Alessia uncrosses her ankle from her knee, leans forward, and studies me like she's reading fine print. Whatever she finds, she keeps it off her face. “And if it gets ugly?”
“It’s already ugly,” I say. “I’m just done pretending it isn’t.”
Rabid’s chair creaks as he stands. The room seems to shrink. He walks around the desk slowly, boots heavy, stopping close enough that I can feel the heat of him. Power. Authority. The man people obey because the alternative is pain.
He looks down at me. “Tell me how long you knew.”
“Since this morning,” I say. “I came in today to work. I tried to keep it together. I couldn’t.”
“You slept with him.”
“Yes. I slept with him, I loved him, and now I hate him. If you want to call me a liability for that, then do it. But don’t call me a liar.”
For a long moment, nobody speaks.
Then Rabid turns his head slightly. “Goldie.”
Goldie straightens. “Yeah?”
“I want you to go out to the bar and calmly and quietly make sure every civilian leaves. I want an orderly exit. And then I want you to lock down the clubhouse. Claire, Alessia, I want you two to stay with her.”
I’mhernow. Not Molls, not Molly, justher.
Which, I suppose, is a step up from traitor.
At least for now.
Rabid leans, his eyes coming level with mine. “You don’t go anywhere in this clubhouse alone. You do nothing without someone knowing where you are and watching you. Nothing. You need to eat? You ask for permission first. You need to use the bathroom? It happens only after Claire or Alessia allows it. Nothing, and I mean nothing, happens without them knowing first.”
I can only nod. “Understood.”
Rabid steps back. His eyes circle the room, taking in the other three. “Once lockdown is complete and I’m certain we’re secure, we’ll brief the club. Then, tomorrow, we’ll hold church and a vote.” Rabid’s voice goes colder. “And understand this, Molly: we’re not just voting on what to do with you. We’re voting on whether you’re still family.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Evan
I wake up with my cheek stuck to the couch cushion and the taste of cheap whiskey coating my tongue like acidic punishment.
My apartment is dim and stale, the air thick with all my bad choices — a nearly empty bottle of something called “Granpappy’s Secret” sits on the coffee table beside my keys and a pair of invoices for my work for the club. My phone is face down on the floor like it’s ashamed of me. I don’t blame it.
Awareness drips into me. Awareness and regret and pain surge in my chest, reminding me that, no matter how much I drink, no matter how hard I fight to forget, nothing will erase the memory of the pain I’ve caused. When I look at June, I won’t just see my sister and be grateful she’s alive, I’ll see Molly’s face — I’ll know the price I paid.
Groaning, I sit up and grumble as a stray sunbeam flickers through the overcast sky and penetrates my window shades to stab me right in the eye.
Fuck.
I check my phone. It’s tomorrow.
I sit up too fast and my skull protests. The room tilts, then steadies.
Silence presses in.
No Molly. No gentle, unguarded sighs beside me as she slumbers. No sharp mouth making everything feel alive. All I’mleft with is just the hum of the fridge and the memory of her eyes when she found out — burning, devastated, done.
I stand and my feet crunch on something. I look down.
A single index card, bent and smudged. It must’ve come out of my pocket — one of hers from the study date. In Molly’s neat handwriting:
