Not Steele’s truth. Not Stone’s truth. Not the version where I was just a victim who had nothing to do with any of it.
My truth.
The real one. The ugly one. The one that keeps me awake at night even now.
Titan Ward died because Steele and Stone wanted power and their father was in the way.
And because I wanted freedom more than I wanted to stay human.
They planned it. They arranged it. They told me exactly what to do and when to do it and how to make it look like something else.
I did it.
I walked into that room, and I made it happen and I walked back out.
My only regret is, I hadn’t thought of it myself, hadn’t thought of doing it sooner.
And I’ve been carrying that truth alone ever since. Carrying it like a stone in my chest that gets heavier every year instead of lighter.
I’m sorry, Stephen.
For all of it.
For every lie. For every secret. For every wall I built between us. For every year I stole from you by not being honest about who I really was.
Most of all, I’m sorry that the woman you loved became someone capable of murder.
I wish I could tell you she didn’t. I wish I could tell you I’m still the woman you met all those years ago. The one who laughed easily and believed in second chances and thought people were basically good underneath everything.
But that woman died long before Titan did.
I just didn’t realize it until afterward. Until I looked down at my hands and understood what I’d become.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Popeye
The words blurred.
I read them again. Then again. My brain kept trying to make them say something different, something that made sense with what I’d believed for fucking years.
But that woman died long before Titan did.
Titan.
Titan Ward. President of the Silver Shadows’ Mother Chapter. Murdered in his bed alongside his old lady while they were sleeping.
For twelve years, twelve goddamn years, we’d believed it was a rival club. Some retaliation hit. Then last year we found out it was Steele and Stone. That they’d killed their father to take over the club.
But it wasn’t them.
I walked into that room, and I made it happen and I walked back out.
Christina killed him.
Not Steele. Not Stone. Not some rival club enforcer in the night.
Christina.
