Chapter Eight
Poseidon
I watched my sister head upstairs to her room, her back ramrod straight. Abyss trailing behind her like a loyal fucking dog as my hands clenched into fists.
She’s lying.
I knew it the second she walked into church. Knew it in the way her shoulders tensed when Zeus asked about Rapid City. Knew it in the careful, measured way she answered every question, like she had rehearsed the answers beforehand.
Derek Walsh. Bad breakup. Cocktail waitress.
All of it was bullshit.
The question was: what was she lying about? And more importantly, why?
Alex had always been trouble. Even as a kid, she had a talent for finding the worst possible situation and diving headfirst into it.
Sneaking out at fourteen to go to parties with kids twice her age.
Getting caught shoplifting at sixteen, not because she needed anything, but because she was bored.
Running her mouth to the wrong people and starting fights she couldn’t finish.
I spent half my life pulling her out of fires she started herself.
But this felt different.
This felt dangerous.
I turned and walked back into church, my boots heavy on the worn floor. The hallway was empty now, the photos on the walls watching me like silent witnesses. Brothers who’d bled for this club. Brothers who’d died for it. I’d bled for it too. More times than I could count.
But Alex was my blood in a different way. She was the only family I had left after our parents died. The only person in this world who knew what it was like to grow up in the chaos we survived.
And she wouldn’t let me help her.
Stubborn. Just like Mom.
I pushed open the door to church. They were all still there.
Waiting as Zeus sat at the head of the table, his fingers drumming a slow, deliberate rhythm on the wood.
Hades leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, his scarred face unreadable.
Atlas had his phone out, scrolling through something, but his attention snapped to me the second I walked in.
Hermes, Adonis, Caishen, Aries, Hyperion, Coeus, Asclepius, Apollo, all of them watching me with varying degrees of concern and suspicion.
“Well?” Zeus said.
I closed the door behind me and moved to my seat. “She’s lying.”
“We know that,” Hades said, his voice a low rumble. “Question is, what’s she lying about?”
“I don’t know.” My admission tasted like failure. “But whatever it is, it’s bad. She’s scared, and Alex doesn’t scare easily.”
“Scared of what?” Aries asked. “This Derek guy?”
“Maybe.” I shook my head. “Or maybe Derek doesn’t exist. Maybe the whole story is fabricated.”
“You think she made him up?” Adonis looked up from his notebook, pen poised.
“I think she gave us exactly what we wanted to hear. A story that explains why she’s back without giving us any real information.”
Zeus nodded slowly. “That’s what I thought, too. She’s too careful. Too rehearsed.”
“She’s always been a good liar.” I hated myself for saying it. “But this is different. This isn’t her usual bullshit. This is survival mode.”
“Survival from what?” Caishen leaned forward, his calculating eyes narrowed. “What could be so bad that she’d come back here after four years?”
That’s the question, isn’t it?
“Could be anything,” Hermes said. “Bad debt. Pissed off the wrong people. Got involved in something illegal.”
“She worked at a strip club,” Hyperion added. “Those places attract all kinds of trouble. Drugs, trafficking, organized crime.”
“She said she was a cocktail waitress,” Apollo pointed out.
“And you believe that?” Aries snorted. “Come on. A girl who looks like Alex, working at a strip club in Rapid City? She was dancing. Guaranteed.”
I wanted to argue. Wanted to defend her, but he was probably right. “Even if she was dancing,” I said carefully, “that doesn’t mean she’s in trouble. Plenty of girls do that work and walk away clean.”
“But not Alex,” Zeus said quietly.
His words hung in the air like a death sentence.
Because he was right.
Alex never did anything clean. She never had.
“What do you want me to do?” I asked, looking at Zeus. “You want me to push her harder? Try to get the truth out of her?”
“No.” Zeus shook his head. “Pushing her will just make her shut down more. You saw how she reacted when I assigned Abyss. She’s already defensive. We push too hard, she’ll bolt.”
“And if she bolts, we lose any chance of protecting her,” Hades added.
“Protecting her from what?” I demanded, frustration bleeding into my voice. “We don’t even know what we’re protecting her from. Could be nothing. Could be she’s just paranoid because of a bad breakup.”
“You don’t believe that,” Atlas said, his voice flat.
“No,” I admitted. “I don’t.”
Silence settled over the table.
“She’s hiding something big,” Coeus said, his fingers tapping on his laptop. “I can feel it. And whatever it is, it’s going to blow back on us big time.”
“Then we need to figure out what it is,” Caishen said. “Before it becomes our problem.”
“It’s already our problem,” Zeus said. “The second she walked through that door, it became our problem. She’s Poseidon’s sister. That makes her family. And we protect family.”
“Even when family won’t tell us the truth?” Aries asked.
“Especially then.”
I looked at Zeus, grateful for the support even as frustration gnawed at my gut. “So what’s the play?”
Zeus leaned back in his chair, his eyes distant and calculating. “We watch her. Abyss reports back on everything. Where she goes, who she talks to, what she does. We keep her close, keep her safe, and we wait for her to slip up.”
“And if she doesn’t slip up?” Hermes asked.
“She will,” Zeus said with certainty. “Everyone does eventually. Especially when they’re scared.”
“What if whoever she’s running from finds her first?” I asked. The question I had been avoiding finally surfaced. “What if we’re too late?”
The room went quiet again.
It was Hades who finally spoke. “Then we deal with it. Same way we always do.”
With blood and bullets. The God way.
“I don’t want it to come to that,” I stated reluctantly.
“None of us do,” Zeus replied. “But we need to be prepared for the possibility. If Alex brought trouble to our door, we need to know what kind of trouble it is. And we need to be ready to handle it.”
“She’s not going to tell us,” I admitted with a certainty that settled in my chest like a stone. “Not willingly. She’s too stubborn. Too proud.”
“Then we find out another way,” Coeus offered. “I can dig into her digital footprint. See what she’s been up to online. Bank records, social media, anything that might give us a clue.”
“Do it,” Zeus said. “But be discreet. If she finds out we’re investigating her, she’ll shut down completely.”
Coeus nodded and turned back to his laptop.
“What about Rapid City?” Adonis asked. “Should we send someone up there? Ask around? See if anyone knows anything about this Derek guy or what Alex was really doing?”
“Not yet,” Zeus said. “We don’t want to tip our hand. If someone’s looking for her, we don’t want to lead them straight to us.”
“But if someone’s already looking for her,” Aries said, “they might already know she’s here.”
The thought sent a chill down my spine.
What if they are already watching? What if they are waiting?
“That’s why we keep her close,” Zeus said. “That’s why Abyss doesn’t leave her side. If someone comes for her, we’ll be ready.”
“And if she tries to run?” Hyperion asked.
“She won’t,” I said, though I wasn’t sure I believed it. “She came here because she had nowhere else to go. She’s not going to leave unless she has a better option.”
“Or unless she gets desperate,” Hades added.
Desperate. That was what she was. I had seen it in her eyes during the interrogation.
The way she looked at me when Zeus assigned Abyss, like I betrayed her.
Maybe I had, but what choice did I have?
She wouldn’t tell me the truth. Wouldn’t let me in.
Wouldn’t let me help. All I could do was try to keep her alive long enough to figure out what the hell she had gotten herself into.
“There’s something else,” Apollo said quietly. He’d been silent most of the meeting, watching and listening like he always did. The chaplain. The conscience of the club.
“What?” Zeus asked.
“Alex isn’t just scared,” Apollo said. “She’s guilty. I saw it in her face. Whatever she’s running from, she thinks she deserves it.”
His words hit me like a punch to the gut.
Guilty.
What the hell had she done?
“You think she did something?” Caishen asked. “Something illegal?”
“I think she did something she regrets,” Apollo said. “And now she’s paying the price.”
“Or about to,” Hades muttered.
Zeus drummed his fingers on the table again, that slow, deliberate rhythm that meant he was thinking.
Planning. “Alright,” he said finally. “Here’s how we play this.
Abyss watches her. Coeus digs into her background.
Poseidon, you keep trying to get through to her.
She trusts you more than anyone else here.
If she’s going to open up to anyone, it’ll be you. ”
“She’s not going to open up,” I said.
“Try anyway.”
I nodded, even though I knew it was pointless.
“Everyone else,” Zeus continued, “keep your eyes open. If anything seems off. If anyone starts asking questions about Alex, if anyone new shows up in town. I want to know about it immediately.”
“What about the other clubs?” Hermes asked. “Should we reach out? See if anyone’s heard anything?”
Zeus hesitated. “Not yet. We don’t want to draw attention to her. But if it becomes necessary, we will.”
“And if it turns out she’s brought serious heat down on us?” Aries asked. “What then?”
The question hung in the air, heavy and dangerous. Zeus looked at me. “Then we deal with it. As a club. As a family.”
Family. The word should have been comforting.
Instead, it felt like a noose tightening around my neck.
Because I knew what it meant. Knew what the club would do if Alex’s trouble became their trouble.
They would protect her. They would fight for her.
But if it came down to a choice between her and the club?
The club would always win.
“Meeting adjourned,” Zeus said, getting to his feet. “Get to work. And, Poseidon, talk to your sister. Find out what the hell is going on before it’s too late.”
The officers filed out one by one, leaving me alone with Zeus and Hades.
“You think she’s in over her head?” I asked quietly.
Zeus looked at me, his expression unreadable. “I think she’s drowning. And I think she’s too proud to ask for help.”
“Sounds like someone else I know,” Hades said, glancing at me.
I ignored the jab. “What if we can’t save her?”
“Then we make sure whoever’s coming for her regrets it,” Zeus said simply.
It should have been reassuring, but it wasn’t. Because deep down, I knew the truth.
Alex had brought something dark to our door. Something dangerous. Something that was going to explode in all our faces if we weren’t careful. And the worst part? I had no idea how to stop it.
I walked out of church and into the hallway as my mind raced.
What are you hiding, Alex? What the hell did you do?
My phone buzzed in my pocket.
A text from Abyss.
Abyss: She’s in her room. Door’s closed. Hasn’t come out.
I stared at the message, frustration and fear warring in my chest. She was up there right now, probably planning her next move. Probably trying to figure out how to get around Abyss, around Zeus, around all of us. Because that was what Alex did.
She ran. She hid. She lied and she never, ever asked for help.
Not this time, I thought grimly. This time, you don’t get to run.
I shoved my phone back into my pocket and headed for the exit. Whatever trouble she brought home, whatever nightmare she was living in, I was going to find out.
Even if it killed me.
Even if it killed us both.