Page 147 of Deacon

None of us had known. We knew Lena as his wife, Cage’s mother, then the woman who betrayed us. We hadn’t known Ledger had built the marriage around duty before it ever became anything else.

Ghost rubbed both hands over his face. “Anyway. It hit me then. I asked if there’d been anyone before her. Anyone he loved that she might’ve known about.” He paused, eyes lifting. “He flinched like I slapped him. Then his head snapped to the safe.”

I could see Ledger realizing his dead wife knew exactly which name he had buried deepest.

“He went back over,” Ghost said. “Hit the buttons. Safe opened.”

Rook shifted, slow and controlled.

Ghost shook his head once. “He cursed like a motherfucker. I don’t know whose birthday it was, but he was pissed she used it. Or pissed she knew it. Not sure which.”

Priest broke the silence. “What was in it?”

“A few journals.” Ghost’s voice had flattened, the way it did when he was trying to keep feeling out of something that had too much of it. “He grabbed the most recent one first. Entries talked about meetin’ with someone from Dead Man’s Hand. Guy approached her at the grocery store. She started feedin’ him info, but not enough to fully burn us right away. Runs. Dates. Routes. Bits and pieces.”

My jaw tightened. Across the table, Graves went very still.

Ghost looked toward his laptop without really seeing it. “She wrote that she just wanted them out of the club. Wanted a normal life. Wanted the suburban house with the white picket fence, Ledger with some office job, Cage goin’ to college, all that shit.” His mouth pulled tight. “She thought if she helped bring down the club, then there’d be no club for Ledger to choose. Thought that would force him into the life she wanted.”

Nomad swore under his breath.

Anger came easier than pity for a second. “That bitch never realized she was riskin’ his life same as the rest of ours,” I said.

Ghost nodded. “Exactly. The more he read, the more furious he got. He was about to tear the whole damn journal apart. I had to snatch it out of his hands.”

Priest leaned back carefully. “And the other journal?”

Ghost’s face changed, just a tightening around his eyes, but every man at the table saw it. “That one was older,” he said. “From early in their marriage. That one’s why he ain’t here.”

The room tightened around that sentence. I cleared my throat. “Well, kid, don’t keep us waitin’. What the fuck was in it?”

Ghost dragged his hands over his face again. “So I told you he said he got drunk and somehow slept with Lena without rememberin’, and then she wound up pregnant with Cage?”

Priest’s answer was quiet. “Yeah,”

Ghost looked straight at him. “Her journal told a different story.”

Nobody moved.

“He came home slightly drunk after drinkin’ with the guys from his unit, but not blackout drunk” Ghost said. “She offered him another beer. Beer was laced.”

My stomach turned. Ghost kept going. “She drugged him. Then slept with him. Next mornin’ she told him they got passionate because he was drunk, made it sound like she thought his feelings finally showed up, that he acted like he felt things for her. In the journal she wrote that he apologized to her. Said he didn’t mean to take advantage of her or hurt her feelings.”

My hands curled against the edge of the table. Ledger had woken up believing he had crossed a line. He had apologized to the woman who had drugged him because she had convinced him he was the one who needed forgiveness.

Ghost’s mouth flattened. “Then she wrote that she knew she was ovulating and did it on purpose. Wanted to get pregnant so he’d stay. Said she always loved him. Wanted him to be with her.”

Graves’s voice came low and furious. “Jesus Christ,”

“Yeah,” Ghost said. “That’s about what Ledger said too. Then he fucking lost it.”

Ghost’s voice held no judgment now, only helplessness. “Before I could do anything, he started throwin’ shit all over the house. Lamps. Books. Chairs. Whatever he could get his hands on.” Ghost shook his head. “I tried to stop him. He yelled at me to get out.”

Rook looked over. “You left?”

Ghost gave him a look. “I went outside and waited him out.”

Of course he had. “About an hour later he came out,” Ghost said. “Told me he was headin’ back to the apartment because Cage would be home from school soon, but he needed time to process.” His gaze dropped to the table. “Said he closed the rest of the journals back in the safe but checked the dates first. The others are even older. From before they were married. Back when they were still at the old club before and just after he left for the Army.”