Talon leans in. “Chase has been waiting long enough. Let’s go remind him what happens when you touch what’s ours.”
Tonight, we start collecting debts.
Tonight, Chase Harrington learns what real mercy feels like.
TWENTY-FOUR
JASPER
My sister’s murderer is chained to the metal support beam in the center of the concrete floor. He’s shirtless, ribs stark under bruised skin, and his head hangs forward. When Talon flips the light switch on, he flinches, his chain rattling.
He looks up and you can immediately tell what three weeks of pure isolation has done to him. Talon and Dredyn take the front while I stay half a step behind, with Mara at my side.
Talon crouches. “Your hint last time paid off.”
Chase’s cracked lips twist. “You’re all dead. You just don’t know it yet.”
“Not yet. First, you’re going to tell us everything about Evangeline, and exactly what part my father played in it,” Dredyn says.
Chase’s broken laugh turns into a cough. “We all blame our fathers. It’s cute, how the monsters who raised us are the same ones we end up becoming. You’ll wear his face one day, Dredyn. You already are.”
“I kill monsters. That’s what Omega Chi does.”
“No. The Syndicate just hands you names—distracts you with rabid dogs so you never notice the wolf at your back. You think you’re the hunter, but you’re really just the bait.”
“You’re already marked for slaughter, so why don’t you just go ahead and tell us what happened—from the top. Since you have nothing to lose.”
Chase shakes his head in defeat, bringing his chained hand up to wipe the snot off his nose. “I had brought her to a Syndicate event a week before. She wasn’t supposed to go into the room, but she did.”
“What did she find?” Mara asks.
“Women being sold as wives to lower level members.”
Talon scoffs. “Can’t wine and dine a woman anymore?”
“Are you truly that dim? Love doesn’t exist in our world. Not in yours, not in mine,” Chase says.
“Speak for yourself,” Dredyn counters.
“Loving someone is the most dangerous thing you can do in life.” He focuses on me, or tries to—his eyes keep sliding out of focus. “Your sister… Evangeline… she was so beautiful, so fucking smart. I loved her, you know? Really loved her.”
“Don’t.” The word rips out of Talon before I can sign anything. “Don’t you dare talk about love.”
“But I did. That’s what made it so hard. That’s why I—” He stops, swallowing hard. “James Steele found me after an event—cornered me in the parking garage. He was furious that I’d brought Evangeline, that I’d exposed her to that world when she wasn’t approved. I tried to explain that she was half Psi Theta because of your mom, but he wouldn’t have it. She saw something when we were down there after the party, and she wandered off—heard crying, I think. She ran toward it like she could fix the whole damn world. I chased after her, tried to stop her, tried to drag her back before anyone noticed.”
Mara makes a small sound beside me but I don’t look at her—can’t look at her. If I do, I’ll lose what little control I have left.
“She didn’t react the way she was supposed to. She was supposed to look away, pretend she didn’t see, stay quiet like everyone else who stumbles on shit they’re not meant to know. But she didn’t. She started asking questions—demanding answers. She threatened to go to the police, to expose everything.”
“So James told you to kill her,” Dredyn says flatly.
“He said she was a liability, that she had to go. He framed it as necessity, not cruelty. Said if I didn’t handle it, someone else would. Someone who wouldn’t be gentle.”
“Gentle. You call murdergentle?”
Chase flinches like I’ve hit him. “I begged for time. Told James I could talk to her, convince her to forget what she saw. He agreed—gave me a week. But he made it clear this was my problem to solve.”
“And you chose to solve it by killing her,” Mara says. Her voice is icy. Nothing like the warm woman I know.
