Slowly, deliberately, Jade lifted her chin.She met his gaze and noticed he had green eyes so dark Jade thought they were black.They were clear and focused, and he watched her in a way that made it feel like he was taking inventory of her, of the room behind her, of everything.
Jade squared her shoulders.
“No,” she said.Her voice came out steadier than she felt.“He’s not here.”
Wolf didn’t move—heck, he didn’t even react.He simply watched her and that worsened her growing unease. The silence stretched, thin and taut, like a wire pulled too tight.Jade held his gaze anyway.She told herself not to look away or fidget.Jade wouldn’t give him anything he could use.
“I don’t know where he is,” she added, each word placed carefully, deliberately.“He left.”
Another beat.The hallway felt smaller now, the air heavier, like it was pressing in on her from all sides.
Wolf flicked his gaze, just briefly, past her shoulder, and into the apartment.He seemed to take in the space, the dim light, the smallness of it.Jade shifted, just enough to block the view.It was motherly instinct.
Something flickered in his face at that.Surprise, then perhaps interest.Her pulse jumped.Jane made another noise behind her, louder this time, a soft whine that edged toward a cry.
Jade’s chest tightened.Not now.Please, not now.Wolf’s attention shifted again, subtle but unmistakable.He’d heard it, of course he had.Jade swallowed, forcing her focus back to him, back to the moment.
“I told you,” she said, a little sharper now.“Derek’s not here.”
She didn’t add anything else, make explanations or apologize on that asshole’s behalf.Whatever Derek had done, it wasn’t hers to answer for, even though this biker might not see it that way.
Wolf’s gaze returned to her face, steady, unreadable.
For a second, Jade wondered if he’d push past her anyway.If he’d decide her answer wasn’t enough, that he’d take what he wanted regardless.Jade curled her fingers against the doorframe, nails biting into the wood.
Let him try.The thought came sharp and fierce, cutting through the fear.She wouldn’t make it easy, even though her heart was racing, and dread coiled tighter with every passing second.Jade held her ground.She kept her chin up, her shoulders back, not breaking away from his stare.
“I don’t know where he is,” she repeated, quieter now, but no less firm.
Behind her, Jane started to cry in earnest.The sound cut through the tension like a blade.Jade didn’t look back, although all she wanted to do was run back to Jane and console her.
****
Wolf had wrongly assumedretrieving Callahan would be easy.The last thing Wolf expected was to bump into Jade. He stood in the narrow hallway, one hand braced lightly against the doorframe, gaze fixed on her while a baby cried somewhere behind her, the sound sharp and insistent, cutting through the space in uneven bursts.
Before coming here, he had one of the club’s tech guys pull what little there was on Derek Callahan.Callahan was the kind of man who thought he was smarter than he was.There’d been a note about a kid, a daughter, and a girlfriend listed as Jade.Wolf had filed it away as irrelevant, background noise.
Then he came here and met Jade face-to-face.She wasn’t what he’d pictured.Wolf had met all sorts of women in his line of work.Most of them were weak.They pleaded, broke down when he questioned them about their scummy boyfriends.Jade wasn’t like that.
She was tired.He could see that immediately.It clung to her, settled into the lines of her face, the way her shoulders held tension, but underneath that was steel.
She lifted her chin slightly, her spine straight despite the exhaustion dragging at her.Her sharp blue eyes held his without flinching.Defiance flickered in her like a live wire.
For reasons Wolf didn’t bother examining too closely, it caught his attention in a way very few things did.Women like her always had.The baby cried again, louder this time, and Jade didn’t look back.She didn’t break eye contact, although he could tell she wanted to.
Wolf looked over her shoulder, catching a glimpse of movement.A small shape in a highchair, tiny hands slapping against plastic, face red with frustration.A baby girl.She was maybe a year old, too young to understand anything except that she needed something and wasn’t getting it fast enough.
Something tightened in his chest, an unwelcome and unnecessary emotion.He ignored it, because he had to focus on the job first.It always came first.
“May I come in?”Wolf asked, keeping his tone polite.
Jade didn’t answer immediately.Once again, she stared at the patch on his jacket.When she looked back up, something had shifted.Not fear, he’d already seen that.This was calculation.She was weighing options she didn’t have.
“No,” she said finally.“We can talk right here.”
Wolf studied her.Most people would’ve stepped aside, simply let him in.They would try to placate him, and make themselves smaller, in the hope it would make him easier to deal with.
She didn’t.Jade merely planted herself in the doorway like a barrier.
