LOGINVivienne's POV This was officially the worst idea I had ever had and considering my recent life choices, that was saying something.The SUV bounced over another pothole and pain shot through my side so hard I nearly bit through my tongue.A muffled whimper escaped before I could stop it."God," I whispered through gritted teeth. Everything hurt, my side hurt, my back hurt, my neck hurt and even my pride hurt.The cramped space in the back of the vehicle had seemed manageable when I'd climbed inside, but now? Now it felt like a punishment specifically designed for me.A crate dug into my shoulder every time the SUV turned. A metal latch kept jabbing my knee, and the heat was becoming unbearable.Sweat stuck my shirt to my skin and my mouth felt dry enough to crack, but first of all, nobody had found me.At first, I'd been terrified of getting caught, now I was beginning to wonder if I was simply going to die back here from dehydration and stupidity.Another bump rattled the vehicle
Vivienne's POV The clubhouse hadn’t been quiet once in the last two days.Not once.Even from inside the room, I could hear it constantly. I heard boots against floors, doors slamming and raised voices drifting through the walls at all hours of the night.If all those signs pointed to one thing and one thing only, it was the fact that tension lived here now.Heavy, restless, waiting, and somehow, I’d become the center of it.I sat carefully against the headboard, wincing as another dull ache spread through my side. The stitches still pulled every time I moved too fast, and standing for longer than a few minutes made dizziness creep in almost immediately.I hated it.I hated being stuck here while everyone else ran around trying to fix the mess I helped create.Another burst of voices echoed faintly downstairs and I actually flinched. “…shipment routes changed…”“…they’re watching us now…”“…move the trucks before nightfall…”I closed my eyes briefly.God.Every conversation soun
Vivienne's POV The second Maverick said “We may already be too late,” the entire atmosphere changed.Ronan went still beside me, but not in shock or panic. This was worse. He became focused, that terrifying kind of focus that meant decisions were already being made in his head faster than anyone else could keep up with.“What happened?” he asked immediately.“It's not good news.” Maverick glanced toward me briefly before lowering his voice further, almost as if he was asking for permission before he spoke. “A shipment disappeared an hour ago.”“What shipment?” My stomach tightened as Ronan asked.“We don’t know yet.” Maverick scrubbed a hand down his face roughly. “But calls started coming in right after those papers surfaced.”“From who?”“Everyone.”A wave of silence followed next, and from how it echoed, it was all shades of heavy, wrong and dangerous. Then Maverick added quietly. “They think we sanctioned it.”Ice flooded my veins instantly while Ronan’s expression hardened
Vivienne's POV The silence Ronan left behind felt worse than the argument itself.I stared at the closed door long after he walked out, my chest tight enough to hurt. Every word he’d said kept replaying in my head over and over again, sharper each time.I don’t know who you are right now.That one refused to leave me alone.I pressed the heels of my palms against my eyes hard enough to hurt, but it didn’t stop the tears burning behind them.God, everything felt ruined. Not broken, but fucking ruined, and I had no one else to blame but myself. The room suddenly felt too small to breathe in. The walls pressed inward, heavy and suffocating, and the longer I stayed in that bed, the more trapped I felt.I needed air, even if it hurt, even if I probably shouldn’t have been moving yet.I pushed the blanket aside slowly, wincing immediately as pain ripped through my side. The stitches pulled sharply, forcing a shaky breath out of me, but I ignored it.I deserved worse than pain right now
Vivienne's POV “What do you mean, war?” The question left me before I could stop it.Maverick looked uncomfortable immediately, and somehow that made everything worse.“I'm listening.” Ronan didn’t take his eyes off him. “Explain.”Maverick exhaled slowly before stepping further into the room. He held a folded stack of papers in one hand now, worn from being opened too many times already.“There were names inside,” he said carefully. “Locations, shipment schedules, literally everything you can think of.”“I don’t understand,” A cold feeling spread slowly through my stomach as I whispered.“You weren’t supposed to,” Ronan muttered. The words weren’t loud, but they landed hard anyway.Maverick on the other hand, continued carefully, like he was choosing what to say in front of me.“There were forged signatures too,” he said. “Markings tied to us.”“What?” Ronan went completely still beside the bed. “What kind of markings?”“The kind that makes it look like we authorized something we
Vivienne's POV Pain woke me before consciousness fully did. A sharp, burning ache tore through my side every time I breathed, dragging me upward slowly and unwillingly. For a few seconds, I didn’t know where I was and everything felt heavy, blurred around the edges and muffled like I was underwater.Then memory slammed into me all at once. I recalled Brick, the gun grazing my side, Ronan and the package.My eyes snapped open and panic hit so fast it nearly made me choke..I jerked upright instinctively, only for pain to explode through my side hard enough to rip a cry from my throat.“Easy.” The voice came immediately from a corner in the room. It was low, controlled and dangerously calm, but worse? I recognized its owner immediately.My head whipped toward the direction of the room, and Ronan stood near the door, one hand still resting against the handle like he’d just walked back in. For one horrible second, I couldn’t process what I was seeing.There was blood on him and not a l
Ronan's POV Good.That was the first thing I told myself after she walked out. Good. She saw it, and now, she knew where I stood. Only a fool would have witnessed what she did and decide to stick to the fact that things were okay between us. It was probably petty, but if I couldn't be happy, th
Vivienne's POV The house learned my grief faster than I did. I told myself that I was probably overthinking and reading too much meaning into it, but the more time I spent in the house, the more the realization settled into the pit of my stomach like a heavy weight that refused to budge. The h
Ronan's POV I spoke to the doctor again because silence was eating at me. I initially wanted to talk myself out of it, I wanted to convince myself that it wasn't necessary, but the more I tried, the harder it got, and before I could yell out Maverick's name, I was already on my way to find a do
Vivienne's POV I woke up to voices, and for the life of me, I couldn't bring myself to really come to terms with how I felt about that. At first, I thought I was still dreaming, because everything felt thick and distant, like I was submerged underwater. My body was heavy, and it was aching i







