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Losing her was my second worst fear. My very worst was Emmie losing me and not having anyone in her corner to look after her. That was almost unbearable to think about.
I sat down on one of the cots and beckoned for Emmie to sit with me.
“Come here,” I said.
When she joined me on the cot, I wrapped my arms around her and held onto her.
“We’re going to be just fine, okay?” I said. “I promise I’m going to do whatever it takes to get us out of here. Do you hear me? Whatever it takes.”
I meant every word I said. I would do anything for my daughter. I would die for her.
When I’d found out I was pregnant, I’d thought my world had crumbled all around me. But the moment I’d held her in my arms, I’d known the world was going to be a better place for me. I’d always believed we could figure it out, and we’d come this far. It was too soon for our story to be over. I’d only just had her in my life for a few short years, and I needed more—so much more—for any of this to be the end of the line.
No matter what it took, I would make sure we got out of here. Emmie was all I had, and I was all she had, and we owed it to each other to survive.
I owed it to her to keep her safe in this crazy world, and that was exactly what I was going to do.
No matter what it took.
9
WESLEY
On Wednesdays, I took the day off. I got sick of the club sometimes and spent my time away from people, hiding out in my penthouse suite like a hermit.
In a different life, with a different set of responsibilities, I might have been a complete loner, living somewhere in the mountains.
That wasn’t how my life had worked. I’d worked my way up after I’d come to the city, challenging one shifter after the next, becoming more and more powerful until I’d taken the position of alpha. There were only a few cases in which being a monster and knowing just how to find weaknesses had counted in my favor.
Most alphas were a bloodline thing, the mantle passed from father to son. Maybe my bloodline had alpha in it somewhere, but my dad hadn’t been an alpha. He’d been a fucking coward, leaving me behind with this curse as if I didn’t matter and going off to create a better life for himself. Without me.
I shoved the thoughts away. Why was I thinking about my dad so much lately?
I knew the answer to that question—technically, I was a father now. At least, I’d created a child. As I’d said to the fae who’d shared the news, afatherwasn’t someone who spread their seed and left, so I wasn’t a father, anyway.
Still, knowing I had a child out there had affected me in a way I’d never expected.
I hadn’t expected it to affect me at all.
I wore gray sweatpants and nothing else, standing at the full-length window in my private living room that looked out over the Las Vegas strip. The whole city lay at my feet.
Below me, guests from far and wide stayed in my hotel, coming and going as business and pleasure blew them around the globe to rest here for a while, but this hotel, this suite, was my home.
When I’d bought the hotel, it had been my first big investment. It was before I’d owned the club. The hotel had been my first business venture, and I hadn’t expected it to take off the way it had.
I loved living on top of the hotel. I was on top of the world in every way, not only the shifter world, but the investment world, the financial world, the world of pleasure and sin.
My phone rang. When I checked it, it was Cullen’s number on the screen.
I ignored it. It was my day off, and unless the club was burning to the ground or some shit equivalent to the world ending for me, I didn’t want to hear about business today.
My phone rang again, same number.
Damn it, couldn’t the guy get a hint? He was relatively high up, ranking just below Rune and Zen, and he could deal with whatever shit, or he could run to them if he couldn’t handle it himself. I had a power hierarchy in place for a reason.
The third time my phone rang with the same name flashing on the caller ID, I groaned.
“What?” I barked into the phone when I answered.
