“Doesn’t take away from the fact she’s carrying his kid,” Keys grated out. “He ain’t going to let the kid just leave.”
Kenzie’s face crumpled, and though I wanted to call Keys out on talking like that when she was here, the truth was, Kenzie was in this up to her eyeballs and needed to be here to hear the shit that was going to have to go down to get her out of this mess.
I sounded like a bastard, I knew. But she should never have run off. Sure, I got the fact that some kids hated the life. They didn’t want the MC to tarnish their adulthood because not everyone had a good experience within the club as kids. But to run to another MC? One where your brother and father couldn’t protect you? That was the height of idiocy, and it surprised me because I’d never have considered Kenzie as being stupid.
“Maybe he will, maybe he won’t.” Lucifer rubbed his chin. “Ain’t like Hex is paternal. He’s a bastard, sure. Might take an interest just to be petty. But for the moment, getting her out of here is all I got. And what I got is more than you’d usually be getting…”
It went unsaid that he was only helping because Ama had twisted his arm. To be honest, I was astonished she’d managed that much. Although, maybe I shouldn’t be. Considering she had a way about her, some wiles that couldn’t be ignored and that usually had Keys and I doing whatever she wanted—within reason, of course—it figured that she’d be the one to save Kenzie.
Even though I knew, point blank, Kenzie had been a bitch to her back in the day.
Kenzie was a bitch, period, but it seemed like that had changed.
At least, for the moment.
She was too scared to be a bitch. Too terrified.
Fuck, that bastard Hex needed to be made to pay.
“What about Hex?” I rasped. “He shouldn’t be allowed to get away with shit like this. He’s just going to do it again.”
Lucifer cut me a look. “Don’t start preaching at me.”
“I ain’t preaching,” I growled back, hackles rising, and only common sense stopped me from surging forward and headfirst into a fight.
This was Lucifer.
Sure, he was older than me, a hell of a lot older than me, but he’d done shit that was legend in our world.
The bastard had left prison and, from inside that world, had somehow made the contacts and allegiances that had helped him rise to Prez once he was out.
Everyone knew what that meant.
He’d killed on the inside.
Without getting caught.
And one murder would get you some good vibes from your brothers. Some fist bumps and ‘well dones’ on the outside. But the rise to Prez? Only Lucifer himself knew how many souls he’d had to take to get to where he was today.
So, old or not, I was still only twenty-fucking-four with a relatively blank slate. Well, in comparison to the Prez. I wasn’t exactly sunshine and roses. If anything, my soul was painted a concrete gray, but that would only be absorbed by the sheer pitch of Lucifer’s black.
“If he carries on, if he makes a nuisance of himself, then he’ll be dealt with.”
I nodded, but persevered—I had to. Sometimes a rabid dog just needed to be put down. “You know he’ll do it again, don’t you?”
The Prez’s mouth tightened. “I do. That’s how those fuckers work. Once ain’t enough.” He got to his feet with a lithe grace that belied his age, then headed for the door. “Be ready to roll out at seven-thirty. My guys will head out at six so there’ll be enough distance between us for safety.”
Without another look back at any of us, and without another word, he left, leaving us staring after him.
“Kenzie? You know you need to go back to him tonight, don’t you?” I rasped, and fuck, I felt like the evilest piece of shit in the world when she turned terror-stricken eyes my way.
“I’ll go with her. He can’t say shit when I’m her brother,” Keys rasped. “Where you living?”
“On the compound,” Kenzie whispered miserably. “We got our own apartment. It’s small, but there’s a separate living room. You can sleep on the sofa.”
“Will it piss him off?”
“Most things do,” Kenzie replied. “But if we’re lucky, he won’t even come back. Sometimes, at these parties, he doesn’t.”
I nodded, knowing exactly what the fucker was doing while his pregnant old lady clung to the