Page 177 of Cobra
Carter’s hand tightens around the phone. “You won?”
“I said it’s done,” Matteo replies. “The bid was accepted. Funds transferred. Confirmation received.”
My vision narrows. Funds transferred. Bid accepted. Confirmation received. Business words. Clean words. Words that make me want to put my fist through the desk again because every one of them means the same thing.
Olivia was sold.
The room doesn’t relax. No relief comes. Not from me. Not from anyone. Because sold does not mean safe. Sold does not mean home. Sold means the system processed her. Sold means some fucker behind a screen took payment for my woman like she was an item on a manifest.
My hand curls against my thigh. Not enough to shake. Enough to feel bone under skin.
Logan steps closer to the desk. “Where?”
Matteo pauses. Not long. Long enough to remind every man in this room he is giving information because he chooses to. “Inventory will be delivered to my residence tomorrow at ten p.m.”
Inventory.
The word changes the air.
Cain mutters, “Motherfucker.”
Blaze’s head drops for half a second, his hands braced against his hips, like he’s trying not to explode through his own skin.
Joker smiles. It’s the kind of smile that belongs nowhere near sane men.
I don’t move. I don’t speak. I take the information and set it where it goes.
Tomorrow. Ten p.m. Matteo’s residence.
A delivery. A transfer. A chance. A new battlefield.
Logan’s answer is immediate. “We’ll be there at nine.” Not a request. Not a suggestion. Command. That’s Logan. President. Father. Husband. Brother. He hears a location and builds force around it. It’s instinct. It’s what we do.
I’m already ahead of him in my head. Vehicles staged out of sight. Front perimeter. Rear entry. Snipers if the property allows it. Intercept the van before it reaches the gate. Kill the men. Cut her out. Burn whatever comes behind them.
“No,” Matteo says. One clean word.
The office turns hostile in the space of a breath.
Shadow’s head lifts.
Hammer’s eyes cut to the phone.
Blaze looks like he’s about to say something stupid enough to get us all in trouble.
Logan stills. “No?”
“No,” Matteo repeats, calmer than he should be. “You will not be at my home at nine. You will not be near my gates. You will not be visible from any route leading into my property.”
Carter’s voice sharpens. “You don’t give orders to this club.”
“If you want her alive, I do.”
Silence. Hard.
Every man in the room feels that one.
I step closer to the desk. Logan’s eyes flick to me, warning. I ignore him and look at the phone like Matteo can see me through it. “You explain that.”
