My mother. A sister. Now in enemy hands. How long has Gideon had them? How old is the video? I can no longer hide. I can’t. They need me. I have a sister. How did he know? How did her find them? It couldn’t have been when he had me, he would have said, he is too proud a man to keep this secret… No.
This is deliberate.
Calculated.
He is using this as leverage to draw me out.
Guilt surges through me so quickly it makes my stomach turn.
“I can’t…” My voice shakes despite my effort to steady it. “I can’t let him hurt them. I won’t…”
The image of them standing there, still and controlled, burns into my mind.
“This is my fault…” I say. Trey shakes his head hard.
They are going to be remade into something that belongs to him.
Because of me.
“I can’t let them suffer for me,” I whisper, the words cracking under the weight of it.
I don’t realize I’m shaking until Trey’s hands are on me, pulling me firmly against him, his body solid and unyielding.
“Don’t say silly shit, Dove, this isn’t your fault. It’s choices that cockroach made,,” he murmurs against my hair, his voice steady in a way that forces me to latch onto it.
I cling to him because I need something real to hold onto, something that doesn’t shift under the weight of everything else.
“Chace has…” He sighs, searching for the words. “Chace has a plan.”
“If you’re going, then I’m coming with you,” I say, with more steel in my voice than I thought possible.
But then his grip tightens slightly—not enough to hurt, just enough to make something else clear.
“No. This is too dangerous. You can’t be there. I won’t let you, baby. I’m sorry.”
He kisses my head. I want to pull back. It’s the first time I’ve felt real anger toward him, and I don’t like it.
“Trey…”
“Sera. It’s not just you we have to protect now, is it?”
“That’s not fair.” My hand instinctively goes to my stomach, his words stealing my fire.
“I’m not going to be fair. Not about this. If I thought I could bring you and keep you safe…” He shakes his head. “No. Not even then.”
I find myself disappointed, momentarily knocked off balance.
I pull back just enough to look up at him.
“What about you?” I ask quietly. The understanding of what he is already preparing himself to do. His hand lifts to my face, his touch gentle as he cups my cheek before leaning in to kiss me, as though he is trying to give me something steady to holdonto before everything shifts again. I feel it in the way his hand lowers, in the way his shoulders square, in the way his gaze darkens into something colder and far more dangerous than anything that came before it.
“I have to reach out and apologize to my dad…”
“What? Jonathon, why?” He shrugs.
“Chace’s orders.”
“I—I don’t get it…” I say, my heart tearing.
