Page 11 of Brightness

I snort out a laugh, cocking my brow at her.

“Or… well, so I imagine,” she corrects herself.

Sliding off my ride, I exhale, running my fingers through my hair. “You really are something else.”

She giggles. “No, really… can we do it again?”

Rolling my eyes, I wrap my arm around her shoulders and guide her down the concrete ramp. “No. It was dangerous. I could have gotten us both killed.”

Ivy scoffs, waving her hand through the air dismissively. “You ride like a pro. I was never in any ‘real’ danger.” She uses air quotes, and the smile she sports is contagious.

I shake my head. “That’s not entirely true.”

“What do you mean?” she asks as we walk through the clubhouse doors. She detaches from me, scrunching her face.

I reach out for her hand and grab hold. “C’mon, we gotta go see Nycto.”

Ivy cocks her head, standing her ground. “Void, no. Tell me what’s going on.”

“Void,” Nycto grunts out as he walks across to us. “Got a call from Trixie saying you left the café in a shower of shit. She thought something might be up.”

I roll my shoulders. “Not here. Chapel.”

Nycto grits his teeth but tilts his head toward the rear of the bunker. I grab Ivy’s hand, then walk with her past the pool table toward the large, dark gray double doors with the Defiance logo proudly displayed across the metal. I walk in behind Nycto, the industrial wall lamps giving the ominous vibe it always has in here.

Nycto rounds the metal table and takes his seat at the head. I edge around the other side, sitting to his left, while Ivy moves in beside me.

Nycto pulls out his pack of cigarettes, lighting one up. “Feel like I’m gonna need nicotine for this.”

I grimace. He’s not wrong.

“We were at Trixie’s, as you know. When we were about to leave, I noticed something—”

“Is that why you got weird before we left?” Ivy asks, cutting me off.

I turn to her. “Yeah. There was a car pulled up about fifty feet away from us, but the weird thing was, the driver had a camera. He was taking pictures of Ivy and me.”

Nycto rubs his forehead, clenching his eyes shut tight.

Ivy shrugs. “So? What does that mean?”

“Nothing good,” I tell her. “We’re in the dark about who this could be. What does he want? Is he targeting you, me, the club? If he’s after you… is it just you, or is it Eva too? Is he an underground asshole, or an official—”

“An official?”

I pause, attempting to figure out how to word this right. “You and Eva… you’re here illegally.”

“Oh, shit! You think he could be immigration?” Her eyes widen, and the whites show her fear.

My stomach knots as I turn back to Nycto.

He raises his hands to placate her. “We don’t know anything. Did you get the license plate number, at least?”

“I needed to get out of there, Pres. I needed Ivy safe.”

Nycto sits back in his chair, puffing out a ring of smoke. “Dick move, Void. If you had an opportunity to get the plate, you fucking should have. It would have given us a lead about who the asshole is. Now, we have to sit back and wait, which could be more dangerous than you waiting twenty seconds to get a little intel.”

I sit forward, placing my fists on the table.

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