Chapter 23 #4
Every few seconds, her eyes swept the room, cataloging exits and entrances, counting guards, measuring distances.
Habits that had kept her alive in the Boundary, now automatic as breathing.
Two main exits, both heavily monitored. Four emergency doors with alarm systems. Twenty-three displayed security personnel positioned throughout the club, all in black with subtle earpieces that betrayed their purpose.
Fifteen more security dressed like patrons.
Six cameras visible in the main space, likely dozens more hidden.
And not a single clear path to freedom.
The bartender—a willowy woman with a simple silver mask that marked her as service class—kept her distance, approaching only when Shadera’s glass emptied. The other patrons did the same, creating a bubble of isolation around her that felt both protective and suffocating.
“Try to have a little fun.” Greyson’s voice materialized behind her as his arm swept over her shoulder and set another glass in front of her. “You look like you’re planning a massacre rather than enjoying a night out.”
She didn’t bother looking up at him. “Maybe I am.”
“Targeting anyone in particular?” There was a lightness in his tone she wasn’t used to hearing, almost teasing. He slipped to her side and leaned casually against the bar.
“I haven’t decided yet,” Shadera replied, taking the fresh drink. “But you’re definitely in the fucking running.”
A sound escaped him—a laugh. A genuine laugh. The cadence of it was so warm Shadera finally turned to look up at him. His mask seemed less menacing in this lighting, its shadows softened by the club’s ambient glow. His posture had changed too, some of the rigidness in his shoulders loosening.
“Are you drunk?” she asked, surprise evident in her voice.
Greyson tilted his head. “If I am?”
“Then good thing you have a driver, because I am nowhere near sober.”
There it was again. That fucking laugh.
“I’m going to go find Callum,” he said, leaning closer so she could hear him over the music. “He’s either in his office or his apartment over the club. Will you be all right for a few minutes?”
Shadera raised a brow even though he couldn’t see it. “I think I can handle this gaggle of drunken idiots.”
His hand ran down her bare back as he leaned across the bar and she froze.
He didn’t even seem to notice he was touching her, like this was something he always did, something natural between them.
She swallowed hard, forcing herself not to lean into his touch, not to bask in the warmth his fingers sent trickling up her spine.
Greyson’s other hand came back over the bar with a bottle in tow, and he set it down in front of her. “The bartender seems to be scared of you, and I did promise you could drink to your heart’s content.”
His hand disappeared from her back and she thanked God he moved away from her before she could protest the loss.
New rule after tonight, she thought to herself, as she downed the liquid in her glass then unscrewed the bottle. She was no longer allowed to drink around Greyson Serel.
She watched as he strode away from her, threading through the crowd with ease.
The bodies parted for him, recognition and fear creating a path as he headed for the staircase in the back of the room.
Before he could ascend, a woman materialized from the crowd, intercepting him with the confidence of someone who knew they belonged in his orbit.
Even from a distance with liquor hazed eyes, Shadera could tell she was beautiful.
Her dress—deep blue and cut so low in the front it bordered on scandalous—clung to a perfect figure, the shimmering fabric catching light with every movement.
Her mask was a masterpiece of silver filigree and sapphires, framing eyes that seemed to laugh even from across the room.
She stepped directly into Greyson’s path, one hand landing on his chest with familiarity. Her head tilted up toward him. Whatever she said made Greyson pause, his posture shifting subtly as he replied.
The woman’s hand slid from his chest to his shoulder, then around to the back of his neck, the touch lingering, possessive. She leaned closer, her body curving toward his like a flower seeking the sun. There was history in that gesture, in the way she claimed his space like she owned it.
Shadera’s grip tightened around the bottle, an unwelcome heat flaring in her chest. It wasn’t jealousy—it couldn’t be jealousy. That would require caring, and she couldn’t give less of a fuck who Greyson touched or who touched him.
Yet her eyes remained fixed on them, watching as the woman’s fingers slid over his body, tracing patterns on Greyson’s arm, her laughter carrying faintly above the music. Greyson hadn’t stepped away, hadn’t created distance. But he hadn’t touched her back either, hadn’t leaned toward her.
Then his head turned, eyes finding Shadera’s through the crowd. Shadera quickly looked away, bringing the bottle to her lips and taking a large swallow.
When she risked another glance, the woman had linked her hand through Greyson’s and was leading him up the stairs. They disappeared around the curve of the staircase and her teeth clenched.
“Who was that woman?” she asked, leaning over the bar so the woman behind it could hear her without yelling? “The one with the Executioner.”
The bartender didn’t bother looking up at her as she crushed a lemon for a drink. “Maya, she’s a regular.”
“Maya,” Shadera muttered under her breath as she turned back to the crowd, the name bitter on her tongue. She took another drink. “A regular. Of course.”
Shadera pushed away from the bar, bottle in hand, and turned toward the dance floor.
The crowd seemed to pulse with the music, a living entity of masked faces and swaying bodies.
She could disappear into it, could find someone for herself, someone to help her forget, if only for a moment, the nightmare that her life had become.
She took two steps toward the dance floor when a hand closed around her upper arm, jerking her backward with unexpected force. She twisted, swaying on her feet, alcohol sloshing over her hand as she prepared to unleash hell.
But the words died in her throat, the liquor making her tongue heavy as she found herself staring at the reflective faceplate of a Veyra officer. Her heart stuttered, then raced. The Veyra weren’t supposed to be in here. Greyson told her his father’s men weren’t allowed in Callum’s clubs.
Before she could speak, the officer pulled her away from the crowd, toward a door marked with a small red light—an anti-scan room, where the Heart elite could conduct business without fear of surveillance.
She jerked against his grip, but his fingers only tightened, digging into her flesh hard enough to bruise.
“Let go of me,” she hissed as the music swelled, drowning her voice beneath its relentless beat.
She didn’t have any weapons. Didn’t have anything to protect herself. She’d have to fight her way out of this.
No one around them seemed to notice or care. To them, she was just another patron being escorted away by security. No one would intervene, not against a Veyra officer, not for a woman wearing a skull mask that marked her as something outside their carefully ordered world.
The officer shoved her through the door into the anti-scan room, following immediately after.
The door closed behind them with a pneumatic hiss, sealing out the noise of the club and plunging them into relative quiet.
The room was large, with soundproofed walls and a single recessed light that cast everything in a dim blue glow.
Shadera spun to face him, fury replacing fear. She wasn’t going quietly, wasn’t going to be another victim of the Veyra’s brutality against women. If he wanted to take her, he’d have to kill her.
“Touch me again and I’ll tear your fucking throat out,” she snarled, dropping into a fighting stance.
The officer tilted his head, regarding her through that expressionless faceplate. He chuckled—a low, familiar sound that stopped her heart in her chest.
Then, the next thing she heard was Jameson’s voice.
“Did you miss me?”