with Zayn.
“Umm…boss? About that problem?”
“What is it?” the guy next to Maeve asks, the frustration with the situation plainly clear in his voice.
“There’re a couple of types upstairs.”
“And a senator,” I add, shivering with revulsion. Scrubbing my hands over my face to push away, I wince in pain as I hit the sore spots and the cut on my head.
The two guys who refuse to tell me their names turn and look at me, and I shrug. “I recognized him and the one movie star when they, umm…” I pause, struggling to voice what they’d done to me.
Draven stands and walks to me. I look up at him with tears in my eyes and he hesitates. He’s covered in Maeve’s blood, but I don’t care. I need my daddy. I step toward him and he wraps his arms around me, pulling me into his body, but the tactical vest keeps me from the comforting warmth I usually find. Huffing, I slide my hands under the vest and the shirt he’s wearing.
“Can we go home?” I ask.
I feel his lips press against my forehead as he nods. “Soon, lilla du.”
He pulls away and looks at the wound on the side of my head, tsking under his breath. “Is there a medic in the group with ye, Ghost?”
“We’re all trained. Why?”
“Tavish needs checked over, and then I’d like to get him cleaned up.”
The guy at the stairs walks in and opens a compartment on the wall I hadn’t noticed. He comes toward Draven and me, stopping in front of us. “We need to get some photos and then call the authorities.”
A gasp rushes through me. The thought of what calling the cops means for not only me but for all the others chills me to the bone. The members of Societas Exspiravit, as well as all the people the Order of Death trafficked.
“Draven…”
He sighs. “I ken, Tavish. I’ll take care of it.”
Draven turns back to the others, putting himself between them and me.
“The ship’s gotta go down.”
“Up. It’s gotta go up and with all the people on the boat that were here of their own accord.”
“You’re suggesting we kill a US Senator and several high-profile celebrities.”
I step from behind Draven and pull myself up to my full height. Looking these two big ass military types dead in their eyes would normally have me cowering in the corner without my screens and tech to buffer the interaction, but not today. I’m fucking done cowering.
“Yes. That’s exactly what I’m saying. Y’all can do it or Draven and I can, but the boat has to be obliterated, along with any evidence left on it.”
“What about the guy’s protection detail?”
