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  She got dressed as well, unable to stop thinking about the myriad of possibilities that a military presence brought with it these days.

  There had always been rumors about the military coming through different towns, sweeping people away. She’d heard members of Defiance come back after long trips, post-Chaos, talking about stumbling upon ghost towns. They always seemed freaked out about that, because these were towns that had made it through the Chaos, that had appeared to be thriving. Places that had aligned themselves with Defiance.

  Had the military been doing their targeting all this time? Did it tie into Keller’s human-trafficking business? She asked Bishop that and waited for his answer.

  * * *

  Bishop didn’t want to give her any kind of an answer. But she was waiting, none too patiently. “Look, I think there’s a hell of a lot that’s gone on behind the scenes. The government’s trying to keep control. It’s smart for them to use guys like Keller. It’s smart of Defiance too. He might do some bad shit, but he’s keeping an awful lot of people alive.”

  Fuck, he wanted to spit after saying positive things about Keller. All of what he’d told her was true, but none of that meant the guy wasn’t a complete asshole in a charming, almost disarming way.

  When it came down to it, Keller was a fucked-up kid, which was why he was drawn to Bishop and Luna. People who’d been happy pre-Chaos or had happy childhoods? Those people Keller couldn’t relate to.

  “Are there other AWOL military men here?” she asked.

  “I’m sure there are a ton, but for sure, I know there’s one guy here—he’s from my old platoon,” he said. “He’s AWOL too—left a couple of months before Mathias and I did. He said that if he hadn’t come here right after, he probably would’ve killed himself. That’s how bad things had gotten.” Even now, he still had the ghost of battle in his eyes, had seen things that none of them were meant to see.

  “Suppose he turns you in to save himself?” she asked.

  “Not much I can do but trust him. Or kill him, I guess,” he said. She stared at him sharply and he said, “I’m supposed to say I’m just kidding, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Just kidding.” He paused, then said, “You know I don’t mean that just kidding part, right?”

  “I know, Bishop.”

  He smiled at that as someone knocked on the door. Maybe it was the guard, or Rocio with some food.

  When he opened it, he found Declan there, and moved aside to let the man he did Keller’s dirty jobs with inside.

  “Is the military here?” Bishop asked him.

  “Yeah. They were in the area—they stopped by to see if we needed help with crowd control. Sometimes there are riots after a storm like that,” Duncan directed the last part to her.

  “Is this going to be a regular thing?” Bishop asked.

  “The LoV’s no longer allowed on the compound. We’ve had some other issues with them—they’re not following the rules. I’m sure Keller’s informed the military of that.”

  “Great,” Bishop muttered.

  “Don’t worry—they don’t know you’re here. Even if they did, Keller won’t let them take you.”

  “Yeah, for now,” Bishop muttered.

  Declan ignored that, said, “Anyway, once they leave and Keller clears us, it’s cool to come up. Probably won’t happen for another couple of days, at least.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Luna woke the next morning, post-storm, knowing she’d see the sun.

  Keller’s was equipped with sunlamps in every one of their rooms, but nothing could beat the real thing. She supposed even Keller couldn’t bring it out more often than the satellite—the government—warranted.

  She and Bishop walked through the still-dark compound lit with fluorescents, and she took a moment to look around more. They were in a different area from where Bishop usually took her through. Here, there were strip clubs and whorehouses right next to grocery stores. Pre-Chaos, those placements would’ve caused problems.

  When she told Bishop that, he said, “Chaos let us let go of any forced morals. Who gives a shit if people want a lot of sex? People are still dying, going out younger now than they did, but they’re having more fun, it feels like. Isn’t that what life should be about?”

  “Maybe? I don’t know—there was never any promise of fun.”

  “Should’ve been.” He grabbed her hand. “Come on, sun’s coming out.”

  There were open fields all around the property where people spread out in anticipation of the event. Bishop pulled her into the cold grass. One minute she was shivering and the next, the warmth spread along her body. She shuddered pleasantly as the change of temperature gave her goose bumps.

  “Beautiful,” Bishop murmured, but he was looking right at her when he spoke. “Tell me what happened to you.”

  She stared at him, wondering why he’d try to ruin this precious time, mar it with ugliness, but he added, “Nothing’s ever as scary during the daylight.”

  She blinked, looking into his bright blue eyes and realized how right he was. The world was always different in the light. Everything was possible. Ghosts folded away.

  She ran her fingers along his tattoos, the Celtic knots, a few other symbols she didn’t recognize that looked much older. “These weren’t done by Mathias.”

  “No.” His expression crowded. “My father.”

  She guessed, if he was going to ask about her secrets, he was going to be forthcoming with his own. “How old were you?”

  “Not old enough.”

  Some of them looked scarred. They obviously hadn’t been done with any care. She traced a finger over them, asked, “Why not have Mathias cover them?”

  “I’ll still know they’re there. Who am I covering them for?”

  “For you...so you can make something pretty out of something painful.”

  “Is that important to you?”

  “Yes.”

  He nodded. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  She ran a hand over her own half a sleeve of tattoos. “These don’t cover anything. I just wanted pretty.”

  “They suit you.”

  “It started when I was thirteen,” she said, knowing she needed to get this over with. “I was just starting to look older than I was. Of course, that’s what I wanted. It’s what we all wanted when we were young, right? To be adults.”

  “I never want to be a kid again. Never want to be helpless. Fucking never,” he said fiercely in agreement. He’d pulled away from her for a second to strip down. She noted that most people were naked, soaking up the rays with every part of their bodies.

  “You don’t have to,” he told her in response to her gaze.

  The way he looked at her though, it made her want to. She pulled her T-shirt over her head and snuggled against his side. She was mostly covered by him. He shifted her, put his arms across her breasts, her nipples hardening against his forearms.

  For several minutes, they were quiet. The crowd around them was as well, just a gentle ripple of murmurs, as if the sun was some kind of calming drug for the masses.

  “He was the old Sergeant at Arms. One of Lance’s best friends. He was also good friends with my father. He was really respected. I’d never heard another girl or boy talk about him badly, so I don’t know if I was the only one. It stopped when I was almost fifteen, because he was killed. I was never so glad for anyone dying than I was for that man.”

  “Did he die in the Chaos?”

  “Yes.”

  “If he was still alive, I would’ve left here today. Killed him with my bare hands.”

  She’d known that, would’ve been comfortable with that. “Rebel would’ve beaten you to it.”

  He nodded, like he approved. Waited for her to continue, and
she did.

  “The whole time, he threatened me. Told me he’d kill my parents, and he had the means and the power. He told me he was going to marry me.” She bit back the anger and shame, angry that the emotions from that time could still affect her so strongly. “Finally, I told my parents and it ruined everything.”

  His face tightened. “They were wrong, Luna.”

  She nodded, “I knew it then, too. But when you’re young and scared, there’s nothing worse than watching your family fall apart around you. Because of something you did.”

  He held her a little tighter. “I know.”

  “They found out. And it ruined them, Bishop. It ruined them. And it almost ruined me.” She paused, wiped her eyes viciously. “My father believed Adam. Took his side. My mother believed me. They had a knock-down, drag-out fight. All the dishes, smashed everywhere. My father hit her. I’d been around club violence my entire life, knew that men took their shit out on their old ladies all the time. But I thought my family was completely above it. I’d walked around like I was in some kind of protected bubble because I didn’t have that kind of family. But I did, Bishop. The whole damned time. Because my mother told me later that it hadn’t been the first time it had happened, and it wouldn’t be the last. She said it so matter-of-factly, like it was something I was going to have to grow into and accept if I was going to be a part of this. She said my father was angry that she didn’t tell me to shut my mouth about Adam. That it wasn’t something I was supposed to bring up.”

  “That’s fucking nuts, Luna.”

  “I didn’t know what to think.” She’d been living with the burdensome knowledge of all of this for so long. “I was ready to run. And then the Chaos happened. And I was alone. It was like all traces of the bad stuff, the arguments they were all wiped away. But I still held onto everything in here.” She put a hand over her heart, then ran her hand across his muscled forearms that held her. “I just want to be rid of it.”

  “You can’t be. It’s all a part of you. That shit, it makes you the woman you are. The one I fell in love with the second I saw you. People think love at first sight’s all about physical beauty—a big part of it’s the aura you put out there. Yours, Luna? Fucking gorgeous.”

  She laughed, maybe the first time she’d ever done so while discussing her past. Because she understood what Bishop meant. He was so handsome, but there was so much more to that which drew her to him.

  Because she normally didn’t walk up to strange men and kiss them. But with Bishop, she hadn’t been able to resist. Like some great force yanked them together and refused to let them go.

  That’s why the separation had killed her. That’s why she’d run to him. She’d resisted for as long as she could.

  She had no trace of resistance left. “I buried it so deep inside that I told myself it didn’t matter. Pretended it actually never happened. But it did. And it wasn’t nearly as bad as what happened to Aimee but...”

  “Don’t you say that, Luna,” he told her fiercely. “It was every bit as bad. You have to stop comparing. Rationalizing. Sex is power. It’s not about feeling good to the people who tried to hurt us with it.”

  Us. He’d said us. She stared at him and, for the first time in as long as she could remember, she wasn’t scared anymore. “I’m not really angry at Tru. More at myself, because I didn’t have the courage to do what she did. Ignorance is bliss and all that. I didn’t know any differently. I didn’t think I wanted to. Until she left and I thought about following her. I almost did.” She could see her backpack, crushed by the roof of the house when it collapsed from the sudden tornado. “I had my future in my backpack. And I left it behind to go underground in order to save my life.”

  He brushed a finger between her breasts. “Mathias and I were camping out in the swamps, which was really code for drinking.” He could still smell the water as it rushed toward them. “Those cypress trees had been there for thousands of years. Nothing was gonna take them down. And Mathias and I, we held on to that fucking tree. The first rush went over our heads but then leveled out. We watched it go, getting stronger with everything it collected.”

  She tried to picture anyone outside in that mess and failed. But now that she knew Bishop and Mathias, she could see them, clinging to the trees, refusing anything except survival.

  “Amy and Hammer are talking about getting married,” she whispered, like the tunneled walls were some kind of confessional. “I mean, married. She’s interested in that? Or is she just pretending?”

  “Why do you think everyone’s pretending? Because you’ve been?”

  She glanced up, as if startled to have been caught. Maybe she didn’t even realize it herself. “I’m not anymore. I can’t with you. Even if I wanted to pretend.”

  She was angry about that, but he wasn’t.

  “And you can stop looking so pleased with yourself,” she added. “And you were right about me hiding behind Rebel’s secret.”

  Luna flashed back to the first time she’d realized that Rebel was gay. It had been post-Chaos, and she’d finally gotten up the nerve to kiss him. He did kiss her back for half a second, almost like he was willing to give it a try...and a few long moments later, he pulled back. Stroked her cheek and said quietly, “Luna, look, I...”

  “I know.”

  “You know what, exactly?” Rebel demanded, keeping his voice low, even though they were in his place.

  She stared at him, tilting her head. Saying it out loud wasn’t her place, but they both knew what she was telling him.

  Rebel was gay. If he was bisexual, it would’ve been easier, for both of them. But the fact that he wasn’t attracted to women meant he’d been safe for her all these years. No threat to her...and since Rebel was the only person in Defiance who knew what happened to her at the hands of the old Sgt. at Arms...

  “How long have you known?”

  “Probably forever on some level,” she admitted. In her mind, Rebel had been her first—because it had been the first time sex had been consensual for her and he done so because she’d asked. Because she knew he wouldn’t hurt her—and he hadn’t.

  Afterward, she told him she’d stand by him if he decided to come out.

  “I can’t tell anyone, Luna. Can you fucking imagine how that’d go over? Lance’d skin me.”

  He’d been right at the time. But she’d revisited it with him once Lance was gone. She’d pointed out that Caspar was firmly in place as Defiance’s president and Rebel was one of the most respected members of the club. How and why could falling in love with a man instead of a woman change that? It seemed unfair.

  “I want you to be happy,” she’d told him. “How can you hide and be happy?”

  “I could ask you the same thing.”

  She’d wanted to slap him. But he’d realized what she’d been doing the entire time. Hiding behind him was so much easier than accepting the fact that she was scared and damaged. And it remained that way, even after Bishop had come into Defiance and rocked her world.

  A lot of Rebel’s secret was wrapped up in her desire to leave Defiance, and she told Bishop now, “I tried to talk Rebel into leaving with me, but he refused. He watched me like a hawk after I brought it up initially. That’s why I figured leaving right after Tru showed was best, because there was a lot of confusion. Rebel figured I’d stay now that she was back, but things were worse. I wanted to be anywhere but Defiance. After what they did to Tru, even though Caspar saved her...” She shook her head at the memory. “It was all too much. We didn’t have a say. I didn’t have anyone. The guys in the garage tolerated me. Rebel loved me, still does, but that was getting so complicated.”

  “Not for him.”

  “No,” she agreed.

  “So you were protecting yourself, not him.”

  “He let me,” she said, as though that made it all okay.


  “He’d do it for as long as you let him, yes,” he agreed.

  “I was trying to help him.”

  “You were trying to help yourself too, and look, that’s cool. Rebel let you,” Bishop said. “I know he was protecting you as much as you protected him.”

  “You knew...about Rebel? The abuse?”

  Bishop was silent. He’d been staring down at the floor and when he met her eyes, there was such pain there.

  It was easy for her to forget that Bishop was an abused kid. He came across strong and fierce, not afraid of anything. Outwardly.

  Just like me.

  Just like...

  She blinked. “Rebel’s father was the gentlest man I knew. His mom died when he was really little. I didn’t know he’d been hurt...not until after I came to him and told him and he...God, he felt so guilty that he hadn’t done anything. He’d figured he was the only one.”

  She and Rebel were drawn together because of a far greater secret that she’d ever realized.

  “He didn’t say anything to me. We never talked about it. I just fucking knew, okay?”

  “Did it happen to you?”

  Bish stared at her. “Abuse is abuse, Luna. Let’s leave it at that.”

  “Let’s not. Because I’ve been walking around like a selfish bitch, hogging all the pain.”

  “Yeah, that’s true.”

  He was teasing her—it hit just the right note. Made her laugh for a second, then she sobered. “Rebel’s my best friend in the world—like Mathias is to you, Bishop.”

  “There’s room for more.”

  “I know. If anything ever happened to Rebel, I’d...” She trailed off, her throat choked, unable to complete that sentence. She did manage, “This—with you—just felt like a betrayal.”

  “Of who?”

  She rubbed her arms. “I don’t know.”

  “It’s not a betrayal to fall for someone, Luna. Whatever happened to you, you’re allowed to find that happiness.”

  “It sounds like you have experience in that.”