Feeling frozen, I couldn’t even muster up a yelp to call for help. I dropped my plate on his feet, which just seemed to enrage him further. Taking my cup of tea, he tossed it to the side, careless of where the liquid splashed. He locked the door, then stood in front of it, barring me from getting anywhere near the exit.
“How kind of you to show up, since you’re the reason for all of my fucking problems. I knew you were gonna fuck everything up, from the first moment I saw you.”I backed up until I was out of arm’s reach, standing next to the bed and the open duffle.
Eyeing the open bag, I tried to see what he had managed to pack, while also keeping track of his erratic movements. My stomach dropped, and my heart began to race as he casually pulled a gun out and pointed it at me.
“Tell me everything you know about the books and missing money. You leave anything out, and I’ll leave your mutilated body for Bash to find.”
Chills went down my spine at his words. Crow’s face was full of rage, any friendly facade he had managed before disappearing under the cold morning light. In its place were the eyes of amadman, desperate and on the verge of losing everything. Crow was the one stealing from the club. As he stepped toward me, I instinctively backed up, but my legs hit the bed.
Stumbling to the side, I tried to get as far from Crow as I could. With a speed I didn’t think he was capable of, he was in my face, pinning me to the wall with a hand around my throat. Seeing the crazed look in his eyes, I thought about where those motivations came from, and couldn’t help but feel like it was deeper than money or power.
To betray his family like that, I had to assume he must have let something hateful and venomous infect him fully. It wasn’t an evil he could come back from. I swallowed thickly as his hand tightened on my throat, getting ready for whatever malice he had in store. I knew I had to keep him talking, distract him, if I wanted to have any chance at getting away.
“Why did you do it? Why hurt your parents like that? Why hurt everything your dad worked so hard to build?” I squeezed out.
He let go when I said that, shoving me down to the floor in the process and stepping back in disgust.
“He is not my father,” Crow spit in my face. His tone was low, and he seemed disgusted.
“What do you mean?” I asked, confused.
“Reaper knows I’m a bastard. That my real dad was the man he stole my mother from,” Crow replied, shocking me.
After several afternoons with Cece and Seph, I had been inducted into their secret club and was filled in on Seph’s past, as well as the work the club was doing to help other women and children in situations similar to hers. I had always assumed Reaper was Crow’s biological dad. There had never been any implication he wasn’t.
“Why do you think that?” I was stunned.
“Bike crash when I was seventeen. I lost a lot of blood. Neither of my parents were a match. I may not be a fancy accountant, but I know that shit means something. He’s always treated me differently, pushed me harder, rewarded me less. Nothing was ever good enough. I was never good enough.” I shook my head, trying to reconcile all of the information.
“Are you sure? Have you ever done a paternity test?” The question popped out of my mouth without my permission. Crow stepped closer to me and put the muzzle of the gun to my temple.
“Stop asking so many questions. I know the truth, and that fucker is gonna get what he deserves. I was just taking what was meant to be mine.” I froze, fear turning my blood cold.
Everything felt heightened; the sensation of the gun against my head, the shine of grease in Crow’s hair. I took all of it in, but my thoughts were elsewhere. I didn’t want to die, not when I had finally started really living. I had such a full life now with Bash, his family, and our friends.What will this do to him?He would be devastated.
Shaking those thoughts away, I tried to focus. I would get out of this for Bash, and if I didn’t, I knew his family would be there to catch him.Removing the gun from my head, Crow started pacing and continued his rant.
“Spent years biding my time, working every detail out. Then you had to come around and fuck everything up. Just a few more weeks, and I would have taken the entire club by surprise. Disappeared with the money, none of them the wiser. Get one over on that bastard. Calls himself President, meanwhile, I took everything from right under his nose.”
“Then what?”
“Start my own club. Become President, like I always should have been. Run it like a real club. My rules, my way,” he replied casually, as if that were an easy or feasible future for him.
“What about Seph? Do you think she’s not your mother? Would you have preferred she stay in an abusive marriage? You think she deserved to get beaten? Take the risk of him hitting you?” I asked coldly.
“Don’t treat me like an idiot. Of course she’s my mother. It’s her sins that started this. She was pregnant and a married woman who stepped out on her husband. Choosing a stranger to raise me instead. That wasn’t her right! She took away any chance I had of getting to know my real father. She made that decision without considering me. This time, I’m making the decisions. She can stick by her blood, or stay with that fraud and lose me forever.”
“What did Reaper do that was so terrible?” I just couldn’t wrap my head around it. This wasn’t just about power; it was about teaching his parents a lesson. But for what? From everything I had seen and heard, Reaper was a devoted father to Crow.
“He knew. He must have known I wasn’t his. I always tried to get his approval, but nothing was ever good enough. Around everyone else, he paraded us around like one big happy family. But he looked at me differently. When I started prospecting, he rode my ass. Kept me on scut work, toilets. All the petty bullshit he could think of.
“All the while, he never trusted me enough to put me on runs or put me on protection details. He held me back from the start. Never gave me a chance to prove myself to the club. Placing Bash as VP instead of me was the nail in his coffin.”
“Why haven’t you tried talking to Reaper and Seph about this? You’re an adult now. I’m sure they would have explained it. Why go this route instead of just asking them?” I couldn’t help but scoff. Slamming his hands on either side of my face, I flinched as he closed the space between us.
“Nosy bitch! You have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about. Who are you to pass judgment on me? You’ve been around the club for what, a few months? You gave your loyalty to the first man to pay attention to you for more than a couple of hours. Don’t act like you’re any better than me. You’re just as fucked up as I am, a thief and a runner. We’re not so different, after all.”
That hurt. I knew he was trying to get a rise out of me, but I didn’t like the comparison. I let my mouth run before I could consider the consequences.
