Cypher finally pulls a laptop from a bag. Butcher pulls a screen down from the ceiling, and the security feeds fill the room in a grid of flickering gray and green. I stand up, moving to the screen with mechanical precision. For the next thirty minutes, I am the teacher and they are the students. I point out every vulnerability. I show them the pockets of shadows I made into a home inside and outside their perimeter. I show them how theirimpenetrablefortress has doors I’ve been walking through for weeks.
I turn to Pope, letting my gaze shift between him and Tomcat before I point to the most critical section of the feed. “You really need to do something about this area here,” I say, my voice steady. “Because the other night, I wasn't the only stalker Tomcat had.”
Boom.
I skip back to my seat, theIf You’re Happy and You Know Itmelody dancing off my lips.
“Why the hell are you just now informing us?” Pope asks, his voice cracking like a whip.
I tilt my head, one corner of my mouth twitching up in a hollow imitation of a grin. “Would you believe me without proof?”
Please say yes. Please tell me I’m still one of you.
“Yes.”
If it weren’t for the slight, jagged hesitation before Pope said it, I might have actually believed him. I raise a brow, my expression a mask of mocking skepticism. “Really? Just trusted me without hesitation? No questions asked?”
Pope holds my gaze, but he doesn't say another word. His silence says everything.
That’s… just unfortunate.
”Don’t worry. I have proof. The picture is at home. Tomcat can bring it to you.” My fingers drum an unsteady, frantic rhythm against the polished wood of the chapel table. I scan the faces sitting around me. These are men I’ve joked with, fed, and considered my big brothers. “You know, if I really were just seeking attention, there are much easier ways to get it. I thought you all were smarter than that. I thought you knew me.” I stand up, my hands hitting my hips. My mask slips, replaced by cold, sharp-edged disappointment. “If you’d have let me tell my truth before painting me in such an ugly light, you might have had a chance to show me your intelligence was bigger than your dicksize.” I heave a dramatic sigh and shake my head. “Alas, you’re leaving a woman disappointed again.”
A few of the men start to protest, their voices rising in a rumble of defensive anger, but I wag my finger at them like they’re misbehaving toddlers. “Bad boys. It’s rude to interrupt a lady when she’s speaking.”
Unable to sit still, I pace the perimeter of the room, the walls of the chapel feeling like they’re closing in. I close my eyes for a second, finding that thin, silver line in my mind that separates my current consciousness from the vault of my memories. It’ll be easier to get through this if I just pretend I’m telling a story.
Because that’s what it is, right? Just a story.
A story of a woman who survived hell.
Granted, that woman has some damage that can’t be seen. She’s probably a little…brokenin the head. But she’s alive. She’s here.
And she’s just me. Goldie to some. Sunshine to others. Little shadow to Tomcat.
My voice sounds distant to my own ears, hollow and empty, like a recording played in an abandoned house. If I can hear the vacancy in my words, I know they don't miss it. I see the shift in their eyes as the story unfolds. The suspicion starts to melt, replaced by a heavy, leaden regret. They’re finally seeing the monster I’ve been running from. My shoulders fall as I reach the final, bloody chapter. The room is so quiet I can hear the hum of the laptop fan.
Stopping behind Tomcat’s chair, I lean down to press a soft kiss to his cheek. He’s tense, a coiled spring of protective fury, but I can feel his heart breaking right along with mine.
“I love you for wanting to keep your promise, Tomcat,” I whisper, my voice barely a ghost of a sound. “But we both have to be realistic. You can’t control what someone else does. This club… it’s your family. They’ve just proven it’s not mine.”
I don't wait for Pope to apologize or for the brothers to beg me to stay. I turn on my heel and walk out of the chapel, my chin held high and my spine straight.
I keep that posture all the way through the clubhouse, even as it feels like my chest is caving in, the vacuum of losing my family all over again threatening to swallow me whole.
Chapter Sixteen
"Thefuckiswrongwith all of you?"
Rage simmers inside, quiet but sharper, poised like a blade, more dangerous than a scream.
It burns through me like a scorched-earth inferno, demanding justice for the haunted look in Marigold’s eyes as she left. Each breath stokes a beast inside me, straining against its leash. I've felt this before, just never aimed at my brothers. The fact that one woman, with her wild, unpredictable energy, can drag this fury out of me and aim it at the men I’d lay down my life for should probably terrify me more than it does.
“I was the one being stalked by her,” I say, my voice dropping into a dangerous, vibrating register. “If anyone gets to be shitty about it, it’s me. But the only thing she actually did to anyone in this room was prove that our clubhouse is fucking vulnerable. We should be thanking her for showing us where the holes are before someone with real malice walks through them.” I lean over the table, my knuckles white as I stare them down, one byone. “Marigold has been loyal as hell to this club since day one. She took a bullet for us. We trusted her enough to hand her one of our businesses and let her run it as if it were hers. What more does she have to do? What more do we need from her before she counts? To prove she’s family?” I shake my head, letting my gaze linger on the men I’ve called brothers for years. “It’s disappointing that you jumped to conclusions. That’s not what we do. We wait for the facts. Facts that you would have had if you’d shut your mouths and let her speak. I believe her about the stalker. Why the hell can’t you?”
“You sure you’re just not blinded by her pussy, brother? Because she’s not been honest with us,” Pope defends.
I ignore the first part because I don't feel like putting my President through a wall today and address the lie instead. “About what? She’s been truthful about her name. It’s not on her if Cypher’s search didn't dig deep enough.”
