Page 65 of His Fury

I didn’t answer right away. I finished reviewing the footage on the main monitor, tapping through camera feeds like muscle memory.

“She’s at work,” I said finally. “Back at The Grand, she’s got three events this week. She’s good.”

Rye grunted, arms folding. “She okay to go back?”

“She says she is. I believe her.”

He gave me a flat look. “You let her go outside alone? Should I be impressed?”

“She’s not alone.”

Rye blinked. “You put someone on her?”

“Of course, I did.” I smirked. “What do you think I am?”

His mouth twitched. “Possessive.”

“Exactly.”

He raised an eyebrow but didn’t challenge it. That was unusual. Still, I saw the shift in his stance and the quiet tension.

“She knows how I feel about what happened,” I added, disliking the need to explain myself but understanding that it was necessary, or he would gnaw at it like a dog with a bone. “And I understand why she let Julian through that door. She owed herself the closure. I get it.”

Rye didn’t look convinced. “You don’t think she’s a threat,” he said flatly. “Fine. But that doesn’t mean she’s not a liability.”

I let the words hang in the air before I corrected him. “She’s not a liability.”

His jaw ticked. “She makes youtouchable, Zayn.”

I glanced at the monitors showing the event happening downstairs. “She keeps me human.”

“Exactly,” Rye muttered. “That’s not the asset you think it is.”

I didn’t rise to the bait.

“We’ll see.” I took a breath. “The way I see it, she didn’t lie,” I carried on. “She made a bad call, but she owned it. Told me the truth before it reached me through anyone else. That counts.”

Rye nodded once. “And Julian?”

My mouth tightened. “Still hiding. For now.”

“I don’t like loose ends,” Rye muttered, his eyes flicking to the front entrance monitor.

“Neither do I.” I didn’t tell him that Julian wasn’t the loose end I was focusing on. Delaney was who I wanted to watch bleed.

The room was silent for a beat, the hum of the club alive beneath our feet.

“I don’t trust her,” he said.

Ah, there it was. “You don’t trust anyone.”

“Exactly.”

I almost laughed. Almost.

“And right up until Isla Wells walked through those doors, neither did you,” he scolded.

“She’s mine,” I said. “And you don’t have to trust her. You just have to respect that I do.”

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