Page 47 of Treachery

“Boys, boys!” a small yet mighty Cilla chastised as she pushed through the crowd of oversized toddlers, and glared. She pointed at Cluster, then Horde. “You two can have a dick measuring contest later; right now, there’s something more important that needs to happen, and it won’t happen if you two don’t pipe down and let Locust talk.”

“What’s he doing, anyway?” Cluster asked.

“Yeah, why are all of us here?” Tony Dos asked, scratching his head. “This room doesn’t look like our normal kind of place.”

“I’d like to know as well, brother,” Frost agreed, moving to stand next to Locust, who she still refused to look at. “I got the same text everyone else got, which means that whatever this is wasn’t cleared with me.”

A derisive cough sounded from the back of the room, and Nadia looked to see a peeved Emily glaring at her husband. Well, that wasn’t good. Then again, since Emily had found out about what Frost had ordered Locust to do, she sent a weekly wildflower bouquet to the front desk. Nadia was prettysure that was Emily’s way of apologizing for her husband’s behavior, which meant the woman was still upset about it. Understandably.

The grumbling and whispering and talk of dicks faded into nothing when Locust stepped forward. Something in the way he moved made her look at him,reallylook at him. There was an intensity, a desperation, a determination in his eyes that took her breath away. His massive body was tense, as though every muscle in his was locked tight, waiting for the hammer’s blow. She watched him swallow thickly, like there was something lodged in his throat.

Her heart skipping beat after beat after beat, she held her breath. Every atom in her body, every synapse in her brain, every last fragment of her splintered soul was focused on the man before her.

“I came here, with my brothers as my witnesses, to do this,” Locust announced. As she watched—as the whole room watched, holding their collective breaths—Locust shrugged off his kutte, walked over to the indoor fireplace, switched it on, and then held his kutte over the blue and white flames.

Every man in the room spat out curses, anger and disbelief filling their faces, but none as pissed and conflicted as Frost, who looked on with barely leashed rage.

“Patriot told me I should risk something, something that you think is more important than you are. So…I’m giving up my place in the Unchained. I’m destroying my kutte, taking away and chance of ever wearing the patch again. I want to show you, my love, that there’s nothing—not a goddamn thing—more important to me than you are. If that means burning my kutte, I’ll do it. If it means dismantling my bike, I’ll do it. If it means selling everything I own and living in a doghouse in your backyard, I’ll do it. There is nothing I won’t do, nothing I won’trisk to show you that I love you, that I’m loyal to you, that I will never betray you again.”

The hand grasping the kutte began to lower toward the flames, and Nadia’s chest grew tight, her heart thundering.

Was he really going to do it?

“Locust,” Frost rasped, his voice carried a note of concern she’d never heard in voice before, and from the looks on the faces of the men gathered, they hadn’t heard it much before, either. “I want you to take a moment to think about this. You know the bylaws; you destroy your kutte, you’re dead to the club, you no longer exist, all your ties—money, property, protection—all cut and dead.” He stepped closer, his face pale. “Is that what you really want? After all you’ve gone through? After all you’ve done for the club?”

James shook his head sadly, shame on his face and in his bearing.

He wasn’t really going to do it, right? It was all fake, right? He didn’t really love her or want to be with her, right? He wouldn’t actually drop the kutte because this was all a big, elaborate scene for some benefit, right?

Big elaborate scene? For what purpose? What could the Unchained MC possibly want from you that they’d put all this effort into getting you here, and making James—Locust—act like he was giving up the Unchained?

No, this couldn’t be real….

There’s no way he’d actually do it.

“All I’ve done for the club?” Locust recited thickly, like the words pained him to speak. “You mean like how I was so blindly loyal to you that I hurt the woman I love?” James shook his head again, his mouth a thin, hard line. “I can’t do that again, Frost. I won’t. I woulddiefor the brotherhood, I would spill blood for any motherfucker in here, but I refuse to lose the one person I fuckinglivefor.”

She gasped, her hands flying to her mouth in shock.

Shaking her head in disbelief, she couldn’t take her eyes off the man who was still lowering his kutte closer to the flames. Any second, the leather would begin to curl and smoke from the heat.

But he didn’t stop.

“Nadia,” he choked out, his voice cracking, “I will do anything to prove to you that I love you, that our time together meant everything to me; not a single moment was fake. I know I have a lot to make up for, but I will. I will spend the rest of my life making up for it, worshipping you, cherishing you….” Sucking in a breath that made his chest visibly expand, he pleaded, “Please…forgive me. Please…give me a second chance.”

The whole of her quaking with cataclysmic emotions, she couldn’t speak, couldn’t move—her mind was spinning, unable to latch on to any one thing.

But there was one thing she couldn’t tear her eyes from…the now smoking kutte.

He’s really doing it! Stop him!

Throwing her arms out, she shouted, “No!”

Startled, Locust’s face drained of color, a look of utter devastation on his face.

Oh God, he thought she meant “no” to him.

Hurrying forward, she snatched the kutte from his hand and hurried to one of the planters which held internal reservoirs of water for timed watering. Carefully, she dipped the smoking leather into the basin, watching as the material floated, slightly curling from its exposure to the heat.

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