Even though everything in me is relieved and grateful to find her happy and smiling, there’s still a white-hot, vicious rage inside.
Someone's going to pay for this.
She pulls back just enough to look at my face, her hands framing my jaw. She's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.
"I love you." She says it again, clearer this time, like she needs me to hear it. Needs me to understand. “I mean that. I love you so much."
"I love you too, angel." I kiss her forehead, her temples, her cheeks, everywhere I can reach without letting her go. "The thought of losing you—" My voice breaks completely. "I can't do it, Cami. I can't exist in a world where you're not in it."
She kisses me then, hard and desperate, tasting like salt and fear and relief. I kiss her back just as desperately, needing this confirmation that she's real, that she's mine.
Behind us, Steel clears his throat. The sound pulls me back to reality, to the fact that we're standing in the middle of an Iron Serpents clubhouse.
"Wrath." Steel's voice carries quiet authority. "We need to talk to Viper."
I want nothing more than to take Cami and leave. Get her out of here, get her home, lock her in our room where nothing can ever hurt her again.
But we need answers.
I ease Cami down but keep her pressed against my side, one arm locked around her shoulders. She burrows into me, her hand fisting my cut like she's afraid I might disappear.
"It's okay," she whispers. "I'll stay right here with you. I'm not going anywhere."
We turn together to face Viper. The Iron Serpents president looks like he's aged a decade in the last few hours. His jaw is tight, eyes shadowed with something that might be genuine remorse.
"I owe you an explanation." Viper addresses Steel first, proper respect to rank, but his eyes keep sliding to me. To us. To Cami tucked against my side. "And an apology that probably won't mean shit given what we did. But I'm going to give it anyway because you deserve to know the truth."
"Talk." Steel's voice is flat, dangerous. The voice of a man barely holding onto his temper.
Viper runs a hand over his face. "Three days ago, a man came to our compound. Showed up at the gate asking to speak to me personally about a matter of urgency." He pauses, jaw working like the words taste bitter. "Said his daughter had been kidnapped by the Hellbound Devils. Said you were holding her against her will, trafficking her. Said he'd gone to the police but they wouldn't help because you had connections, and he was desperate to get her back before something terrible happened to her."
Cami goes rigid against my side.
"He was convincing." Viper continues, his expression hard. "Played the concerned father perfectly. Brought photos, showed us text messages that had supposedly stopped abruptly, painted this whole picture of a loving family torn apart by criminals." He looks at Cami directly now. "I'm sorry. I should have questioned it more. Should have dug deeper."
Steel studies Viper with skepticism. "One man's story doesn't usually merit kidnapping an ol' lady from a rival club."
"We did reconnaissance." Viper's VP speaks up for the first time. "Watched your compound and saw her there, saw she never left. We also learned she'd quit both her jobs with nonotice. It fit the profile he'd described. From the outside, it looked like what he was claiming."
Viper meets my eyes without flinching, and I give him credit for that at least. “It was a massive fuck-up on my part. I should have approached you first, asked questions, given you a chance to explain. But—" He pauses, and something flashes across his face. "We have a zero-tolerance policy on trafficking, Wrath. My baby sister disappeared when she was sixteen. Taken by traffickers. So when someone comes to us saying a girl is being held against her will, we act first and ask questions later."
The revelation lands like a bomb. I see understanding flicker across Steel's face, see the other brothers processing this information.
Doesn't excuse what they did. But it explains it.
"Except she wasn't being held against her will." I pull Cami tighter against my side.
"Which we didn't know until we already had her here." Viper's jaw tightens. “That’s when we saw the property patch.”
Cami leans against my side. I run my hand up and down her arm.
"Tell them the rest," she says quietly. Her voice is shaky but determined.
Viper's expression is grim. "I talked to her, heard her side of things." He looks at Cami with something like respect. “Saw how she reacted when we brought her father in to confirm his story."
My whole body goes rigid. "You brought him here? You let that piece of shit near her?"
“The second I saw her reaction, I knew," Viper says quickly. "I knew the man wasn't a concerned father. He was an abuser. And he'd played us to get access to his victim."
