“You’re good, pretty mama?”
She nods. Then she sniffles.
God—not okay. Of course, she’s not okay. I don’t know specifics on why she thought she was in trouble earlier, but if it has anything to do with why Delta is here, I’m going to shred whoever scared her.
Stroking her hair, I drop my chin to the top of her head and eye the guys. “We’re good. Thanks.”
Ryder angles his head toward where the team disappeared. “Brock’s gonna want to talk to her.”
I nod. “Later.”
Emma pulls back and turns to both men, smiling weakly. “Thank you for… that.”
Javier nods, gives her a fist bump to the shoulder, and walks away.
Ryder crosses his arms over his chest. “Shitty circumstances, darlin’, but we were serious. Nice to meet you.”
“Thanks.” She relaxes against me again, but her fingers touch the side of my face, where I’m sure a bruise or two is forming. “That fight sounded like it hurt.”
My lip pulls into a half grin, and I laugh quietly. “Didn’t think about it, I guess.”
She shifts, and her fingers tangle with mine. “Your knuckles are bleeding.”
“Shit. Sorry.” I wipe them on my pants. “Fixed.”
“Tough guy.” But she genuinely smiles this time.
Across the room, Ryan is talking with a few cops. They look buddy-buddy, but then his gaze lands on me and slides to Emma. He shakes hands with the men and heads our way. “I take it Ryan didn’t know, either.”
“No,” she whispers.
“He’s ten feet away and gaining.”
Emma groans. “Oh, God. This is going to—”
“Emma.” Ryan’s voice is low with concern. “Can we talk?”
“—suck.” She slumps against me.
I hang onto her, catching his eye. He’d better watch his ass on this conversation. If I can deal with this, so can he.
“Ems?” I squeeze her.
She doesn’t turn toward him. “Everyone’s going to be so disappointed.”
“No one’s disappointed.” I say it for her benefit, but loudly enough that Ryan could hear. So help me God, if he says anything to make this worse for her, the truce we have will be called off in a heartbeat.
Emma
“I can’t look at him.” It’s not that I’m embarrassed about what I did. I’ve made hard decisions, and I own the consequences. But that there is something going on that feels so wrong, and I was so close to it… never seeing it. That Ryan and Grayson had to get into a brawl to save me—that humiliates me. I’ve never been helpless.
Ryan puts a hand on my shoulder. “You okay?”
“Fine.” But I still won’t look at him.
“Ems,” Grayson murmurs into my ear. “Talk to him.”
I was in tears when I first saw Grayson—when I connected the guy in the crowd to my Grayson and registered the shock and anger and What the motherfuck? look on his face. Now, I turn to face my brother, who looks every bit as menacing as Grayson and has the same fight marks swelling on his face. My throat stings from emotion, and I can’t swallow because of the guilt about what I failed to notice all the time I was working here.
“Hey.” I roll my bottom lip into my mouth.
Gray shifts me to a chair. “Yeah, so I’ll let you two talk.”
My fingers flex into his shirt. I don’t want him to leave me.
“No, it’s fine.” Ryan pulls up a chair and drops into it. “Gray can stay. I get it.”
Gray nods and slides me onto a chair across from Ryan. The tension kills me, and I’m expecting the worst.
You’re a slut.
You’re stupid.
I’m disappointed.
I’m disgusted.
But Ryan just stares. Finally, he runs a hand over his face. “Talked to Cherry. She gave me some details.”
Aw, shoot. I have no idea what Cherry would have said, so I bite my lip and wait, hoping he’ll keep going. His gaze flicks to Grayson then back to me. “Obviously, whatever you do to pull in some cash, that’s yours to decide. Same with Cherry. Not my business.”
My eyes go wide, and I can only imagine what Cherry said—or threatened—to make our brother stick to that kind of non-Ryan response.
“For real, though—you’re okay?” he asks.
I shrug. “I don’t know. What about you? Are you—” mad, embarrassed, pissed “—working?”
“Kind of. There’s a bit of a…” He looks away, as though searching for the right word. “Jurisdiction problem.”
“What do you mean?”
Grayson clears his throat. “Folks I came here with have an off-the-books federal contract on a sex trafficker—”
My back jolts straight. My mind reels. “Wait. What?” He stares at me as if I’m insane, and I turn to Ryan. Same look. “What do you mean trafficker?”
Ryan’s eyebrows raise, and I see he’s lofting the question to Grayson.
My stomach churns. “Bruno had some girls turn tricks. Occasionally. Not everyone. Never me.” I blink, dumbfounded. I don’t condone prostitution—but to each her own. But maybe I was wrong—really, really wrong. “That’s it. Right?”
Gray’s head shakes slightly. “Don’t think so, baby.”
Move over, stomachache. A surge of nausea hits me. “But I know the girls here. No one was forced.” Or maybe they were? I was always different, and no one ever stuck around long.
Ryan shifts in his chair. “Looks like it’s airing out a couple of dirty cops, too. I don’t know. No one’s telling this rookie cop shit.”
“I’m not stupid…” I can’t comprehend this. “I am so stupid. Oh, God.”
“You’re not, baby.” Grayson’s placating voice doesn’t make me believe him.
“I didn’t know. Until today—oh, God. The girl on the stage. Did they—” I’m not sure what to ask. Was she… sold without her consent? I knew it was wrong. Bad. But it didn’t occur to me that she was like—I don’t know—stolen and forced. “I’m going to be sick.”
Quickly as I can, I’m out of Grayson’s arms and running toward a bathroom. I hover in the stall and wait to throw up. But I can’t get sick. It’s just an overwhelming, disgusting hold on me that I can shake.
“What the hell!” I hit the divider wall as hard as I can but don’t feel better. I kick the door, and it slams shut just to bounce open again. “Ahhh,” I scream then collapse on the toilet seat and completely lose it.
I sob into my hands, unable to breathe for how hard I’m choking. For years, I thought I had everything so under control, and now, under my nose, this is happening. It’s disgusting, and those women didn’t have a choice. I can’t imagine how scared or angry or fucked up they have to be. Drugged? Blackmailed? Kidnapped? I cannot wrap my mind around it.
Knock. “Emma?” Ryan asks tentatively from the bathroom door.
“Go away.”
Minutes of crying pass, and there’s another knock. Footsteps that I know are Grayson’s come to the stall. “Ems, baby, you okay?”
“Please just leave me alone.” I sniffle. “Please.”
He ignores me and knocks on the stall door. “I’m worried about you.”
“Don’t be. Just go away.” I don’t think I’ve cried in years, and this—no, everything—is just too much to keep in. I want to be alone.
He bumps his fist against the door twice. “Alright, but I’m right outside the door if you need me.”
“’Kay.”
He leaves me, thank God. I hate how naive I’ve been. Traffickers? I’m so, so stupid.
Finally, I slump. The motion-controlled lights turned off long ago, and the room is eerily quiet—until the damn door opens again, and the lights click back on. “Go,” I choke out, “away.”
“Can’t do it, sweetheart.”
Sarah. Oh, God. The stall door swings open, and there stands my best friend—in her pajamas and sneakers. Faster than I can thank her for showing up, she pulls me out of the
stall.
“Ryan called, and I met Grayson. So, we have a lot to talk about. But first, are you okay?”
Tears burst out. “No.”
She wraps me into a hug that I feel down to my toes. “Okay, it’s okay.”
“I’m so stupid.”
“No. You didn’t know. And you’ve been running yourself a thousand miles an hour. The only thing you focused on was Cally, not investigating the ills of the world.”
“I should’ve known. I turned a blind eye to a lot of things.”
“You can’t be the moral compass to everyone you meet.”
I bite my lip. “I don’t know anything anymore. Grayson was dead, and now he’s not. Bruno’s a dick, but really, he’s a sex trafficker? I mean, come on. Who misses stuff like that?”
“Sweetheart. Stop.”
“I feel like the stupidest person alive.”
Sarah shakes her head. “Cherry danced here. No red flags. Ryan said something about an Internal Affairs investigation. So cops must have been in on it. There are beefy military dudes here who were undercover, so I say lots of people had no idea about what was going on.”
I sigh, letting her logic take hold. “Where’s Bruno?”
“I don’t know.”
“I don’t know what to do, Sarah. I don’t want to talk to Gray, and I don’t want to see Ryan.”
“I think we start with getting you out of this striptastic getup and into some jeans or something. Plus, those are two very worried guys who have been perched a dozen feet away from this restroom, waiting for you to come out. I would’ve paid to see you chase off their efforts, by the way.”
I drop my head. My eyes are swollen, and my makeup must be smeared to hell. I long ago pulled off my fake eyelashes. “I need to wash my face before I go out there.”
Scrubbing in the sink without makeup remover is fruitless. After two minutes of that, I look so much worse. I shake my head and point to my red nose and puffy eyes. “Hot.”
“Eh, not as bad as you think.” Sarah laughs. “And let’s just take a second to say… Grayson is just as hot, maybe hotter, than your brother.” She throws her hands in the air. “No. I don’t want to hear that I’m not allowed to say that. There’s a time and a place for such admissions, and when Ryan’s all growly tough guy with big-ass guns strapped to his hip—let’s forget he’s your brother for a second so I can point out that, oh my effin’ shit, he does that look well.”
I have to laugh. “Oh, too much.”
“Never thought him calling me in the middle of the night would end like this. But I’ll take it.”
I close my eyes and ignore the dull, throbbing headache that has started. “Alright. Let’s go.”
She opens the bathroom door, and there’s a lineup waiting for me: Ryan—guns and a badge on his waist—standing next to the hot guy with dark hair and tattoos, who is next to an older-but-still-hot man with dark hair, and finally, there’s Grayson—chiseled, brooding, and personifying the word alpha. Four men who look ready to kill.
“Holy mother of hotness,” Sarah whispers. “I just died and went to bad-boy heaven.”
CHAPTER SIX
Grayson
My molars might shatter for how hard I’m grinding them. My head hurts from the last few hours, but especially after Emma hid out in the bathroom. Ryan didn’t stand a chance, but his call-in-the-best-friend ploy deserves a little credit. Sarah popped into the bathroom and came out with a beautiful, albeit exhausted and distraught-looking, Emma Kingsley.
Damn. In that second, I want my name on hers more than I want to breathe. Emma Ford. That is how it should be.
I take a harsh breath and clench my fists, trying to focus on the situation at hand. Ryan and I were joined by Brock. Soon after that, the man who gave me a thumbs-up at Titan arrived. Turned out he—Jared—owns that whole company. Both dudes didn’t give a shit what any of the cops said, and with the exception of Ryan, they cleared the badges out of Emerald’s when Bruno and his gang of thugs were arrested.
All I know is Delta got to work tearing the place apart, looking for intel and whatever else without me. Big surprise. Fight in VIP? Check. A fuck-off from the team because I was sticking close to my girl? Check.
I quickly move to Emma and claim her from Sarah’s side. Both girls have wide eyes. Maybe they weren’t expecting us to be waiting, but that’s how it goes. Titan has questions that only Emma can answer, and I’m not leaving her side. Neither is Ryan.
“Come on.” With her under my arm, I guide her to the main seating area, where the lights have been turned up.
“Hang on, buddy.” Sarah takes her other arm. “We’ll be back.”
“Em—”
Sarah scowls. “Seriously, Grayson, give her a minute. We’ve got to get cleaned up.”
“I’m fine,” Emma offers. “I want to change.”
I narrow my eyes. I know that she’ll be fine, but I don’t want to let go. Still, I do. “Do your thing. We’ll be here.”
The two women disappear, and Brock and Jared grab a seat and huddle over a discussion they obviously don’t want us to be part of. I exhale hard, out of frustration more than exhaustion, then turn toward Ryan. We haven’t spoken, other than the necessary conversation points.
I rock back on my heels. “So, a cop, huh?”
He nods. “Always the plan.”
I nod too. “Right.”
Ryan shifts then runs his hands through his hair. Slowly, he shakes his head. “I didn’t know this crap.”
Bet not. “Seems like if that girl keeps a secret, she does it well.”
Ryan breaks his scowl with a harsh laugh. “Yeah, maybe.” His eyes jump past me, and the girls’ voices enter the room before they do.
They walk in, Emma in jeans and a T-shirt. She’s wiped the streaks of makeup off her face, but her red eyes are still puffy. Her smile has resurfaced though. It’s more confident than I would’ve expected. I don’t know why I expect her to still be shaken. I should have remembered that Emma’s a fighter. She’s resilient.
“Alright.” Jared stands and walks her way. “You met Brock.” He gestures with his head toward the Delta team leader. “I’m Jared Westin. I want to know what you know. Let’s chat.”
The man has an edge that shows the world he’d kill first and ask questions later. But in that grumbling request to talk, there’s something about the way he asks that implies that she should trust him.
Emma nods, and Jared looks to me as though seeking my permission. Fuck if I know why. He hasn’t said more than five words to me. There’s no way I have this job, so why does he care? But I nod.
Sarah wanders over to us as Emma joins them on the other side of the room. I glance around. Not a damn good thing has ever come out of these places. I hate them. Just when my molars are grinding again, Sarah squares up to me.
“Hey, we need to talk.” This little girl half my size and weight has her hands on her hips, and she’s scowling at me as if I were the one with a secret stripper job.
My eyebrow rises. “About?”
“You. Buddy.”
Christ. Over Sarah’s shoulder I catch a glimpse of Ryan fighting a laughing smile. Shit. I paint on a smile and get ready for whatever comes my way. “Alright, sweetheart. I’m game to talk.”
“Oh, no way, Mister Back In the Picture. I’m immune to the looks-and-charms thing you have going on, and I’m crazy happy for Emma and—” She catches herself, momentarily slowing her lecture-slash-ass-chewing.
“Cally,” I volunteer.
Her eyes narrow. “I’m crazy happy for them, but if you hurt her, I’ll find a way to destroy you.”
Part of me would rather defend myself to her, but I get it. Actually, I’m glad Emma has a girl like Sarah at her back. “If I hurt her, you won’t have to bother. Those girls are my world.”
“I won’t let her get burned twice.”
Ryan walks over, watching Sarah. “Easy, killer.”
That defense is unexpected, but he seems t
o know how to disarm her. She takes a step back even though the expression on her face says she’d rather take a step toward him. Then her finger bobs from one of us to the other. “If either of you gives her hell for this, I’ll put you in the ground.”
Ryan rolls his lips together. “Got it, gangsta.” Then he adds a sincere smile. “No one plans to jump on her case.”
Alright. Okay. Emma’s brother will keep his cool, and I’ll find a way to handle my own feelings about finding my girl here. I release tension I didn’t even realize I was holding. After seeing how Ryan reacted to my homecoming, I had no idea how he would deal with this. My wager would’ve been on not well, so his admission to Sarah is a shocker.
“And the two of you.” Her finger bobs back and forth between Ryan and me again. “If you act like assholes to each other, it will hurt her. Then I’ll have to find a way to take out both of you, and really, I’m not cut out for this dropping-bodies stuff.”
I have to bite my lip. I have no idea if this girl is for real or Emma’s version of my crazy friend Mazie. But Ryan moves to her side, hooks her under his arm—which makes her blush and smack his chest—and laughs. “It’ll be okay, Sarah.”
“No cute stuff, Ryan. I’m immune to you.” She ducks away, leaving us to watch her, but then she looks over her shoulder. “I need to call Cherry and tell her everything is okay.”
Glad I’m not the one calling Cherry, I nod. Ryan waves. She’s left us with our hands in our pockets, standing awkwardly.
“Immune, huh?” I joke, trying to alleviate the uncomfortable tension.
Ryan chuckles. “I wouldn’t say one hundred percent.”
I glance around, not sure what else to say. He shifts in his boots and clears his throat. We could stand on opposite sides of the room and waste time on our phones or something. But we’re stuck. Shit. Honestly, I miss the guy. If I’d ever had a brother, it would’ve been him.
There’s a tightness in my chest because I’ll never say those words, but losing him as my brother has been a heavy burden. There’s been too much loss in my life. I lost my team, lost my time with the woman I love, and lost the early years with my baby girl. And all because I couldn’t open my damn mouth.
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