Dillon didn't see that kind of life for herself, but it was good to know it was possible.
“The Leviathans' were responsible?” Dillon questioned.
“Mmhm. After Ever and Roar sorted their shit, Top wanted to get to the bottom of who was responsible for the massacre. He'd met Ever's parents way back in the day, so he sent Pike and his wife Susan to Nevada to do some research.
“Pike had been a member of Perdition since before I came on about nine years ago. The two of them weren't in Nevada for a week before they were brutally murdered.
"We found out later that Ghost was responsible; he'd been hired by the Leviathans because we were sticking our nose in their business. We didn't know how dirty it was until much later.
“They run drugs, guns, sex-slaves, and have their fingers in every illegal pie you can think of. I've done everything I can to shut them down—and I tell you with pride, I've put a major fucking dent in their finances and their supply lines. And I’m not just looking for Ghost, there’s a woman named Wren.
“That's another story, but she's special to Pen and he's been a wreck since she disappeared, so I want her home.
"I've been tapping my network, using all the resources at my disposal—and my resources aren't slim pickin’s—to find her.”
Nasa glanced her way again, his gaze dropping briefly to Dillon's belly.
“Considering the message Ghost gave you, I must have been getting close. For some reason, he doesn't want me to find Wren, and I haven't come up with a reason yet why that is.”
“Do you believe the answers you need are here in all these files?” she asked.
Nasa made an affirmative noise, his fingers nimble as he reached in to sort through the papers. “I have everything on a closed data-network, but Top is old-school and likes paper.
"We're working our way through this one step at a time. Unfortunately, there's a ton of shit to work through and only a fraction of it is the truth. The rest is just window dressing to disguise it all. Like Ghost.”
He pulled out a green folder and flipped it open, offering her a sheet of paper with a black and white composite sketch.
Whoever had done it was an exceptional artist. The face she held in trembling hands was so lifelike Dillon could almost see the play of muscle beneath the skin.
She could hear his voice in her head, dull and lifeless, devoid of inflection. It was strange, looking at the face, she only heard one word.
One word Ghost had used on purpose to deliver another message.
One word guaranteed to terrify Dillon and force her to focus on that terror, when in reality, it was a message hidden within the message.
Dillon studied the image, her body flashing hot and cold while she tried to keep herself calm and in the present.
The information she had needed to be shared, but it wouldn't happen if she fell down the dark well of traumatized panic again.
She knew her triggers, and she was precariously weaving from side to side on the tight rope that spanned the deep, dark abyss full of demons and monsters waiting to devour her.
Her entire body flinched when Nasa took one of her hands, his grip firm, ignoring how the muscles in her arm turned to stone.
He held on, guiding her palm up to press her fingers to the pulse at his throat.
“Stay here with me, Dillon.” His eyes were an ocean, deep and rippling. His voice, the waves on the shore, soothing and rhythmic.
Completely focused on him, Dillon didn't even notice he'd taken the sketch from her until he had her other hand in his to flatten against his chest.
“Count my heartbeats, follow the cadence of my breath.”
The technique was a familiar path back to control, and she walked along it, drawn forward by the strength in his fathomless gaze.
His skin was several degrees warmer than hers, the material of his shirt soft over muscles that were definitely not soft.
When she no longer felt like she was about to spin off into a meltdown, she gave a short nod.
“Still here.”
Nasa gave her hands a squeeze before gently releasing her.
“Good. Was it the photo that tripped your trigger?”
Dillon licked her dry lips, rubbing the heels of her hands against her thighs, but it didn't stop her skin from tingling everywhere Nasa had touched her.
“No. Ghost, he ah... when he was with me at my house, he kept calling me Duchess.”
“Yeah, he said it on the phone, too. Does that mean something to you?”
Her eyebrows hiked as she reached up to touch the raised scar that curved over the top of her right shoulder, pursing her lips to draw in another cool breath.
“It's what the interrogators called me. When I was first brought in, the guy whose wife I helped disappear grabbed my face and told me I acted like his wife. Like I was better than him, but I didn’t look like a princess apparently, so he called me Duchess. Never my name, just… just Duchess.”
Her throat closed up, unable to make any more words come out. His steady gaze burned with an unholy fire, fixated on the sketch sitting atop all the files he'd collected.
“Seems Tobias needs to tell us a little bit more about those assholes he worked with. Specifically, John Lewis.”
“It might not be him,” Dillon rasped.
“It's him. That's what I didn't know.”
Nasa shocked the shit out of her when he bent and touched a quick kiss to her forehead before he snatched up the sketch and strode out the door.
Dillon didn't follow. She was too busy trying not to melt into a puddle of goo.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Tobias had quit drinking a few hours before leaving Dallas, and as far as Nasa knew, he hadn't touched a drop of
