not wanting to cry in front of everyone.
“Come on. Let’s go lie down for a little bit. Saint and Bates can fill the others in on what’s happened.”
I try to protest, knowing his men need him. Priest shakes his head, anticipating what I was about to say.
“You need me more than they do right now, so that’s where I’ll be.”
I don’t argue with him. When he picks me up, I wrap my legs around his hips, my arms around his neck, and hold on tight.
We don’t stop to talk to anyone. Priest heads straight for my room, where he lays us both on the bed fully clothed.
“Talk to me, Trouble. Tell me what’s going on inside that head of yours.”
“When is this going to stop, Priest? When will it be enough?” I ask him, but we both know the answer to that. It will only stop when whoever is doing this gets me in their clutches.
“None of this is your fault, Reign. I know you feel guilty, but none of this is on you. It’s all on that sick fuck. I get it, I feel guilty too. I’m supposed to be this mighty president and yet my old lady lives in terror because I can’t find and catch this guy.”
“It’s not your job to catch him, Priest,” I whisper, rolling so I’m half over his body, looking down into his troubled eyes.
“And it’s not your job to offer yourself up as a sacrificial lamb in hopes of saving the others. Don’t think I haven’t seen that look in your eyes. If you give up now, he wins. All those lives lost, will have been in vain, and what about what losing you would do everyone you’d leave behind. Think about Carnage, your brothers, your Dad. I know it would kill me as surely as a bullet, if I lost you now.” I sigh and lay my head over his heart, listening to the rhythmic beat, using it to keep me grounded when all I want to do is wail like a banshee at the injustice of it all.
“We won’t let him win, but you have to keep fighting, so I don’t want to hear any more of this white flag bullshit, okay?”
I nod, breathing him in. “How do you always manage to talk me down from the ledge?” I ask softly.
“Hey, I have skills outside of the bedroom, you know?” he teases, smoothing my hair back from my face as he reverses our positions and leans down over me.
“I’m sorry about before. I was a dick the night of the party. I have no excuse—”
I cut him off. “I know about the baby. Bates told me. You’re right. You were a dick, but I get it. It was at the situation, not me. I was just an easy target.”
“It was still a dick move. I’ll try to keep that in check in the future.”
His eyes rove over my face, one of his rough hands cupping my jaw. “About the baby…”
“I’m not entirely convinced she’s pregnant, or if she is, that it’s truly Bates’s baby. It feels a little convenient, like a last-ditch stunt from a desperate woman. But if it turns out she is, and the baby is Bates’s kid, then I’ll love it as much as I love his or her daddy, as much as I love all my guys,’’ I answer softly.
He presses his forehead against mine before taking a deep, relieved breath.
“Fuck, I’m so glad you feel this shit too. I thought I was losing my mind.”
“Nah, not your mind, just your heart.” I smile.
“Take it. It’s all yours, baby. I have something else to give you too,” he says with a smirk on his face.
I feel his cock hardening against me, giving me a fair indication of what else he wants to give me.
“Is that right?” I purr, reaching down between us just as a fist thunders at the door.
“The police are here with a warrant,” a voice yells. Priest and I freeze for a second before scrambling off the bed.
Chapter Forty
Reign
We head downstairs at a fast clip, the place already in chaos as the police tear the clubhouse apart. I watch on helplessly as the cops swarm the bar, pointing their guns at all the club members, ordering them to get on their knees with their arms behind their heads.
The guys move ahead of me but quickly find themselves pinned to the floor by a swarm of cops.
“Where is Reign Foster?” one of them asks.
I