CHAPTER 19
Face to Face
°°°
"Absolutely not."
Rhys's voice carried a flat, immediate certainty that Emery recognized instantly as the old pattern rising, fast and unthinking, the protective instinct that had once curdled into something closer to control.
She watched him catch himself almost as quickly as he'd said it, watched the visible effort of a man trying to walk back a reaction he knew, even as he was having it, wasn't entirely his to have.
The kitchen had gone tense in the space of that single sentence, the warmth of the morning's earlier triumph replaced by something harder and more fearful, and Emery made herself stay seated, stay calm, resisting the old instinct to soften the moment before it had a chance to actually resolve honestly.
"That's not — " He stopped, exhaled hard, started again. "I don't get a vote on whether you meet her at all. I know that. But I need you to hear how much this scares me before you decide, not after."
"I'm listening."
"She's tangled up with a crew that's been threatening you for weeks.
She could be setting a trap. She could be genuinely trying to help and still get you hurt just by association, because if Salazar finds out she talked to you, there's no telling what they do to either of you.
" His hands had curled into fists on the table, some old operational fear visibly warring with the promise he'd made her.
"I want to be there. Not controlling it.
Just there, close enough to help if something goes wrong. "
Emery considered that, turning it over with the same care she'd give a genuine business decision rather than a fight to win.
"If you're there, she doesn't show. She was explicit about alone, and given everything you've told me about how she feels about you, I don't think that's paranoia.
I think it's practical. She's not going to hand me anything useful with you standing behind me. "
"I know." He said it like the admission cost him something physical. "I know that's probably true. I hate it, but I know it."
"I'll take precautions. Public place, broad daylight, my phone on and recording the whole time, and I'll text you the second I'm walking in and the second I'm walking out.
" She reached across the table, covering his fisted hand with her own until she felt it slowly uncurl beneath her palm.
"This is exactly the kind of moment you promised me you'd handle differently.
Not deciding for me. Just telling me you're scared, and trusting me to make the call anyway. "
He was quiet for a long moment, and she watched the war finish playing out behind his eyes — old instinct against new practice, fear against the promise he'd made on a porch two weeks ago that felt, now, like it belonged to a different lifetime already.
"Okay," he said finally, the word costing him visibly. "Okay. Text me the second you're in. And the second you're out. And if you go more than ten minutes without checking in, I'm coming, and I don't care what that does to whatever she's willing to tell you."
"Deal."
~ ~ ~
Sasha had chosen a diner on the edge of town, the kind of place with vinyl booths and a menu that hadn't changed in twenty years, busy enough with the lunch crowd that no conversation there would draw particular attention.
Emery spotted her in a back booth before Sasha spotted her — a woman younger than she'd expected, tired around the eyes in a way that spoke to more than one bad month, nursing a cup of coffee she clearly wasn't drinking.
Emery had pictured Sasha a dozen different ways over the past weeks, in the private, unguarded moments when the imagining couldn't be helped — glamorous, or cold, or triumphant in some way that would make hating her simple and satisfying.
The woman in the booth was none of those things.
She looked, more than anything, exhausted, her shoulders curved inward in the posture of someone who'd spent a long time being smaller than she actually was.
"You came," Sasha said, when Emery slid into the booth across from her.
"You said you had information. I'm here for that. Not for anything else."
Something flickered across Sasha's face — hurt, maybe, or the tired exhaustion of a woman who'd expected exactly this kind of coldness and was disappointed to have it confirmed anyway. "Fair enough. I probably don't deserve anything softer than that."
"Why did you call me instead of just disappearing? You could have walked away from all of this months ago."
"I tried." Sasha wrapped both hands around her coffee cup, not drinking, just holding it.
"Salazar doesn't let people walk away once they've been useful.
I gave them information about the club — about Rhys, about the marriage falling apart, things I knew because I'd been stupid enough to get close to him for exactly the wrong reasons — and once I'd given them that, I stopped being someone they were interested in keeping happy and started being someone they could use again whenever it suited them. "
"You're saying you're a victim in this too."
"I'm saying it's complicated, and I'm tired of everyone deciding I'm simple.
" Something sharp entered Sasha's voice, old anger finally surfacing.
"I made a choice getting involved with a married man.
That's on me, and I'm not asking you to forgive it or feel sorry for me about it.
But everything after that — the information, the leverage, your niece showing up at my motel room scared out of her mind — none of that was ever something I actually wanted.
It's just what happens when you make yourself useful to people who don't care what happens to you once they're done. "
Emery felt something complicated rise in her chest, not quite sympathy, not quite the cold dismissal she'd walked in braced to maintain — something more like recognition, the specific, uncomfortable understanding of a woman who'd also learned, once, how expensive it could be to make yourself small and useful in service of someone else's approval.
"What information," Emery said finally. "What do you actually know that's worth me sitting here."
Sasha glanced around the diner once, an old habit of checking who might be listening, before she leaned forward slightly.
"Salazar's not as united as they want the club to think.
There's a split forming — some of the older guys think this whole push against the Cades is too aggressive, too likely to bring real heat down on the whole operation.
The ones pushing hardest are a smaller faction, younger, led by a guy named Ruiz who wants to make a name for himself.
If you can drive a wedge between Ruiz's faction and the rest of the leadership, you don't just slow this down.
You might actually stop it, because the rest of them don't want this fight badly enough to keep backing him once it starts costing them something real. "
"How do I drive that wedge?"
"I don't know exactly. That's not my area.
" Sasha's mouth twisted, something bitter in it.
"But I know Ruiz is the one who sent the man to follow you.
I know he's the one pushing the timeline up.
If something happens that makes him look reckless instead of strong — if the rest of the leadership starts seeing him as a liability instead of an asset — I think this whole thing could collapse a lot faster than anyone expects. "
Emery absorbed that, turning it over with the same careful attention she'd give any piece of information that might actually matter, cataloguing the shape of it against everything else she'd learned this month.
"Why are you telling me this," she asked again, needing the answer even though some part of her already suspected it.
"Because I'm done being useful to people who see me as disposable.
" Sasha met her eyes directly, something raw and unguarded finally surfacing.
"And because, whatever I did, whatever I was to Rhys for those few stupid months — I never actually wanted anyone to get hurt over it.
Not you. Not that girl who showed up at my door scared half to death.
I need this to be over as much as anyone does, and this is the only leverage I actually have left to make that happen. "
They sat with that for a moment, the diner's ordinary lunch noise continuing around them, and Emery found herself, unexpectedly, believing her.
"Thank you," Emery said finally. "For telling me. I know it probably wasn't easy to make this call."
"Don't thank me." Sasha's voice had gone rough. "I don't deserve it, and we both know it. Just use what I gave you. That's all I want out of this."
"Can I ask you one more thing?" Emery watched Sasha's guarded expression, choosing her next words carefully. "Do you regret it? Him, I mean. Any of it."
Sasha was quiet for a long moment, turning her cold coffee cup slowly on the table.
"Every single day. Not because he wasn't — I don't know.
Kind, in his way, for the little time it lasted.
But because I knew what he was walking away from every time he came back to me, and I let myself not think about it, because thinking about it too hard would have meant admitting what I actually was in that story.
" She looked up, something raw in her eyes.
"I'm not telling you that so you'll feel sorry for me.
I'm telling you because I think you deserve to know that whatever it looked like from the outside, it was never simple, and it was never something either of us should be proud of. "
Emery absorbed that, feeling something in her chest settle into a strange, unexpected peace — not forgiveness for Sasha exactly, but the quiet relief of finally hearing the affair described honestly, without excuse or drama, by the one person who could speak to it from the other side.
Emery left the diner fifteen minutes later, her mind already working the new information, already starting to see the shape of a plan forming around this single, crucial piece of leverage — a faction, a name, a weakness that could be exploited without a single shot fired.
She texted Rhys the moment she was back in her truck, walking out now, I'm fine, and started the engine, already composing in her head how she'd explain everything Sasha had told her.
She was three blocks from the diner when her phone rang, Rhys's name on the screen, and she answered it already smiling, ready to share what she'd learned.
"Em, where are you right now, exactly."
The tightness in his voice registered a half second before the words did, and her smile faded. "Driving back. Why?"
"You went alone." It wasn't a question. His voice had gone low and controlled in the specific way that told her, immediately, that whatever calm he was managing was costing him everything he had.
"I know I said I'd let you. I know that was the deal.
But Em, I just found out — Ghost just told me — Ruiz had two of his people watching that diner today.
Not Sasha's people. His. If something had gone wrong in there, if he'd decided you leaving with information he didn't want you having was worth the risk of grabbing you in broad daylight — "
"But nothing happened. I'm fine, Rhys."
"This time." His voice cracked slightly on the words, fear finally breaking through the careful control.
"This time you're fine. I need you to understand that I am not okay right now, Em.
I kept the promise. I let you go. And I have never in my life been more scared doing the right thing than I was sitting in that kitchen for forty-five minutes waiting for you to text me that you were out safe. "
She pulled the truck over, some instinct telling her this conversation deserved her full attention rather than half of it split with the road.
"I hear you. I do. And I'm not going to pretend the fear wasn't real, or that Ruiz having people watching that diner isn't genuinely terrifying to sit with.
But Rhys — I need you to also hear that it worked.
I got real information. Information that might actually end this faster than anything the club's tried so far. "
"I know." He exhaled hard, and she could picture him exactly, standing in his kitchen with his free hand braced against the counter, working to steady himself the way she'd watched him do a dozen times these past weeks.
"I know it worked. I'm proud of you and terrified for you in the same breath, and I don't know how to hold both of those at once without it feeling like I'm failing at one of them. "
"You're not failing at either." Her voice softened, some of the day's adrenaline finally draining into something gentler.
"You let me go. You didn't follow me, didn't call Ghost to tail me without telling me, didn't do any of the things the old version of you would have done without a second thought.
That's not failing, Rhys. That's exactly what you promised, held even when it cost you something enormous to hold it. "
He was quiet for a moment, and when he spoke again his voice had steadied, though something raw still lived underneath it.
"Come home. Not the guest room tonight. I don't care where you sleep, I just need to actually see you, put my hands on you and confirm you're real, before I can stop replaying the last two hours in my head. "
"I'm coming," she said. "Ten minutes."