Ashlynn POV.
“Who’s that?” Eli asks me, checking that I wasn’t injured, caressing my face, fussing over me.
“Someone I used to know,” I lie, not wanting to go into details of how I know her.
“Did she hurt you? What did she want? How did she find you?” Eli asks again, this time he was walking me back into the club, but our fun night was ruined, we went to Aspen’s office right away.
Aspen, Marco, and a few other guys were in there, Aspen looked furious, yelling at them in a loud voice, saying some curse words that would make any sailor proud.
“Sir, Ashlynn is here,” Eli says staying away from him, but trying to get him to stop cursing them and their whole bloodline.
“Princess! For fuck’s sake! Why did you leave with her! Who is she! I want to get any and all information about her now!” He yells again, the guys ran out of the office using his command as an excuse to get away from him and his anger.
“Her name is Amber…” I say not sure if I want to share the rest of the story but also need to let them know who she is and how crazy she might be.
“She had a message for you boss,” Eli says, his whole demeanor different, he looked more firm, he wasn’t smiling, he looked like someone at the job.
“What’s the message?” Aspen asks him.
“She kept saying you can’t win this war, that he’s going to win, but that’s ridiculous right?” I say expecting them to laugh and let me in on this silly joke of theirs.
“She said they have wolves too,” Eli says, it sounded like the worse news ever, but I was still clueless about what was going on.
“She said that? Anything else?” Aspen asks, sounding more like a gang boss than a club owner, maybe it’s a club fight?
“That he’d win, that’s all,” I say the rest about her enjoying the pain wasn’t that important.
“How did you even allow her out of your sight! How did one of his girls get in here! We’re in war people! I expect better than this! Marco finds who’s responsible for this shit show and brings them to me,” Aspen yells again, he’s kind of scaring me, I never saw this side of him and it’s not one that I’m enjoying so far.
“What’s going on here?” I ask, I know Aspen has the habit of keeping things hidden, he kept that Marco was a wolf secret for years, what else is he hiding?
“Nothing to be worried about princess,” he assures me but that assurance felt fake, there’s something more going on here, but he’s not telling me.
“I want the truth, Aspen! I deserve the truth,” I demand looking at Eli, he was lied to before, and he knows that keeping secrets would pull us apart.
“Eli?” I say his name softly trying to get him to tell me what’s really going on here?
“We should tell her,” Eli says right away, I knew I could count on my mate, just like he could count on me.
“It’s not safe, she doesn’t need to know,” this time it was Marco who gave his opinion, but unless we’re now in a quadratic relationship, I do not care for his opinion.
“Keeping secrets would only pull us away, if it wasn’t for Ashy, I wouldn’t have stayed here, you don’t want me to get mad for another month, do you?” Eli asks, that’s why he was away from his mate, it’s why we went to the island, he was mad at Aspen.
“These tantrums won’t work anymore Eliot! You’re not going anywhere!” Aspen says in a firm voice looking at Eliot, but he’s avoiding telling me the truth.
“Then tell her the truth!” Eli begs with him.
“I can’t put her in danger, she’s safer if she doesn’t know,” Aspen answers him, but I don’t want to be safe, I need to know what’s going on with my mates.
“And she was safe tonight! She was in the middle of the club when that girl got close to her! She’s a psycho she could have hurt her,” Eli says.
“But she’s safe now,” Aspen says.
“This doesn’t explain what war you guys are talking about! Nor who that guy is! I need to know the truth,” I demand shutting both of them up, even Marco was quiet again.
“It’s nothing princess,” Aspen says again, still backing the better not tell Ashlynn idea.
“Eli, what’s going on?” I ask him instead he’ll tell me the truth.
“We’re more than we look, Ash, our job is a little bit more badass,” he says with a slight smile, badass job, he mentioned something like that back when we first met.
“Gangster jobs?” I ask confused.
“We’re bigger than that,” Marco says with a scuff as if I just insulted him.
“What then?” I ask again, why won’t they tell me.
“We’re more of the mafia,” Eli says, I turned to him with wide eyes and an open mouth, is he for real?
“We’re not bad guys Ashlynn, I promise,” Aspen says, I turned my angry gaze at him now.
“If you’re not the bad guys why didn’t you tell me?” I ask him in a cold voice.
“To keep you safe, there’s a war going on and I wanted to keep you out of it,” he says in a calm tone, the calmest he sounded through the whole night.
“What war? Let me guess? Blood war? Drug war? Or god knows what else you are into!” I say, angry, and hurt. They are worse than Amber, they are the mafia, and they are the bad guys.
“Ashlynn, let me explain,” Eli says taking a step toward me, but I took a step back, getting away from him, ignoring the hurt look in his eyes.
“I want to leave,” I say looking at Marco, since he decided to join the talk, he could be the one driving me.
“Marco takes Ashlynn home, we’ll be home soon princess,” Aspen tells me, I just nod my head, yes, starting to walk toward the door, expecting Marco to follow me.
“I can leave now,” Eli says, taking hold of my arm.
“I want to stay alone,” I answer him, pulling my hand away, leaving the office, the club was still going full force, but the music wasn’t tempting anymore, nor was the lights or even the drink that I never had the chance to drink.
I had more important things to think about, my mates are the mafia…