Chapter 15
London
The thug feints left. I throw myself right, my hand closing around a ceramic table lamp on the end table. I swing it with everything I have.
It connects with his forearm. The bulb shatters and he grunts—but doesn't stop. His free hand snakes out and catches my wrist, fingers clamping down with crushing force.
"Stop fighting, bitch.” His gold teeth glint. “You’re making it worse for yourself.”
I twist. Yank. Drive my elbow backward into his ribs. He absorbs the blow and wrenches me around, my back slamming against his chest. His arm bands across my collarbone and drags me sideways as his other hand reaches for the syringe he dropped on the dirty carpet.
My mother sobs on the couch. "Please don't hurt her. Please—"
I want to scream at her. I want to ask how she can beg for my safety when she’s the one who served me up on a platter. But what good would that even do?
He must have grasped the syringe because it appears in my peripheral vision, filled with dark liquid, as he brings the needle tip toward the side of my neck.
I wriggle as forcefully as I can, but he’s strong and has me held tightly.
Then—from above—I hear the heavy thud of boots on hardwood. Multiple pairs of boots.
"London!"
Oh, my god. Zeus. His voice echoes through the house like a crack of Norse thunder, and every cell in my body surges toward the sound.
"Down here!" I scream. "Basement! He has a—"
The thug's hand clamps over my mouth. I see the syringe and convulse my whole body as much as possible to throw his aim off.
Footsteps pound down the basement stairs. Zeus appears—gun drawn, shoulders filling the narrow stairwell, his face a mask of lethal calm.
His eyes sweep the scene in a fraction of a second. Me, pinned against the thug's chest. The syringe at my throat. My mother, curled and shaking on the couch.
His gun doesn't waver. It's aimed at the thug's head, but the thug is behind me. Using me as a shield.
"Let her go." Zeus's voice is controlled but lethal.
"No, no, no." The thug adjusts his grip, pulling me tighter. "Here's how this goes, amigo. We walk out together—me and the girl. You lower your weapon. If you try anything, my thumb pushes this plunger and she gets enough Raven to stop her heart in two minutes."
Zeus doesn't blink. Doesn't move. His eyes lock on mine—not the thug's. Mine.
I see everything in that gaze. Love. Rage. A promise.
My mother wails. "My baby! Don't kill my baby! Oh god, please—"
The irony would be laughable if I weren't about to die.
“You might think you’ve got it all figured out,” Zeus says. His voice hasn't risen above conversational volume, like he might be discussing the weather. “But there’s something you haven't accounted for,"
The thug's grip tightens. "What's that?"
"I don't miss."
The gunshot splits the air.
The thug jerks—a single, violent spasm—and the arm around my throat goes slack.
I stumble forward, my knees give. I'm going down—
Behind me, a body hits the floor. A wet, heavy sound I'll hear in nightmares.
Strong arms catch me. Zeus. I’m wrapped in him, and he’s pressing my face against his chest. His heart thuds rapidly beneath my ear, the only sign that he felt anything at all during those terrible seconds.
"I've got you." His voice is rough, shredded at the edges. "I've got you. It's over."
My mother is sobbing on the couch—great, heaving wails that sound more like grief for her lost fix than relief that her daughter is alive.
She crawls toward the dead man's body, searching the dirty carpet for the syringe he’d been holding with the single-mindedness of an addict who has lost all capacity for anything else.
Zeus's arms tighten around me. He turns us so I can't see her. So I don't have to watch my mother rob a corpse.
"Don't look, sweetheart,” he murmurs against my hair. "You don't need to see that."
I don't. I bury my face in his chest and grip fistfuls of his shirt and shake apart in his arms.
That’s when I hear more voices. Demon, Fuzzy, others.
"We got cleanup," Demon says. "Get her out of here."
"The mother?" That's Chaos.
"Fury and I will deal with her," Demon replies.
My mother is shrieking now—wordless, animal sounds punctuated by my name. But nobody comforts her. Nobody addresses her grief. It's the sound of an addict realizing her fix is leaving in a body bag.
Zeus lifts me. One arm under my knees, the other supporting my back, and he carries me up the basement stairs without a word
He moves through the house and into the living room, lowering us both onto the couch. He doesn't let me go. He sits with me in his lap, my legs curled against his thigh, his arms forming a cage around me.
"Breathe," he murmurs. His hand strokes up and down my spine. "You're safe. I've got you. Breathe."
I try. My lungs feel too small, too tight, but I match the rhythm of his hand—up is inhale, down is exhale. Over and over until the trembling subsides to a manageable hum.
Minutes pass. Longer, probably. I hear movement elsewhere in the house—heavy footsteps, a scraping sound, muffled commands—but Zeus keeps me facing away from all of it. His heartbeat is my metronome.
When my breathing has calmed and the tremors have faded to occasional shivers, his hand moves to my chin. He tips my face up, scanning every inch of me.
"Are you hurt anywhere?"
I shake my head.
"London." His voice is low and gentle. "Why did you leave?"
I look down at my hands, still fisted in his shirt. The question deserves an answer—a real one—but pulling it out of me feels impossible.
“Was it because I killed your father?” he pushes.
"No." The word comes out fierce and absolute. I lift my gaze to his. "You did what you had to do. You saved Rowan's life. The same way you just saved mine." I press my palm flat against his chest, over his heart.
He exhales as though he's been holding his breath for days.
"Then tell me why."
I swallow. "Who my father was. What he did to all of you, to the club.” My voice gets even smaller.
“The whole time I thought his name meant something—that in a way, being his daughter gave me a right to be here.
Then I found out he was a traitor... That the club despised him.
.. I realized I don't have any claim to that world. Your world.”
Zeus opens his mouth, but I press my fingers against his lips.
"Let me finish." He nods behind my hand, and I continue.
"I also didn't want to embarrass you. You were his best friend.
You already dealt with the shame of that—of trusting someone who turned out to be—" I gesture vaguely.
"I thought being with me would just be a constant reminder.
Not just to you but to everyone. That people would look at us and see the traitor's daughter with the traitor's best friend, and it would humiliate you all over again. "
A heavy silence sits between us. His jaw works beneath my fingers, and I pull my hand away.
"Are you finished?" His voice is barely above a whisper.
"Yes."
"Good. I'm about to say something important, and I need you to hear every word." He cups my face in both hands, thumbs resting on my cheekbones, his gaze locked on mine.
"I know exactly how you feel. Down to the bone. That's how I felt after his betrayal. Ashamed. Humiliated. Unworthy of the brothers' trust. I was his best friend. I should have seen the signs. Should have known. And I didn't. For months, I punished myself. Punished everyone around me."
His thumbs stroke across my cheeks.
“But you are not your father. Just as I'm not responsible for what he chose to do.
You walked through those gates as London—a brave, fierce, beautiful woman who fits into this club on her own merit.
Not because of Fiend. Independent of him.
The brothers respect you for who you are. The girls love you for who you are."
His forehead drops to mine. "I love you for who you are."
My breath catches. He said—
“Yeah, I love you, London. And the club is your home. You belong here. With me."
A tear escapes down my cheek. He catches it without breaking eye contact.
"I want you to be my ol' lady." His voice is raw with emotion. "That means you're mine. Permanently. It means the club recognizes you as family—my family. Protected, respected, valued. Not a guest. Not a girlfriend. Mine.”
My pulse hammers in my ears. I think of what the girls told me—what an ol' lady means in this world. The weight of it. The permanence.
"Does that mean—" I start, and the expression on his face stops me mid-sentence.
He nods. One deliberate dip of his chin. "It means everything. It means forever."
I search his eyes for doubt. For hesitation. For any sign that this is pity or obligation or the heat of the moment carrying him away.
I find none of those things. What I find is certainty. The same certainty as when he told me my stepfather would never touch me again. The same certainty he had when he pulled that trigger minutes ago.
Christopher “Zeus” Petridis does not bluff.
"Yes." The word comes out steady and strong. “I’ll be your ol’ lady.”
His mouth crashes over mine and he kisses me the way a man seals a vow—deep, consuming, and claiming.