Page 54 of Colt
“I know so. They’ve got you now. And Lilac. And Bea, who apparently thinks they’re the most adorable kids she’s ever worked with.” Something softened in his expression. “Said Luca reminds her of me—too serious for his own good.”
I laughed despite myself. “She’s not wrong.”
Dutch appeared in the doorway. “You two ready?”
We were. The others filtered into church behind us—Handful still mid-conversation with someone in the common room, Glitch with his laptop already under his arm. Dutch took his seat at the head. Me on his right. Holden and Handful across from me. Glitch at the far end, screen already open. Just like always.
Holden spread the map on the table.
He walked them through it clean—primary route, secondary, tertiary. Same thing he’d walked me through, only faster. No detours between the easy parts and the complicated ones. He pointed to the dead zone notation and nodded at Glitch, who confirmed the repeater solution without looking up from his screen.
“First facility only,” Holden said. “We assess, Colt writes the preliminary scope, we come home. Two nights.” He looked at Dutch. “Once we have the baseline on the first site, the other two go faster.”
Dutch looked at me. “You ready to move on this?”
I’d been asked that before. Months ago, in this same room, with that same neutral tone. He’d told the table Louisville moved when I was ready, and nobody had argued. The club had just waited.
That wasn’t nothing.
Things weren’t perfect. Lilac still didn’t have her memories back. The boys were still working through things I couldn’t fix with presence or promises alone. But we were somewhere different than that afternoon outside the school when I’d stood on that sidewalk with my brothers and acted like a fucking idiot.
But she was letting me show up now. The boys were asking to come back to the clubhouse. And Dutch would make sure all three of them were looked after while I was gone—Lilac, Luca, Knox. I didn’t have to ask for it. I didn’t have to spell it out. That was just how it worked when you had brothers worth having.
“Ready,” I said.
“End of next week.” Dutch looked around the table. “This is what the Montana runs built—the contracts, the legitimate wing, everything we’ve been working toward. We move on Louisville clean.” He closed the folder. “Questions?”
Handful had already turned to a second page. Nobody spoke.
Dutch nodded once. That was it.
Men started moving for the door.
I stayed in my chair.
The boys were getting help. And Lilac too. That was good—no, that was fucking necessary. But therapy meant digging into the past. It meant asking questions about what haunted their dreams.
What happened when those questions led back to the Death’s Head clubhouse? Back to the night that had stolen Lilac’s memories?
I looked up. Dutch was still at the head of the table, watching me with that knowing look he got when he could read every thought running through my head.
Yeah. We weren’t out of the woods yet. Not even close.
Chapter 20
?
— Lilac —
Bea’s office was quieter than I expected. I’d pictured something clinical—a couch, a box of tissues, framed diplomas spaced at exact intervals. Instead it was warm. Deep green walls, a low bookshelf crammed with actual books, two chairs angled toward each other like the room was arranged for conversation rather than examination. No couch. No tissues that I could see.
“The boys are doing well,” Bea said, settling into her chair with her notebook closed in her lap. She didn’t open it. I got the sense she’d already read whatever she’d written and didn’t need it. “Better than I’d expected, honestly.”
I wrapped both hands around the mug she’d handed me at the door—coffee from a small French press on the shelf behind her desk, not a therapy prop, just coffee—and let out a breath. “That’s good to hear. Luca seemed lighter this week.”
“He’s carrying less.” Bea tilted her head slightly. “The nightmares haven’t stopped, but they’ve changed. He’s starting to be able to talk about them when I ask instead of going silent. That’s a meaningful shift.”
“And Knox?”
