I fucking knew it.
I fucking knew she’d be poison and yet hearing that from him makes me wanna fucking scream.
I ignore the stabbing feeling in my chest.
King starts flipping through the papers and groans. “Fuck me, Tomi. You need to go wipe the security cams and all the records with her on them. Any association the club has had with her needs to be destroyed, and it needs to be fucking now.”
Rue scowls at them both and Speck looks like he’s going to pass the hell out but I lock my shit down tight. “Easy, it’ll be done in under an hour. Is she a fucking Serpent? Or a Demon?”
He pegs me with a glare. “Neither. She’s a fucking kid. A runaway from a shitty home situation. We’ve had an underage runaway taking her clothes off and shaking her titties in our fucking club.”
Fuck.
My stomach drops to the floor and, fuck me, I think I might be the one to pass out. “She showed ID to the girls at the club.”
Thorn scoffs. “It was fake. She only turned eighteen last week. She’s barely older than Poe and she’s been sleeping on the streets, stripping to feed herself, and saving her tips to try to have enough money to put a roof over her head someday. I got a phone call from Poe’s sister about her… personally. She picked up the phone and called me. That never fucking happens and it’s bad fucking news for the club that she did. I don’t care what the hell it takes, the club needs to fix this.”
It just gets worse and worse the more he talks.
Chapter Twenty Nine
Angel
It hurts to breathe.
It hurts to lie there doing nothing, it hurts to sit up and drink some water that Tomi left behind for me, it hurts when Cole arrives back with my bag and I have to get up to grab it from him. I try to avoid his eye but Axe is sitting there outside the door on watch looking like he’s had the shit beaten out of him too.
He gives me a nod and doesn’t move, his gun in his hand like he’s waiting for another Demon to show up so he can have a do-over.
I feel so fucking guilty but I’m clean, I’m safe, and I’m in Tomi’s bed again.
I manage to relax for about a minute before my phone rings. I frown down at The Boulevard’s number on the screen before picking it up.
It’s Diamond, the smugness fucking radiating down the line. “I just unlocked your locker for Cole, I hope that’s everything of yours because you’re fired.”
I swallow. “I was quitting anyway so no skin off my nose. Thanks for the courtesy call.”
She scoffs at me. “You better pray you don’t run into Tomi.”
My breath catches in my throat and I sit up in his bed as my eyes land on the door. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Her laughter is like shards of glass down the line. “An underage whore shaking her titties in his club? Sucking him off in full view of the security cameras? Shit, he’s ready to kill you with his bare hands. Cops catch wind of that with how bad they’re gunning for the MC? You’d better stay the fuck away from the club and the rest of the MC-owned businesses if you wanna make it out of this alive because they’re out for blood.”
I hang up before she can say another thing to me, panic climbing up my throat.
I think my heart is fucking breaking in my chest and this, this feeling is the reason I didn’t want to let anyone too close because I haven’t felt pain like this since Paul.
The good news is the beating I just took must have knocked some sense into me because I definitely don’t want to die anymore. I think dying at Tomi’s hands… fuck, my soul would never find rest that way. I’d always be tortured knowing he was the one to do it.
I need to leave.
Every inch of my body hurts but I get off of the bed and rummage around in my bag until I find my phone and I dial Poe’s number.
“Hey! I was just about to come fight Cole until he let me in to see you!”
My voice is all sorts of fucked up. “Poe, I’m in danger. I need to leave right now, can you just like… make sure Tomi doesn’t make it back to his room for the next five minutes?”
She gasps a little. “What danger? I’ll call my sister, hell or my brother again. What’s happened?”
“It’s—no, it’s fine. I just need to get a hotel for the night. Tomi’s… the club isn’t going to be happy with me. They know… they know I lied about… something and—Poe, I have to get out of this place before they kill me.”
She starts moving, the sounds of her shuffling around loud down the other end of the line. “Okay, we need to talk about this like now but I’ll distract him if you promise not to disappear. Where are you going?”
I swallow. “I’ll get a room for the night, in the next town over. I’ll call you once I’m there and we can talk about it. Please just do this, Poe. Please.”
I sound fucking desperate even to my own ears and she agrees, thank God. My ribs are screaming when I have to bend to pull some tights up my legs and the weight of my bag across my shoulders is like torture, pure fucking torture.
Thank fuck for the side door, thank fuck my truck is parked up close and no one even notices me creep over to it.
I get the Chevy started and out of the parking lot in no time at all, the weird noise gone completely thanks to Poe and I make it out of the suburbs and onto the highway before the tears start but they come in so fucking strong that I have to pull over, the sobs wracking my body like someone fucking died.
Oh.
Right.
The future I thought I might actually get to have just died.
The future I never let myself even hope for until Tomi stomped into my life and rearranged shit. All I ever wanted before was a quiet life, one where I lived alone and had friends but never let anyone close to me. I wanted a roof over my head that no one could take from me, a job, a boring life but now that just feels fucking… empty.
He’s fucking ruined it.
I drive for hours until I’m calm enough to stop at a hotel. I find one that looks safe and clean, very aware of the exact amount of money I’m now carrying and I can’t afford to sleep in my car right now.
I need some help.
I get set up there before I call Poe and tell her the whole story. I mean, not everything, but I tell her why I ran and then I swallow my pride and I ask for some goddamn help.
“Do you know anything about laundering money and offshore accounts?”
She hums down the line. “You met Lips right? Aves can do that shit easier than breathing, lemme get ahold of her. What are you gonna do with the money? If you need someplace to go I’ll call Lips back to get you.”
I clear my throat to shift some of the emotions choking me. “No, it’s—I’ve found a house in Coldstone. It’s a foreclosure on a good street, it’s where I want to live. I think… I think as long as the MC doesn’t know I live there, it’ll be okay.”
Poe grumbles under her breath. “The MC are fucking outlaws, they’re not gonna be fucking worried about you stripping a little younger than the law. I mean… they probably care but not like you’re thinking.”
Oh, the sunshine beam of a girl is back. I have to remind myself that she’s not as innocent as she seems. “I need to think about myself right now, Poe. I need to cover my own ass so I don’t get myself killed. I want to live in Coldstone because… I mean, it’s the first place that’s felt like home. The house isn’t anywhere near the usual Unseen haunts, I should be… safe there.”