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CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

THE CLUBHOUSE FELT different tonight, warmer, lighter, filled with the kind of calm I still didn’t know how to fully trust.

I wasn’t used to this feeling—this illusion of safety—but with Mystic beside me, his arm draped over my shoulders, his body close and solid, his presence like gravity anchoring me to something I didn’t know I could want, I almost believed I could have it.

Almost.

Devil stood across the room, a drink in one hand and that sharp, unreadable gaze of his fixed on us. He looked between me and Mystic with something like worry—like he knew something I didn’t—and the knot in my stomach tightened, just a little.

Mystic turned his head, his eyes locking onto mine with that same depth, that same quiet intensity that always undid me in the worst and best ways.

“You good?” he asked, his eyes roaming over my face, the kind of look that could scrape over your skin and leave heat behind.

I nodded, feeling a smile ghost over my lips, soft and unsure but real. “For the first time since I was stolen.”

And I meant it. I truly did, but my intuition told me something wasn’t right.

Then the door slammed open with a force that didn’t belong here, not in this moment, not in this warmth.

The sound was loud— too loud —and it carved straight through the noise of the room like a bomb exploding.

Laughter stopped.

Voices fell away.

Bodies stiffened.

The men around us turned toward the door, instinct rising in their posture, their movements, and beside me, Mystic’s entire body changed.

He didn’t say a word, but I could feel it in him—that stillness that only came when something was wrong.

A woman stood in the doorway, backlit by the harsh white light behind her, her silhouette cutting a perfect shape of confidence and purpose. Her dark hair was long, lips painted a red that didn’t smudge, high heels clicking on the floor as she came further into the room.

But it wasn’t any of those things that bothered me.

It was where she was looking .

Straight at us.

At him.

She walked through the room like it belonged to her, like the air bent around her figure and the silence followed in her wake, and she never once broke eye contact with Mystic—not even for a second.

“Well, well, well…” she purred, and her voice was honey laced with venom, smooth and deadly and smug. “Looks like you forgot to mention something, Kain. ”

His real name—Kain.

The one I’d only ever heard whispered in the dark, in memories, in things he couldn’t bring himself to share.

It hit me like the wind being knocked from my lungs.

I turned to him slowly, my heart pounding in the back of my throat, my breath stuck somewhere in between disbelief and fear, and all I could do was look at him and hope—hope that he would speak, that he would deny it, explain it, make any of this make sense.

But he didn’t.

Mystic— my Mystic—was silent.

Jaw clenched. Eyes hollow. Fists tight at his sides.

Nothing.

Not a word. Not even a lie, and I think, in that moment, I would’ve taken a lie over this silence. Because silence felt like an answer I didn’t want to hear.

I looked around the room, my gaze catching on Brenda, on Thunder, on the men who had fought for me, stood by me, carried me out of hell.

But all I saw in their eyes was pity.

And pity burned like shame.

A laugh tore from my chest, but it wasn’t a laugh at all—it was cracked and hollow and bitter, and it tasted like something dying on my tongue.

“Who is she?” I asked, and I knew my voice was shaking, but I couldn’t stop it.

The woman finally turned her gaze to me like I was a fly buzzing around her meal, annoying, insignificant.

And she smiled.

Sharp. Perfect.

Cruel.

“Oh, sweetheart,” she said, her tone syrupy and condescending, “I’m his wife. ”

The word stole what breath I had left.

Wife.

I stared at her, at him, at the space between us that had once felt like safety and now felt like betrayal carved into air.

I swayed, dizzy, my hands curling into fists at my sides just to keep myself upright, because everything inside me was collapsing and the room was starting to tilt and I didn’t know which way was up anymore.

I turned back to Mystic, begging him without words, just with my eyes, with my whole heart screaming inside me. “Tell me she’s lying.”

He opened his mouth—And closed it. There was pain in his eyes. Yes. But no denial. No soft words. No desperate plea. No truth that could save us.

Nothing.

And that— that —was the moment I broke.

It wasn’t the woman. It wasn’t the word. It wasn’t even what she said next. It was his silence.

The man who had seen me when no one else did.

The man who held me like I was something holy.

The man who swore he wouldn’t let me go—had never really been mine to begin with. I felt something inside me twist and snap, and it was worse than fear, worse than pain.

It was emptiness.

His wife turned back to him with a smirk, placing her manicured hand on his chest like she knew exactly where to drive the knife. “Look what you’ve done to the poor girl by lying to her,” she cooed.

And I flinched like she’d slapped me. Brenda reached for me, her hand soft and steady on my arm, but I couldn’t take her comfort. Couldn’t take anything. I ripped away from her and ran.

I didn’t look back.

Didn’t think.

Didn’t even know where I was going.

I just knew I had to get away before I shattered completely, because if I broke here, in front of all of them, I’d never be able to piece myself back together again.

Behind me, I heard his voice. Raw. Desperate. “Zeynep—wait—”

But I didn’t wait.

I didn’t stop.

I ran into the night like I had the first time.

Like I was running for my life.

Because it felt like I was.