Page 63 of The Devil’s Escape (The Devil’s Soldiers #7)
Bullet slams his fist into Cryos’s face, and he falls to the ground, clutching his now bleeding nose.
He doesn’t even try to get back up. “You used us. Betrayed us,” Bullet hisses, enraged.
“You took everything we stood for and sold it off for recognition for your fucking inflated ego. You are no better than Dagger. You put us in danger. I don’t buy that you only sent information.
You’re too fucking smart. You knew what was happening, and instead of helping us, of letting us know, you kept it to yourself and protected yourself and this fucking Fed over the men who supported you when you had nothing.
Who gave you a fucking family and everything else you could fucking want.
Did you know that they put a fucking gun in that cell?
Did you?” he roars when Cryos remains silent.
Finally, after a tense silence, Cryos gives a small nod. It’s a punch to the fucking gut. He knew what would happen. He let his own brothers fucking die.
“Did you know what happened to Hammer? Did you see it?” Bullet demands again. “Did you see that Dagger was the one to kill him?”
Slowly, Cryos nods. “I had cameras all over the place, and I found it one time when I was walking along the perimeter. I took pictures and sent the information to my handler. I needed him to add it to the file against Dagger. I didn’t know that Hammer was going to be there.
I didn’t know he was going to follow him.
I saw it happen, sent the footage, and then erased it.
” He lets out a cry of agony as Bullet kicks him in the face with his boot.
“I hope you fucking rot,” Bullet hisses.
“I hope you spend the rest of your miserable life paying for every fucking second of what you caused and aided in. Their blood is on your hands. Hammer, Carson, Titan, Milk, and Timber. All of them fell trying to protect you and this club, and you spat on them. Don’t you ever come back here.
Don’t ask for anything from us. You no longer exist. You no longer breathe the same air we do.
You’re dead to us.” Then he looks at Silver.
“Get him and the others out of our sight. You can handle cleaning up all this bodies and shit you caused too.”
“That’s not?—”
“It is now if you want to live to see another second,” Bullet snarls, lifting his gun and pointing it at Silver.
“I will kill you, and your star witnesses along with it. I’ll make sure to make it look like you were killed in the fight.
Then, I’m going to sic them on you, and anyone connected to you.
” He nods at Glitch and Simba, who both nod and turn their hard glares on Silver.
“And whatever they don’t finish, I’m sure my Old Lady can finish off. ”
Sirens fill the air. Looks like our time is up.
“We’ll handle this,” Simba offers. He looks at Savage, who nods his agreement. “You all go handle whatever shit you have going on.”
“One second,” Rose suddenly says, stilling our movements.
She walks over to Nikolai and slams her foot into his balls, making him groan and keel forward, gagging.
Then she moves to Cryos, who is still lying on the ground.
No one stops her. The pain in her eyes has my chest tightening.
To Rose, we’re all her children. She’s lost four sons today, and now to find out another one betrayed them and was complicit in their deaths, I don’t know if she’ll ever truly recover from that.
I won’t blame her if she can’t.
She stands over Cryos, her face cold and completely detached.
It’s a look that none of us ever wants to see her looking at us with.
I look at Cryos, and I think this is hitting him more than the punch to the face that Bullet delivered.
He looks broken. Defeated. I don’t feel an ounce of sympathy for him.
“I’m terribly disappointed in you, Sean,” Rose tells him simply, using his legal name.
Cryos jerks at that, but he doesn’t answer.
“In all the times that you and I spoke, you never once seemed like you were struggling with anything. You acted like we could love you, trust you. I welcomed you into my home. Into my life. I treated you like I did my own son.”
The tightness of her voice has Cryos flinching again.
“I’ve been hoping for the day you’d grow out of your whore phase and find someone you love. Give me more grandbabies to raise. Clearly, I was wrong in thinking that you valued the time with us as much as I did. That you loved us.”
Her words are sharp. Biting.
“Maybe some day I might find it in my heart to forgive you, but right now, I want to forget you exist. When we clean out that space you used to fuck over the men who put their lives on the line for you, I’m going to do it without a single tear.
With no emotion. Because you don’t deserve that.
Not from them, and most certainly not from me. ”
A lone tear falls down Cryos’s cheek, and agony covers his face when she turns her back on him. A final blow. Shutting him out forever.
“And when you go back to wherever is better than here, you’re going to realize how empty it all is. How empty you are. Maybe then you’ll realize just how much you’ve lost.” Then she walks to Bullet, taking his hand tightly in hers and leaning into him, never once turning to look at Cryos again.