“That’s not what I meant.” Seven let her tongue stud roll along her bottom lip. She leaned to face Jared. “What’s the truth?”
Jared’s face mirrored the same grim look as Parker’s, and he was in agreement. “She’s better off dead to them than she is alive.”
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
The scarred, black Mayhem bedroom door swung open, and Lenora strut through calm and casual as if it were any other day. Her demeanor could’ve been mistaken for lunchtime at the courthouse.
Victoria’s eyes bulged. “What the fuck?”
Her shock wasn’t just that the attorney stood there, seemingly of her own free will, but her clothes were far from the usual attorney wear. Lenora had ditched the power suits and conservative casual wear for torn jeans, a T-shirt with a torn V-neck, and bright red lipstick. Her hair was tossed into a makeshift bun and tendrils were pulled out in a windswept, back-of-a-Harley-hog way that screamed biker babe.
“This isn’t a side of me I ever expected to introduce you to.” Lenora’s bright red lips turned up into an unimpressed grin. “You don’t stay out of the way, do you?”
“Who are you?”
“Come on. Don’t tell me you’re the same girl at work as you are at home.”
Well, yeah, she was. “You’re their lawyer.”
“Among other things.” Lenora didn’t hide her amusement. “Imagine my surprise when my man mentioned Victoria Massey had been won in a gunfight.” She clucked. “Trouble finds you. Or maybe you go looking for it. Which is it?”
“The Russians had women. I decided that they shouldn’t. End of story.”
Lenora clapped slowly. “Andthat’sthe reason why I like you, kid.”
God, she hated when people referenced her as young. But it wasn’t as if she was in the best place to complain about that. “Since we’re friends…” Or something. “Does that mean I can get out of here?”
“I’m not sure that Hawk sees the value in letting go of a prize, but—” The door opened and two men walked in, one older who had serious disregard for Lenora’s personal space, and a younger man who lit a cigarette off of the butt of another cigarette. Could one of them be Hawk? What was going on?
The older man was wearing a Mayhem motorcycle cut. Victoria eyed his patch. Under the emblem read sergeant-at-arms. He greeted Victoria with a head nod. “Peaches.”
Exasperated, she crossed her arms, not caring if he had a leadership patch or not. “That isn’t my name.”
But he didn’t seem to notice that she spoke. Victoria couldn’t believe how Lenora was wrapped into this, and hell, did Seven know how Lenora was tied to Mayhem?
The older man whispered into her ear, and Lenora agreed with whatever he’d said. She turned to Victoria. “I gotta go.”
“Hey, wait. Get me the hell out of here.”
None of them acknowledged she’d spoken.
“Hey!”
They didn’t slow down, and the door locked behind Lenora.
“Bitch,” Victoria mumbled. “See if I ever help you again.”
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
Victoria mapped out what she knew about her only potential ally. Lenora was a biker babe deep in the Mayhem world, involved in club business, and had a Mayhem man. She was an attorney who knowingly let them keep Victoria captive.
The situation was all kinds of screwed up, and the nerves in Victoria’s stomach circled as she paced continual loops around the bedroom. How could she get out of the windowless room? There was nothing to pick the lock with, and waiting seemed to go on for hours on end.
The feminine click of heeled boots made its way down the hall. Fingers crossed it was Lenora, and they could finally wrap this up.
The door opened, and still, Victoria had a mental WTF reaction to Lenora’s biker persona walking into the room. “Any news on when I get to go home?”
“My man came through with great news.”