Total pages in book: 26
Estimated words: 23332 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 117(@200wpm)___ 93(@250wpm)___ 78(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 23332 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 117(@200wpm)___ 93(@250wpm)___ 78(@300wpm)
Sure, he was my protector, my Dom. Sure, I knew he always knew best. But sometimes, I wanted to protect him, too.
So, as we took our seats next to each other at that big wooden table in the chapel where we held club meetings, also known as church, I didn’t tell William I felt nauseous that I was being targeted by an entire club for what he did to my piece of shit father. I didn’t tell him I could feel an anxiety attack climbing up my throat and tightening my chest. And I didn’t tell him that I was scared. Scared for him. Because I knew how William operated, and he’d put himself in the line of fire before he ever allowed someone to come after me.
The thought of losing William made me terrified. I was nothing without him. I needed him. He was my rock. The reason I felt like I was worthy of anything. Hell, he was the sole reason I got up each morning.
If not for him, I probably would have killed myself years ago.
“What’s going on?” Hyram asked as soon as he walked into the room, not even bothering to sit down before he started speaking.
I glanced at William, and I swallowed thickly when I found him already staring at me, his eyes narrowed and his brows furrowed. I quickly yanked my gaze away, keeping my expression schooled into one of calm. He had enough weight bearing down on his shoulders. I could handle my emotional upheaval.
I jumped, sucking in a sharp breath when William’s fingers suddenly wrapped around the back of my neck, his fingertips digging into the sides. Immediately, my shoulders dropped, his tight grip overtaking some of my anxiety. Malik met my gaze across the table, a frown pulling at his lips, but there was also a knowing look in his eyes.
If anyone in this clubhouse understood my need for William to own me, it was Malik. William was a doting Dom. Sure, he liked to fuck me like I was nothing more than a piece of ass he paid for, but he was loving and tender afterward, always taking extra care of me. Rurik, Malik’s husband, on the other hand? He truly was a monster—a psychopath that had to mask himself to pass as somewhat normal in regular society.
“Rico called me,” William rumbled, his hand never loosening its grip on my neck, even as I leaned back in my chair to take some strain off my tense back. “Apparently, Reynold Jasper kept doors open for the SDMC to transport cargo in and out of Mexico. With him dead, their doors are closed, which means no access anymore. My guess is people are spooked.”
“Targeting you, eh? Or targeting Chet?” Rurik asked, crossing his arms over his chest. He was dressed in his usual attire of a black button-down shirt and slacks just as dark. Every inch of exposed skin, apart from his face, was heavily inked with intricate tattoos that had to have cost him tens of thousands of dollars to have done.
“How the fuck did anyone find out?” Malachi asked. “We weren’t followed.”
“I was spotted,” William explained. “Rico was informed, said his informant wants to avoid someone else getting hurt in all of this bullshit after what happened to Malik.”
Rurik’s eyes darkened at the reminder of his husband being shot when the SDMC hired a hitman to take out the Russian Bratva’s Pakhan, Anatoly Balakin. Malik had seen what was happening at just the right moment—or the wrong moment, if you asked Rurik—and shoved Anatoly aside, taking the shot for him.
It damn near killed Malik, and Rurik went fucking feral, putting a literal chain around Malik’s neck that was held closed with a padlock. The padlock had a tracker inside of it, allowing Rurik to watch every single move Malik made. Rurik changed the tracker every thirty days, so he always knew where Malik was. Even now, that thick chain was wrapped around Malik’s neck. I hadn’t seen Malik without it since the moment Rurik wrapped it around his neck while Malik was unconscious in the hospital.
Every time I saw it, I wondered what it would be like if William collared me. We’d never discussed it, maybe because I was already his husband, something William had made sure of mere weeks after stepping into my life. But sometimes, I wanted to ask if it was a possibility for us—for me to wear William’s collar around my neck like Malik wore Rurik’s.
“The SDMC is—what?” Nolan, the club’s vice president—aka VP—asked, looking at William with hard, dark eyes. Nolan was former military, had served with Malachi overseas, and they both knew Shaw, the mother charter’s president, and Konrad, the mother charter’s VP, from their time in the service. “They’re targeting you?”
William shook his head before massaging the muscles along my neck. “Chet,” he answered. “But I’m not ruling out I’m a possible target.”