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Chapter Thirteen

Ash

T he war room is silent except for Santos's breathing.

"I found her badge on the desk this morning," he says, shoulders rigid by the strategy table.

His uniform's wrinkled to shit, and he has dark circles under his eyes from pulling another all-nighter.

"Service weapon locked in her drawer. Files stacked neatly.

Even left her damn uniform hanging in the locker. "

I stare at the thumb drive he dropped on the table. Santos looks like hell, deep lines around his eyes, and there's something else in his expression. Pity, maybe.

"This was with it," Santos continues, tapping the drive with one finger. "It's... you need to hear it. Before the others."

Santos hesitates. Fuck. That's never good. Whatever's on there has Santos, a guy who's dealt with bar fights and domestic calls for fifteen years, struggling for words.

"I listened to it," he admits, jaw working. "Had to know what I was dealing with."

"And?" I keep my voice level despite the dread building in my chest.

Santos meets my eyes directly. "It's her and Royce. A deal of some kind."

Christ. I force my expression to stay neutral even as my mind races through scenarios, none of them good. Santos reads my face, then digs into his pocket.

"There's more," he says, pulling out a folded piece of paper and sliding it across the table. "She left this, too."

I recognize Nova's handwriting immediately. Short, direct: Santos - This is everything you need. The recording proves bribery and conspiracy. Use it. Ash will know what to do with the rest. The families deserve justice. Make sure they get it. - N

Her badge sits there. The thing that meant everything to her, just abandoned on the table. She's gone.

Santos studies my face, then nods. "I'll be at the station if you need anything else." He turns to leave, pausing at the door.

"Take Knox with you," I tell him. Santos is still moving like every step hurts. "Kid needs to focus on something besides beating himself up, and you could use the backup."

Santos hesitates. "You sure? With Nova gone—"

"Station still needs to function. Town still needs protection." I meet his eyes. "That's what she'd want."

He nods, and some of the tension leaves his shoulders. "Thanks."

"For what it's worth," he adds, hand on the doorframe, "she believed in what we were doing. Whatever's on that recording... just remember that."

My hands are steady as I plug the drive into my laptop, though they shouldn't be. Nova vanishing without a word, leaving behind only evidence and her badge—that should have me tearing apart every road between here and Atlanta.

Instead, I'm locked down. Dead calm. The same fucking emptiness that settled in my bones when I realized a weak orc wouldn't survive the camps and I had to become something else or die.

The file opens after Santos leaves. Single audio recording, timestamp from this morning. I click play and Nova's voice fills the war room.

"I want the deal."

My teeth grind together. Her voice is cold. Certain. Nothing like the woman who'd whispered my real name in the dark.

Royce sounds smug as hell through the speakers. "Smart woman. I knew you'd see reason."

I lean forward, hands clenched, as Nova negotiates terms I never saw coming. Three months. Delayed appeals. Procedural roadblocks.

"The MC. Your... relationship with their leadership has been quite convenient."

The air leaves my lungs, waiting for her response.

"You're seeing what I wanted you to see." Her voice is flat. Dead. "He's useful. Access to their intelligence, their resources. Nothing more."

The screen blurs, and I blink hard. Shit.

"So the relationship is purely...?"

"It served its purpose."

I stop the recording.

My hands clench as I replay those last thirty seconds, listening to Nova dismiss what happened between us like it was some strategic play. Like she'd been playing a long con from the moment we met.

But that's bullshit.

I've interrogated liars, manipulators, people who've spent decades perfecting deception. Nova's good, better than most, but she's not that good. Nobody is.

The way she'd trembled when I first touched her. The catch in her breath when I said her name. The tears she'd tried to hide when she told me about Carman.

You can't fake surrender like that. Can't manufacture the kind of vulnerability she'd shown me in the dark, when she thought no one was watching.

I rewind further, listening to her voice again. Too controlled. Too practiced.

Damn. I see it now.

"You're seeing what I wanted you to see," her voice repeats from the recording.

Hell.

I slam my fist on the table hard enough to rattle the laptop.

Why would Royce risk having this conversation at all? Bastard's too careful, too paranoid to leave himself exposed like this. Unless...

Unless he thought he was safe. Because any recording of this deal would implicate Nova just as much. A sheriff caught taking bribes has no career, no credibility. The moment she tried to use this against him, she'd destroy herself too.

Royce thought he had her figured out. Thought I did too.

"He's useful. Access to their intelligence, their resources. Nothing more."

My gut twists, hearing it again, but now I see what she did. She played Royce's game, said what he wanted to hear, and let him think he'd won. All to create evidence she'd never be able to use herself.

Son of a bitch. We both got played by our own assumptions.

But I remember the weight of her in my arms after she'd broken down, the way she'd said Torgash like it was sacred instead of feared, her fingers tracing my scars while she whispered about nightmares and dead sisters and carrying grief alone.

She couldn't have faked that—wouldn't have known how.

Which means she was playing Royce, not me. Painting herself as the villain to protect us from whatever leverage he thought he had.

Clever as hell, and she'd seen his weakness from the start—arrogant bastard would underestimate a dirty cop, think she was just another piece on his board. So she became exactly what he expected while handing us everything we needed to bury him.

I drop my head into my hands as grief hits first, then respect, and fury that she thought she had to do this alone.

She didn't sell us out.

She torched her own life to save the town. To keep families in their homes. To make sure two years of fighting corruption actually meant something.

The war room door slams open. Diesel fills the doorway, eyes wild with barely controlled fury.

"Prospect's tearing himself up over missing her slip," he snarls. "Heard you sent Knox to the station with Santos."

Behind him, I can see Crow making his way in.

"Santos needed backup. And Knox needed to focus on anything besides feeling guilty."

"Fine. But why aren't we out there looking for her?" Diesel snaps. "She's already got hours on us, probably halfway to—"

"Atlanta." The words come out sharp. "She went home. Not hard to figure out."

Diesel's expression shifts, hearing something in my tone. "So we ride. Be there in two hours, drag her ass back here for answers."

My spine goes rigid, every muscle in my body screaming to do exactly that.

To fire up the bike and beat pavement until I'm standing in whatever shithole apartment she's hiding in, demanding to know why she couldn't trust me with this.

Why, after everything we'd shared, she had to shut me out of this.

My beast wants blood. Wants answers. Wants to hunt her down and drag her back where she belongs.

But that's not what she'd want. And maybe that's the point. She made her choice, and now I have to make mine. Let her go, or become the monster who drags her back into a mess she sacrificed everything to escape.

I stare at her badge, memories hitting me hard. That first night at Murphy's, her stepping between me and danger without fear. The night she touched my scar without flinching, saw Torgash and didn't run.

The pattern was there from the beginning. Nova rushing headfirst into other people's battles, putting herself between them and harm, never counting the cost.

This is who I am, Ash. This is what I do.

And I fucked it up for her. Pulled her into my orbit, complicated her mission, made her vulnerable in ways that could get her killed. My need to control her situation, to keep her close, I backed her into a corner where sacrifice was the only way out.

I could chase her down. Find her. Drag her back like some possessive asshole. But then what? Force her to watch what she fought for turn to shit because I couldn't let her go?

"No," I force out through gritted teeth. "We don't ride."

"The fuck we don't. Someone threatens family—"

I hit play on the laptop. Nova's voice fills the room, confident and businesslike as she negotiates with Royce. Diesel goes rigid as he listens, confusion and anger fighting for control of his expression.

When it ends, Diesel's face is unreadable. "That's not right." He shakes his head slowly. "I've seen a lot of betrayals in this life. People selling each other out for money, for freedom, for their own skin." His eyes narrow. "That wasn't it."

Good. I'm not the only one who heard it. "I know."

"That's a performance. She's baiting him, saying exactly what the bastard needs to hear. Hanging herself out there to save us."

"Why would she do that?" Diesel asks, confusion replacing anger. "Why agree to any of this?"

"Because we need evidence that would stick," I explain, picking up the note Nova left. "Royce would never incriminate himself unless he knew using it would destroy her. Any recording would make her look just as dirty as him."

Diesel flips through bank statements, his expression shifting from anger to calculation. He stops at a particular page, taps it twice, then looks up.

"She knew what she was doing," he says quietly. "This recording..." He nods toward the laptop. "We could use it tomorrow. End Royce for good."