Page 114 of Savage Hearts

I looked back at the computer screen, but all the numbers there blended together.

Fuck.

It would be easy to say my concentration was blown to bits from their visit.

But it had been like this all morning—since I woke up and the first image that popped into my head was the image of Mila on the bed.

My fists clenched underneath the desk.

I didn’t like this.

Not at all.

What the fuck did she do to me?

“How rude,” Silas commented, looking over at Maverick, who nodded, though the small twist of his lips told me he was amused.

I rolled my eyes. “What do you want?”

“Do you remember the night we attacked the club?” Maverick asked.

“Vividly,” I responded. That night was years in planning. And it was over too fucking quickly. We might have kept the fucker Hayes for hours afterward, but I still thought we’d killed the fucker too soon. What was several hours of torture compared to nineteen years on the run?

“Do you think someone might have escaped?” Silas asked quietly.

I turned to him. “We had men guarding all the exits. Who would have been smart enough to escape?”

“We never did a complete check of the layout of the club. Don’t you think someone as paranoid as Daniel Hayes would have put in some secret passage for him to leave in case of an attack?”

“Possible,” I muttered. “But why would it matter? The fucker’s dead.”

“I’m thinking about the shooting. Why would anyone be stupid enough to shoot at us? In Chicago? And what’s more, why would they want to?” Silas said quietly.

Maverick didn’t give us any input, though a thoughtful look had taken over his face. This was how it usually went. Silas and I would talk it out, and Maverick would think about it, only telling us what he was thinking at the end.

“The narcotics trade is pretty lucrative. I’m sure plenty of men would have died for it,” I said. Our old man was one of those people. Our family had been getting too big, and it was threatening the club. That was why they had planned an attack on us in the first place.

But Hayes got cocky.

He didn’t think there was anyone big enough who could take him on after such a successful massacre.

He’d thought wrong.

Silas nodded. “Now, imagine if it was someone from the club who had been banking on this trade to pay his way through life, and we took it away from him. It would be a good reason to attack us.”

“And who do you think that is? We slaughtered everyone in that house.”

“Did we?” Silas asked, bringing his thumb to his lips in contemplation. “We never kept an account of how many men were killed. That attack, although well executed, was messy in other ways. We were blinded by revenge. Hell, we didn’t evenknow Mila was living there until the fucker confessed, thinking to give up his daughter in trade for his life.”

And I wondered how hurt Mila would be if she found out.

For some crazy reason, I didn’t want her to find out. I didn’t want her to be hurt, not this way. Something told me the hardened front she put on was just that, a front. Flimsy at best, and so fucking fragile, we could have blown right through it if we pushed hard enough.

“We know Sebastian Cline is alive and trying to recoup the previous members. Some members might have escaped and are trying to seek revenge. We know Cline is a part of that. Only, how did he escape the clubhouse with our men surrounding the property?”

I rubbed my chest. “So you think he’s the one behind the attack? The one leading the charge? Should we put out a hit?”

Silas nodded. “Not only on Cline. There are three members we haven’t been able to account for.”

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