Scared.
Like some part of her already knew the answer was going to break her.
Nyla flinched at Edge’s stare, but she lifted her chin anyway. “They found old newspaper stuff. About Mandy. About Tarak. About the engagement. The crash. The funeral. They passed pictures around. Made posts. Group chats.”
Regan covered her mouth.
Jake’s jaw tightened. “They asked her who her real dad was. Said maybe Mandy didn’t know. Said maybe the whole club had a turn.”
A sound came from Tarak.
Not a word.
Not a growl.
Something broken.
Tris started crying harder, but she didn’t stop. “They called her the club whore’s daughter. They said Mandy named her Destiny because it was a stripper name. They taped a dollar bill to her locker. They told her to earn tips at the bar. They called her white-trash biker whore. They told her bad blood shows eventually.”
Edge’s face emptied.
Completely.
Regan’s eyes filled with a horror so deep it looked bottomless.
“No,” she whispered. “No, she would have told me.”
Tris shook her head. “She wouldn’t. That was the point.”
Regan looked at her.
Tris took a shaky breath. “She said if she told you, Edge would come to school. You’d destroy the mothers. Tarak would look haunted again. The club would show up, and everybody would say, see? Biker trash. Violent. Dangerous. Just like Mandy.”
Tarak turned away.
His shoulders shook once.
Regan made a sound that was almost a sob.
Edge didn’t move.
That scared me more than if he had put his fist through a wall.
Jake looked at Edge then, and whatever fear he had, he pushed through it for Destiny. “She said the people Mandy actually hurt were the ones who loved her anyway. You. Regan. Tarak. The club. She said you didn’t pass Mandy’s sins down to her, so she wasn’t going to make you bleed for what those kids were doing.”
Nyla wiped under her eyes. “She took it all because she was protecting you.”
That landed.
Hard.
You could see it hit every person in the room.
The guilt moved like smoke.
Regan sank onto the bottom step.
Edge finally turned his head toward her, but he didn’t go to her. I don’t think he could make his body move.
