I step aside, watching the two of them. Torch buries his face in her hair like a man who’s been drowning.
My gaze drifts from Torch to Wolf. Only then do I notice the look he’s giving me. Shock. Relief. And something that looks suspiciously like pain.
“I… I went to your room upstairs,” he says hoarsely. “Y-you weren’t there. And… I thought…”
Oh. The realization settles heavy in my stomach.
“Paul,” Mama says, her voice muffled against his chest. It cracks slightly. “Honey, what is it?”
“You were gone when I woke up,” he says, pulling back just enough to look at her. There’s a rough edge to his tone now. “And then I couldn’t find you.”
“I was here,” she says, frowning in confusion. “With Charlotte.”
My gaze flicks between Torch and Wolf, and I notice another figure a few feet away.
Ruin is leaning against the wall, arms crossed loosely over his chest. His eyes are fixed on me, watching intensely. But his posture is anything but relaxed.
“Did something happen?” I ask quietly, but no one answers.
The silence stretches long enough to make the air feel thick. Wolf sniffs, dragging a shaky hand down his face. “The Reapers’ compound was hit again,” he says finally. “Nine of their brothers are dead.”
The words land like a physical blow.
Wolf looks like he might crumble trying to continue, so Torch picks up where he left off. His eyes flick to Mama for a moment—as if he needs to see her standing there to steady himself. “They’re gone, my love,” he says quietly. “Their Ol’ Ladies. Their princesses.”
A cold dread crawls up my spine. Torch’s jaw tightens. “They’ve disappeared.”
TWENTY-FIVE
Ruin
Three hours, and no word from Healer. Nothing from his medical team. Not a single goddamn update.
He took Scar, Hound, Bulldog, and Spike with him to the Reapers’ compound to see if anyone was left alive. But Hell’s Army doesn’t leave survivors.
The only call we got was when Healer had arrived on site. He didn’t speak for a full ten seconds when I picked up, just breathed. Then he told us about the bloodbath. About how the front yard of the compound looked like a slaughterhouse floor—mud turned black with blood, boot prints smeared through it like someone had been dragging bodies across the ground.
Two of their warehouses were nothing but smoking skeletons of steel beams and melted siding. Ash still floating through the air.
The hit must’ve happened sometime in the middle of the night. Clean. Precise.
Not a single fucking alarm triggered. No patrol units. No sirens. Which means the systems were either disabled beforehand or someone made damn sure the authorities never got the call.
Tactical. Efficient. Brutal.
Healer said the clubhouse doors had been blown inward, splintered wood everywhere. Bullet holes peppering every inch of the walls.
The inside looked worse. Blood sprayed across the bar like someone had taken a pressure hose full of it and painted the room.
Furniture overturned. And bodies. Brothers sprawled across tables and floors—some still clutching guns they never got the chance to fire.
Hell’s Army didn’t just hit them. They butchered them, then torched the warehouses for good measure.
If it hadn’t been for Bug, we wouldn’t have known anything until the news started sniffing around the county.
Or God! If we got hit, too.
Bug had pinged Ryder early this morning. Sent everything he could dig up from security and satellite feeds before the signals went dark.
