Page 24 of Pain

I didn’t feel like justifying myself to anyone else. Not right now.

The problem was I wasn’t positive whether I was doing the right thing here. Or rather... Well, I was sure that helping Saraya was the right thing. But I didn’t know if I was doing it for the right reasons. On the surface, if I was being purely rational, I should have been on board with Gemini’s reading of the thing. Keeping Saraya around was risky as hell, in a number of ways. Even if I sent her on her way, I’d risked the club just by bringing her here. Helping her in any way would be seen as baiting Devil and his crew, and if I did what I truly wanted to do—keep her here and make her a part of our club to protect her—it would turn into something very big and potentially very, very damaging.

It would turn into war.

Of course, then there was the other side of that coin. Devil had wanted a war with me ever since he’d left my club. Longer than that, actually. He’d wanted a war with me before I went to jail.

He was, after all, the one who had set me up and sent me there. And if that wasn’t a declaration of war, I didn’t know what was.

He’d been trying to start something with me ever since then. Was anyone really going to be surprised if he finally found a reason to buckle down and get to it?

I fell into the recliner in my room and leaned back, staring at the ceiling as I let my brain process the information.

No, I decided, no one could be surprised if we went to war against each other. Devil had been aiming at this exact thing ever since he started his crew. They’d been a thorn in our side for years, undermining us at every opportunity and trying to goad us into reacting.

This was where we’d been headed. We were always going to end up here, unless one of us got killed before the other found a reason to declare war.

If Saraya was going to be the reason it happened, then so be it.

Because if we were going to go to war, I didn’t think there was a better reason out there than Saraya Post.

There was what he’d done to her, first of all. The way he’d beaten her up and allowed his men to do the same. That alone would have given me the motivation to go after him. You didn’t treat any woman that way, and especially not a woman you claimed as your own. A woman you claimed to care for—or who you were supposed to watch after.

Yes, I would have attacked him for that, and I was willing to bet most of our allies would have backed me up. Devil Davis had made his bed in that regard the moment he first hit her, and unless he was incredibly blind, he must know that.

Then there was how I felt about her, and that was something entirely different. Something entirely more dangerous. I’d never kept a girl by my side for long in the past—certainly not long enough to feel like there might be any future in it—so I’d never had anyone I’d felt I had to protect. Sure, I felt a certain sense of responsibility for the girls in the club—particularly Mandy—but that was something different.

Those girls belonged to someone else. They were just all under my umbrella.

But looking down at Saraya on that sidewalk yesterday... seeing the tears streaking the dirt on her face and the sheer terror in her eyes... hearing her beg me to help her...

It had sent something crawling through my body that I didn’t understand. Something dark and possessive and more overwhelming than anything I’d ever felt before.

And I hadn’t been able to see past it.

It had gotten even worse when she told me what had happened, and when she stood there in front of my club and recited it again, then told them that she wanted revenge, it had brought a thrill of pride to my heart.

These weren’t things I was supposed to feel about a girl who didn’t belong to me. Who did, in fact, belong to someone else. But that didn’t change the fact that I felt them.

It also didn’t change the fact that those feelings were blocking out any rational thought I might have had about the situation. I couldn’t deny that I was attracted to her and had somehow become possessive over her. I also thought I’d seen those emotions echoed in her eyes. I hadn’t imagined the way she shivered when I touched her.

But was any of it real?

Did it matter if it was?

Tomorrow, I’d go to Devil and lay out a challenge that might cost me my life. It might cost Saraya hers. Was any of that worth it?

Would it be better to just let her go her own way and avoid the danger?

A scream suddenly echoed through the hallway outside, and I jumped, glancing at the clock to see that I’d already been in my room for three hours, just thinking. Shit. Everyone else would already be in bed—including Saraya, who’d been given a room of her own in the living quarters of the clubhouse.

Who the hell was still awake to scream?

Another hoarse scream followed the first, and I was up and running for the door without another thought. It didn’t matter what time it was or who might be screaming. All that mattered was that we’d already been attacked once today, and the people under this roof were my responsibility.

I yanked open my door and paused, trying to keep my own breathing quiet so I could hear anything that was going on. There were no more screams, but a moment later I heard muttering and heavy breathing, like someone was talking to themselves three doors down from me. I turned and headed in that direction, my footsteps quiet and my hand on the wall. When I came to the door the muttering was happening behind, I paused, listening. Was there more than one person in there? Were they just having a conversation?

A conversation that for some reason included screaming?