Keifer's POV
I reached the parking lot and climbed into the back of the SUV. I needed to see her, even if it wasn't face-to-face. I dialed Cin's phone on a video call.
Cin answered on the second ring, her face appearing on the screen. She looked tired, but she understood the silent plea in my eyes. She turned the camera toward the bed.
"Jay?" Cin said softly. "Keifer's on the line. He... he wants to check on you."
Jay froze. She didn't look at the screen at first, her gaze fixed on her bandaged hands. "I'm alive, Keifer," she said, her voice small and hollow.
"I know you are," I rasped, my heart hammering against my ribs. "But tell me... what happened in there? Angelo said you... you changed."
Jay finally looked at the camera, and the vacant coldness in her eyes chilled me to the bone. "Thats nine of your business," said.
"Jay, tell him he wants to help you",Angelo said caressing her.
"I don't need his help for anything ",She kissed.
"Please ,baby sistah.Just tell him what happened",Percy said to her carefully.She nodded.
"When Mykle hit me... when I saw blood hit the concrete... something just snapped. It wasn't me anymore. It was like I was back in my childhood , someone taking over my body. There was no pain, no fear—just a need to make it stop. To make them stop. I didn't feel like a person. I felt like a weapon."
The silence that followed was heavy, filled with the realization that Jay's innocence hadn't just been bruised; it had been executed.
Then, Cin broke the silence. he looked between Jay and the phone, his expression genuinely puzzled and innocent.
"Wait," Cin asked, tilting his head. "If seeing your own blood is what triggers that... why don't you turn into a killing machine every month during your period?"
The room went dead silent.
Angelo's jaw dropped. Percy choked on his water, coughing violently, while Aries slowly covered his face with his hand, groaning. Even through the screen, I felt the physical weight of the awkwardness.
Jay blinked, the dark intensity in her eyes momentarily replaced by sheer, blinking confusion as she stared at Cin.
"Cin, for God's sake , shut up," Arieshissed, his voice vibrating with secondary embarrassment.
"Seriously, man? Read the room!" Percy groaned, throwing a discarded bandage at Cin's head.
Angelo didn't even speak; he just leaned his forehead against the wall, his shoulders shaking in a silent "why is this my life" prayer.
But Cin, ever the oblivious strategist, just dodged the bandage and looked even more confused. "What? I'm being serious! It's a logical question. If blood is the trigger, then physiologically—"
"Cin!" they all roared in unison.
I saw Jay's eye twitch. A vein in her temple, right above her bandage, began to throb. The dark, haunting trauma that had been clouding her face just moments ago was being rapidly replaced by a much more familiar emotion: pure, unadulterated irritation.
"Because, Cin," Jay snapped, her voice regaining a bit of its old, sharp spark, "that's internal shedding, not a blunt-force trauma wound caused by a psychopath hitting me with a lead pipe! My brain can tell the difference between biology and a murder attempt! Do you want me to give you a PowerPoint presentation, or can you let me recover in peace?"
Cin blinked, seemingly satisfied. "Oh. Right. Contextual triggers. That makes sense."
Aries looked like he wanted to jump through the phone and throttle him.
Seeing that tiny flash of the real Jay—the one who could still get annoyed, the one who wasn't just a "weapon"—made my chest ache with a mixture of relief and agony. She was still in there. But as I watched her sink back into the pillows, the light fading from her eyes as she remembered where she was, I knew I couldn't be part of this healing process. Not yet.
I was the one who had brought the lead pipes into her world, even if I wasn't the one swinging them.
"I'm hanging up," I said, my voice thick. "Take care of her. If she needs anything—anything at all—you call me."
I didn't wait for Jay to look at the screen again. I couldn't bear to see her realize I was still there, watching her from the safety of my reinforced SUV while she sat in a cage of bandages. I tapped the red icon, and the screen went black.
I stared at my own reflection in the dark phone. "I'm sorry, Jay," I whispered to the empty car. "But I'm going to make sure no one ever makes you bleed again."
I looked at the driver. "Get me to the hangar. And tell Section E to bring the 'surgical' kit to the warehouse. Since Mykle likes blood so much, we're going to show him exactly how much he has to spare."
At warehouse
The drive to the industrial district felt like a descent into hell. My phone buzzed—a text from Aries.
"We're also coming. For Jay, ."
I tightened my grip on the steering wheel. Percy and Aries were the "clean" side of the family's operations—strategists, protectors, the ones who kept Jay's world bright.
Section E was the void. They were the shadows .
When I pulled up to the warehouse, the atmosphere was thick with tension. On one side of the entrance stood the Section E operatives—masked, silent, smelling of ozone and cold metal. On the other side stood Percy and Aries.
"Keifer," Percy said as I stepped out. He didn't use my title. His voice was raw. "Tell them to step back. We'll handle the questioning."
"You don't have the stomach for what comes next, Percy," I said, my voice as cold as the concrete beneath us.
"I have the stomach for anything that touches my baby sister!" Percy stepped into my space, his eyes flashing.
Aries stepped between us, putting a hand on Percy's chest. "Not now.Lets first deal with him."
I nodded once. "Understood."
We walked into the warehouse together—a fractured front of brothers and killers. Inside, the sound of dripping water was drowned out by Mykle's ragged, terrified sobbing. He was a broken man, but he was still a goldmine of information.
"Who told you?" I asked, my voice echoing off the corrugated metal walls. I signaled to the Section E lead, who stepped forward with a roll of surgical steel.
Mykle's eyes went wide, darting between the masks of Section E and the cold, grieving faces of Jay's brothers.
"I... I can't... he'll kill me..." Mykle blubbered.
Percy stepped forward, surprising us all. He didn't use a blade. He leaned in close, his voice a terrifyingly soft whisper. "You're worried about him killing you? Look at us, Mykle. Look at what you did to Jay. You've already invited the devils into your house. If you don't talk, We are going to make sure you live for a very, very long time. And I'm going to watch."
The collaboration was gruesome. Section E provided the efficiency, while Percy and Aries provided the rage. They didn't like the "shadows," but for Jay, they were becoming them.
"It was... it was the London leak," Mykle finally screamed, his spirit snapping like a dry twig. "Someone in your own board... they gave me the coordinates. They said you wanted her gone, Keifer! They said she was a liability!"
I felt the world tilt. My own board. My own world had bled into hers. Clyde and Keizer.
I felt Percy's gaze burn into the side of my head. It wasn't just anger; it was a silent, devastating indictment. He didn't have to say it—I knew. My "protection" had been the very thing that painted the target on her back.
Mykle looked up, a glimmer of pathetic hope in his one good eye. "I told you... I told you everything! Let me go. You said—"
"I said I wanted you to be awake when I decided what your life was worth," I interrupted, stepping into the circle of light. I looked at Percy and Aries. "He doesn't get a trial. He doesn't get a cell. He touched Jay."
You thought she was a liability," Aries whispered.
She's the only reason we haven't burned this city to the ground yet," Percy added, his voice trembling with a rage that surpassed anything I'd seen from him.
"Section e.One hit rule",I roared .And section e doesn't need to told twice for Jay.They started hitting him , Percy and Aries also joined. Mykle was injured badly about to die.
I stood over the remains of Mykle, my silhouette flickering against the damp walls.
"For every tear she shed," I whispered, delivering the final, silent blow.
As the warehouse went still, I turned to the exit. Mykle chapter was close , but the board member in London was next.