brotherhood notice me. Their faces morphed from hatred to full fucking rage. Confirmation that the heir now belonged to Hades.
“Fucking betrayer!” Uncle Landry shouted. Some of the other Klan echoed his slight. But there was only one person out of these fuckers I’d ever given a shit about. When I found Beau, he was glaring at me, arms over his wide chest. And when my eyes fixed on his, his lip lifted in disgust and he spat on the ground at his feet.
And that was it. Proof that my brother hated me too. And I was just gonna have to be okay with that fact.
“Keep strong, brother,” Tank said under his breath. “Those fuckers ain’t your family no more.” I breathed deeply and let his words sink in. He was right. They weren’t my family. He was. Beauty was. These brothers were my fucking family . . . and that was my woman in the truck. My bitch who these cunts were trying to take away.
Movement caught my eye and led me to Diego. The minute I saw him, my veins flooded with the need to kill. To tear him apart limb from limb for even touching one hair on Adelita’s head. For having the audacity to believe that he was good enough for her. That he would ever be her motherfucking husband.
“I’d heard the rumors,” Diego said, addressing me and completely ignoring Styx and Ky, who were leading the Hangmen. Diego walked toward us. My brothers clicked the safeties off their guns. “I’d heard the great White Prince of the Ku Klux Klan had abdicated and fled to the enemy.” His head cocked to the side, and I wanted to knock his teeth from his fucking mouth.
“Give us the kids, prick. And cut the fucking theatrics,” Ky drawled and folded his arms, waiting for Diego to speak.
Diego, even to this exchange, was wearing an expensive black suit and tie. His brown eyes went ice cold. “I want to see her first.” He pointed to the van Landry guarded. “Only then will the exchange take place.”
Styx eventually looked back at me and nodded. I passed by Smiler, who was watching that van like a hawk. Slash was in there. This all had to go to plan. I approached the truck and saw Adelita sit up straight. I opened the passenger-side door. “You ready, baby?”
Adelita climbed from the truck. I led her through the Hangmen. I held my hand back. Adelita slipped her hand in mine and fucking squeezed it tight. As we broke through the final few brothers, we stood beside Styx and Ky. Adelita released my hand and walked forward toward Diego.
I saw fire light in Diego’s eyes on seeing Adelita . . . until he saw what she was wearing. Then that fire lit into a fucking inferno. The cartel princess stood in biker bitch clothes. “Adelita . . .” Diego said, softly.
“Diego.” No one would ever know my bitch was scared. She stood like a fucking warrior queen, staring down her ex-fiancé.
“You’ve seen her,” Ky said. “Now show us our prospects.”
Diego nodded, but he was wearing a sadistic kind of smile. I braced myself, wondering what the fuck it was for, when Landry opened the van. I couldn’t see inside. Then a Klansman came out of the dark cabin, pulling a beaten woman with blond hair to the ground.
At first I didn’t know what the fuck was happening, who the hell she was, until Adelita whispered, “No . . .” The woman lifted her swollen eyes at the sound of Adelita’s voice, and a pained sound ripped from her throat. “No!” Adelita cried again, and this time tried to run toward the woman. The beaten bitch had a rope around her throat, the binds rubbing her skin raw. I grabbed Adelita before she could gain any ground. “Charley!” she cried, and my head snapped to the woman. Charley . . . Adelita’s best friend. The bitch from California.
“I thought I’d better bring some insurance,” Diego said coldly.
Adelita shook in my arms. “My father will kill you when he finds out you have taken her.”
Diego’s head tipped to the side. “Cari?o . . . it was his idea.”
Adelita froze. She gasped. But she didn’t argue back. After what she had discovered about her father, I figured she believed he was capable of anything.
“The prospects, cuntface,” Ky growled. “I’m getting real tired of your bullshit.”
Without taking his suspicious eyes off me and Adelita, he signaled with the click of