I laughed and held the phone tightly to my ear, wishing he were here with me. Wishing I didn’t have to do this without him. But the man who had helped give me life and the one who was my life didn’t need to be in the same room. It might explode.

  “I love you,” I said.

  “You are my life,” he replied.

  I felt tears sting my eyes.

  “He agreed to let you call me daily. He’s using a goddamn burner phone, and it’s untraceable. I can’t track you. Know I’ll move heaven and earth if you aren’t delivered to me in three days.”

  I wiped at the tears that had rolled down my cheeks. “I will be.”

  I was trusting Liam, and Blaise was trusting me. I knew he didn’t trust my father.

  “When you return, if I’ve not uncovered the fucking traitor, we will have to face that. I need it handled. It’s not safe for anyone here until it’s handled. What you are asking of me puts my people in danger,” Blaise said.

  He didn’t understand, and I couldn’t tell him. Gina wasn’t going to hurt any of them. She wasn’t hurting me. She just wanted me gone.

  “No one else is in danger. I would tell you if you were.”

  Blaise was silent a moment. I feared he had figured it out. My palms felt sweaty, and panic began to build in my chest. I hadn’t been careful enough.

  “Madeline, is it—”

  “NO, Blaise. Do not ask me who. I’ve figured out some things, and we need to talk about it. Do not kill anyone. They don’t deserve death.”

  He sighed heavily. “Fuck, the shit I do because you ask me to. At this rate, I’m going to be the worst damn boss in family history.”

  A laugh escaped me, and the pressure inside me lifted.

  “I love you too,” I replied.

  Twenty-Six

  Blaise

  I dropped my phone to the table and gripped the edges of it to calm my temper. Several deep breaths. I had to get control. She was alive, and although I didn’t fucking like admitting it, Liam wasn’t a danger to her. He was a danger to himself, however, because he had taken her from me.

  Lifting my gaze, my eyes locked with Huck’s.

  “It was Gina,” I told him, not needing confirmation from Madeline.

  Her determination to protect who had helped Liam’s men take her from me had made it real damn clear.

  “Maddy confirmed it?” he asked, looking as sick as I felt.

  I shook my head. “No. She won’t tell me. Says she needs to explain to me why they did it. She thinks she caused it. Fucking blames herself for it. She’s protecting her. If it were someone she didn’t know or didn’t trust, then she’d have told me. She doesn’t want me killing Gina.”

  Huck let out a heavy sigh. “Garrett won’t care what she says. He’s gonna do what the hell he wants. You can’t protect Gina from him. She’s betrayed the family.”

  I nodded. I knew this, and as fucking furious as I was with Gina, Madeline didn’t want her to die. It would destroy Madeline. How the hell did I keep this from happening? I wanted answers from Gina. I wanted to know why the fuck she’d done this, but if I asked and she admitted it, then she would be signing her death sentence. And I would be chancing Madeline never forgiving me.

  “We say nothing for now,” I told him.

  Huck nodded, but I could see what I already knew in his eyes. There was no way to save Gina from this. She’d chosen to do it, and in doing so, she’d taken her own life.

  “I take it, no one has hurt Maddy, if we aren’t heading out on a killing spree,” Huck said.

  I let go of the table I was gripping and stood up.

  We had checked into one of the hotels we owned in Miami moments before the call from Madeline came through. Huck had called off Gage, who would arrive here at any moment. I wasn’t leaving because I knew there was nowhere else that Liam would have taken her. Until recently, his world was here. All his clubs, his filming studio, and his prostitute ring. The one place I couldn’t locate was the damn MC headquarters. It was well hidden.

  “She asked for three days,” I told Huck. “She wants to know her father.”

  “We’ve watched him for weeks. He’s shady as fuck with business, but so are we. I’ve not seen anything that tells us he’s dirty,” Huck said.

  I nodded. “Yeah, I know. He’s not going to hurt her. She wants to stay. I can’t not let her have this. When she finds out I knew that her father was in Ocala and his exact location and didn’t tell her”—I shook my head—“she’s going to be fucking furious.”

  Huck shrugged. “She doesn’t have to know.”

  I hadn’t planned on telling her. My fear was that she’d figure it out on her own. Unless she was truly naive enough to believe I had just trusted a man with her safety and life after a five-minute phone conversation.

  Twenty-Seven

  Madeline

  Sleep hadn’t come easy last night. I had missed Blaise being beside me, the smell of him on the sheets, and sex. When I had fallen asleep, my dreams had been of him, and I’d woken up, aroused with no Blaise to fulfill me.

  It wasn’t until I stood up that the nausea came, and I spent some time over the toilet, then lying on the marble tiled floor with a cold cloth on my face. I knew I needed to eat something. A warm shower eased the tension from my shoulders, and I changed into the clothing Liam had brought in last night after the phone call with Blaise.

  I didn’t know what all had been said between the two men, but Liam seemed different. Today, I intended to ask my questions and start getting answers to my past.

  Finding food first was on my list. If I didn’t get some toast and maybe juice soon, the nausea would get worse.

  The pair of jean shorts were loose on me and hung on my hips. The T-shirt fit better. It was cut for a woman and was black with River Styx on the front in glittery red letters. I already knew this didn’t represent the River Styx in Greek mythology. Last night, I’d heard Liam tell Micah to go there.

  I was going to find out exactly what my father’s motorcycle club did for a living. I had a feeling it wasn’t exactly on the up-and-up.

  Slipping my feet into the sandals with heels I had worn yesterday, I headed for the door. I had no idea where to find Liam, but I figured I would start at the library. I had only taken a few steps when a door to my left opened, and a barely dressed woman with dark brown hair and bigger boobs than I had ever seen in my life stepped out. Her gaze met mine, and she did a quick check of my clothing before smiling.

  “Didn’t know we had a new girl,” she said. “Whose bed did you just crawl out of?” she asked with a smirk, nodding her head back at the door she’d just closed behind her. “I’ve had them all, but Tex is my favorite.” She lowered her voice as she said it.

  I opened my mouth to tell her that I hadn’t crawled out of anyone’s bed when another door opened behind us, and a blonde wearing a red halter top, a shiny white skirt that couldn’t cover her butt completely, and a pair of stilettos walked out of a room. Her boobs were equally huge.

  She looked from the brunette, then to me with a frown, then back to the brunette. “Who is she?”

  “No clue. She was out here already when I came out of Tex’s room,” the brunette told her. She then looked back at me. “I’m Amethyst. This is Dylan,” she told me before looking back at the blonde. “I thought you were done with Micah.”

  Dylan shrugged. “He was sweet last night.”

  Amethyst rolled her eyes. “Meaning he ate your pussy like a cat eating cream until you bounced on his dick.”

  The blonde flashed a smile. “He can eat pussy like no one else.”

  Amethyst shook her head and laughed. “I know. We all know. He eats them all.”

  Then, both females looked at me.

  “What’s your name?” Amethyst asked.

  “Madeline,” I replied. I started to tell them that Liam was my father, but Dylan gasped.

  “You’re Liam’s girl!” She seemed surprised.

  “No shit,” Amethyst said, looking at me more closely now.

  “Tell me, are you really fucking that hot Mafia boss? What’s his name? He’s a Hughes.” Dylan bit her bottom lip, like she wanted details.

  “Uh …” I started, but Amethyst held up her hand to stop me.

  “Don’t talk about it. Those bastards are fucked up. You want to live, you don’t talk about them.”

  Who were these women?

  “Besides, look at her. She’s as sweet as a damn sugar cube. Those men fuck like animals. She would be broken if a Hughes fucked her,” Amethyst said.

  I fought the urge to put a hand protectively over my still-flat stomach. No need to draw attention there. At that moment, my stomach growled.

  Both ladies looked at me.

  “I’ll show you to the kitchen on my way out. I’m sure one of the old ladies is already in there, cooking,” she said.

  That was a rude way to describe whoever was cooking for the people in this … club?

  The two women in front of me had to be prostitutes. They looked the part, but I would admit they were much more attractive than I imagined real prostitutes to be. Kind of like Pretty Woman. Maybe that movie wasn’t so far from reality as I had always thought.

  “God, I hope it’s Nina. She makes the best biscuits,” Dylan said.

  They began walking, so I decided if I wanted to eat, my best bet was to follow the two of them.

  When we started down the stairs, Dylan glanced back at me. “I’m surprised Liam didn’t post a guard at your door.”

  Frowning, I wondered if I needed one. Was there something to be afraid of here?

  “The boys are going to salivate all over themselves,” she added.

  I looked at the way her body curved in the right places, and her breasts were spilling from the top she was wearing. “I think they’ve got plenty to look at around here already.”

  She laughed then, tossing her head back, as if I were a comedian. “You don’t know much about men. Give them something sweet and innocent-looking with a face and body like yours, and they lose their damn minds,” she said. “Sure, they fuck us and enjoy our performances at the club. We fulfill sexual fantasies for them, but we aren’t innocent. We sure as hell don’t look sweet. They can’t teach us or own us.”

  I was stuck on performances. “What performances at the club?” I asked her.

  Amethyst paused at the bottom step. “You know nothing about your daddy, do you?” she asked me.

  “I’m here to fix that,” I replied honestly.

  She smiled at me. “We’re strippers.” She waved at Dylan. “And some of us also perform in adult movies. The Judgment owns five strip clubs, a film studio for the adult movies they produce, and a host of other things,” she replied. “Your daddy is the president.”

  The president? Of strippers and adult movies, which I was going to assume meant porn. I should have asked more questions last night.

  Did Blaise know this? God, I hoped he did and was okay with it. If he found this out after letting me stay, he might forget his promise not to kill people.

  “I, uh, didn’t know all that,” I admitted.

  She continued walking and I followed.

  “Liam’s gonna spank your ass for that,” Dylan warned Amethyst.

  “God, I hope he does,” she replied. “Lately, he only lets Demi in his bed.”

  Dylan groaned. “He’s gotta get bored with her eventually. Besides, she’s almost, like, thirty. She’s fucking old.”

  “Second-best thing is Micah.” Amethyst paused then and looked at me. “Micah is the VP—vice president. So, fucking him ranks. He’s had Dylan in and out of his bed for the past year.”

  So, that was what he had meant when he called Micah his VP last night.

  I wanted to cover my ears. These women had to be around my age, and they had sex with my father? Surely not. Almost thirty? How old was he? At least forty? Micah was much younger. I understood that. But my father? Ewww.

  “Kitchen is this way,” Amethyst said as she walked down another long hallway.

  They didn’t speak until we reached a red door.

  “I’m not eating, but I’m sure Dylan will join you. I’ve got to make sure my stomach is flat for tonight.”

  Dylan sighed as we walked into a big, bright kitchen. “It smells like fucking heaven,” she called out.

  The two women in the kitchen were not old. One might have been in her mid-thirties, but she was attractive. Dark blonde hair pulled up in a ponytail. Tight black shorts and a yellow halter top, tied just below her breasts. She was tanned and toned. The other lady, who looked up from the large pot she was stirring on the stove, had dark red hair cut into a bob, freckles. She was wearing a black tank top with a pair of white cutoff jean shorts that I could see some of her butt cheeks hanging out of. She might be thirty. Maybe. I saw no old ladies anywhere.

  “Nina, you’re a goddess,” Dylan said, walking over to the blonde, who had just set down a pan of biscuits.

  “If only all of us could eat like you and remain so thin,” the woman she’d called Nina replied before looking at me, smiling. “And you must be Madeline. Lord, you’re as gorgeous as Micah was carrying on about last night. Pres is gonna have his hands full with you around all these men.”

  Dylan reached for a biscuit and shot me a look. “Micah is a whore. Stay clear of him.”

  Nina looked at Dylan with a disgusted frown. “Says the girl who won’t get out of his bed.”

  Dylan shrugged. “I said he was a whore. Not that I wasn’t going to fuck him.”

  With a shake of her head, Nina looked back at me. “You are a vision, I swear to God.”

  “Thank you,” I said, feeling embarrassed by the compliments.

  “I’m Nina. My old man is Jars. He manages Strokes and didn’t get in until an hour ago. You’ll meet him later. This here”—she pointed to the redhead—“is Goldie. Her old man is Brick. You met him already.”

  Brick wasn’t old either. I had a feeling the terms old man and old lady didn’t mean actual age. I looked at Nina’s hand and saw a tattoo ring around her ring finger. Did that mean she was married? Perhaps, in biker lingo, that was the meaning of it. Like an old ball and chain?

  “These are the only two who have managed to claim one of The Judgment. They’re hard to nail down. But it ain’t stopping me from working on Micah,” Dylan said.

  Amethyst walked back into the room from the back and opened one of two large refrigerators and pulled out a bottle of water. “I’ve got to go,” she said, then looked at Dylan. “And Micah don’t want an old lady. You’ve got to let that shit go.”

  Dylan snarled at her as Amethyst left out the red door we had entered.

  “It’s true. He had one of those house whore’s tits in his face as she bounced on his cock right there on the sofa last night, then went up to see Pres. When he came back down, he was going on about this pretty thing right here when that slutty Tracy bitch came up to him, topless, and asked him to fuck her ass. Which he did before he left.”

  Dylan scowled and stood up. “Ugh. No more,” she said. “I need to go bleach my vagina.”

  “I agree!” Goldie called out as Dylan left behind Amethyst.

  “Now, what can I get you to eat? It’ll be a while before the boys all get down here. Long night,” Nina said.

  I wasn’t sure I had much of an appetite anymore after all that information I had not wanted.

  Had Micah actually done that to someone’s butt in front of everyone?

  “Try my cheese grits,” Goldie told me, putting a spoonful of what she had been stirring in the pot on a plate. “Pres loves them,” she assured me.

  Nina took the plate from her and placed a biscuit on it. “I’ve not started the bacon or sausage yet. We were gonna do eggs next.”

  I was thankful they weren’t doing the meat next. “This is good. I don’t want any of the meat. Thank you.”

  “We got some jelly and butter for that biscuit, if you’d like. What about coffee?”

  I felt bad, having them wait on me. I started to tell them I could fix it when the door opened behind me, and I turned to see Micah with disheveled hair, wearing a sleeveless white shirt and a pair of athletic shorts. He looked pissed until his gaze met mine, and then a slow grin spread across his face. I turned back to my plate of food. I didn’t want to look at that man.

  “Stop leering at her like she’s your next meal,” Nina scolded him.

  “I’d die and go to heaven if she was,” he drawled.

  “You’d die all right, but it wouldn’t be heaven you’d go to,” Goldie called out from the stove, and then she winked at me.

  “A taste of something that sweet, and eternity in hell would be worth it.”

  He was too close to me. Way too close.

  “Back off.” Nina waved a spatula at him. “Pres’s daughter. DAUGHTER. Plus, her man almost killed off Butch and Grinder last night.”

  I lifted my head then. “It wasn’t Blaise. It was one of his men,” I told her, needing to defend him.

  She shrugged. “Whoever it was, you are clearly important to the most dangerous bunch of fuckers I’ve ever heard of. No need to stir the nest.”

  “Look at her. I’m not violent, but I think I could become a killer myself if that was my hot piece of ass and someone took her from me,” Micah said, pulling out the stool beside me and sitting down. “Tell me, sweet thing, does he eat that pussy properly?”

  “For the love of God! Don’t talk to her like that!” Nina yelled at him. “Dylan just left here. Go grab her if you woke up horny.”

  Micah brushed the hair on my shoulder back and leaned too close to me. I froze.

  “She’s just so damn pretty. All sweet and sexy,” he said in a low voice as he moved closer to me.