Page 94 of His Fury

My feet carried me to the couch. I felt lightheaded. Fragile. Like I wasn’t really here. My legs shook. I hadn’t even looked at the fucking thing, and I was a nervous wreck. I sank down onto the couch, the plastic weapon gripped between my fingers like a live wire.

My mind raced. Too fast. Too loud. I repeatedly ran through the conversation in my head that I’d had with Julian,analyzing every moment and searching for anything I had overlooked. I examined every gut feeling I had pushed away. Every moment of thinking I knew who he was.

He handed me over to them. He explained who I was and how I was connected to Zayn. He allowed them touseme to get to Zayn.

As a pawn.

And the worst part. I wasn’t even surprised to hear it confirmed. Not anymore.

“What the hell happened to us?” I murmured, dropping my head into my hands and rubbing my temples, with the flash drive still firmly in my grip.

It all started and ended with Zayn. Elixir. The gala. The alley. The warehouse. Being tossed into the back of a car like I was a name on a debt ledger.

His world…was so much darker than I ever wanted to admit. And hethrivedin it.

And now?It was my world too.I bit down on the inside of my cheek, striving to maintain steady breathing and contain my panic.

I needed to hand this over to him and forget about it.Chicken. The word echoed in my mind. I would never be able to stand by his side if I was scared. And Iwasscared. I was petrified of what was on this drive. What if it revealed there was more behind my kidnapping? What could be even more dangerous than just a simple kidnapping to settle a debt?

Did I seriously just saysimplekidnapping?

I pushed myself to my feet. “What if this isn’t just about Zayn?” I clutched the drive closer.What if this is about me?

Mysafety.Mychoices.Mylife.

I ran my thumb along the edge of the USB port, my eyes burning. I needed to tell Zayn. Iwantedto tell Zayn.

But if I did—if I handed it over—there would be nocoming back. No more pretending I could remain separate from it all. No more lines in the sand. I knew that whatever was on that drive, he would react to it, and it wouldn’t be good.

Which meant I would be choosing his side in the full, blinding light of day, not hiding under the pretense of a divide.

I sat in the silence of the house, still gripping the flash drive. Deep within me, the decision had already been made. Slowly, I got to my feet and made my way back to the kitchen.

Almost robotically, I pulled out the stool and sat at the counter. I stared at the laptop as if it might bite me. Reluctantly, I opened my hand and examined the flash drive resting in my palm, appearing as harmless as ever. It was as if it hadn’t just been handed to me by my oldest friend—the one who had betrayed us both.

I took a breath.

Then another.

And slid the USB into the port.

The screen lit up with a folder displayed on it. No password. No encryption. Just one folder labeled Pyramid.

I clicked the folder, pushing aside the fleeting thought that it could be a virus or something worse. Inside was a list of spreadsheets, and I clicked on the first one.

Time stamps. Transaction IDs. Wire routes. Bank names I didn’t recognize. Names I did recognize. I came out of it and clicked on the next one. It was more of the same. So was the next. And the next.

And one that was calledE.M.C. Holdings–Elixir Nightlife Transfer–Routed: V. Ferraro

I stared at the screen, the blood rushing in my ears.

I didn’t understand any of that except for one word.Elixir.

Zayn’s club. His front as it turned out. There it was, linked by name and number, like a receipt. What was I looking at? It appeared to be a web of shell companies, silent partners, and laundering pipelines that I couldn’t even pretend to comprehend.

A subfolder caught my eye. Photos.

With a shaky breath, I clicked.

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