Cold swamps my belly and I swallow the lump in my throat at his candid words. Clearly, I’m getting the VIP treatment, which means they don’t suspect me of anything yet. Good.

I watch him leave. These men are dangerous—even the doctor who is supposed to save lives has a fatalistic streak that scares me.

I wait a few minutes, then, with Whizz’s blessing, I open the bedroom door. I need to get the lay of the land, see how easy it will be for me to get out of here when the time comes. I expect to see brothers milling around, maybe a guard on my door—that’s what Isaac would have done—but the corridor is empty. The smell of stale smoke and something musky hangs in the air as I make my way down the corridor towards the stairs, retracing the steps Nox and I took earlier.

The clubhouse is quiet, which has fear dancing up my spine. It doesn’t strike me as a place that usually does silence.

I move down the stairs, a hand pressed to my bruised chest, but I encounter no one. Where the hell is everyone? I know Whizz is at least in the building somewhere, but surely everyone else didn’t clear out.

The front doors call to me like a siren, calling to an unsuspecting sailor. Just a few steps and I can be outside. Just a few steps and I can find my freedom.

“Lucy?”

I spin at my name and find myself coming face-to-face with Nox again. My heart rate quickens and I feel like a naughty kid caught where I shouldn’t be.

“I was just stretching my legs,” I quickly explain.

His brow draws together at my words. “You feeling okay?”

The concern makes my stomach fill with warmth. “Yeah,” I say softly. “Whizz just checked in on me. No traumatic brain injuries.”

I smile, but he doesn’t mirror my expression. Instead, his eyes roam over my face and I feel as if he could glimpse over my walls if I let my guard down for even a second.

“You hungry?” he surprises me by asking.

I’m not sure I am, but I nod anyway.

He leads me into a large dining area with a long table with chairs to seat at least thirty people, and into the kitchen. Everything is stainless steel, but it looks old, no longer shiny. There’s a double cooker that is definitely not new and a dishwasher that has seen better days. The space is clean, though. Whoever is in charge of their cleaning does a good job.

He drags open the fridge and gestures at it.

“Help yourself to whatever you want while you’re here. If you can’t find something you like, write it on the board,” he juts his chin at a white board on the wall, “and someone will pick it up for you.”

“You?”

He snorts. “I don’t shop.”

This doesn’t surprise me. He doesn’t strike me as a man who does something as mundane as picking up groceries.

He steps aside and I peer in the fridge, feeling like a thief. I pull out a yogurt and some grapes. These guys don’t strike me as healthy eaters, but the salad crisper is surprisingly full of greens. Then again, I suppose they have to keep these bodies somehow. There’s no doubt Nox is built beneath his kutte. His tee clings to the contours of his body, showing the peaks and valleys of his pectorals.

“So, um, what happened to my car?”

“It’s in the club’s garage. Hector will take a look at it, see if he can fix it up, but it was pretty fucked up.”

Disappointment floods me. How am I supposed to escape without a vehicle? At the time, my sole focus had been on finding safety. Maybe I should have been a little more careful. First thing to do is sort out new wheels.

“Sorry about the damage I caused.”

He waves a hand. “It’s just stuff. It can be replaced.”

He steps into my space, and I back up until my spine is against the counter. I peer up at him, my mouth drying out as he dips his head closer, and for a moment, I think he might kiss me. My stomach flip-flops at the thought and not in an unpleasant way, but his mouth doesn’t descend. Instead, his tattooed arms come either side of the counter, pinning me in. My breath catches in my throat at the molten look in his eyes.

I shouldn’t encourage it, but it’s been a long time since I had anyone other than Sasha care about me. I can’t help but want this a little, even if I try to deny it.

“You can’t look at me like that,” I breathe out.

“Like what?”

“Like you want more.”

He cocks his head to the side. “I can’t help wanting to taste your sweet mouth, Lucy.”

He tucks a piece of hair behind my ear and I can’t stop from leaning into his hand as he does. My mind wanders, wondering what he’d feel like under me, on top of me, his veiny arms holding me down. Heat pools in my belly at the thought, and it scares the shit out of me.

Needing to get out of his space so I can think clearly, I duck under his arms and grab my food, holding it to my chest like a shield. He lets me go, turning to follow my movements. The man is sinfully sexy, but I can’t be thinking about him like this. I mutter something about needing to lie down, and make my escape.

Getting close to Nox isn’t an option, but the more time I spend with him, the more I think that might be out of my control.

I’m in trouble.

6

Nox

“Any news?” Rav demands.

He’s sitting at the head of the table, drumming his fingers off the wood. The way he’s slouched in his seat suggests he’s relaxed, but I can see the tension in the tight set of his shoulders and the narrowing of his eyes. The beasts that live inside him can only be tamed by two people, Sasha and Lily-May.

Lately, I feel like my own monsters have been too close to the surface. It’s been four days since Lucy crashed into the gates of the clubhouse and dropped the bombshell that someone tried to kill her. My anger over that hasn’t disappeared yet. It seems to grow every time I remember the gash on her head, remember the blood that covered her, remember the way she sobbed against me.

It’s also been four days since I thought about taking her mouth in the clubhouse’s kitchen.

The only thing that stopped me was the fact that a few hours earlier I had to shower her because she was so out of it. It didn’t feel right taking things further when her emotions were so fucked up, but fuck if my mouth didn’t water every time I looked at those pouty lips of hers.

“Hank came up clean,” Titch says, scratching at his jaw. There isn’t a hint of scruff on it and I wonder how much the guy must shave to keep it that way. It makes him look younger than his thirty years.

“Keep digging,” I order.

Church isn’t going the way I expected. I thought we’d have a lead on the boss. That hasn’t happened. How the hell did Hank come up clean? That guy has to have dirt in his life. You don’t get murdered for nothing.

Maybe we need to go deeper to get to the crux of what this arsehole is involved in. It’s probably a good thing he’s dead, because I want to kill him myself for dragging Lucy into his shit, and I wouldn’t have made it quick either. When I think about how close she came to having her brains blown out it makes my stomach roll.

Titch scowls. “What fucking difference is going deeper going to make? There ain’t shit there to find.”