Phoenix laid it out like I’d gone dense and it was his duty to educate me.
His dark edges set in a vicious glower.
Unease stirred.
“That bastard was dead for coming here, with or without Brinley in the mix.” I threw it out like a defense.
Phoenix cut a sharp shake of his head. “That’s bullshit, man, and you know it.”
“And what would you expect me to do?” I gritted beneath my breath, hoping to keep the words out of earshot of the rest of the Crows working the shop.
All of ustryingto keep up that front and obviously failing.
“You should have kept her locked in that room from the get-go and never let her come out.”
I scoffed. “She’s not a damned prisoner, Phoenix. She needs this.”
Phoenix blew back at the emphasis in my voice. He clearly heard what it contained. I could almost see the crop of hairs lifting at his nape, prickles of awareness crawling through his senses.
Intuition kicking in.
“Thought she was off-limits?” It was fully an accusation.
“She is.” I basically spat it. Guilt constraining. A boot smashing down on the back of my neck with the intent of snuffing the life out of me.
Phoenix chuckled an ominous sound, ruthlessness rippling around him in black waves. Pitch hair shoved back. His eyes that were just as dark were slit into daggers as he stared me down.
“You really gonna pretend like you aren’t dipping your dirty paws into our collateral?”
I was on my feet in a flash, refusal slashing out. “She’s not fucking collateral.”
With the way I said it, I might as well have been pleading guilty.
Phoenix took it as such, and a huff of air left him on a shot of condemnation. “Is that right?”
I turned away, trying to gather myself, roughing a hand down my face as I mumbled, “That’s right. She’s under our protection. Nothing less and nothing more.”
Visions flashed. Her mouth and my hands and the twisted greed that was chipping away at everything I was supposed to stand for.
He exhaled something heavy at my back. The sound packed with his loyalty to this club, which I clearly had a deficit of at this point.
I might have been president, but our mission was just as important to my crew as it was to me.
“She’s the one thing keeping that fuckwit under our thumb,” Phoenix gritted. “You really think he wouldn’t turn on us if she wasn’t here? If he didn’t know she was still breathin’ because we’re allowing her to remain that way?”
A surge of rage had me whirling back, in his face in a nanosecond.
“Allowing her to remain that way?” It was a snarl that erupted from my soul. “It doesn’t matter what that piece of shit does, no one will touch a hair on her head.”
Our heated conversation finally rippled through the other Crows in the shop, and Trevan, Colby, and Brody shifted our way to take in the animosity.
All patched-in members within earshot except for Brody, and Phoenix knew he was already on the inside.
Brody knew the score and the dirty deeds and was all too ready to partake in them.
Phoenix tossed a disbelieving chuckle out into the tension that distorted the air. “Seems to me someone already has.”
I turned away again, nearly fucking convulsing with the tumult that Brinley Webber had incited on my life.
