Chapter 87 Ryder's reaction
Sage's POV
The look in Ryder's eyes wasn't anger exactly, or at least not only anger. There was fear underneath it, the raw and desperate kind that came from imagining the worst possible outcome and realizing how close it could have been. His hands were still on my shoulders and I could feel them trembling with the effort of holding himself back from something, holding back the words or the embrace or maybe both.
"Ryder," I said quietly, and his name came out softer than I meant it to.
He didn't respond right away. He just stood there looking at me like he was checking for damage, scanning my face and my body the way he always did after anything had gone wrong, making sure I was whole and in one piece and still his.
"Do you have any idea what I went through when I woke up and you were gone?" His voice was low and tight, controlled in a way that told me he was working very hard to keep it that way. "I checked every room in this house. I called you six times. I was about to call Jaxon and every brother in the club to start a search before I even knew what had happened."
"I'm sorry. I should have told you where I was going."
"You shouldn't have gone at all." He released my shoulders and turned away from me, running both hands through his hair and pacing to the window like he needed to put distance between us before he said something he couldn't take back. "Someone has been photographing us, Sage. Someone followed you to that warehouse and was close enough to take pictures of your face in the dark. And you just walked out of this house alone in the middle of the night like none of that matters."
"I know how it sounds."
"It sounds like you don't care whether you live or die as long as you get answers about your father." He turned back to face me and the rawness in his expression made my chest ache. "And that terrifies me more than anything anyone else could do to you."
We stood there looking at each other in the dim light of the bedroom, and the silence between us was heavy with everything we weren't saying. I wanted to tell him that I did care, that I had been scared the entire time I was out there, that the figure watching me from the loading dock had haunted every step I took back to my car. But I also knew that explaining my reasons wouldn't undo what I'd done or make the fear go away for either of us.
"I won't do it again," I said, and I meant it, at least in that moment. "Not alone. Not without telling someone first."
Ryder studied my face for a long moment, looking for the truth in my words. Then his expression shifted and he crossed the space between us in two steps and pulled me into his arms so tight I could barely breathe. His face buried itself in my hair and I felt the tension in his body release all at once, like he'd been holding himself together with sheer willpower and had finally run out.
"Show me the text," he said against my hair. "The one from the same number."
I pulled out my phone with hands that had started shaking again and handed it to him. I watched his face as he read the message and looked at the photo of me standing on the loading dock with my flashlight illuminating my face. His jaw went so tight a muscle jumped in his cheek the way it always did when he was fighting the urge to hit something.
"I'm showing this to Jaxon first thing in the morning," he said, his voice dangerously calm. "And then we're going to figure out who took this photo because they were close enough to see your face clearly which means they were right there with you and you didn't even know."
"I know."
"You found a note at the warehouse?"
"Yeah. It said the next payment is Friday, same time and place. No signature, nothing else."
Ryder handed my phone back and pulled me toward the bed. "Sit down. Tell me everything from the beginning. Every detail about what Diesel did, where he went, what you saw, and everything that happened after."
So I did. I told him everything, from the moment I'd watched Diesel's truck skip the turn to his own house, to the figure on the loading dock, to Jaxon's anger when I told him what happened, to the threatening text. Ryder listened without interrupting, his expression shifting between fury and fear and a darker tone that I'd learned over the past few weeks meant he was already planning what he was going to do about it.
When I finished talking it was almost four in the morning and the sky outside the window had started to lighten at the edges. Ryder was quiet for a long time after I stopped, turning everything over in his mind the way he always did before he spoke.
"Jaxon said Diesel has a gambling problem," he said finally.
"Yeah. He said Dad knew about it too and they kept it quiet."
"That tracks. Diesel has been borrowing small amounts from the club fund for months. I assumed it was for personal expenses but now it makes more sense." Ryder's brow creased. "But a gambling debt doesn't explain why someone was watching you watch him.