Chapter 29
TWENTY-NINE
KEELEY
I’m wedged on the sofa between Dayna and Maylie, drowning in blankets and snacks. Makenna and Ivy are on the other couch, making their way through a bowl of popcorn while the movie rolls in the background.
On the table between us, the baby monitors flash every time Seren or Theo snuffles or grunts.
No one’s watching the film. We’re too busy giggling. It feels good to just let go. For the last hour, I forgot about deals, idiot brothers, and threats. I let myself feel something close to normal, even though I’m sitting in a world that is anything but.
I don’t think I’ve ever sat in a room with women who look like they’d take a bullet for each other before.
“They’re never going to forgive us for this,” Ivy muses, reaching for another handful of popcorn.
“They’ll get over it,” Dayna waves off her concern.
“Zane looked baffled by the concept of girls movie night.” Makenna’s lips curve a little at the corners as she sips from a mug that definitely has something alcoholic in it. “He’s definitely going to insist on a couples’ movie night after this.”
“You and Nic seem to be getting on well.”
I snap my head up. Dayna’s eyebrows are wiggling and I know I’m about to be interrogated by a group of women with zero training but skills that could rival a special forces team.
“Yes?”
“Are you asking or telling us?” Makenna pulls a cushion into her lap.
“We’re… good.” My cheeks feel hot. It’s not that I don’t want to share with them, but me and Nic? It’s ours.
“And?” Maylie prompts, nudging my side.
“It’s really good.”
Dayna tips her head back against the couch. “Woman, you’re killing us. Give us—”
A shout punches the air, cutting off whatever she was about to say. Then another, loud and clipped.
The first gunshot cracks so loud I flinch. The second follows, swallowed by more until it sounds like the world beyond these doors is splitting open.
Maylie and Ivy move like lightning. Seren, Theo and Toby are down the corridor.
My heart is in my throat.
Where’s Nic?
I don’t follow the girls. I head for his office. The door’s open. Inside is empty. My heart is jack hammering in my chest as I pivot toward the bar.
The shooting stops as abruptly as it started, but it doesn’t loosen the bands wrapped around my throat as I push inside the room. I scan automatically for him and only Diesel and Riot are coming in through the other door—the one that leads outside.
They’re both armed and they both look furious. Riot’s already barking orders, words that I can’t focus on.
Because he’s not here. “Where’s Nic?” I demand.
Riot glances at Diesel and cold slides straight down my spine.
“They took him.”
My stomach rolls so violently, I clutch it. “What do you mean? Who took him? Was it Morozov? Riot, where the fuck is Nic?”
“We’ll get him back,” he says before his attention is snagged by Mace and Dash shoving through the doors.
“Got a partial plate,” Dash pants, his chest heaving as if he’s ran here.
I don’t miss the guns they’re both carrying. Mace is moving fast, his expression lethal.
“Diesel.” Mace just says his name. That’s all he needs because Diesel clearly understands.
“On it.”
More instructions are barked, but no one is telling me anything. They’re not even looking at me. The room is loud and yet quiet. I’m not sure I’m breathing anymore because all I can think about is the Nic-shaped hole in my chest.
He’d come for me.
He’d already be on his bike.
Fuck this.
I’m not standing around politely, waiting for someone to fix this. The fear inside me is a living thing, beating and pushing against my ribs. If Morozov has him—
I can’t even imagine what he’ll do to him.
I move to the door, not sure what my plan is, but I’m blocked by a solid wall of muscle before I even flinch toward the handle.
I glare up at Riot who is giving me that look. The one that says don’t even try it.
“Move,” I hiss.
“No,” he says firm but not sharp. My jaw tightens. Not in anger, but calculation. I’m not sitting here twiddling my thumbs while Nic’s out there.
“Riot—”
“We’ll get him back. Us. Not you.”
“With all due respect,” I rasp, “that’s not your choice to make.”
He leans in. “What do you think Nic’ll do if he finds out you put yourself in danger? Morozov needs you in his hands, Keeley. Don’t fuckin’ deliver yourself gift-wrapped.”
Helplessness washes through me. “So, what? I just sit here and wait for you to bring him back?”
“Hey, Keels,” Dayna’s hand is on my arm. I didn’t see her come in, but she’s with the girls. Maylie and Ivy have their kids pressed against them. “Come sit. Let the guys do what they do best, yeah?”
I let them guide me over to the table while my pulse roars in my ears. I blink back tears, my chest so tight I don’t know if my heart is about to explode or my lungs.
“Hey,” Maylie squeezes my leg. “He’s coming home. The guys will make sure of that.”
Dayna leans her elbows on the table. “They just took a sitting president. The club is going to fucking destroy them for that.”
It should reassure me. It doesn’t. “Will they be able to do that before Nic is—” My voice cracks and I break off. My thoughts scatter and I take a shaky breath. Nic has been poking Morozov for weeks, taunting and tormenting him. He won’t be kind. “I just want him back.”
“Okay, we’re not writing obituaries yet.” Dayna sits a little straighter, even as she watches Dash across the room. “Nic’ll be fine. The guys are cooking a plan, and will get him back. There’s no other way this ends. You’ll be curled up with your man tonight, I promise.”
I really want to believe her, so I cling to that truth like a life raft, but still I can’t stop the empty hollow feeling in my belly.
“I hate to tell you this,” Makenna says, “but Nic isn’t exactly defenceless.”
I know that. Of course I do. The man runs an MC, not a knitting circle. He’s used to danger. He probably commits more violence before breakfast than most people do in a lifetime.
It doesn’t mean I feel any less terrified for him.
For the third time in as many weeks, the clubhouse has come under attack.
I’m tired of this.
Tired of being the reason for it all too.
I just want Nic back, safe with me. I want my friends to be able to sleep without fear. I want their kids safe.
I want to breathe easier too.
The guys disappear into the back room to hold church. I stare at the closed door for what feels like forever. The more time that stretches, the more my skin itches. What’s taking so long?
I bounce my knee while I chew my nails.
Why aren’t they out there looking for him yet?
What the hell are they even discussing?
Every second they waste is another Nic is alone with Morozov.
Come on.
Makenna grabs my arm, like she knows I’m about to launch out of my seat, and gives me a gentle squeeze. “They’re fixing it.” That’s all she says.
It should be enough.
It’s not.
But I stay in my seat, my knee going crazy.
When the door eventually opens, I’m coming out of my skin. My head snaps up and I lock eyes on Mace.
He looks like he’s aged a decade in that room.
I’m out of my seat before I can stop myself. I go straight to Mace, reading every inch of his face. I can see the tension rolling off him and that only adds to my own sense of dread.
“Have you found him?”
Mace glances at Riot, who shifts his shoulders just a fraction. A hundred words pass in that gesture, none of them good.
“Morozov has him,” Mace confirms.
The room tunnels, and I blink hard. I already knew that. It was obvious Morozov has Nic, but getting that confirmation makes everything blur and sharpen at the same time.
“Okay.” I exhale slowly. “How do we get him back?”
“I’m handlin’ it.”
I stare at Mace. Glare really. Yeah, that’s not an answer. “How?”
“Keeley—”
“Don’t,” I snap. “Don’t act like this isn’t my business. He’s mine too.”
His expression flickers, not with anger, but maybe a little respect.
“Trust me to bring him home, yeah?”
I do, and maybe I shouldn’t but I do because they love Nic too.
But I can’t sit here and do nothing either. “Do you know where he is?”
“Keeley.”
“Do you? Because that’s kind of an important detail and since Nic hasn’t been able to find Morozov yet, I’m assuming you don’t know either.”
He doesn’t answer, which is an answer. “So what’s the plan? Hope Morozov sends you his address?”
“Sweetheart, we’re lookin’,” Riot says.
I shoot him a glacial glare. “And while you’re looking, what about Nic? What the hell is Morozov doing to him?”
Panic and fear are a dizzying mix in my blood.
“He can handle himself.”
“What exactly is the plan here? Kick over the same rocks you’ve been kicking for weeks and hope you find Nic before Morozov kills him?” All I can hear is the thumping in my ears. “He wants me, right?”
Mace scrubs a hand over his mouth. “Whatever you’re thinking the answer is no.”
“You know what Nic would do to us if we let you walk into the building?” Dash’s expression is as unmovable as Mace’s.
“Then give me a better idea of how we save him. Because right now all I have is a ticking clock and no direction.”
“I have at least ten that don’t include you handing yourself over to a man who wants to fuckin’ sell you,” Mace says deadpan.
I press a hand to my stomach, which feels like it’s turning itself inside out. Not because Morozov wants to sell me. I already knew that. But because it feels like all the options are being shut down.
“I’m not saying hand me over. I’m not stupid or brave, Mace. I’m saying we use me to draw Morozov out. He wants me, right?”
“You want to bait a pissed off Russian wannabe mobster?” Riot’s brows inch up his head.
“Okay,” Dayna says, “I assume we’re coming up with a plan that doesn’t involve Keeley sacrificing herself to a megalomaniac.”
“Obviously,” Diesel rumbles.
I shake my head. “How else do we find him?”
“Literally any other way,” Riot says.
I stare at Mace, and he stares back. “All I care about is getting Nic home. I don’t care how we do it, just that it happens. He’d do anything to get one of you home and you all know it.”
Mace rubs the back of his neck. “This ain’t a movie. This goes wrong he dies and you get shipped off to be a fuckin’ sex toy for some depraved bastard.”
I flinch. Maylie gasps.
“So we don’t let it go wrong.”
“Morozov’s backed into a corner,” Diesel glances at Mace. “Desperation can make people do stupid things.”
“Like handing over prez’s old lady to a dickhead?” Riot asks.
Mace’s phone beeps and he huffs a breath before lowering his eyes. His posture changes the second he opens the screen. It’s not even subtle. Every inch of him goes taut like a bowstring and his skin stretches over his knuckles.
I snatch the phone from him. I don’t even stop to consider the consequences as I peer down at the screen.
It’s a photograph.
It’s Nic.
My stomach drops and my throat is so tight I can barely get air past the lump there.
It’s dark and grainy, but I can see enough. Nic is hanging by his wrists, his face black and blue, swollen almost beyond recognition.
I grip the phone so hard my fingers ache.
Beneath the image, the message says: ‘Her for him’.
I feel like I’ve been hit in the chest with a hammer. “Oh.” Tears burn my eyes as Mace prises the phone out of my hand. “You tell him yes.”
“No.”
“You tell him yes,” I repeat, “or I’ll go alone and pull him out of there my fucking self.”
“Perfect president’s old lady,” Riot breathes under his breath. Mace shoots him a glare. “What, like you weren’t thinking it too?”
Mace peers down at me, a hundred arguments running through his head in that quiet beat. “If we do this, you do exactly what I tell you. No deviations from the plan, no heroics, no solo rescue missions. Understand?”
That pressure on my chest eases just a fraction. “No heroics. Got it.”
Mace blows out a breath. “Don’t make me regret this, Keeley. I won’t have your death on my conscience.”
“I won’t,” I say firm. “Now, tell me, what’s the plan to save Nic?”