Slate shook his head. “Unlikely. Looks like he’s been skimming a little bit off the drug and gun shipments. Not a lot, just enough to be written off as waste or the cost of doing business, but I found the accounts.” He grinned to himself. “He might be a dirty cop, but Halloran is damn good at digging up shit people don’t want found.”
“That’s leverage,” Hawk said.
“I agree,” I said, shocked by the thready layer to my own fucking voice. “We need to use it all against him, apply pressure in all the right places until he starts to panic.”
Pike nodded. “When he panics, he’ll fuck up.”
“He’s already panicking,” I grumbled, pointing at the spreadsheet Slate had up on the wall. “Look at how much money he’s spent just to find Macy. His obsession with her is what’ll be his downfall.”
In more fucking ways than one.
Diesel stood. “Lockdown starts now,” he said, his voice serious and low. “No women or kids leave without an escort, and only when absolutely fucking necessary.”
“No exceptions,” Rocky added.
Nobody dared argue with that. Lockdown was a bitch, but it was what kept the people we loved safe.
When the meeting finally ended, the air in the room felt heavier instead. Plans were in motion and with lockdown declared, the path was laid out clearly. We were no longer playing defense. This was war and we were going on the offense.
Diesel fell into step beside me as I headed for the door. Rocky joined us, both of them studying my face a little too closely. “How’s Macy holding up?” Diesel asked.
I exhaled through my nose. “She says she’s fine.” I shook my head. “I’d love to believe that, but after what she did, she can’t be. Right?”
Rocky snorted. “She ain’t fine, brother.” He squeezed my shoulder. “She’s trying not to be a burden,” he explained. “Theyall do it because they think we’re already doing enough for them.”
Diesel laughed to himself. “You know how you felt the first time you killed someone.”
I nodded, swallowing around the lump in my throat. “Yeah,” I sighed heavily. I didn’t want to leave her, but the women had her. I hoped she let them be there for her. I wanted her to see everyone in the club as a support system and eventually, a family.
“She’s in good hands,” Diesel assured me.
I knew that but I still couldn’t stop thinking about the way her hands shook. They were ice cold. The way she’d cried inside that fucking helmet, thinking I couldn’t hear her. She hadn’t turned off the speaker and even if she had, I felt those fucking sobs shaking behind me the whole ride back to the clubhouse.
“Go check on her,” Diesel urged, his tone gentle and understanding. “I’ll let you know when we got anything actionable.”
I nodded, already picking up my pace. I was desperate to see her again. I knew with every fucking fiber of my being that she wasn’t all right. There was no way she was okay, which meant she needed me to be there for her. The girls were fine, they were going to be her friends and her family.
But right now she needed me.
I stopped at the edge of the bar, scanning the room until I found those familiar violet eyes, sad and fierce, pulsing with relief.
There she is.
And only one word came to mind.
Mine.
Chapter Thirty
Macy
If there was any mercy in this universe, time would’ve sped up, done its thing and helped me forget about what I’d done. But that wasn’t the way the world worked, at least not for people like me. Oh no, I had to feel every slow fucking second as it ticked by. My nerves were scraped raw and I was cold, so fucking cold, and I wasn’t sure I’d ever be okay again. It wasn’t just a chill, either. It was a bone-deep, teeth chattering cold that made it hard to breathe. My hands and fingers felt as if they belonged to someone else.
Despite the warm evening, I was wrapped in an oversized hoodie that fell to my thighs, the sleeves swallowed my hands, but nothing warmed me. The leggings and wool socks gave me a false sense of security, but nothing could cure the cold.
After Drew put me in a hot shower and scrubbed the other guy’s blood off me, I still saw the faintest hint of red staining my skin and once he was gone, I spent another fifteen minutes scrubbing my skin until it hurt. I still saw it. No matter how much soap I used and no matter how hot the water burned, I still saw the blood.
Someone else’s blood that I had spilled.
