She’s looking at the both of us, eyes clearing up with each second. She shrugs like none of it ever happened. “I don’t know who came in. Who left. Who stayed. I wasn’t there to see their fucking faces or hear their… their… names, I guess.” Her chest is heaving by the end.
And I don’t even realize I’ve already stood up, hovering near her even though she’s maintaining a colossal distance between us.
“Figure it out yourself, Prez. You’re all the fucking same.” Her last biting words echo through the walls, even when she walks out, slamming the door hard enough to rattle the frame.
I stand there, unconcerned about what my fucking Prez thinks. Because my loyalty is shifting. It doesn’t belong to the club anymore.
It’s hers now. And I feel the shift snap into place with a clawing rupture.
But I’ve also finally realized I’m one of the men she now associates with them. The burn in my chest is reminiscent of the redness clouding Wolf’s eyes.
I don’t care anymore. I’m not moving at hisfucking pace. I’ll find my own.
THIRTEEN
Ruin
I dazedly watch as two prospects drag a nearly unconscious Spike out of the ring. Healer is standing near the ropes, arms crossed, staring at me with a disappointed frown. I can’t care less about what he has to say.
The only thought on a constant loop is what Wolf muttered after Charlotte left us scrambling with our collective, uselessguilt—forty minutes ago.
??????
“There’s… there’s something else and I wanna keep it between us,” Wolf whispers, like even the closed door would somehow catch the conversation. “For now.”
I blink at him, my heart still pounding with Charlotte’s last words.
‘You’re all the fucking same.’
“What is it?”
He sighs, picking up a folder from the bottom of the pile. “This is a printed email thread between my fa—Savage and someone named Ioana. I don’t know who this person is but they… they talked about a sale seven years ago in June.”
“Seven…” I repeat uselessly. This was the same time when—
“It was two months before Charlotte came to us.” He nods, sliding the document toward me with shaky hands. “I don’tfully understand what this thread is all about, but I could deduce they were expecting a seventeen-year-old Charlotte. The email conversation was solid. But I’ve been wracking my brain, trying to figure out if anything out of the ordinary happened when she turned seventeen and…” He shakes his head, his voice collapsing into a thick, strangled noise.
If this started seven years ago, and they wanted a seventeen-year-old Charlotte—four years ago—they could be coming to collect. Even my hands are shaking now.
We already know Hell’s Army is deep into flesh trade.
Christ. Did Savage actually make a deal with them and fail to comply? Was Glory involved in any of this?
“Ryder?” I blurt out. “Can I include him? I’ll find another way if you don’t trust h—”
“No, I trust him. But don’t let this get out any further.”
I give him a firm yet brittle nod, my throat locking at what this could mean for our club.
If Hell’s Army was promised something, they wouldn’t stop until they got it.
As I’m about to head out, calibrating my brain to beat the shit out of Spike, I hear Wolf again, nodding at the dreaded folder. “And find out who this Ioana is. Sounds… Romanian.”
Fucking hell.
??????
I need to find Ryder. Or perhaps develop better skills to understand the email thread from a technical standpoint. It’s been half an hour with me scouring through every page of this and… nothing.
