My hands start shaking.
“But Savage swapped you with… s-someone else.”
The words echo in my skull.
Sold. Mafia. Swapped.
“W-Why… what?” My voice barely sounds like mine. My whole body feels like it’s collapsing in on itself.
“Charlotte,” Ruin says softly beside me.
I can’t hear him. All I hear is the ringing in my ears.
Sold. Flesh trade. Mafia.
“Why are you t-telling me this?” I whisper, my voice thick with fear.
Wolf shoots up from his chair. The legs scrape loudly against the floor, making me flinch. He starts pacing, dragging his hands through his hair like he’s trying to tear the thoughts out of his own head.
“Charlotte, look at me,” Ryder says quickly.
I can’t. My hands are clenched tight in my lap, palms slick with sweat. Is this what it feels like? Realizing that the nightmare of a life you lived through might have been the better option? That something worse existed out there. Something that could still come for you.
“Please, love.”
I lift my head. A low growl rumbles from beside me, but I ignore it, keeping my focus on Ryder.
“Hell’s Army,” Ryder says gently. “They work with the Romanian flesh trade. We think… they might be coming to collect.”
I bite my lower lip hard enough to taste blood. He keeps talking, throwing in reassurances, but I’m drowning. Part of me wishes I never heard any of this. That the dots hadn’t fallen into place so perfectly.
Another thought claws its way to the surface. “Y-You said I was swapped,” I whisper. “Who was it?” Who was the person Savage sacrificed for me? Who did he send into that hell instead?
My eyes lock onto Ryder’s. I can see the hesitation on his face. He glances at Wolf before looking back at me, his expression heavy with regret. “Her name was Leila Richard,” he says quietly. “She was seventeen at the time.”
Crack!
Glass shatters to my left. My body freezes.
Wolf stands beside his desk, chest heaving, staring at the broken glass he just destroyed.
Slowly, he leans back against the wall. and slides down it. A sound tears out of him—raw and broken. Something so full of grief it twists my stomach.
Leila. She must have been someone important to him by the way he’s reacting.
A sick thought crawls through me—Wolf now has a reason to hate me. I curb the urge to let it fully form. For some reason, I think back to the relief he possessed mere minutes ago, when he saw I was okay.
“Dane,” Ruin whispers frantically. Ryder stares silently at the desk between us. No one says another word.
While my brother, Dane—not Wolf, Wardens’ Prez—falls apart.
James
THIRTY-ONE YEARS AGO
My knee won’t stop bouncing under the table as I wait for Sandra.
The diner barely has a few patrons chattering about, unaware of the nervous energy rolling off of me. My hand wouldn’t stop brushing the new leather I’m donning.
