She hated that everything he said was true. She didn’t want to feel helpless again. Or without hope. She had left all that behind and become so much more. Tears burned behind her eyes, but she wasn’t about to shed them in front of these people. All she could do was listen to the pounding of her heart and feel terror overwhelming her. Zane was with them. Her beautiful little boy with her mop of tawny hair and Steele’s unusual midnight-colored eyes. Dark blue would have been rare enough, but Steele’s eyes were so dark they often looked like a midnight sky. That was how she thought of them, and her son had those same eyes.
“He’ll be so afraid.” It escaped before she could hold it back.
“I’ve got soup made,” Alena said. “Let me get that for you.”
Breezy glanced at her. Alena had always ridden with Czar as his old lady. He’d been so protective of her. None of the Swords dared look at her for fear of his retaliation. She’d kept to herself unless Lana was around. Lana was always on the back of Ice’s’s bike. She didn’t remember either woman saying much to her. In fact, it was possible it was the first nice thing Alena had ever said to her.
She tried not to allow hurt to rule her. She’d promised herself she would be a better person. She wouldn’t be judgmental or nasty to other women if she could help it. That had been done to her almost from the day she was born, others snubbing her both inside the club and outside of it.
Breezy nodded. “Thank you.” She practically choked on the words, so she couldn’t get anything else out. Alena didn’t seem to mind that she was brief because she left the room through the door on the far side, away from the entrance. Breezy had noted that door. If it led to all the bedrooms, it was possible there was another exit.
“Baby, stop looking for an escape route. Your ride is gone.”
That jerked her head up. Her gaze clashed with Steele’s and then she ran to the window to look out. Her truck wasn’t there. She whirled around to find him close. He was so silent he could walk like a cat across a room, not making a sound. That had always freaked her out a little.
“Get it back, Steele.”
“Not happening, Breezy. You’re not running out on me in the middle of the night. You have every right to be angry. And hurt. But you also have to admit, you should have told me you were pregnant …”
“You didn’t give me the chance when you were throwing my ass out. You couldn’t get rid of me fast enough. You made it very clear I was nothing to you …”
“Damn it. I had no choice.”
“Step back.” He was too close, and she was still intimidated by the biker world and those in it. She’d been trained to obey the members or get beaten. Three years, most of it trying to learn to survive on her own, hadn’t been enough time to block out that programming. He was a threat to her and her body reacted with those years of conditioning. She detested that she froze, holding her breath. Waiting.
Steele immediately took two steps back, giving her room. “Breezy, we have to talk. You know we do.”
“I know we need to talk about getting Zane out of their hands. If that’s what you want to talk about, let’s do it. I’m ready. Anything else, there’s no reason.”
“Zane? You named him Zane?”
There was a note in his voice, possessive maybe, that scared her. He couldn’t have her son. He couldn’t. “The moment I have him safe, I’m taking him home.”
“The home they stole him from?” Steele shook his head. “What’s to say they won’t take him back?”
“They’ll be dead. If you don’t kill them, I will.”
“Breezy, you know the life. Baby, come on. You were born into that club. They’ll come after you. Chapter after chapter. Brother after brother. You won’t survive. Neither will Zane.”
He was right. He was so right. She pressed her fingers to her throbbing head. She was so terrified for her child she was almost numb. From the moment she’d rolled over onto her hands and knees, vomiting blood and hurting so badly, she’d been panicked for Zane in the hands of men who had were capable of great cruelties.
She looked up at Steele. He’d been the man she believed in. The one she thought she could count on. His betrayal was far worse than the club’s. She wanted to collapse into his arms and let him take care of everything, but she couldn’t. She wasn’t that girl anymore and she refused to be, even when she desperately needed someone. It had been a hard-won fight, but she’d made it. She’d learned to stand on her own and she wasn’t going back.
“He’s so little, Steele. He’s just so little.” Her voice broke and she pressed her fingers over her mouth, knowing her lips were trembling and he could see that telltale sign that she was about to fall apart.
“We’ll bring him back to you, Breezy,” he promised.
She wished she could believe him, but he’d lied to her for an entire year. She shook her head and looked away from his face, that face that had represented strength and safety to her.
Clearly reading her expression of disbelief, he cursed under his breath and stepped back again. “Go sit. Let Alena feed you. You can tell us where my boy is being held.”
She winced at his word choice, but the important thing was getting Zane out of her father’s hands. She could sort the rest after. “That’s the problem, Steele. They refused to tell me. I think they’re moving him around, but I don’t know for certain. They send me pictures, so I know he’s alive. I have a number I’m supposed to call when I have the information on you and then again when I kill you.”
“Where were you planning on going when you left here?” Czar asked.
She turned to face him. She’d almost forgotten the others were still in the room they were so silent. It was eerie being with so many people and not one of them made a whisper of a sound. Her gaze touched on them one by one. They looked grim. Dangerous. Very sober.
“I know them. I know their haunts. I know where they think they’re safe. My father won’t be able to take having a toddler around. He’ll need a woman to take care of him. One of the younger girls. A teen, but old enough that she would have been beaten into submission. Or one of the women who is desperate to be an old lady—desperate enough to go with Bridges and try to please him.” She was revealing way too much about her life, but they already knew. They’d been there. They’d witnessed it.
“That was always the trouble with you,” Steele murmured. “You’re so damned smart. You observe everything.”
She didn’t know what was wrong with being intelligent, and she didn’t care.
“Keep going,” Czar said. “And sit down before you fall down. Driving yourself to the point of collapse isn’t going to get that boy back. You have to eat, sleep, and be in good shape. We’ve got a little time because they aren’t expecting you to succeed so quickly when they failed in finding us. We need to take that time to plan things out, so we get him back the first time and there’s no chance that he can be injured or killed.”
She flinched at the thought. She’d been avoiding the idea that her father and brother might kill her son, but it was a very real possibility if they got angry enough.
Steele put his hand on the small of her back and gave her a little push toward the chair where she’d been sitting. She might have protested, but Alena was back, putting a steaming bowl of soup on the table and a small basket of sourdough bread beside it. Lana added a bottle of water.
There was sense in what Czar said and it gave her the added idea that he was considering taking her along with them when they went after Zane. She was going even if she had to hitchhike after they left; it would be better for her to be there. She knew the way her father thought—and she could track him once she figured out one of the places he had taken her son.
She slipped into the chair, trying not to wince when she settled into the seat. She had to be careful of angles because her ribs were sore, and she knew Steele watched her with hawk eyes. They all seemed to be watching her.
“Did you go to a doctor?” Steele asked.
She sent him a look. Was he crazy? She was beat all the hell up. A doctor would report it to the cops. She knew that. If her father or Braden caught wind the cops were looking for them, they’d kill her son and bury him where no one would ever find him.