Page 48 of Property of Mako
We had Lily. Lyra was still breathing.
But I knew—deep in my bones—that whatever Haidyn was doing back there was rewriting the entire damn playing field.
And I was going to have hell to pay for it.
By the time we hit the clubhouse gates, the adrenaline was fading, leaving behind the raw, twitching edge of something uglier.
We were alive. We had Lily.
But we’d left a storm brewing in that cursed plantation, and Haidyn was at the center of it.
Dexter swung the gate shut behind us, the heavy chain clinking as he locked it. Crypt Keeper was already shifting back, the crack of bone and ripple of muscle fading into his human form. His clothes were shredded, his hair matted with blood—most of it not his.
Bugsy was waiting at the door, leaning hard on a cane. His bandages were fresh, but the tight set of his jaw told me he hated being sidelined.
“Get her inside,” he said, jerking his chin toward Lily. “No point in sneaking in. They will know it was you if they don’t already—and so will the rat.”
Lyra still had a protective grip on her sister’s arm, like if she let go for a second, the world would snatch her away again. Lily’s wide eyes darted over the bikes, the clubhouse, the Kings—everything unfamiliar.
“It’s safe here,” I told her, keeping my voice low.
She didn’t answer. Just pressed in closer to Lyra, whose glamour had disappeared the second we stepped over Thane’s property line.
Inside, the warm glow from the overhead bulbs felt almost offensive after the cold, cruel light of the plantation’s halls.
Dexter poured whiskey for himself, then thought better of it and slid a glass my way.
“We’re not gonna talk about the fact that a demon bailed our asses out?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Not yet,” I said.
“Not yet?” Crypt Keeper snorted. “Mako, we owe Haidyn. That’s not the kinda tab you can just skip out on.”
I downed the whiskey, letting it burn all the way down before I answered. “We’ll cross that bridge when he comes to collect.”
Lyra led Lily toward one of the back rooms we kept for patch members who needed a place to crash. I caught the way her shoulders stayed tense, even once they crossed the threshold. She wasn’t going to sleep tonight—not with what she’d just seen.
Neither was I.
When she came back out, she didn’t meet my eyes at first.
“You’re thinking about going back,” she said flatly.
I didn’t deny it. “Thane’s still breathing. So’s half the Covenant. This isn’t finished.”
Her jaw tightened. “And Haidyn?”
Pretending nonchalance, I shrugged. “He’s not our enemy.”
She gave me a look that said she didn’t buy it for a second. Jaw clenched, she turned on her heel and went back to her sister.
The Kings gathered in the main room. Bugsy filled us in on the calls he’d been fielding—other charters asking questions, whispers about a leak in our own ranks growing louder.
“We’ve definitely got a rat and people are talking,” Dexter said. “Only question is who.”
Crypt Keeper’s gaze swept the room, sharp and distrustful. “We can’t plan anything big until we find them. Otherwise, everything we do, Thane will know before we even mount up.”
They were right. But the thought of sitting still made my skin crawl.
