Page 42 of Sinner's Storm
If he was right and I was truly in danger, then whatever happened when I left this place was on me. More importantly, would I be putting Harlow in danger as well? After everything she’d just been through, could I conscientiously endanger her more?
There were too many variables.
The numbers weren’t adding up.
No matter how I looked at it, the solution was not simple.
I needed more information.
“You are a businessman. You deal with numbers. The math never lies. I’m the same. I attended NYU and received my degree in business. I can make any figure work, only if I have all the numbers. So, help me out here, Jason. You have to give me something. Anything. Because the longer I look at the problem, the more it becomes unsolvable, and I’ve never found a problem I couldn’t fix.”
“You want the numbers?” He smirked. “Alright. Here is the breakdown. We have a daughter. She needs us both. There are people out there who will come for the both of you when they learn you both exist, and trust me, they will find out. In the interim, we have to contend with the investigation into your father and the subsequent aftermath. To do that, you are going to need me, my connections, and my club. But my club has rules, and the only way they will help is if you are legally my wife. It’s a clusterfuck, and the only way we walk away alive is if we do it together.”
Taking a deep breath, I looked out the window into the bright sun shining down on the city.
I had an idyllic childhood. I had two loving parents that doted on me and loved me until the night they died. I should have been there that night but was asked at the last minute by some friends to go to the movies. While I was having fun, my parents were dying in a house fire. It was something I still hadn’t reconciled with. Because of my age, I had no choice but to return to New York City and stay with friends of my parents until I turned eighteen. Life was different in the city, and while I was born in the Big Apple, I never considered it my home. After graduation, I attended NYU and studied hard, forgoing friendships and having fun, determined to make my parents proud.
I wasn’t like my friends. I took life seriously, knowing that it could change on a dime. After my parents’ deaths, I lived my life cautiously, never taking risks. Then one drunken night, I threw caution to the wind. The result: my beautiful daughter and now my subsequent affiliation to a man I barely knew. Now that man was asking me to trust him with my life, and God help me, I wanted to.
What the hell did that say about me?
I didn’t know what the hell was going on, but so far, Jason Calloway hadn’t given me a reason not to trust him. In fact, he’d kept his word. Everything he’d said or promised, he’d followed through on.
Turning back to the man, who stood watching me intently, waiting patiently for me to decide my own fate, I took a deep breath and went with my gut. “I’m trusting you to protect me and our daughter.”
“I will.” He sighed, his body instantly relaxing. “I give you my word.”
Nodding, I added, “Then I will marry you.”
The second I said the words he needed to hear, everything happened fast. One minute I was sitting in bed, barely awake, making a life altering decision not only for me but for my daughter. The next I was standing in the living room of the penthouse, as men I’d never seen before milled around talking.
“Here, Delany. Drink this.” A woman named Largo smiled when she handed me a tumbler half full of amber liquid. I watched Malice stand near the fireplace as he stuck a metal poker into the fire.
The second I agreed to marry Jason, he started making calls.
The first to arrive was a man who introduced himself as Christian Moreno—Jason called him Fury—who wasted no time shoving document after document at me to sign. I knew of Mr. Moreno. I’d seen him in the papers all the time. He was a major player in the city and the father of the heir to Duchene International.
I also learned that he was Jason’s attorney.
I tried to take the time to read what I was signing, but Jason told me that the documents were inconsequential, just the legal documents to add me to banking information, medical and life insurance, and shit like that. But when Mr. Moreno asked me to sign an NDA, stating that I was prohibited from ever talking publicly about the Soulless Sinners Motorcycle Club or any of its members, my hand shook when the reality of who I was marrying sank in.
I wasn’t just marrying the CEO of Calloway Investments.
I was marrying a member of the Soulless Sinners Motorcycle Club.
The most notorious motorcycle club in the world.
Neither man moved as my hand shook while the pen hovered above the document. Neither said a word, giving me the time to accept my future. And when I looked at Jason, he schooled his features, giving nothing away. Closing my eyes, I prayed I was making the right decision before I signed my name.
The second Mr. Moreno had my signature, he made a call and simply said, “She signed.”
Moments later, the elevator doors opened and in walked Caleb Davenport, architect and owner of Davenport Tower, along with his wife Largo Davenport, Christopher Hart, owner and CEO of Hart Tactical Services, Gregory Van Otto, owner and CEO of Van Otto Lapidary and his wife Linsey Duchene Van Otto, the current regent of Duchene International, followed closely by Dr. August Lansing and Malice.
Looking at Jason, I couldn’t believe my eyes. Some of the city’s heaviest hitters, big names in business, the crème de la crème of the city was standing not five feet from me.
“Delany, you’ve already met Fury. This is Mercy, his wife Largo, Payne, Vicious, his wife Linsey, and Bane. My brothers... my family.”
“Where is Harlow?” Dr. Lansing asked.