Page 30 of Scarred in Silence (The Twisted Trilogy #2)

Lucien

The music hits me first—low, bass-heavy, a tune of impending doom. Club Muse smells like expensive perfume, sweat, cocaine, and sin—same as I remember it always being.

I shouldn’t be here. Not when she’s at home, wallowing in sadness, but Dante insisted we shake Silas down tonight. “Strike while the iron’s hot,” he said.

He told Silas three, but he wanted the element of surprise. He wanted Silas to think he blew him off or something.

We glide past the bouncers. They know Dante. Everyone does. Doesn’t matter that his name isn’t on the building—his reputation is carved into the bones of this place. The bartender flinches when he sees Dante, like he expects a bullet instead of a drink order. Smart man.

“Where’s Silas?” Dante shouts over the music.

The bartender nods towards the stairs.

Dante angles toward the member’s only staircase, silent as frost. I follow, suit jacket brushing my thighs, hands empty—for now. Tonight I’m the leash; Dante’s the blade.

We climb the stairs, passing a girl in crimson latex who blows me a kiss she’ll never fucking get, and we reach the private suites. We walk past several doors before reaching the black door. Gold trim. A guard outside the door, holding a gun, gives us the sign that Silas is inside the Sin Suite.

Each of the rooms has a theme. They are: the voyeur room, the velvet noose, the red throne, the abyss, the inferno, the gilded cage, and pain and pleasure. Lastly, there is the Sin Suite.

Dante nods at me. I step forward.

“Badge,” I bark.

The guard blinks. “What badge?”

Wrong answer. My right fist cracks his jaw. He’s asleep before he hits the carpet. Dante catches the gun midair, checks the mag, clears the chamber, and tosses it to the sofa.

“Subtlety,” he mutters.

“Later.” My knuckles bleed. It feels righteous.

Dante parts the curtains, and we sweep inside.

Silas lounges on a chaise like a bored Roman being hand-fed grapes. Leather trousers, silk shirt unbuttoned past his sternum, hair slicked back like black oil. Two dancers kneel at his feet, collars gleaming. He strokes their hair without looking. Predatory, sure of his place.

He sees Dante first, then me, and still doesn’t stand. Interesting.

“Gentlemen,” he purrs, raising a crystal flute half-full of champagne. “Didn’t know we were hosting a funeral.” His smile is lacquered bright, but his fingers twitch—one tell. He’s nervous.

Dante closes the distance in three smooth strides and backhands the flute from Silas’s hand. Liquid sprays across purple velvet. The dancers crawl away like mice.

“Sit up,” Dante says.

Silas eyes the broken glass, then Dante’s smile—which is no smile at all. Finally, he shifts upright, voice tight. “This better be important.”

“It is,” I say. “Important enough to cost you your fucking life if you lie.”

My rage is humming under my tongue, eager to spill, but I hold the line. Questions first. Violence later. That’s always been our dance.

Silas sets his shoulders. “Go on.”

Dante perches on the coffee table opposite him, relaxed but lethal. “How much do you know about auctions?”

“Auction houses? Or the kind that sell flesh?”

“The latter,” I say, voice low. “Specifically, the one that happened on this floor two weeks ago. The Utah location.”

He plays dumb. “Vague. A lot of girls pass through.”

Dante cracks his neck. “Try harder.”

Silas laughs, thin and brittle. “Why care about one girl? You two usually deal in death, not charity.”

Wrong again. The world tilts crimson. I lean down until my breath fogs his perfect cheekbone. “Because she’s mine.”

Recognition flickers in his polished eyes. He’s heard the stories about me. Lucien Crowe. A man who’d drown empires to save a single woman. Not just any woman. My little Siren. The moment that truth settles behind his pupils, Silas swallows.

“So it was Astra,” he whispers. “Wasn’t sure.” Then, composed again. “Look, I didn’t touch that sale. I just provided the room.”

“Who hosted?” Dante asks.

Silas hesitates. Fear flashes. Good.

“Names,” I snap.

“I—I didn’t get the buyer list. Confidential. I swear.”

I draw my pistol and lay the barrel on his thigh. “That’s not how swearing works.”

His breath hitches. “Miles Holloway organized transport. He paid cash.”

Dante’s nostrils flare. “And the seller?”

“Some West Coast broker. I never saw their face. Hell, I never saw the girl—they kept her sedated.”

“Wrong,” I hiss. “She was awake. She remembers your decor.”

He wets his lips. “Look, Lucien. Club Muse is a venue. Everything else is freelance. Holloway used his own security. They loaded cargo at the side entrance. Two SUVs, tinted. That’s all I know.”

Dante flicks his gaze to me. “Truth or lie?”

“My gut says half-truth.”

“Time to bleed answers,” Dante smiles.

“Phones on the table,” I command. Silas obeys, shaky.

I nod at Dante. He stands, moves behind Silas, grips his jaw, forces it open with a technician’s precision. Dante’s other hand slips a slim steel blade from his pocket.

Silas jolts. “Wait—”

“Tongue,” Dante murmurs. “Lie again, lose an inch.”

Silas freezes. Dante pricks the blade against Silas’s taste buds. A bead of blood blossoms.

“Last chance,” I say. “Who else is in this chain?”

“Enrique Martinez!” Silas blurts. “He brokers the Utah route. That’s all I know, I swear. The girl—she was listed as Lot Forty-Seven. They said she was damaged goods.”

Dante’s eyes spark like flint. “Damaged goods?” His blade presse s into Silas’s tongue once more. Silas whimpers.

I tap Dante’s shoulder. Enough. We need him alive—for now.

We hogtie Silas’s wrists with zip cuffs, march him out like a trophy. The club’s patrons avert their eyes. Money and fear make people blind.

In the hall, Dante’s phone buzzes—Evelyn. He ignores it. Priorities.

We drag Silas to the freight elevator. He babbles half-apologies, half-threats. I pistol-whip him once; he quiets.

Outside, we approach Dante’s Mercedes. Night air tastes of rain and neon. Dante shoves Silas inside. I climb in after, the door slamming shut behind me.

“You’re making a mistake,” Silas croaks.

Dante straps him to a seat with a cable. “We can fix mistakes. Corpses are harder.”

Silas’s pulse flutters in his throat. Good. Fear is an honest God.

* * *

I sit opposite Silas, pistol resting on my knee. Dante pilots the Mercedes, calm, humming some old Metallica riff under his breath.

Silas trembles. “I told you everything.”

“No,” Dante says. “You told us enough to buy time.”

He swallows. “What else do you want?”

“The name of the man who sold my sister,” Dante’s bitter words ice over the car.

“I don’t know.”

Bang. I shoot the floor near his left boot. The metal rings like a church bell. Silas screams, jumps. The cable is biting his wrists.

“Try again,” I say.

He pants, eyes wide. “I swear—bids are anonymous. Password-locked. There are too many sex traffickers. You’ll never find which one sold your sister.”

“Either way, Holloway’s a dead man,” Dante calls from the front. “You’re a maybe.”

Silas’s tears run clean tracks through the smear of sweat on his cheeks. “Please, Dante. Lucien. I’m not your enemy.”

I lean in, voice colder than any winter. “A man who profits from cages is everybody’s enemy.”

* * *

Security waves us through. Floodlights carve silhouettes out of the night. We park in the gravel near the building—cinder block, soundproof, and forever hungry.

Dante drags Silas out. I follow, pocketing my pistol. No bullets inside. Pain first, death later.

We move through twin steel doors, down a corridor that smells of bleach and fresh paint. Dante unlocks Room 6—one with a drain in the floor.

Silas pales. “Lucien—think about Astra. She wouldn’t want you to—”

I backhand him. “Don’t speak her name.”

He falls to his knees, cuffed hands scraping concrete. Dante hauls him onto a steel chair, chained ankles, wrists, and throat. Silas sobs.

Fluorescent lights hum overhead. I circle him like a predator, slowly.

“I need you to be clear,” I say. “What you gave us tonight… It’s a map. But I hate puzzles.”

He licks blood off his lip. “I can help.”

“Yes, you can.” I gesture to Dante. My brother-in-arms unlocks a black case, producing a leather roll of scalpels, pliers, and needles.

Silas’s eyes are practically bulging from the sockets. “Please—Lucien—Lucien!” He rattles chains.

I crouch, cupping his face. “Give me Holloway’s drop house. Camera footage. Wire transfers. Every shred of incriminating evidence you have—on him, on Enrique, on every soul who touched that auction. And maybe, just maybe, I won’t make you a fucking example.”

His breath shudders. “The files are on a secure drive… in my office safe.”

“Combination,” I whisper.

“Four-eight-zero-six.”

Dante scribbles, keeping silent.

“What else?” I ask.

Silas’s shoulders shake. “A lock box— it holds buyers, bids, and cargo numbers. But it has a bio-metric lock—needs my thumb and iris.”

“Then we will bring it to you,” Dante says, his voice like gravel.

Silas sobs harder. “I’ll give you anything. Just—promise me I won’t die.”

I smile, gentle as a scalpel. “I promise you won’t die… unless it’s justified.”

It’s the truest thing I’ve said all ye ar.

* * *

We leave him shackled, lights dimmed. Dante stands by the door, methodical as always.

“Everything good?” he asks.

“Not yet.”

“He’ll talk eventually.”

“I know.”

I stare through the observation glass at Silas’s trembling form. The guilt inside of me gnaws to the surface, like rats. Astra’s cries. Her eyes. My hands.

I’m tearing the world apart to fix what I broke. To give her back the fire I stole.

If it means burning every club, every brother, every memory—so be it.

The lights buzz. Silas whimpers. Dante’s phone buzzes again—Evelyn.

“Answer her,” I mutter. “Tell her we’re coming home.”

He steps into the hall. I stay, watching the man in chains.

I change my focus to my phone, checking the cameras at my house. Astra sleeps in my bed—quiet, breathing, broken.

But tomorrow she’ll wake. And when she does, the world will be cleaner. Or redder.

Either way, she’s mine.

Mrs. Crowe.