30. ~Mason~

30

~Mason~

My pulse was spiking like crazy.

She wouldn't just leave for this long.

Not on her own.

Not of her own free will.

She couldn't get enough of being close to the three of us right now, just like we couldn't with her.

All four of us were caught up in some sort of honeymoon phase at the moment.

Even though she'd managed to go home, because she hadn't wanted to lose focus on her studies, her program meaning so much to her, it had still been hard for her to be away from us, and we all connected all the time via text and call and video.

Even if her call tonight—whoever it was to—had taken longer than she'd anticipated, she would have at least texted us.

Fuck me. Where was she?

I'd already checked the bathrooms and the east, south, and west side of the building—even down the alley Colt and I had just fooled around in.

I still couldn't wrap my head around me instigating that. I was glad that I had, it was just surprising for me. Bree being with us… it was loosening me up more than I'd ever thought possible. She was inspiring hope in all of us in different ways.

For me, it was the notion of being who I really wanted to be. Bit by bit.

The addition of her to our group had managed to restore the camaraderie we'd lost for a while, to bring us closer together, and for there to be many more lighthearted and jovial moments that we'd been without for too long.

So where the fuck was she?

I neared the north side of the building when I picked up on a commotion.

"Get the fuck off me, you skank!"

I frowned at the familiarity of the voice.

Rosemary?

A thud sounded and her pained cry rang out.

Then a very familiar voice eclipsed hers.

"It's bad form to slut shame someone in this day and age. Even more reprehensible is doing it as a sorority head with young women under your charge who look up to you. Don't be sore that someone has beaten you at your own game. Did you really think you could double cross Mason that easily?"

"I would have if you hadn't interfered."

"The moment Colt told me about you, it raised suspicion. So I kept an eye on you. Or, my girls kept an eye on you. You actually thought you could weasel your way into being a member of Hex just so you could report on what Mason was doing to use it as blackmail to be with him, or threaten to report your findings to his father should he refuse? That would destroy him. As it is, now it will only destroy you."

What the fuck?

I peered around the corner and found Brianna there pinning a flailing and really pissed Rosemary up against the wall as she spoke in that calm and reasonable manner of hers—all class—while Rosemary hissed and struggled in a completely undignified manner.

Brianna turned her head toward me right away, obviously having sensed my approach. Damn, she was on the ball. In more ways than one, clearly.

"Hey, babe," she greeted, casually, like she wasn't pinning somebody against the wall and conducting covert business like a seasoned pro at this sort of thing.

"What's—" I started, but Rosemary's whine cut me off.

"Mason, this little cunt—"

"Shut your fucking mouth," I rumbled dangerously, and it literally had her lips slamming closed.

I stepped forward, but Bree held up her hand, signaling that she had it.

In the next moment, she released Rosemary roughly.

"We're not done," she warned when Rosemary made a move to take off.

I watched, more than a little curiously, as Bree reached into the pocket of her jacket, then withdrew her phone. She scrolled for a few moments, then flipped the screen for Rosemary to see.

"A single word to Peter Hall through any means—even via your sorority members—and this hits Reitner and Simmons immediately. I really don't think your mom will take well to photos of you snorting a line of coke off some random guy's abs, or to this video of you fucking one of her business partners."

"You cu—"

I cleared my throat roughly.

Rosemary bit her tongue.

"Get gone. Now," I commanded.

Bree stepped aside and pocketed her phone, and Rosemary ran off into the night.

"How much did you hear?" she asked, walking to me, as we met halfway.

"Enough to know how far you went to protect me." I screwed up my face at the guilt that plagued me like a bitch of a thing. "After what I did to you? I don't—"

She took my hands in hers. "That was then. It was through a massive misunderstanding based on your flawed perception of Levi. We're allies now, right?"

"More than allies."

She nodded with a sweet little smile. "And I protect those closest to me."

"How did you even—how did you stop what she was attempting to do?"

"Well, if you hadn't come at me, I actually wouldn't have been able to. Not fast enough. When you marked me, I mobilized my girls to investigate you and to turn up intel. Once we became allies, those that I had in place were shifted to protective mode on your behalf, Levi's, and Colt's."

"Wow, that's… beyond impressive."

"Well, I'm not just a sweet, innocent girl with a pretty face."

"Believe me, we're all well aware you're much more than that, even without this. We wouldn't be so enamored with you otherwise. You're complicated, multifaceted." I stroked her fingers. "You're extraordinary."

"That she is," Levi's voice came from behind us.

We pulled apart as he stepped out of the shadows, grinning from ear-to-ear. "I accessed the cameras and picked you up here right in time for that show with Rosemary." He came to us and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her in for a tight hug, his hands shaking a little and belying just how freaked out he'd been when we hadn't been able to find her for those few minutes. "Nicely done," he said, as he eased away just a little, still staying close, like I was to her.

It was very noticeable that he didn't say anything about her taking off without telling us what she was doing and making us worry.

He was really trying so hard not to be so invasive and clingy with her, trying to give her the space and freedom that she needed. After all, he knew better than anyone from knowing her in the past, seeing her club life, and doing so much in-depth research on her, that she'd been denied that freedom for so long, a compromise she wasn't ever going to make again.

"Did you know about her girls ?" I asked him.

He lifted a shoulder, then beamed at her, answering non-committal, "I know a lot about our woman."

"Who are they?" I asked.

The two of them exchanged a look, then Bree pressed her hand to my pec. "All in good time," she told me, planting a soft kiss on my cheek.

"Let's head back inside. Colt needs us," Lev said.

"Yeah," I agreed, re-centering myself after all the worry and the shock of what I'd walked in on. "Yeah, he does."

We headed back in, my hand on the small of Bree's back, and Levi holding her hand as he played with her hair.

We'd just sat down at the booth as Colt was finishing up another song.

And then he surprised the fuck out of us by snatching up a spare microphone at the edge of the stage and pointing it at Bree. Off her surprise, he chuckled and spoke out into the bar for everyone to hear, "That's right, cutie, time to debut our duet. Everyone will melt at the sound of your sexy voice."

She hesitated.

Lev stroked her shoulders, encouraging her, "Being free, remember? This is a great step toward that."

"Sink into the song, block out the crowds. Just focus on Colt," I added.

It took a moment as she looked between us, the students packing the place who'd come for Colt's special show, and the microphone he was still holding out to her, but our words proved to be enough to bolster her when she rose to her feet.

Applause and wolf-whistles of encouragement from the audience sounded, egging her on, and then she was sauntering up to the stage.

Colt wrapped his arm around her and gave her a sweet kiss on the top of her head, then handed her the microphone, as he started off the song.

"I've been standing in the shadows/ Willing the blackness to pull me in/ A place where nobody else knows."

As he sang, Lev snagged my glass of scotch across the booth between us to get my attention, halting it just shy of my lips. "I want to tell her."

"About our tracking of Lynch?" I whispered back.

He gave me a withering look. "What else, Mason?"

"I don't know, I was hoping for anything but that."

"You saw her earlier. She can handle it. I don't want to keep this secret from her any longer. My plan was always to tell her once she'd come around and accepted the real her and stopped hiding. And she clearly has."

"These girls she has in place… it poses a danger, not just to what we're doing, but to her if she gets them and herself involved. After earlier, I can absolutely see that happening, something she'd do in a bid to protect us."

"Mason—"

"Just wait until we have something concrete, all right? Once you're able to leverage your recent infiltration of Royce Humphrey's security network toward finding Lynch."

I could see his resistance, his need to share this with her.

But he surprised me when he took the cautious and careful route and gave a nod. "Okay, yeah. It will be best for her if there's something concrete when I reveal that Lynch didn't actually perish six years ago."

"After what he did to her, I have no doubt. Knowing he's out there with no current way or strategy to take him down… it will torment her."

"Yeah," he murmured, a dark look flitting across his face, as he obviously started to recall that time.

Fortunately, the sound of Bree starting her verse of the duet managed to pull us both from our current conversational path, and jar him before he slipped into an episode.

We turned to watch as charisma came off her in waves and she sank into the moment with Colt and the song.

"It was easier not to open my eyes/ It was easier not to feel a thing/ Until you."

She really was something.

Fuck me, that didn't even cover it.

She was fast become everything to us.