he caught me up in his arms, cradling the back of my head and holding me up with an arm under my ass. He smelled like home, spicy smoke and leather. I dragged deep lungfuls of his fragrance into my chest and focused on not breaking down.
“What the fuck happened?” he barked, already carrying me into the clubhouse.
Loulou met us at the door with a blanket and tucked it around my shoulders when Nova sat us both in the first couch by the door. I thanked her with a shaky smile and accepted her kiss on my crown.
Then, I told the collected brothers what happened, feeling Nova get tenser than an uncomfortable plastic chair beneath me.
When I was done, Zeus immediately stood up and growled, “Meetin’, church, fuckin’ now. Get the brothers back I sent off already. Fuckin’ fuck, this ends now. If we gotta storm that fuckin’ production lot, we will.”
There was a collective grumble and grunt of assent. Most of the men shot me sweet little smiles as they followed orders and moved toward their sacred meeting room at the left side of the clubhouse, but Zeus himself stalked toward me and crouched his huge frame at my feet.
His face was filled with so much fury, it was hard not to feel frightened when one of his big, scared hands reached out to gently touch my face.
“We got you,” he told me quietly. “We’re gonna handle this now, yeah? You did good, Li, gettin’ that info for Curtains. But we can take shit from ’ere on out. You never shoulda been involved. Fuckin’ regret sanctionin’ this shit…I was in a bad place with King’s passin’, but fuck, that’s no excuse.”
I put my hand over his on my cheek and mustered a genuine smile for him. “It’s the best excuse and probably the only one that would have allowed you to let me do this. I would’ve anyway, Z, but I’m glad I didn’t have to do it behind your back.”
His smile was soft, blurred at the edges with sadness. “Brave girl, ya got, Nova.”
“Don’t I know it,” he responded woodenly. “Meetcha in there in a minute, boss man.”
There was something in his voice, something toxic, that Z seemed to notice, too, because he looked over my shoulder at his brother for a long moment before he sighed loudly, clapped my thigh, and left for church.
“Lou, give us a second, will ya?” Nova asked.
Loulou bit her lip as she looked between us, pity in her expression when it lingered on me.
And I knew.
Just as Z and Lou had.
Nova wasn’t just freaking out. He was breaking, tearing off the piece of me he harboured in his chest, readying to give it back to me.
I didn’t notice Lou leaving, but I didn’t have to because Nova spoke as soon as she did.
“This ends now,” he intoned like some automated speaker at the end of a 1-800 number.
I twisted to look at him then, struggling to stay on his lap when he firmly settled me at his side.
“What does?” I demanded even though I knew.
“You workin’ for Irina,” he began, stopping to take a few deep breaths. “You puttin’ yourself at risk for this club. You nearly getting’ fuckin’ abducted ’cause of me.”
“It wasn’t because of you,” I retorted sharply, wanting to slap him. “It was because there are some crazy ass people in the world, and some of them happen to want to take down this club.”
“This club you think you have to protect ’cause of me,” he bit off each word and spat it out with contempt, his face a gorgeous mask of indifference.
The mask he always tried to hide behind.
“You think you’d be willin’ to do what you’re doin’ if I wasn’t around?” he argued before I could reply. “You wouldn’t even know these people if it wasn’t for me. I’m the one brought you around here thinkin’ it’d be good you had family, not carin’ what kinda family I bought you.”
“You bought me the best family there is,” I cried out, shedding the blanket because suddenly I was hot with anger, the fabric like needles against my flesh.
“They got Mute killed, King killed, Z in jail so he missed the first months of his babies bein’ alive,” he said flatly.
“The club did shit all to buy that! The Fallen gave Mute and Ares a home like they gave me. They made King into the kinda guy who’d take a bullet to save his family, and they gave Zeus