Page 31 of Sinner’s Torment

“What if I don’t want to go?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper, small and scared and uncertain. “What if I want to stay here in Diamond Creek, raise this baby here where I have roots and memories and people I know?”

King’s expression was kind but firm, understanding but realistic, sympathetic but honest. “Then you stay. That’s your right. Your choice to make. But you need to understand the risks, understand what you’re choosing and what you’re giving up. And you need to understand that Torment will still be involved regardless. He’s the father. That’s not going to change, no matter where you are, no matter what you decide, no matter how you feel about him. The DNA test made that an undeniable fact. He has rights, legal and moral. He’ll want to see the baby, be part of the baby’s life. That’s going to complicate things if you’re here and he’s in New York.”

I nodded slowly, mechanically, my throat so tight it hurt to swallow, like I’d swallowed glass.

He was right.

Of course he was right.

King was always right about club business, about how things worked in this world.

Torment was the father.

The DNA test proved it beyond any shadow of doubt.

And that meant he had a say in what happened next, whether I liked it or not, whether I was ready for it or not, whether I’d spent the last two months convincing myself he didn’t care.

Whether I wanted him involved or not, he was involved now.

“Call him,” King said gently, encouragingly, his voice softer than I’d ever heard it. “Talk to him. Hear what he has to say. Listen to his side of things, find out what he’s thinking, what he wants. Then make your decision based on all the information, not just fear or anger or assumptions.”

I looked at Grace again, searching her familiar, kind face for... something. Guidance, maybe. Or reassurance. Or permission to fall apart. Or just comfort, someone to tell me everything would be okay even if it was a lie.

She squeezed my hands one more time, hard enough to hurt just a little, hard enough to ground me in the physical sensation. “You don’t have to decide right now, honey. Not right this second. Take your time. Think about what you want, what you need. What’s best for you and the baby. That’s what matters most. Not what King wants or what Torment wants or what the clubs want. What you want.”

I nodded, clutching the paper in my hands like a lifeline, like it was the only thing keeping me from drowning in the overwhelming tide of emotions and decisions and consequences.

“Okay,” I whispered, my voice breaking, cracking right down the middle. “Okay. I’ll think about it. I’ll call him. I’ll... I’ll figure this out somehow.”

But as I sat there in King’s office, staring at Torment’s number until the digits blurred together into meaningless shapes, my fingers tracing the numbers like I could divine some answer from their arrangement, all I could think was that nothing about this was okay.

Nothing about this was what I’d planned for my life when I’d woken up this morning, or two months ago, or any morning before that.

Nothing about this was what I’d imagined when I’d dreamed about my future—finishing school, building a career, maybe meeting someone and falling in love on my own terms, in my own time.

And now, whether I wanted it or not, whether I was ready or not, whether I felt capable or not, my life was no longer entirely my own.

It belonged to this baby growing inside me.

It was club business now, tied up in alliances and politics and wars I barely understood.

Connected to the Soulless Sinners, to Torment, to a world I’d only glimpsed from the edges.

Part of something bigger and more dangerous and more complicated than I’d ever imagined, bigger than just me and my simple dreams of a normal life.

And club business always, always got messy.

That was the one thing I knew for certain, the one truth that had been driven home again and again in my life around the Silver Shadows.

Club business always got messy, always got complicated, always dragged in people who didn’t ask to be part of it.

And now I was right in the middle of it, holding a piece of paper with a phone number and a decision that would change everything, no matter what I chose.

CHAPTER TEN

Brandy

I couldn’t call him.