Page 127 of Cold Bastard
“Something worse.”
“Yeah.” I ran a hand through my hair, exhaustion pulling at the edges of my thoughts. “Sypher and Nav confirmed it. Their sections only show a few discrepancies. Whatever Arizona was doing, it wasn’t part of theSocietywar. It was independent. Coordinated. And I have no idea who he was working for or what his endgame was.”
Morpheus set the phone down on the desk, his expression darkening. “So we’ve got a second threat. One we didn’t see coming.”
“Looks that way.”
“Fuck.” He leaned back in his chair, his fingers drumming against the armrest. “What else did you find?”
This was the part I had been dreading. I took a breath, forcing myself to meet his gaze. “The storage facility computer was wiped clean.”
Morpheus went very still as he closed his eyes and shook his head. “Tell me she didn’t.”
“She did. It was the same program she used at the Pussycat to steal our money. I tried every recovery method I know and nothing. My gut’s telling me Arizona chose the storage facility because no one would think to look for him there. Whatever he had on that computer, she has it.”
The silence that followed was heavy, oppressive, like the air before a storm then out of the blue, Morpheus laughed. Threw his head back and laughed loudly. “Fuck me, Nano. You sure picked a fucking winner.”
I chose not to comment on that as he continued, “So let me get this straight. The thief who walked into the Prancing Pussycat and stole seventy-five-million dollars from us, walked out of our club, stole her brother’s bike, then waltzed right into that storage building, the same building where Arizona was going to kill Eros, and stole more money, and all the information on his computer, then killed Arizona and vanished into thin air, again?”
“Yeah,” I grumbled.
“And the only person who might know what Arizona was really doing, who he was working for, is your old lady, our thief, Alexandra.”
My chest tightened as a knot of dread twisted in my gut. I nodded. “Yeah.”
Morpheus leaned back in his chair, his expression shifting from amusement to something colder. More calculating. The kind of look that meant someone’s fate was being decided, and there wasn’t a damn thing they could do about it. “She killed Arizona,” he said quietly. “Saved Eros. Didn’t hesitate, didn’t blink. That makes her one of us, Nano. You understand that?”
I did. I understood exactly what he was saying. Alex had proven herself in the most brutal way possible. She’d killed to protect a brother. She’d chosen violence over escape, action over survival. She’d earned her place in this world through blood and fire.
But I also understood what came next.
“We need to know what Arizona was planning,” Morpheus continued, his voice flat and final. “We need to know who he was working for, what this separate operation is, and how deep it goes. King, Reaper, Montana—they are all asking the same questions. And the only person with answers is Alex.”
No.The word screamed through my head, but I didn’t say it out loud. Couldn’t. Because Morpheus wasn’t asking.
“I need you to find her,” he said, his eyes locking onto mine. “Bring her back. Whatever it takes.”
Whatever it takes.His words landed like a punch to the gut, knocking the air from my lungs. He was ordering me to hunt her. To track her down like prey. To drag her back here and force her to surrender everything she knew, everything she had stolen, everything she had become.
He was ordering me to become the monster again.
The predator who broke her in the first place.
“She’s your old lady. You claimed her in the Bastard way,” Morpheus added, as if that made it easier. As if claiming her gave me some kind of right to destroy her all over again.
“Morpheus—” I started, but he cut me off with a raised hand.
“This isn’t a request, Nano. This is an order. The Biker Federation is counting on you. If there’s a second threat out there, something separate from theSociety, then we need to know. And Alex is the only one who can tell us.”
I stared at him, my mind racing, my chest tight with a fury I couldn’t express. Because he was right. The Biker Federation needed answers. The Brotherhood needed answers. And Alex was the only person who had them. But, fuck, the cost. The cost of hunting her down. The cost of dragging her back here. The cost of forcing her to relive the nightmare she had barely escaped. The cost of proving to her that I was exactly what she had always feared.
A monster who would never let her go.
“What if she doesn’t want to come back?” I asked, even though I already knew the answer.
Morpheus’ expression didn’t change. “Then you make her understand she doesn’t have a choice. She’s one of us now, Nano. She killed for us. She bled for us. That means she belongs to us. To the Brotherhood, and we don’t let our own walk away.”
Fuck.I wanted to argue. Wanted to tell him he was wrong, that Alex had earned her freedom, that she deserved to disappear and never look back. But I couldn’t. Because he was right. She killed Arizona. She saved Eros. She proved herself in the most brutal, unforgiving way possible.
