Chapter 132
-Hailey-
My hands got clammier with every second that ticked by. Still no response from Anatoly.
Logan had turned back toward Ledger, leaving me alone with my coffee. And my anxiety.
Their conversation was all tech talk, about signal strength and encrypted channels. Jamming and dead zones. Ledger’s eyes kept flicking to me, with a question in them. Why was I here?
I wanted to ask the same thing.
Talon stepped out of his office and pretty much filled the doorway. His gaze swept over the main room like he was cataloging his men, Viktor’s imported muscle, the few women at the bar. Then his eyes landed on Logan and he jerked his chin. “Logan. In here. Now.”
Logan nodded, and then his hand was on my lower back, urging me along with him. I dug my heels in.
*He didn’t mean me,” I whispered.
“Too fuckin bad,” Logan muttered, his tone leaving no room for further argument. “You’re not leavin‘ my sight.”
The office was starting to feel like a second home. Talon was behind the desk. Viktor stood by the window. Logan steered me to a chair in the corner before taking up a post leaning against the wall next to it. Ledger trailed in behind us with his laptop.
Talon didn’t acknowledge my presence. His attention was on the map of Riverstone spread across his desk, weighted down with a glass ashtray and a pistol.
“Viktor’s men identified three viable infiltration routes we missed. All low–traffic, all with blind spots we were too arrogant to consider.” His voice was a low, displeased rumble.
“The perimeter’s sealed now,” Logan said defensively.
“The fox has already been in and out of the hen house, son,” Talon shot back, finally lifting his eyes. “We’re still playing catch–up, and I don’t like the view from behind.” His eyes flicked to me before landing back on Logan. “You sure you want her here for this?”
Logan didn’t look down at me. He nodded once. “Doesn’t matter anymore. Can’t put her in a cage, and I can’t trust anyone else to keep her out of trouble.”
Viktor turned away from the window, wholly ignoring me and putting the conversation back on track. “The problem is not the perimeter. It is the assumption that the perimeter will keep him out. And the question is not how to keep him out. It is how to find the needle in the haystack you are now trapped inside of.”
His accent made my skin prickle. Trapped. That’s exactly what we were. The clubhouse wasn’t a fortress.. it was a prison. And Anatoly was the warden.
Ledger cleared his throat. “I’ve successfully integrated Viktor’s tech with ours. We’ve got full coverage now, zero blind spots. If a moth lands anywhere on the property, we’ll know about it. But I’d be willing to bet he’s not coming back. The taunt was placed. The point was made. He’s moving on to phase two.”
“Which is?” Talon asked.
“Destabilization,” Viktor answered before Ledger could. “Isolate. Divide. Demoralize. Then strike at the heart when it exposes itself.” His cold eyes landed on me for a brief second, finally acknowledging my presence. A shiver ran through me
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Chapter 132
He knew. They all knew the heart he was talking about.
The meeting shifted into a blur of logistics that was somehow more unsettling than talk of violence.
55 Vouchers.
Then they discussed the compound outside town as a potential fallback, but Talon vetoed it. “I said no. Too predictable. Too isolated. If he traps us out there, we’re fucked. We stand our ground here.”
I just sat in my little corner, picking at a hangnail, and listened. This was the machinery of war. Humming along right in front of me, with Logan as one of its main gears.
He argued points with his father. His voice lost its rough edge and took on a sharp, strategic precision.
He was calculating angles. Anticipating moves. Seeing him like this, in his element, was like seeing a completely different person. He was more than a brawler. The blunt instrument had a brain, and it was terrifyingly focused.
After an hour, Talon dismissed us. Logan’s hand was on my back again, guiding me out. But we didn’t go back to the main room. He steered me toward the chapel.
I hesitated at the doorway. This was different. This room was sacred in a way the office wasn’t. It was for brothers. Period.
The long table was surrounded by the inner circle seconds behind us.
–
faces I knew, but some names I didn’t. Talon and Ledger came in a few
Logan pulled out a chair for me. His chair. Every face at the table was staring at me. River’s eyebrows shot up. Talon’s jaw flexed but he didn’t say anything.
Logan stood behind me with his hands resting on my shoulders.
It felt like a statement. *She stays.*
The conversation here was entirely different. The clinical planning was gone. It was all loud, grim wrath.
“I want eyes on every Russian piece of shit in a three–state radius,” Talon said gruffly. “I don’t care if they’re selling piroshkis or pushing heroin. I want to know their patterns.”
“That’s gonna step on a lot of toes, Boss,” an older member with a scar through his lip grunted.
“Fuck ‘em,” Logan snarled from behind me, and the venom in his voice made me jump. “They wanna complain, they can take it up with me. We’re not comin‘ for anyone but Anatoly.”
Anatoly. It was spoken like a curse. Every time someone said it, Logan’s fingers would tighten around my shoulders. I could picture the fire in his eyes. The promise of absolute violence.
This was the man from my nightmare. The one who would burn the world to ash to save me. And he’d get his throat sliced open as a result.
The mental image flashed through my head, and I swallowed hard.
A sickening thought wormed its way in after it. If Logan knew about the text I’d sent… if he knew about the camera watching us last night… then this calculated rage would turn into an uncontrolled inferno.
He’d become exactly what Anatoly was counting on. Predictable. Reckless.
The meeting broke up with a plan that sounded like a declaration of extermination. I didn’t have much faith in it.
As everyone filed out, Logan slumped into the empty chair next to me, rubbing a hand over his face. He looked exhausted down to his bones.
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G G
I reached out, tentatively, and put my hand over his on the table. He flinched, then turned his hand over to lace his fingers through mine. His grip was almost painfully tight.
“It’ll be okay,” I murmured.
He didn’t look at me. He was staring at the gavel at the head of the table, “We’re gonna end this,” he said. It was a vow.
No. I was going to end this. I nodded.
He stood up, pulling me with him. “C’mon. You need to eat something.”
We went back to the bar. Trina brought me a fresh coffee and a sandwich I knew I wouldn’t be able to eat.
Logan stood close, acting as a barrier between me and the rest of the room. But his attention was fractured. He was listening to three different conversations. His eyes were constantly scanning. Assessing.
I nibbled at the sandwich to appease him, but my appetite had been murdered by the grim reality of the last few hours.
I slid my hand into my pocket and touched my cold, silent, useless brick of a phone. The wait was its own kind of torture.
I took another tiny bite of sandwich.
And I almost choked on it when my pocket started buzzing.
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