I smiled. “It’s good to be the King. And you’re my fucking queen. Will you be my queen?”
A single tear slipped down her face as she nodded. “Yes, I’ll be your queen.”
I left Grace in our room to get dressed. She promised she would come down. She wanted to do it herself. I felt like we had a breakthrough this morning, but I worried it was too fucking early.
The way she kissed me, the way she ground herself against me. It took every ounce of willpower I had not to toss her on the bed and crawl over her. I needed to talk to Haizley. I didn’t want Grace to move too fast. I didn’t want her to be with me until I was sure she was ready.
I made it down to the main room just as the door flew open. Stocks, Payne, and Eros stormed in, followed by two women and a young girl. She looked about twelve years old.
“Oh fuck!” Jack said.
I turned to look at Jack, and he was staring at the girl. “Jack? You know them?”
“Never met them,” he said, never taking his eyes off the girl.
I walked over to the women just as Kytten called out, “Slyce!”
Slyce had been absent when I’d ordered the Night Nymphs to come to the clubhouse so Kytten could tell them her story. Massacre had seen her at the Death Dogs’ clubhouse, but no one, including Valhalla, her president, had known why she was there.
The other woman shrank back behind Slyce, her hands on the young girl’s shoulders as she watched the room, her eyes wide. I stepped closer and lowered my voice.
“My name is King. I’m the president here. Is this your daughter?”
She nodded but didn’t speak. She pulled her daughter closer as if to shield her from me, and I wondered if she had been through something similar to Grace. I prayed her daughter hadn’t.
“You’re safe here.”
The woman snorted, her eyes glaring at me, and I knew she was wishing death on me and every man in here. I looked over at Stocks and raised an eyebrow.
He shrugged.
“Church. Now.” I walked toward the doors and turned. “Kytten, would you bring your friend? Zeus, you too.”
I held the door open as everyone walked in. Before I followed, I caught Haizley’s eye. “Grace should be down soon.”
“I’ve got her. I’ll tell her where you are.”
“Thank you!”
The doors closed behind me, and I sank into my chair. “What the fuck happened?”
Payne looked at Stocks, and his eyes were wide when the fucker didn’t open his mouth. He rarely said much. I didn’t expect him to give me a full report, which was why I’d sent Payne and Eros with him. He could have done it alone, but I needed someone who could tell me what happened when he came back.
Shaking his head, Payne began, “We got out there and wired everything up. Chatty Cathy over here”—he motioned toward Stocks, and I knew he was being sarcastic—“wired up the barn, while Eros and I took the trailers. We were just about to blow them up when Stocks took off running. I guess he’d seen the women and the kid when we hadn’t.”
That didn’t surprise me. Stocks was observant. He was fucking smart, which was probably why he didn’t talk much.
“He ran after them, and a few guys took off after them too. Stocks took them down and yelled for us to blow it up. There is nothing left. We made sure the guys who went after Stocks were dead and threw their bodies in the fires.”
All in all, it sounded pretty straightforward and with the Death Dogs gone, life should start to settle down. The war couldn’t continue without the opposing side. I looked over to Slyce.
“What about you?”
Chapter Forty-Four
King
Slyce told us her story, who the woman and child were, as Jack continued to stare. He was suspiciously quiet through the whole thing. We made a plan to protect the woman, and I made a decision that would likely throw me into a new category of controlling asshole where Grace was concerned. But it was currently the only option.
