33. Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Three
Wrenley
When our eyes lock, the room narrows to blood and sound. Tiffany’s smile is too bright, too sure, the kind of smile that used to make me laugh. Now it looks like a dare. I’m a hair’s width from losing everything that steadies me, and all I can see is red.
“Wren…” Wrecker starts, hands up like he wants to stop me without touching me. I raise my hand and shake my head slowly, cutting him off. I don’t need him to move for me. I need her.
The words leave my mouth before I can chew them. “You fucking bitch!”
She sees it then, the heat, the rage, the thing in me that used to be a blade, and she bolts. People scatter like I shouted fire. Torque and Wrecker curse, shove off the bar, and the room becomes a clear line for the chase.
I’m faster than she thinks. Faster than jealousy and spite. I cut the distance in three strides, the crowd parts around me in a ripple of boots. She’s halfway to the door when I leap, tackling her hard, bringing us both down onto the floor in a tangle of limbs and spilled drinks.
Everything after that is noise and motion. Torque and Wrecker stop right behind me, and the other employees freeze, eyes wide. Torque swallows and says, loud enough for everyone to hear and small enough to keep order. “You can all leave.”
Wrecker adds, voice steady. “If you want to keep working here, you saw nothing. This was an ordinary staff meeting.” A dozen heads nod like marionettes, footsteps retreating, most exit the clearing with a mechanical hum.
Tiffany is fighting under me, despite being in a smaller package. She claws, elbows, spits words like venom. I don’t slow down. I don’t let her breathe. She’s throwing punches, claws at my face, and then she grabs a fistful of my hair and yanks hard.
I laugh. The sound is ugly and thrilled and something like relief. “Do that again,” I rasp. “I like it rough.”
Wrecker huffs out a laugh in amusement. He clamps on Tiffany’s arms while Torque leverages my weight and lifts me clear. I don’t resist much, I like how she looks when she’s scared.
Torque still has his hands under my arms when I look down at Tiffany. Her mascara’s smeared, lip split, hair tangled from the scuffle. I want to feel satisfied; I don’t. All I feel is the pulse in my neck, a low, steady drum of fury.
“Put me down,” I tell Torque.
He hesitates a second, then sets me back on my feet. Wrecker keeps his grip on Tiffany’s wrists. She tries to twist away, and he squeezes just enough to stop her.
“Why’d you do it?” I ask. My voice sounds too calm in my own ears.
Tiffany’s chin lifts a fraction. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Wrong answer.”
I take a step closer, enough for her to see that I’m done playing. The lights from the bar throw a red haze across the floor. Somewhere behind me, glass crunches under a boot. No music now, no crowd, just breathing and the hum of the lights.
“You stole Lena’s access card,” I say. “You got into the system. You sent information that nearly got us killed. So, I’ll ask again—why?”
She shakes her head fast, hair clinging to her face. “I didn’t, I swear. I don’t even know how to do any of that tech crap.”
I laugh once, sharp. “You don’t need to. You just need to hand it to someone who does.”
Her eyes dart between Torque and Wrecker, looking for help she won’t get.
I crouch so we’re eye-level. “How do you know Sebastian?”
That gets her. She freezes, pupils wide, a flicker of recognition she can’t hide.
“I don’t,” She whispers.
“Try again.”
“I told you, I don’t know him!”
I straighten, fold my arms. “Fine.” I turn to Wrecker. “She doesn’t want to talk here.”
He nods once, the motion slow and deliberate. “Basement?”
“Basement,” I confirm.
Tiffany’s breath hitches. “Wait—what basement? Wrenley, please—”
Wrecker hauls her upright, ignoring the way she digs her heels against the floor. Torque falls in beside them, silent and solid as a wall.
I follow them halfway across the dance floor before stopping, calling over my shoulder. “The rest of the staff can leave. Riot lock the doors behind them.”
The few stragglers who hadn’t fled scatter fast. The heavy door leading down to the basement swings open, and the sound that comes out of it is a low, metallic groan.
Tiffany stumbles once, caught between Wrecker’s hands, still pleading. “Wrenley, please, I didn’t mean to—I didn’t know he’d—”
I step closer to her, grab her chin, and force her to meet my eyes. “Then start figuring out what you did mean. Because down there, you’re out of excuses.”
She swallows hard, eyes glossy, voice small. “You’re not like him.”
I lean in until she can feel my breath against her ear. “No,” I tell her quietly. “That’s the mistake you made.”
Wrecker pulls her forward. Torque follows in behind them, and the club goes still again, empty, echoing, waiting for answers.
The club floor is too quiet again, once they disappear below.
The door to the basement hangs open, a mouth breathing warm air that smells like dust and metal.
I stay on the main floor, listening to the scrape of boots and the soft jangle of cuffs somewhere down there.
Wrecker and Torque know what to do; they always do.
Footsteps on the main staircase behind me pull me back, Liam first, Max right behind him. The sound of them is comfort and a weight at the same time. The low light paints their faces in gold and shadow, soldiers, husbands, executioners, if I ask them to be.
Liam’s voice is quiet. “How do you want to play it, little warrior?”
“I’m going to make her talk.” I don’t look at either of them when I say it. My hands are already fists.
Max folds his arms, watching me. “We’re with you. You know that.” He hesitates, just long enough for the words to carry weight. “But this one’s going to hit differently, Sparrow. She’s not a target we picked off the street. You know her.”
“I know exactly who she is,” I say sharper than I intend. “I know what she did.”
Liam takes a slow breath. “That’s what we mean. It’s easier when you can hate them. When they’re strangers. You’ve poured drinks next to this one, exchanged words with her. Don’t underestimate how that’s going to feel once she starts talking.”
I meet his gaze. “You think I can’t do this because I know her?”
He shakes his head. “I’m certain you can. I just don’t want you to forget who you are when you’re done.”
That lands in my chest like a dull weight. He’s not doubting me, he’s reminding me that this will cost something. It always does.
Max’s tone softens. “We get what we need. We stop whatever Sebastian’s building. But when it’s over, you hand her to us. No ghosts are following you out of that room.”
I nod once. “Fine.”
Liam steps closer, the faintest touch at the small of my back. “Then let’s go finish this.”
We start down the last stretch together, three sets of boots on the metal stairs. As we descend the smell of dust and fear thickens in the air. By the time I reach the bottom, I can see Tiffany under the light, pale, shaking, trying to look smaller than she is.
Liam’s presence behind my shoulder steadies me. Max’s hand brushes mine as he passes the door. The lock clicks shut with a sound that feels final. Whatever is about to happen, we walk into it together.
The air in the basement hums like a live wire. Tiffany sits tied to the chair under the single hanging bulb, wrists chafed, jaw set. The ropes creak each time she breathes. Wrecker and Torque stand silently behind her.
I start with the tool chest. The black paint is scarred, fingerprints in dust from a hundred other lessons. I open the top lid, let the clang echo. It’s not a threat yet; it’s a promise of where this conversation can go.
“Tell me how you know him,” I say.
She blinks. “I don’t—” she fires back.
“Sebastian,” I correct.
Her eyes flicker, quick as a spark. Caught.
“Try again.”
She exhales hard through her nose. “You think you scare me?”
I tilt my head. “No. I think you’re stupid enough to think I need to.”
Her mouth twists into something between a sneer and a smile. “Of course. Saint Wrenley. The Serpents’ pet whore. You really think sleeping with them makes you untouchable.”
It’s not what she says, it’s how she says it.
Soft. Sweet. Like she’s been saving it for this exact moment.
Torque mutters a curse. Wrecker shifts his stance but doesn’t move.
The laugh that comes out of me doesn’t sound like a laugh at all.
My fist connects with her mouth before I even decide to throw it.
The sound is small, bone, breath, the wet crack of a bad idea.
Her head snaps back, blood spotting bright on her lip.
She gasps. Then smiles. “That's all you’ve got?”
I step forward. “Not even close.”
Wrecker’s hand twitched at his side. “Boss—”
“No.” I don’t take my eyes off her. “She’s mine.”
I move behind her, fingers tangling in her hair, jerking her head back until she’s forced to look up at me. The pliers in my hand gleam under the bulb, cold metal, ugly on purpose.
“Last chance,” I say, my voice low, steady. “You start talking now, or you find out what silence costs.”
Her breath shakes. “Okay, okay. He found me after closing one night. Said it was business. He knew everything—about you, about the Serpents, about the mansion. I thought he just wanted to scare you.”
My stomach twists, but I keep my voice even. “And you helped him.”
Tears cut through her foundation. “He said he’d take care of me. That I deserved better than being in your shadow.”
Liam’s voice drifts from behind me, calm and lethal. “He used you.”
She flinches, whispering. “He promised—”
Max finishes it for her. “He lied.”
I let go of her hair and step back, dropping the pliers onto the chest with a clang that makes her flinch. “You should’ve known what kind of man makes you promises like that.”
She starts to cry, real tears now, the ugly, hiccupping kind.
“Wrecker,” I say without looking at him, “Lock her down. She doesn’t speak to anyone. Elias gets everything she just said, every detail.”
“You got it, boss.”
Liam’s hand brushes mine as I turn away, steady, grounding, but I can feel the question behind it. How far would you have gone if she hadn’t talked? I don’t answer. Because I don’t know.
The apartment above the club feels too still. The quiet isn’t peace, it’s a vacuum. I pace once, twice. Stop. Start again. My skin buzzes like static under my jacket. Every heartbeat is a knock against bone that won’t slow down.
I sit. Stand. Sit again. My hands are clean, but I can still feel the tack of blood between my fingers. I scrub at them until the skin burns. The smell doesn’t leave. I’ve never hurt someone I knew before, other than my parents, but that relationship was long dead before they were.
There’s a hum in the walls, the air-conditioning, maybe, but my brain twists it into voices. Muffled, distant. My pulse stutters. I look toward the door, half sure I’ll see her there. Tiffany. The way her eyes went wide when I—
I stop the thought, but it keeps going anyway. The room tips. My breath catches high in my throat. In, out, doesn’t work. The air feels too thick, like I’m drowning in it. I pull at the collar of my shirt, drag my nails down my throat, desperate for space that isn’t there.
“Breathe,” I whisper, but the sound comes out wrong, like broken glass, not words. The lights flicker. My chest won’t open. My vision tunnels. I drop to my knees because standing isn’t an option anymore. The floor feels safer, steadier, except it isn’t; it’s vibrating with my heartbeat.
Everything is noise. The hum, the echo of my own breath, the crack in the drywall that keeps getting bigger when I stare at it.
The panic folds in tighter. I curl forward, palms pressed to the floor, trying to find a rhythm.
It doesn’t come. My lungs seize, refuse.
The harder I fight for air, the smaller the world gets.
The door opens. A burst of light, footsteps, heavy, familiar.
“Wrenley?” Max’s voice cuts through, sharp enough to hurt. I can’t answer. I can’t do anything but gasp.
He’s there in seconds, dropping beside me. “Hey, hey—look at me.” His hands catch my face, forcing my gaze up. The room keeps spinning, but his voice stays anchored. “Breathe with me. Come on, Sparrow. In—out. Follow me.”
I try. Fail. Try again. The air burns on the way in. I choke on it on the way out. Liam’s voice joins Max’s, low and steady from behind me. The warmth of his palm lands between my shoulder blades. “You’re safe. She’s gone. It’s over.”
It isn’t, but hearing it helps. A little.
“Match me,” Max murmurs. He exaggerates the breath, slow in, slower out, until mine starts to sync with his. My fingers claw at his sleeve.
Liam keeps the circles on my back, quiet, patient. “You’re here,” he says. “With us.”
The world begins to widen again. My lungs remember how. I collapse against Max’s shoulder, shaking, wet-eyed, furious at myself for it.
He presses a kiss to my temple. “You held it too long, Sparrow. It had to break somewhere.”
Liam kneels beside us, one arm curling around my waist. “Next time,” he says softly. “You don’t try to face it alone.”
For a long minute, the only sound is breathing, theirs is steady, mine is catching and finding rhythm again. The tremor in my hands fades to a faint ache. The panic retreats, leaving the hollow exhaustion it always does.
When I finally speak, my voice is hoarse. “Is it done?”
Liam nods. “She’s gone.”
Max brushes his thumb across my cheek. “That’s all you need to know. Now we figure out what comes next.”
Liam stands pulling me up with him, Max following. “Come on, little warrior, let's go home.
I nod, but inside, everything still feels off-balance. The war isn’t outside anymore. It’s under my skin.