Chapter Six
Nadia
My fingers itch to fidget with the dog tags wrapped around my neck. A nervous tick that was taken care of. I can control everything about myself: body language, microexpressions, emotions. But for whatever fucked up reason, he makes me lose my control.
He’s a weakness.
“His headlights are tweakin’.” Deck says.
“No.” I sit up, recognizing the familiar alphabet.
“He’s spelling out my name in Morse code,” I admit, shoulders sagging.
“Fuck him. Say the word, and we’re outta here.” Deck assures.
“That would just delay the inevitable.” I unbuckle my seatbelt.
“Nadia-”
“It’s fine, Deck. Go home. Check on Isla. I’ll let you know when I’m at Pop’s.” I step out of the car.
“Just… be careful. He’s more unhinged than you remember.” Deck warns.
“No, he’s more unhinged than you remember.”
I gently close the door and leisurely make my way over to the Acura. As soon as I get the passenger door open, Deck drives off, knowing better than to
linger when there could be more Phantoms waiting to get him alone.
Easily, I slide it, buckle up, and stare out the windshield.
Acting aloof. Like the tobacco and amber scent about him doesn’t electrify my nervous system.
Like my body isn’t attuned to his every move.
I spent years of my life studying Riven Devereaux.
I had to know him better than I knew myself.
At first it was about survival, until it became something more.
He doesn’t speak, but I don’t either. I know this game. Him so desperately wanting to break my control. To chip at the ice that acts like my armor. He’s sorely mistaken if he thinks that after all this time, I’m the same girl he once knew.
But then again, he isn’t the same boy I knew either.
“So, you disappear for two years, come back, and now you’re gonna act like we’re strangers?”
“We’re far from strangers, but a lot can happen in two years.” I retorted.
“Don’t I know it.” He reaches out to touch me, but is quick to resist that urge. I still don’t look at him.
“We gonna sit here in silence all night or you gonna tell me what you want?” I ask after he doesn’t continue.
“You couldn’t handle what I want.” I stop breathing.
“Not yet, at least.” He shifts into first gear and takes off.
I know exactly where he’s taking me. Phantom territory, obviously, but closer to the edge where they border the south side of Stonebridge.
Back in the day, Stonebridge had four gangs.
LBC, Phantoms, Kingsmen, and the Scorpions.
The Scorpions were big, and they had turf from here in Stonebridge all the way to Briarwood, a small town in Canada.
Pop would tell us stories of the violence that took place during that era.
It was a dark time where people would literally die in the street, and no one would bat an eye.
That’s how Pop lost his son, Callahan. He was on a job for Pop, but he was called home the second he heard his girlfriend Bevie was in labor.
She was staying with Cal at Pop’s house.
Just as Cal got home, the Scorpions drove up and shot him to death 27 times right there on the steps of his childhood home.
Abby doesn’t know this, but the gunshots started going off the second she was delivered.
Callhan never got to hold his baby girl.
She was delivered right there by Pop’s sister Eileen, who was a nurse at the time.
When Bevie found out, she was heartbroken.
Killed herself two days later in the bathroom of the very room she had Abby.
Pop later found out that while it was a Scorpion who killed his son, it was the Phantoms who gave them the information on his whereabouts. Pop went feral after that. A temporary alliance was formed between him and the Kingsmen, and together they scorched the south side. The Scorpions are
nothing but a cautionary tale now, and no one even dares to live on the south side. JC was one of the few lives that were spared, an innocent orphan abused by the system.
To this day, I have no idea why Pop never went after the Phantoms. That was one of the only things he never trusted me enough to tell me.
But on the border of the two territories is a clubhouse that only Riven and his inner circle have access to. And that’s exactly where he’s taken me. A simple three-story home with exposed brick and a wraparound porch.
The minute he cuts the engine, I hop out. My eyes connect with Hatchie’s, who’s one of four sitting around the fire pit in the yard.
“What the fuck?” He exclaims, dropping the blunt he was rolling. Skylar pouts at the discarded weed, eyes lifting and finding me. A huge smile lifts her lips before she gets up, sprints over, and jumps on me.
“Nadia!” She shouts in my ear, arms squeezing me tight. Shane chuckles at both the scene and Hatchie and Roxy’s bewildered expressions. Riven keeps walking.
“My eardrums are ringing,” I tell her deadpan. She gets off and gives me a once-over.
“Goddamn, you look even finer than you were before.” Once she finishes her inspection, she drags me over to the pit.
“Isn’t she our enemy? Why the fuck is she here?” Hatchie questions. Skylar rolls her eyes.
“Excuse him; we haven’t had a chance to catch him up on things. He isn’t a freshie, but he might as well be. All he’s good for anyway is rolling tight blunts for me.”
“That’s not what Ow!” Hatchie rubs his neck, right where Shane just hit him.
“Don’t even think about finishing that sentence, Hatchie.” Shane narrows his eyes. “He isn’t wrong, though. Why’s she here?” All eyes move to Roxy. She’s sitting back on her hands, eyes lit by two fires. The one in front of her and the fire of her hatred towards me.
“Nadia is family. Before you two were even here, it was me, Skylar, Riven, and Nadia. I know it’s complicated and she’s part of LBC, but just trust me.” Shane placates.
“And if you don’t trust Shane, trust Riven. Might I remind you that he’s your leader and the one who brought her here.” Skylar adds.
“Whatever.” Roxy rolls her eyes and walks off, presumably to find wherever the hell Riven fucked off to.
“Don’t mind her. She’s just been… going through a lot.” Skylar pulls me to sit next to her.
“Don’t care. It’s not my problem.” “She just… she’s… protective of Riven.” She explains. I stay silent.
“You know, when you left, he was spiraling. He was in really bad shape, Nadia. And then we got Hatchie-” She smiles at the idiot in question.
“And Roxy came along not too long after. She and Riven were both two very broken souls who leaned on each other to get by. So, tonight when you made your surprise return after two years of no contact-” She glares at me.
“He crawled closer to the edge of his sanity. Roxy saw that, of course, and saw that you were the reason, so-”
“So, she decided to insert herself into something that has nothing to do with her.” I surmise. It’s their turn to stay silent.
“Or maybe-”
I watch Roxy climb down the steps of the house back to the fire pit; only now she has Riven’s leather jacket hanging off her shoulders.
“It is her business.” I finish just before she reclaims her seat.
“Riven’s calling you.” She haughtily informs me, checking her nails.
Shane and Skylar tense beside me, expecting the worst from me.
When we were younger, I probably would’ve reacted poorly.
Said something equally as catty or threatened her with bodily harm for provoking me.
But that was the old me. As much as that woman would love to come out to play, I keep my cool.
Besides, if Riven thinks he can summon me through his new bitch and I’ll let him get away with it, he’s got another thing coming. Choosing peace, I stand, dust my jeans off, and saunter towards the clubhouse.
“He’s in his bedroom. It’s on the second floor, last-”
“Don’t bother. I’m very familiar with his bedroom.” I don’t cast her a glance as I let the innuendo soak my words.
Yeah, I know exactly where his room is. I’ve had to drag him there and nurse him back to health far too many times.
Been there more times than necessary, crossing lines I had no right crossing.
I take my time, carefully shutting the front door and creeping up the stairs.
My pace is unhurried, but loud enough so that he knows I’m here.
I stare at the last door on the right for all of a second, not allowing myself an anxious reprieve, and march right through it.
The door slams shut behind me, and I lean back against it, palms behind me pressing into the wood. Riven sits there on the foot of his bed, creasing the dark sheets with his elbows on his knees. His eyes stare intently at me. He lifts two fingers on his right hand and makes a crooking motion.
“Come here.” The rasp of his voice elicits chills to dance down my spine.
After all these years, he still manages to unnerve me.
“Make me.” I tilt my head tauntingly.
A brief smirk crosses his face before he’s up and stalking towards me.
I may be a predator, one of the worst to come by, but he’s the apex.
Always dominating the food chain and reveling in my submission.
I never gave it to him, but there was a fleeting moment there when I did let him carry my burdens on his shoulders.
Until I didn’t anymore and had to erase those burdens myself.
How foolish I was not to realize that I was only making space for new ones to fester.
Resting his hands on either side of my face, he cages me in.
Ensuring the only thing I hear is my racing heartbeat.
The only thing I smell is his cologne. The only thing I can feel is the heat emanating from his body.
The only thing I can see is the warring emotions in his eyes.
He consumes each and every one of my senses.
And he’s looking at me like the only thing he wants me to taste is his lips.
He slants his head just the slightest bit, pressing a searing kiss to the place where my neck meets my collarbone.
Moving upward, he presses another to my neck, one beneath my ear, and another on the skin of my jaw, scandalously close to my mouth.
Just as he tilts his head to kiss me, like I’m his to kiss in the first place, I turn away, desperately trying to control my breathing. I can’t let him see what he does to me.
I just can’t.
“What?” He purrs devilishly.
“Can’t I get a kiss from my wife ?”