The streets were busy. People were everywhere, and we were fighting against the crowd. Levi with his hand on my back, pushing my body forward while Skins was fighting a battle of his own. And even though Dakota was tiny, she wasn’t exactly easy to carry while trying to haul ass down a busy street.

“Meyah!”

I could hear my name being called from behind me, but I couldn’t stop, I couldn’t risk being trapped.

“This place!” Levi practically picked me up off my feet, shouldering the swinging door and holding it while Skins dove through with Dakota. The receptionist lady screamed, and several people stepped away.

I waved. “Sorry. My friend got a little too drunk,” I tried to play it off as Levi shoved me in the direction of the elevator, reaching out and pressing the button over and over again like that was going to make it come any damn faster. The moment we got inside, and they slipped closed with a ding, Levi hit the fourth-floor button and I sunk to the floor. That’s when the tears began to roll down my face.

Skins was heaving, trying to catch his breath.

“Give her to me, man,” Levi offered, walking over and taking my tiny best friend into his arms while Skins sunk to the elevator floor beside me and wrapped his arm around my shoulders.

I turned my head, wiping my tears on his shirt, trying to stop myself from wanting to be sick all over the place.

“You’re okay,” Skins tried to soothe me as he took long steady breaths in and out. His heart was pounding in his chest, and I could feel it against my arm.

The elevator stopped, and the door dinged open, the both of us fighting exhaustion to get to our feet and following Levi down the hall. He stopped and kicked against the room 405 door then stepped to the side, nodding at the doorway.

The hotel room door opened, and I didn’t even need to wait for him to come into focus before I threw my body forward. He caught me, his arms going around my waist and lifting me off the floor before backing back into the room.

I couldn’t stop the sobs at that stage. I felt like I’d done pretty damn well until then to keep some sort of sanity, even after being attacked by Asshole One and Two. Then having to look away while Levi killed Asshole One and Two. Then realizing I didn’t fucking care they were dead because I’d imagined how many girls they had done that too, and damn-well succeeded. It made me feel physically ill just to think about it.

“It’s okay, fury fists,” Ham soothed, burying his face in my neck and my hair, nuzzling me like a cat would when it wanted to leave its smell on something, so everyone knew they owned it. “You scared the fucking shit out of me.”

I heard his voice shake. That was something I wasn’t used to from him. There’d only been one other time, and it was after the run-in with the sheriff.

My heart knew where home was. The second he had a hold of me, it was like nothing else around us mattered. I hadn’t been attacked. I hadn’t watched my best friend be beaten and sedated. I hadn’t stood there while Levi murdered two people in order to save us.

In his arms, I was safe from that. That shit didn’t matter because he would protect me.

“Wanna tell me what the hell you were doing in that place?” a deep voice snapped from behind me.

Ham growled low in his throat as he slowly placed my feet on the ground. “Leave it alone, Romeo.”

“Leave it alone? Do you realize how close your Old Lady just came to being on Isiah’s latest menu?” Romeo proclaimed his voice at a tone and level I hadn’t heard from him before. I clutched onto Ham a little tighter realizing he wasn’t wearing his club cut.

Wait! Why the hell were they here in Las Vegas?

I pulled back, looking up at Ham, my eyes blurred and watery. “What are you guys doing here?”

“Saving your ass apparently,” Romeo interjected before Ham could even open his mouth.

I spun around. “I get it, okay. You can’t trust guys in a nightclub. We made a mistake.”

The dark laughter that dripped like acid from his lips actually scared me. He braced his hands on the small hotel dining table in front of him, looking at me as if I was nothing but an annoyance—a fly that was buzzing around his head that he’d like to swat.

It gave me the chills.

Romeo and I had gotten close, even up until recently when he’d been the only one who stuck up for me, who helped me to see Ham.

Now, suddenly I was a piece of shit?

“Do you have any idea what goes on in that place?” Romeo snarled. “Do you realize how close you just came to being someone’s slave for the rest of your fucking life? How close you came to being tortured, and drugged, and rap—”

“That’s enough,” Ham spat, pulling my back against his chest. “How the fuck was she meant to know? It’s not as if he has a sign outside that screams ‘I steal women.’”

“Will someone tell me what the hell is going on?” I demanded, turning in Ham’s arms to face him and searching his eyes. They were full of worry, and honestly, what looked like fear. “What are you guys doing here? How did you know we were in there?”

He brushed his fingers through my hair, twisting them in the strands so he could pull my face forward and place a kiss on my forehead.

Romeo had moved off into the corner, and Levi and Skins were both sitting on one of the beds in the room, Dakota was still completely knocked out between them. Skins was brushing his hand across her hair in a comforting gesture, while Levi sat back against the wall staring straight ahead. He looked completely exhausted, his body drained.

I knew Levi wasn’t new to this. He’d almost died trying to protect the women when Skylar’s brother came to try and take Emma. But it never made taking someone’s life any easier.

Levi was still young, he wasn’t immune to these things. He hadn’t created that hard shell that most of the men had developed over time. Ham had been a part of the club for years, and he still struggled sometimes, even though he probably wouldn’t admit it.

I took a deep breath, pulling back from Ham and trying to be a little braver than I thought I was. Fake it till you make it.

I was an Old Lady now. I’d seen the women in the club do this a million times when things got stressful, and when the men would come home from places and missions that I didn’t even try to imagine. They comforted their men, and then they checked on the other boys. The ones who maybe didn’t have anyone to stand beside them, yet. The younger ones who needed to know there was someone there after they had been through hell, and after they had done and seen things which would scare even the hardest assholes.

I squeezed Ham’s hand and stepped around him, walking over to the bed and taking a seat on the edge where Levi was lounging. With the movement of the bed, his head shot up, and when he saw me sitting there, he sat a little straighter. “Hey, Meyah.”

“You all right?” I asked seriously.

His brow pulled together in confusion for a moment. “Was about to ask you the same thing,” he replied with a grin, his body relaxing a little. “But yeah, I’m doing all right. Your uncle told me a while back that sometimes you just need to take time to breathe.”

My instant reaction was to smile. I could hear those words in my head, something that Uncle Leo had said to me many times while I was growing up. When he helped me to ride my bike without training wheels. When he put together the shelves in my bedroom.

“He’s pretty smart, huh?”

Levi nodded. “Yeah, he is. Thanks for checking on me, though.”

“Come on, Meyah.” Ham was suddenly at my side again. “We need to talk about this.”

I put my hand in his and let him pull me to my feet, even though they were still shaky. We walked over to the table where Romeo was still brooding and glaring at everything and anything that moved.

I sighed as I took a seat. “I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t know.”

He looked up at me from beneath his heavy set brow. “You know how fucking scared I was when I saw you in that club. How many times I’ve seen that asshole go… Eeny, Meeny, Miney, Mo, and pluck a girl off their barstool, and in thirty minutes she’s never fucking seen again.”

Ham grabbed my hand under the table, squeezing it tightly.

“I’m sorry.”

I was strong enough to admit when I was wrong. We didn’t know the area, we should have stayed with Ripley and the boys. We should have known better than to just wander off on our own in a city like this. It was a stupid thing to do.

Romeo got up from his chair and came around the table. He pressed his hand to the back of my head and leaned down, pressing his lips to my forehead. “I don’t want to lose you. Unfortunately for me, you’ve become kind of important,” he whispered before walking over to the mini bar and searching through for something alcoholic.

My heart slowly began to find its regular beat. Romeo was angry but only because of the situation. Because this hard-ass man had actual emotions and cared if I got hurt.

This was new for him, he wasn’t really sure after years of keeping to himself and keeping the emotional shit to the back.

“I love you, too,” I murmured, enjoying the way his body froze, and Ham chuckled under his breath.

“I didn’t say that,” he growled, refusing to turn around and look at me.

“You didn’t need to.”