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When she asked if she was a prisoner, and I didn’t answer.

Instead, I showed her to her room.

She shut down in that moment. Not crumpling to the ground, but her face lost all emotion. Her eyes died before me. Any small spark she had left after what went down at the Devils’ place was completely gone.

She trailed after me as I led her downstairs to the basement. She didn’t comment at all that the place was mostly a gym. Not even one remark about the smell of cleaning supplies or that I had more than one treadmill. She didn’t seem to care, or maybe didn’t even notice.

I pointed out the bathroom, then the storage room. It wasn’t till I opened the only room I actually did anything with, other than the gym down here, that she showed any kind of emotion.

It was only a single tear.

“The guys got what they could,” I told her, trying to explain that her landlord had already started tossing her stuff out on the street when they went over. The dick put the eviction notice up saying she had thirty days but only gave her twelve hours before he changed the locks. If we hadn’t already come up with the plan to bring her back here after we went and got her, there’s no telling if we’d have gotten half as much as we did.

Which isn’t much, and most of it’s broken. Still, the brothers brought it all here to let her sort through.

But it’s been over a week, and each time I go down there to work out, when I catch a glimpse of her room when she opens the door to use the bathroom before shutting it again, it’s still the same. Not a single box has been moved or the trash taken out. The only comfort I have is knowing that at least she’s sleeping on the bed and not the ground, based on the way the bed is usually unmade.

I wouldn’t put it past her to sleep uncomfortably. She seems to do everything in her life to make it far worse than it could be.

She doesn’t eat. Not really. I told her that first day that if she needed something, to let me know. That I’d get it for her. Said the same about the food in the house, how it was there for her use.

I even make dinner for her each night. Not that she joins me, Rex, and Fido for dinner when it’s done. The first few times, I set the meal outside her door, only to come down the next morning and see it untouched except for my cats licking it.

Then I started putting the plates I made for her in the fridge. She eats them when I’m not around. They get picked over. Nothing too much, and she just leaves them in there. It’s a mess to clean up, but it’s becoming a routine.

Which I thrive on.

I learned that a while back. As a kid, I didn’t have any structure. Some kids do well with it, others don’t. My mother was a free spirit, and so was my dad, when he was around. But the more time he spent in lockup, the more Mom’s free spirit was telling her to get away from what she’d tied herself to. And the moment Dad died in prison, she was off with the wind.

I was old enough to look after myself at that point, for all the good it did me.

I got in more fights than I can remember. Thought being a bouncer would be a good job, till it wasn’t. I ended up in the center of what started as a full club of people pushing and ended with twelve guys knocked out and me the last one standing.

Which is how the Hounds found me. I never looked back after they brought me in.

A few of them were hotheaded like me, so we fit. But when I got the itch to lose control, that’s when the teaching came. Helping me find routines that center me or some shit. I didn’t have one mentor—I had them all. Each brother taught me something, and I was eager to learn and make a change. I didn’t want to end up like my old man and knew I needed to make things work for me.

So routines became my therapy.

Get up, feed the cats, and get to work. Work on bikes, eat, hang at the club.

Repeat.

It doesn’t have to be so specific that each hour and every day are the same, but enough that I feel in control.

Another thing I read about. Apparently, my loss of control is from me not feeling like I’m in control.

I still don’t really get it, but what the fuck ever.

All I know is now I’ve got another routine to add. This one is for after hanging at the club. Come home, cook dinner, and clean.

“We might need to try a different tactic,” Casper mumbles, and I look at him over the bike I’m working on.

He wants answers. We all do. But he’s going to have to wait. Despite that, he’s in charge of the club. But this one is on me. I decide the timetable. That was one stipulation with her staying at my place. One of many.

He, like the entire club, doesn’t like to be left in the dark. And while Natalie’s kidnapping—this last one, anyway—was because of us, we don’t know about the one before that. Or the two before that. We need to know if we just brought a threat against us into the club.

Flint and Gator are working on intel, but even with Reina giving up that her family is Yakuza, we still aren’t getting details on Natalie. It’s as if she never existed, which makes Casper question everything.