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I do it. I take another breath, then another, until it feels like some of his calm steadiness transfers to me.
It helps.
I still feel like I’m going to break, but maybe not right this second. I already knew we weren’t here tonight for Chloe, so I just have to remember that this is a win. At least I’ve seen her. At least I know she’s… well, I can’t say she’s all right. Not after seeing the hopeless emptiness in her eyes while she danced.
But I’ll make her all right.
I’ll fix this.
I force my muscles to relax, giving Maddoc a nod so he knows I’ve got my shit together. His eyes search my face with a look that I’d almost call soft if that was a word that would ever actually apply to this man.
Once he’s satisfied with what he sees, he jerks his chin toward the back of the club. We start moving again, and Dante crowds up behind me as we make our way to the private area there that overlooks the floor.
Logan is already waiting at a roped off area when we reach the back of the club, his eyes as cool and unreadable as always as he watches us approach. He steps aside when we get there, and Maddoc tells the bouncers that they’re here to talk to Austin.
My chest starts to tighten up as they move the rope aside and let us in. Austin McKenna is lounging on a plush leather couch, his legs kicked out in front of him like he’s fucking royalty. There’s a curvy brunette tucked under one of his arms and half a dozen men positioned around him, but neither Maddoc, Logan, nor Dante look the slightest bit intimidated by his bodyguards.
“Maddoc,” Austin says, greeting us with a smirk. “Treating your seconds to a night out?”
Maddoc answers with some comment about how they’ve got better taste than to come to this club for enjoyment, but between the loud music and the way my pulse is pounding in my ears, I don’t even try to follow their posturing.
The girl sitting with Austin is watching Maddoc with a calculating gleam in her eye, while Austin himself assesses each of the three men with barely concealed hatred. His gaze flicks over me too, but he immediately dismisses me.
I grit my teeth. I can’t tell if he recognizes me or not, and even though I know I’m a thousand times safer if he doesn’t, the idea that he cares so little about what he’s taken from me that he’s already forgotten who I am infuriates me.
“So if you didn’t come to enjoy the club, then what the hell are you doing on my turf?” Austin finally asks as he casually picks up a drink and sips at it, raising his eyebrows in an invitation to the Reapers to get on with it.
I fucking hate him. Seeing him look so relaxed and casual while he’s got my sister dancing practically naked on a pedestal makes me want to rip his eyes out with my bare hands.
I curl my fingers into fists, my nails biting into my palms.
“We know what you’ve been doing, McKenna,” Logan says in a flat tone.
“Enjoying myself?” Austin says with a shark-like smile, draping his arm over the back of the couch, behind the brunette. “I am, thank you.”
“You really want things to get ugly?” Dante asks, his demeanor just as casual and charming as Austin’s, but somehow coming across as twice as deadly. Then he jerks his chin toward the girl. “Uglier than they already are, I mean.”
“Fuck you, Dante,” she spits out.
Austin pulls her back. “Don’t worry, Sienna,” he all but purrs. “I’ve got this.”
“We’re offering you one chance to back off before we escalate things,” Maddoc says, coldly ignoring the exchange between Dante and the girl.
Austin relaxes back against the couch as he banters back and forth with the Reapers, as if they’re not talking about wreaking havoc on this corner of the city. About the possibility of a bloody, violent gang war that will no doubt spill out onto the streets and leave chaos in its wake.
I don’t care. I really didn’t think I could hate Austin McKenna more than I already did, but I can’t even be curious about whatever history there obviously is between all of them. Not when my sister is less than fifty feet away, on display for the club’s patrons like she’s nothing more than a cheap accessory Austin picked up.
Worse, she saw me too.
She knows I’m just… leaving her there.
As the conversation between the men goes on, I can’t help glancing over in her direction. I can just make out the pedestal she’s on from where we’re sitting, and my gaze finds her just as one of the men in the crowd reaches up, snagging her ankle and trying to pull her closer so he can grope her.
The shithead makes her fall on her ass, and something inside me snaps at the sight.
My pulse skyrockets, hot fury blooming inside me like a bomb exploding. I’m past the bouncers and on the other side of the rope before I even realize I’ve moved.
I don’t care that the tension between the Reapers and West Point is already balancing on a razor’s edge. I don’t care how my actions could fuck up whatever Maddoc is hoping to achieve here tonight. I only care about protecting Chloe, and I charge the motherfucker who still has his hands on her—who’slaughingabout it—and attack him like a fucking banshee.
