THE JOKE

The first thing Riley Knox did was drive her knee into my stomach.

The second was pin me in the mud while half of Grant Whitmore’s friends watched from the ridge.

I hit the ground hard enough to knock the breath out of me. Cold water surged through the back of my tactical suit, and mud splashed across my face. For one startled second, I could taste dirt and nothing else.

“Got you, Sloane!” Riley shouted, laughing above me. “You’re out.”

“This is a paintball game,” I said, trying to push her off. “Get up.”

“Relax, future sister-in-law. I’m searching for loot.”

She grinned as if we were sharing a joke. Her hands closed around the collar of my protective jacket and yanked it open. The zipper strained, then broke. I caught her wrist.

“Riley. Stop.”

The laughter behind her grew louder. I could see Grant on the slope, surrounded by the men he had known since prep school. He had one hand on his rifle and the other resting casually on his hip. He wasn’t moving toward me.

Riley saw where I was looking. Her grin sharpened.

“Don’t be shy,” she said. “Your fiancé’s right there.”

She tore at the silk top beneath my jacket. The fabric split. The cold air touched my skin, and the snickers around us became whistles.

A month ago, I might have tried to make peace. I might have reminded Riley that our families had known each other for generations, or asked Grant to take me home before the situation became worse.

Before that day, the game had seemed like a harmless way to satisfy the Whitmore family’s idea of courtship. Grant had invited me because his mother insisted we spend time together. Riley had arrived with his friends, claiming she could beat all of us. From the start, she called me “the future Mrs. Whitmore” in a mocking voice, then asked if I planned to hide behind my expensive gear all afternoon. I had ignored her. I had learned that answering every insult only gave her a stage.

Grant had once promised that he would keep things easy between us. He said Riley had been around so long she was practically family. I accepted that explanation because I wanted to believe him. I told myself that a little jealousy would make me look insecure, and that a woman who expected to marry into a powerful family should know how to keep her composure.

I had confused silence with dignity. I had confused endurance with trust. When Riley’s hands closed around my jacket, I finally understood that my patience had made both of them comfortable.

I had spent years making those excuses for him.

That afternoon, something inside me went still.

My hand found a sharp stone in the mud. I lifted it.

A crack split the air.

Pain exploded through my right wrist. I dropped the stone and fell back into the water, unable to keep the scream from breaking out of me. Red paint spread over my sleeve. Beneath it, my wrist was already swelling.

Grant lowered the modified paintball rifle.

He had been aiming at me from the ridge.

He ran down the slope—not to check on me, but to pull Riley upright. He brushed mud from her shoulder as if I were the one who had attacked her.

“What the hell is wrong with you, Sloane?” he said.

I stared at him. “She pinned me down and ripped my clothes.”

“She was messing around.”

“She tore my shirt.”

“Riley’s a girl,” he said, impatiently. “What could she possibly do to you?”

The men behind him laughed.

Riley leaned around his shoulder. “It was a joke, Sloane. Don’t be so uptight. You’ll never survive in our circle if you can’t take a little teasing.”

I used my left hand to pull the ruined jacket closed across my chest. My right wrist throbbed in time with my pulse. The pain was sharp, but the humiliation was worse.

I looked at Grant. This was the man my family had expected me to marry. The man whose family had been tied to mine since before either of us could remember. For years, I had treated his loyalty to Riley as an annoying habit. I had assumed there was a line he wouldn’t cross.

Now I knew there wasn’t one.

“You’re right,” I said.

Grant’s expression eased, as if he had expected me to apologize.

I could hear water dripping from my sleeves onto the leaves. The other players had stopped pretending the game mattered. They watched me with the same curiosity they had shown when Riley pulled my jacket open. I would remember that, too.

I stood, soaked and shaking, and kept my eyes on him.

“If tearing someone’s clothes off is a joke, I understand.”

His mouth tightened. “Good. Then stop making a scene and go change. Call me when you’ve calmed down.”

I walked away without answering.

No one followed. No one offered me a jacket. I heard them start laughing again before I reached the path out of the trees.

At the parking lot, I climbed into my black G-Wagon and shut the doors. For a few seconds, I sat with both hands on the wheel. The pain in my wrist made my vision blur at the edges.

Then I took out my phone and called Dante Cross.

He answered on the third ring. “Did you finally decide to dump the Whitmore idiot?”

“Dante.”

His voice changed. “What happened?”

“I need ten people I can trust. Quiet people. And I need you to find fifteen men near the old rail yard. The kind no one will look for.”

There was a pause. “You want me to ask why?”

“No.”

“Understood.”

I looked down at my swelling wrist and the red paint on my sleeve.

“Bring them to the abandoned repair shop outside the city,” I said. “Tonight.”

Dante let out a low breath. “This is about Grant?”

“This is about a joke.”