MasukMaddox’s POV
She’d been distant. Not obviously—Alina was good at pretending everything was fine. But I’d spent months learning to read her, and I knew when something was off.
It had been two weeks since the Vulture ambush. She’d thrown herself into work, into training, into everything except actually connecting with us on a deeper level.
The ceremony had been beautiful. The commitment real. But something was holding her back from being fully
Chloe’s POVI wore a blazer to visit the office. Armour, basically. The kind of outfit that said I am a professional person who has a normal life and definitely did not spend last night in a converted warehouse after being shot at through a hotel fire escape.It was a very good blazer. I didn’t think it was working.Adrian looked up when I knocked on his open door, and his expression did the thing it had been doing lately — that careful, assessing look that meant he’d noticed more than he was saying.“Chloe. Come in.”I sat across from his desk. Straightened the blazer. “Before you say anything…I’m okay. The situation is being handled, I just wanted to stop by and see everyone.”“I heard there was an incident at a hotel downtown two nights ago,” he said. “Two men were found zip tied in an alley.”“I wouldn’t know anything about that.&rdquo
Dominic’s POVI woke up at six fifteen because I always woke up at six. Didn’t matter where I was or what had happened the night before. My body ran on a schedule that nobody had asked it to keep.The warehouse was quiet. Grey morning light came through the high windows in flat, even strips. I lay on the couch for a moment, staring at the ceiling, piecing together the previous twelve hours. Hotel. Fire escape. Gunfire. Eggs. A two-hour negotiation that had somehow ended with four people agreeing to share a building and figure out the rest as they went.I sat up.The spare room door was closed. Marcus’s usual spot at the table was empty, his mug rinsed and turned upside down on the drying rack. I looked at the couch where Marcus had been sitting at midnight when I’d fallen asleep, and he wasn’t there either.I looked at the spare room door again.I was not going to be weird about this.I stood up, rolled m
Chloe’s POVThe warehouse at midnight felt different from the warehouse at noon.Quieter. The city outside had settled into its nighttime sounds…distant traffic, the occasional siren, wind pushing against the high windows. The industrial lights were off and Marcus had turned on a couple of standing lamps that made the space feel smaller and warmer than I expected.Dominic was asleep on the couch. He’d lasted until about eleven, and then he’d simply lain down mid-sentence, one arm over his eyes, and that had been the end of that. Lucian had taken the spare room—Marcus had one, barely used, mattress on a frame, nothing decorative, which was very on-brand.Marcus had set up a sleeping space for me in the back corner, separated from the main room by a makeshift divider of shelving units. Private enough to feel like mine. Close enough that I didn’t feel alone.I lay in the dark and listened to Dominic breathe from ac
Marcus’s POVBy evening, the warehouse felt smaller.Not in a bad way. More like the way a space feels when it’s full of people instead of just stuff — the edges closer, the air warmer, the silence less empty. I’d lived alone for two years in this building, and I’d preferred it that way. Preferred knowing where everything was, preferred the quiet, preferred not having to account for anyone else’s presence.Now there were three other people using my kitchen and arguing about what to watch on the laptop, and I wasn’t bothered.That itself was worth thinking about.I pulled up the threat assessment around eight PM and spread it across the table. Chloe’s apartment was compromised. The hotel was obviously out. The rotation system — moving her between three locations had already failed once, and professionally speaking, it would fail again. Variable schedules only bought time. We needed something more
Lucian’s POVMorning came in through the warehouse’s high windows in long strips of pale light. By seven, I had eggs on the stove and coffee brewing and absolutely no idea where Marcus kept his spatula.“Second drawer,” Marcus said from across the room without looking up from his laptop.I found the spatula. “Thank you.”“I can feel you judging my kitchen.”“Your kitchen is extremely organized and slightly terrifying.” I cracked another egg. “I mean that as a compliment.”From the couch, Dominic’s voice: “Is there enough for everyone or just the people who weren’t up at three in the morning getting shot at?”“We were all up at three in the morning getting shot at,” I said. “There’s enough for everyone.”“Scrambled or not scrambled?” Dominic asked.“What do you want?”
Chloe’s POVThe warehouse smelled like sawdust and machine oil and, faintly, the coffee Marcus had made at some point earlier in the evening. He had a corner of it set up as a living space — a real couch, a proper kitchen area, a bathroom that was cleaner than I expected. The rest was tactical equipment and storage and the general impression that this was a place where a person lived when they were serious about not being found.I sat on the couch wrapped in a blanket someone had pushed into my hands, and I stared at the wall, and I waited for the shaking to stop.It didn’t stop.All three of them were doing things. Marcus was on his phone, quiet and clipped, reporting in to someone. Lucian was cleaning the cut on my arm with careful, precise movements, his brow furrowed slightly. Dominic had made tea, chamomile, from Marcus’s cabinet and set it on the table in front of me like he’d done it a thousand times before.&ld
Alina’s POVThe transformation happened gradually, piece by piece.First, there was my hair. Maddox arranged for someone to come to our safe house and dye my dark hair to a deep shade, almost black, with soft waves and stylish clips that made it look luxurious and purposefully done. Next came the m
Maddox’s POVAs soon as Alina touched her necklace, I was on high alert, scanning the room for any potential threats. Charles Qozlok, a rough-looking guy with scars, had been asking too many questions about her past. When Alina stood up to leave, I rushed to intercept her before things could get ug
Alina’s POVAs we rode back through the gates, everything felt different. There was a strange energy in the air, like the moment before something big happens. The usual hustle and bustle of the club was replaced by a sense of urgency. Members moved with focus, conversations interrupted as we passed
Jaxon’s POVThe night air hit like a physical thing—cold enough to sting, heavy with the smell of rain that hadn’t fallen yet. I handed Alina a leather jacket that swallowed her whole, and she looked like a kid playing dress-up in my gear. It was fucking adorable, which meant I was absolutely fucke







