Lover Avenged (Black Dagger Brotherhood #7)(137)

She let him loose with a shove, sending him skipping into his buddies.

Xhex kept going, leaving the VIP area and striding past the dance floor. Under the stairs to the mezzanine floor, she went up to a door marked SECURITY STAFF ONLY and entered a code. The hallway on the other side led her by her staff’s locker room and to her destination, the security office. After she entered another code, she walked into the twenty-by-twenty room where all the monitoring equipment dumped data into computers.

Everything on the property, except for Rehv’s office and Rally’s scale den, which were on a separate system, was digitally recorded here, and gray-blue screens showed pictures from all around the club.

“Hey, Chuck,” she said to the guy behind the desk. “You mind if I have a minute alone?”

“No problem. Have to have a bathroom break anyway.”

She traded places, sinking down into the Kirk chair, as the boys called it. “I don’t need long.”

“Neither do I, boss. You want something to drink?”

“I’m good, thanks.”

As Chuck nodded and hulked out, she focused on the monitors that showed the bathrooms off the VIP section—

Oh…God.

The trio from hell were crowded in together, with Gina in the middle, John kissing his way down to her breasts, and Qhuinn, who was standing behind the woman, slipping his hands around to the front of her hips.

Pinned between the males, Gina did not look like she was working. She looked like she was a woman getting off in a big way.

Damn it.

Although at least it was Gina. Xhex had no particular relationship with her, as the woman had just come on staff, so it wasn’t much different than if John had banged some chick from the dance floor.

Xhex eased back in the chair and forced herself to review the other monitors. People were all over the wall, flickering images of them drinking, doing lines, having sex, dancing, talking, staring off into the distance, filling her sight.

This was good, she thought. This was…good. John had lost his romantic delusions and was going elsewhere. This was good—

“Xhex, where are you?” came Trez’s voice in her earpiece.

She yanked up her arm and spoke into her watch. “Give me a f*cking minute!”

The Moor’s response was typically calm. “You okay?”

“I…Look, I’m sorry. I’m coming now.”

Yeah, and so was Gina. Christ.

Xhex stood up from the Kirk chair, her eyes going back to the screen she had pointedly not stared at.

Things had progressed. Fast.

John was moving his hips.

Just as Xhex winced and went to leave, he looked up into the security camera. Whether he knew it was there or whether that was just where his eyes ended up, it was hard to know.

Shit. His face was grim, his jaw set hard, his stare soulless in a way that saddened her.

Xhex tried not to see the change in him for what it was and failed. She had done this to him. Maybe she wasn’t the only reason he’d turned to stone, but she was a big part of it.

He looked away.

She turned away.

Chuck put his head through the door. “You need more time?”

“No, thanks. I’ve seen enough.”

She clapped her man on the shoulder and left, going out and to the right. At the end of the hall there was a reinforced black door. Entering yet another code, she took the passageway to Rehv’s office, and when she came through his door, the three males around the desk all looked at her warily.

She took up res against the black wall across from them. “What.”

Rehv leaned back in his chair, crossing his fur-clad arms over his chest. “Are you getting ready to go into your needing.”

As he spoke, Trez and iAm both made the Shadow hand motion for warding off disaster.

“God, no. Why do you ask?”

“Because, no offense, you’re cranky as f*ck.”

“I am not.” As the males looked at one another, she barked, “Stop that.”

Oh, great, now they all just pointedly didn’t look at each other.

“Can we get this meeting over with,” she said, trying to moderate her tone.

Rehv unfurled his arms and sat forward. “Yeah. I’m about outtie to go meet with the council.”

“You want us to come with you?” Trez asked.

“As long as we don’t have any big deals scheduled after midnight.”

Xhex shook her head. “The last one on the books for this week happened at nine and went off without a problem. Although I will say our buyer was extremely nervous, and that was before it came over the police scanner that another drug dealer’s been found dead.”

“So out of the six major subcontractors who buy from us, there are two left? Man, that’s a turf war, right there.”

“And whoever’s pulling this shit is probably going to try to work his way up the food chain.”

Trez spoke up. “Which is why iAm and I think you should have someone with you twenty-four/seven until this shit shakes out.”

Rehv seemed annoyed but he didn’t disagree. “We got any intel on who’s leaving all those bodies around?”

“Well, duh,” Trez said. “People think it’s you.”

“Not logical. Why would I kill off my own buyers?”