Her mouth opened.
He took her hand.
“You’re going with our girl,” he said. “I stay here and burn down anything that comes near her name.”
Regan’s chin trembled once.
Only once.
Then she nodded.
JD kept talking because that was what JD did. He stepped into pain and turned it into logistics.
“No Santa Fe chapter member can go with them,” he said. “Not Edge. Not Tarak. Not River. Not Bullet. Not Tank. Nobody recognizable from this town. If anyone is watching the airport, the private strip, the roads, the resort, social media, anything, a Santa Fe cut or face becomes a flare.”
Nate lifted one finger. “I would like to point out that my face has been described as forgettable in three states.”
Callum gave him a look.
Nate lowered the finger. “Fine. Handsome but adaptable.”
I ignored him. “Nate and I can go.”
Edge’s stare snapped back to me.
The room got very still again.
I forced myself not to look upstairs.
Not to think about Destiny asking for me.
Not to think about her blood still under my fingernails, her voice in the desert, her hand curled in my cut like she already knew I would carry her.
“Nate and I aren’t Santa Fe,” I said. “We’re San Diego. Nobody at that party saw us enough to place us, and if they did, they saw bikers in the smoke. Not resort guests. Not college guys.”
Nate nodded slowly, catching up and liking it way too much. “We can pose as college boys on vacation. Spring-break-adjacent. Graduation trip. Whatever. Board shorts, bad decisions, flirting with girls by the pool. I can blend.”
Callum stared at him. “You are twenty-four and have a knife scar on your neck.”
“College was hard for me.”
River, who had been standing near the back with his head in his hands, groaned. “Don’t look at me.”
Nate pointed at him. “Actually, we should absolutely look at you.”
“No.”
“You know all about posing as college guys.”
River lifted his head slowly.
The room went silent in a different way.
A few of the Santa Fe brothers suddenly found the floor fascinating.
River’s expression went flat. “That was one time.”
Tank muttered from the wall, “It was three months.”
