But she obviously knew the way of Chaos and knew her ex-husband.
She was no longer an old lady.
She was still toeing the line.
Anyway, Zadie couldn’t confirm Valenzuela’s involvement because he wasn’t at my house. So she couldn’t give any more to the story than what they already knew.
Valenzuela was careful. He’d totally covered his tracks. In fact¸ the totality of this was both eerie and scary as shit.
“Millie,” Tyra called again.
I jerked and focused on her.
“Sorry,” I muttered.
“Girl, you gotta get yourself some help,” Elvira encouraged softly, watching me closely. “You need to work things out in your head. The shit you experienced was extreme.”
I drew in breath and shrugged.
She was right, of course. I’d been kidnapped and witnessed two men murdered.
I was an old lady but I wasn’t made of steel.
But I was also handling it.
“Is it messing with you?” Tyra asked.
I nodded. “I wake up at night.” I then shook my head. “Actually, not sleeping great at all.”
“Is High taking care of you?” Lanie asked.
“Yeah,” I said quietly, because he was.
I knew there was rage burning in him down deep.
But in order to take care of me, he was burying it.
I didn’t see it. Not at all.
If I woke up in the middle of the night, he acted like his only reason for being was beating back the demons that woke me. Even during the day when I could control the flashbacks, he was watchful, careful, tender.
It was a balm that was soothing.
But even as potent as it was, I knew there would be a long wait to healing.
“Talked to Malik about this shit,” Elvira declared. “He says as good as the support you have around you is, in every case he’s dealt with, professional help is the only way to go.”
I feared if I admitted I needed a counselor, the wrath Logan was banking would start to blaze out of control.
I slid my eyes to Tyra.
She got me, knew my dilemma, the limited answers to solving it, and gave me a soft smile.
I looked back to Elvira.
“It’s sweet you’re worried but it’d help if we could focus on the task at hand,” I told her.
“I’ll do that. Sure,” she returned. “Only if you promise you’ll consider lookin’ after yourself the way you should.”
I could give her that so I nodded.
“Right, what we need to do isn’t gonna be easy,” Tyra declared.
She was right.
Meddling in the affairs of the brothers was tricky business. If those affairs were dangerous and they were dealing with them the way they felt they had to, it was a no go.
But if Logan was banking his rage, I knew his brothers were too. That was what they did. What one felt, the others reciprocated. What one endured, the others endured with him.
And when vengeance was earned, the others were there to mete it.
And I worried that Valenzuela knew just that.
“Millie, are you sure you’re in a place you can be in on this?” Lanie asked.
I leveled my gaze on her.
“Just consider living twenty years without Hop, then getting him back. No matter what happened to you in the meantime, would you ever allow yourself to be in a place where you might lose him again?”
“No,” she answered quietly.
“No,” I repeated firmly. “So, yes, I’m in a place where I can be in on this.”
“Okay, then,” Tyra butted in, and I looked to her to see her looking at Elvira. “I think our best bet it to start with Hawk.”
“Hawk ain’t gonna let us wade in on this either,” Elvira replied. “Valenzuela don’t like me much after I did that undercover shit with his business. Hawk’s also in his line of sight. He gets wind we’re wadin’ in in whatever way we could do that, he’ll shut us down to the point I wouldn’t put it past his ass to kidnap all of ours and lock us down in one of his safe houses.”
Every time he was mentioned, Hawk Delgado got more and more interesting.
“I don’t mean asking for his help, Vira. I mean finding a way to find out what’s going on,” Tyra said. “If we try to get anything from our men, they’ll figure it out.”
“You think Hawk keeps files on shit like this?” Elvira asked.
“I think you can find out if he does or if he doesn’t,” Tyra answered.
Suddenly, Elvira grinned. “You’d think right.”
Tyra sat back in her chair. “We’ll start with that. It may not come to anything but the more information we have, the better. In the meantime,” she looked to Lanie and me, “work your men. Go cautious. Be smart. And I’m not talking about pumping them for information. I’m talking about making sure they get what they’d be leaving behind if something disastrous happened.”
“I think they already know that, Ty-Ty,” Lanie noted, and Tyra looked to her.
“I know they do. Just make sure they don’t forget,” she replied.
“I get you all. I get you’re freaked,” Elvira put in. “Valenzuela is a threat. But Chaos has never gone stupid. Do you honestly think this guy is gonna get the better of the brotherhood?”
“A man took me,” Tyra reminded her, “and Tack walked through a hail of gunfire to get to me.” She lifted a hand and indicated me. “Valenzuela took Millie. Do I think Chaos would do anything stupid?” She shook her head. “Do I fear that emotion, which is all that guides the Club, love, trust, family, protection, brotherhood, could cloud things when they’re up against an insane but worthy opponent? Yes.”