by Tate James
"You guys, it totally smells like sex in here." His eyes flicked between Zed and me accusingly, and Zed snickered.
"Don't look at me," he replied, innocent as a damn nun. "I was driving the whole time."
I whacked him with the back of my hand as he laughed. "Shut up and get us over to Timber. We're going to be late at this stage, and I still want to know what the hell Alexi is doing there."
"Alexi's at Timber?" Lucas asked. "Why?"
Zed gave him a droll look in the mirror as he backed out into the street once more. "That's what we want to know."
Changing the subject, I shifted in my seat to look at Lucas as I asked how his mom was doing. He took the hint, spending the drive over to Timber filling us in on Sandra's health and how badly her mind was slipping. He'd apparently discussed it with Claudette at length today, and the nurse agreed that it didn't seem like that was from Sandra's MS. All the tests at Sunshine Estate had come back inconclusive, but maybe it was worth running them again through our own pathology lab.
We parked directly in front of the main entrance to Timber and headed up the steps. My phone buzzed in my hand, and I took the call as Zed unlocked the door.
"Hades, it's Nadia," Cass's grandmother said, unnecessarily. "I want to let you know that the little girl from the Anarchy basement passed away this morning in hospital. Feds were there, and someone heard your name mentioned. Figured you should know."
My stomach dropped, and I sighed. "Thanks, Nadia. I'll keep my eyes open."
Yet more bullshit setups. I'd bet Chase was somehow salvaging his sex trafficking frame-up to pin me for that little girl’s death. I just needed to stay alert and ahead of him.
"Door was already unlocked," Zed told me as I joined him.
I grimaced. "The building crew are probably madly trying to finish everything in time for this meeting."
We headed inside, but instead of our building crew, I spotted a blonde woman standing in the middle of the room speaking with a salt-and-pepper-haired man. Something about her seemed so familiar, even though her back was to me. It wasn't until she turned around that it clicked.
"Jeanette?" I asked, coming closer. She'd been one of my downstairs neighbors in the building that blew up, the woman with the dog that peed a lot. "This is unexpected." I arched a brow at her and glanced at the man she was with. He didn't strike any notes of familiarity, so I shifted my attention back to my former neighbor.
Her smile was cold as I approached. "I'm aware," she replied. "That's usually how these things go."
Seemingly from nowhere, the room suddenly filled with armed officers, all of them with their guns pointed straight at me. This had been a setup. But by whom? Alexi? Or Hannah when she told us Alexi was here?
"You're going to want those hands in the air, Hades," my sweet, cheery neighbor Jeanette sneered. "You have no idea how long I've looked forward to this moment."
"What moment is that, Jeanette?" I asked, keeping my tone calm as I eyed her. Now that I was paying attention, her whole demeanor had shifted slightly. Motherfucker. Jeanette had been undercover FBI the whole time she lived downstairs from me.
Her eyes flashed with anger. "Put your fucking hands in the air," she barked. Slowly, because we were surrounded by a solid fifteen to twenty armed officers, I did as I was told.
Jeanette nodded to the man beside her, and he quickly disarmed me. I could only imagine they were doing the same to Zed and Lucas behind me, but I wasn't turning to look. My eyes were locked on Jeanette.
Her smile was wide and slightly feral as she pulled a pair of handcuffs from the pocket of her ugly pants. That should have been my first giveaway. The Jeanette I knew wouldn't have been caught dead in boxy man-pants and flat shoes.
"Hayden Darling Timber," she recited, practically dancing over to me with her handcuffs ready. "You're under arrest for so, so many things. Let's start with the murders, shall we?" She started listing names that she'd clearly memorized. Some of them I recognized and was guilty for, some I wasn’t sure about, and some were definitely not me. Like Maryanne Green—Zed's ex.
"Brant Wilson?" Lucas repeated, interrupting Jeanette as she grabbed my wrists and hooked them together behind my back with the cuffs. "Did you just say Brant Wilson?"
Jeanette paused, looking over at Lucas, who was not handcuffed but did have his hands up nonetheless. "Yeah, former FBI director Brant Wilson was tortured and killed by your sugar mama."
Lucas's stricken gaze met mine, and I died inside.
"Tell me that's a setup," he croaked.
My heart screaming in pain, I couldn't lie to him. Not like this. Not when he was asking whether I was responsible for killing his bio-dad before he’d even met him. Not even my Hades armor, dented, cracked, and slow to form, could bear it. So I took the coward’s route and just closed my eyes against the agony in his glare.
Jeanette snickered a nasty laugh, then continued her list of crimes I was supposedly responsible for. Only one made me jerk in shock.
"You're under arrest for the attempted murder of Maxine Hazelford—"
"Wait, what?" I blurted, outraged. "I never hurt Maxine." There were a great many deaths I was responsible for, but Maxine's wasn't one of them.
Jeanette smirked. "No? So you didn't threaten to bludgeon her to death with a stripper shoe? The exact same weapon used to put her in the hospital last night?"
My heart stopped dead in my chest, and my eyes flew to Zed. I'd been joking with Maxine when I said that... and he’d been the only other person present.
His expression was tight and shuttered, betraying nothing, and that struck me as deep as a knife through the chest. Only then did I realize that he wasn't being arrested with me. Nor did he have any guns pointed at him.
"That was really useful evidence that Agent De Rosa collected for us, I gotta say," Jeanette continued, her voice threaded with malice. "Without that little soundbite, I doubt we'd have been able to make this all stick."
Agent De Rosa.
He wouldn't even look at me. His cold gaze just fixed on a point past my shoulder as Jeanette marched me out of Timber with my hands cuffed behind me. Outside, official cars were clustered around where Zed had parked.
Jeanette confidently pushed me toward a black sedan that must have been her own but paused briefly to open the door. Then she spotted someone coming down the street and gave a grunt of surprise.
"Huh, look at that. The new FBI Director is here to witness this monumental arrest. I bet I get a juicy promotion for this." She gave a sneering grin, and I looked in the direction she'd been facing.
Just when I thought things couldn't get worse, Chase motherfucking Lockhart dressed in a sharp suit strode along the sidewalk and gave me a sarcastic little finger wave.
"You've got to be kidding me," I whispered as Jeanette shoved me into the backseat of her car and slammed the door. I was helpless to do anything but stare in horror, my heart and soul shriveling up to die as Chase walked up to Zed and clapped him on the shoulder.
My lipreading wasn't as good as Lucas's, but even I could make out those four words spoken from Chase to Zed. Those four damning words that burned like acid across my mind.
Good work, old friend.
To be concluded in
TIMBER
HADES #4
Books2read.com/hades4
TIMBER
Betrayed.
My best friend, my right hand, the man I trusted above all others. Zayden de Rosa declared his love for me and pursued me until he shattered the walls between us. Then the man who loved me proved to be a traitor. I never saw that coming.
Abandoned.
My fierce lover, he died to protect me. Let me kill him and erase him so he could move in the shadows. He’s out there alone and he has no idea what’s happened. All he’ll know is that I’m not where I’m supposed to be. Something that might cost him his life for real. I have to trust him to survive on his own. He never saw that coming.
Framed.
My ligh
thouse. My lover. My Lucas. I love him so damn much and while I might be guilty of some crimes, the worst seems to be hurting him. The majority of what they arrested me for was a damn lie, but not that one. Hopefully the light he promised me will sustain through this time. We never saw that coming.
Enraged.
My ex is at the heart of this all. One assault after another. He didn’t break me before and he won’t break me now.
I’m Hades.
He’ll never see me coming.
A LETTER FROM TATE
Daaaaaamn... that one stung a little bit, huh? Naughty Zeddy Bear. There’s always two (or more) sides to a story, though, and to find out what’s behind this nasty little betrayal you’ll need to hold out for TIMBER coming in September! I know, I know, I’m an asshole. But you know it makes my shriveled black heart happy when you curse my name.
Club 22 put me through the wringer a bit, I’m not even going to lie. It’s sex heavy, no question about it, but it’s for a damn good reason. But aside from all the fucking, Hades made me dig deep to get into her head. She was in a dark place, needing to face her own damage, having the monsters in her closet claw their way out... it was a tough one. And as much as we authors like to pretend we’re “just telling a story” it’s total bullshit. These characters are real people, simply living inside our head-worlds. When we spend all day every day sharing a brain-space with a character who is experiencing trauma, facing her demons, acknowledging her shortfalls, it bleeds over. The lines get a bit blurred.
And it’s only going to get worse before it gets better. I feel now, more than any book I’ve written to date, that I need to warn you, the reader, to proceed with caution into Timber. Shit’s getting dark. I think by this point of the story you know what I mean, and I hate giving spoilers. So please consider this a possible trigger warning for Timber!
Despite how exhausting and personally challenging this series is turning out to be, it’s also the most rewarding series I’ve ever worked on. I’m loving every (painful) moment that I’m spending with Hades and her boys, and it’s a bit surreal to think it’s almost over.
Just one book to go. How wild is that?
Don’t worry, though, there will be plenty more from the Shadow Grove world still to come! You’ve already met two of the main characters from my next connected series. Can you guess who? Post your guess somewhere on social media—Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, TikTok, whatever—and tag me! I love to see speculation and theories.
On that note, be sure to join the discussion over at my readers group, The Fox Hole. Or, until the next book releases, you can talk spoilers in my dedicated spoiler room, aptly named WTF TATE?!
Please note, this spoiler room is cleaned out and re-opened with every new release.
Thank you for reading. Thank you for trusting me. Thank you for reviewing (wink wink, nudge nudge) and thank you from the bottom of my heart for supporting me on this wild ride that is Hades.
xxx Tate
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