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“They were going to kill me. I don’t know if they were supposed to, but they were going to. I’m sure Milo wouldn’t have cared, but he will care that I’m still alive and not under his control.” I pushed up to stand. Eagle stood beside me and suddenly the room was too small. I pushed past Blaze and into the middle of the room, breathing deeply, trying to clear my mind of the panic trying to seize me. The room was too small for all the people in there. It was a tiny studio type apartment and there were six people besides me milling about. “I need some space.” I opened the door and stood out in the hallway taking in big gulping breaths of air. Rose stepped into the hall with me but kept her distance. Like she knew how everything was crashing down on me.
“It’s OK, Nyla,” she said. “You’re safe here.”
“No. I’m not. Neither are any of you. If Milo finds out you’re hiding me, he’ll blow this place off the face of the earth.”
“You let them worry about that.” Rose said, emphatically. “Take some time to get your bearings. To rest in a safe place. You might find you like it here.”
“Rose…” Atlas gave his wife a shake of his head.
“Stop it, Atlas. If she needs our help, she should be able to stay. No matter what the rules say. You can’t turn her away. If Sting won’t let her stay, I’ll call my father. The Shadow Demons will gladly take her in.”
“We won’t turn her away, honey. But you can’t expect her to consider something like this without knowing the score.”
“Look,” I said, wringing my hands in spite of trying to get a grip on my emotions and not to show fear to these people. “I appreciate the help, but I’d never be able to live with myself if he hurt anyone in this place because of me.” I nodded to Rose’s belly. “He’d kill your unborn child without a qualm. Just cut it out of you and watch you bleed out while you watch the baby die.”
Atlas took a threatening step toward me, and I really didn’t blame him. I couldn’t stand my ground against the fury on his face either. “That’s enough!” he snapped. “There’s no reason to upset Rose. She’s on your side.”
“And I’m on hers,” I countered. Finally, I found my backbone. I was still intimidated to hell and back by these men, but I also knew the best way to get them out of this situation was for them to kick me out. “The very last thing I want on my conscience is the death of someone here. Especially Rose or her baby.”
“Nyla. Stop.” Eagle stepped into the hallway looking even more furious than Atlas. “You stay where the fuck you are.”
I shook my head. “No. I really appreciate you helping me when I needed it, but I’m going to return the favor and leave. You gave me a fighting chance. The rest is up to me now.”
“At least stay the night.” Another woman stepped forward. I thought I’d heard someone call her Iris. Sting’s woman. She arrived just as I’d come out of the bathroom. “Take a good soak in the tub, eat your fill, and sleep until you’re rested. You can’t run if you’re exhausted. You’ll make mistakes that could cost you your life.”
As much as I hated to admit it, she was right. I was tired. Filthy. Hungry. And I had no way to survive on my own.
“You know she’s right,” Eagle said, taking a step closer to me. I met his gaze with a hard one of my own. I was still shaking with fear, and dread sat like a lead weight in my stomach, but I was trying to take charge of my situation. “Twenty-four hours. Give us that. If we can’t find Milo or if it looks like things might get too hot to handle, I’ll help you leave.”
I narrowed my gaze at him. “That sounds suspiciously like a trap to me.”
Eagle grinned. Too bad it didn’t reach his eyes. He was dead serious. “No trap. Just telling you the conditions that need to be met for you to leave. If we haven’t found Milo in twenty-four hours, you can leave. If we find him and the threat is too much for us to handle, you can leave.”
“You sound far too confident for my liking. What do you know that I don’t?”
“He knows that Iron Tzars MC is home to the motherfucking tech guy.” A younger man with shaggy dark hair, with a bright green streak in it that fell across his forehead to cover one eye, approached us. He had a grin on his face and a tablet in his hand. “I’m Wylde, by the way. You Nyla?”
