He was right.
"Janie and Alex," I said, turning back to the group. "Get them on the cameras at the train station."
"Repo..." Reign said in that voice again.
"Don't you fucking dare try to tell me this is any God damn different than what you did with Summer and Cash with Lo and Wolf with Janie. You all broke rules when your women were in trouble and I don't want to hear a fucking word about this," I said, I think momentarily shocking them all silent before Reign nodded slightly.
"She's yours?" he asked.
"Hell fucking yeah, she's mine." It didn't matter that she'd kept so much from me. It didn't matter that there was so much to her that I was in the dark about. What mattered was the connection we had despite all the secrecy. She melted against me when I reached for her. She sparked when I touched her. She smiled and laughed and bitched and joked with me. She couldn't fake those things. That was real. What we had, however little it was, was real.
"Alright, Cash see if you can get in touch with Breaker and get Alex on this. I'll call Wolf and see if Janie is at the cabin or Hailstorm. Duke, Renny..." he trailed off for a minute. "I dunno. Make yourselves useful. Go ask around in town or something."
"What? Am I supposed to sit on my fucking hands?" I asked, my hands clenching up into fists at my sides.
"You and K can have a talk until we have a direction we can point you in."
With that, the room cleared out, leaving just me and K and the weight of worry between us. It wasn't lost on me that the two people who genuinely gave a shit about Maze were the ones left twiddling their damn thumbs.
"Don't know much about you," K said, breaking the tense silence, "but I doubt you deserve her."
"Why? Because I'm a biker?"
"Because after what she's had to deal with, I don't think anyone does."
"I respect what you've done to get and keep her safe, but fuck off. Just because some asshole lied to her and her mom was a deadbeat and her bosses were dickheads doesn't mean everyone she crosses paths with plans to screw her over. I've had nothing but good intentions with regard to Maze."
"Except to make her life hell to get her out of the MC."
"You think I'd have done that if I knew fuck-all about her situation?"
"You think she'd have gotten in if she was upfront from the jump?"
"No, but maybe..."
"Hey, man. Don't go on an ego trip. Just 'cause you made her come a couple of times doesn't mean shit. Your dick ain't some magic remedy for her trust issues."
"You didn't exactly help those issues by..."
"Listen, she can trust me. I was the one who was there for her when no one else was. I kept her safe. I trained her. I got her strong. If, by doing that, I helped enforce her distrust of everyone, well, it was fucking necessary. But it didn't matter because she knew she always had me."
"That's a little short-sighted, don't you think? Maze is young. She's fucking beautiful. She's a combination of sweet and sour that anyone with a cock would want to get a taste of. Did you really think she was going to be a fucking nun? Especially here?" I paused, shaking my head. "Maybe you should have taught her how to spot a decent man instead."
To that, K's lips quirked up on the side slightly. "Didn't I though?"
"What?"
K shrugged. "All these men here... a couple of other probates she was around all the time, was on the same level with, could have more easily connected with without risking her position here. But she chose you. And, judging by your reaction to all this, I'd say she did spot a decent man."
"Janie is pulling up the cameras now," Reign declared as he walked back in. "She's on her way in. Alex is working on seeing if she can find any records for the Kozlov brothers in Navesink Bank or Jersey in general."
"Alright," I said, taking a deep breath. I turned to K again. "How long you been doing this?"
"Ten years. Give or take."
"How many women have you worked with?"
"Dozens. At least fifty."
"How many have you lost?"
"You mean while permanently on my watch, not going rogue?"
"Would Maze go rogue?"
"No."
"Then yeah."
"One," he said, his tone an odd mix of sad and almost... determined. There was a long pause as we listened to a car door slam. "I'm not losing Maze," he added with the same determination.
"Alright," Janie said, bursting through the door with an open laptop on her hand, Wolf walking in behind her. "I got her pulling into the train station. Well, fucking barreling in is probably more accurate. She pulled in, sat there for a couple of seconds then walked up to the machine and paid for parking. She locked the keys in the car. She went and bought a ticket to somewhere..."