CLAIMED BY THE ROGUE PRESIDENT

THE PRESIDENT

POV: Ryder

The clubhouse door opened just before midnight and I looked up from the paperwork on my desk.

A woman stepped inside and stopped just past the doorway, one hand wrapped around a folder, the other gripping the strap of her bag against her shoulder. Jeans and a pale sweater, hair pulled back loose with damp curls clinging to her cheeks from the rain. She was breathing hard like she'd run from the parking lot.

Her eyes moved across the room, over the bikes lined against the wall and the bar and the men scattered around the garage. Oil smell, leather, burnt coffee from the pot that had been on since six. Boots thudding. Someone revving an engine in the back bay, loud then cut off. Her gaze stopped on the bloodstained rag beside Jace's chair. Her fingers tightened around the folder, knuckles going white, but she kept walking.

Marcus looked at me from behind the bar. "Boss?"

I raised a hand to tell him I got it.

She stopped several feet from my desk. "I'm looking for Ryder Vance." Trying to sound steady. Her voice cracked a little at the end.

"You're looking at him."

Her eyes met mine. "I'm Evelyn Thorne."

I already knew. Leo's sister. Twenty-one, cellist, the responsible one who balanced the family books because her father made her.

She lifted her chin a little. "I need to see him. Leo."

"That isn't going to happen."

Her eyebrows pulled together. "He's here?"

"He is, yes."

"Then let me talk to him." Stepping closer.

"Can't do that."

Fear flickered across her face and she swallowed. She lifted the folder a little higher like it was a shield. "I brought something."

Jace leaned back in his chair, grinning. "Everybody brings something."

She ignored him completely. "I have Leo's bank statements, transfers, gambling accounts. Everything I could find." Eyes back on me.

I looked at the folder. "You think that clears eighty thousand dollars?"

"No, I think it might tell you where the money went." Her hand was shaking and she was trying to hide it by pressing the folder against her stomach. That got my attention.

I pushed my chair back. Metal scraped against concrete, cutting through the room.

"Leo's been gambling with us since March."

"I know."

"He borrowed more than he could repay."

"I know that too." Jaw tightening.

"He disappeared with eighty thousand dollars and something else."

Her eyes dropped for a second. "I know." Quieter this time. She wasn't here to defend him. She was here because she'd run out of options and her parents expected her to fix it again.

"What do you want?"

"My brother."

"Can't give you that."

"Then give me information."

"Can't do that either."

"Then tell me how much he actually owes." She opened the folder, spreading papers across the nearest table with damp fingers. "Look at these."

I did. Names, dates, transfers. Some belonged to gambling accounts. Others didn't.

"I went through his accounts tonight. The payments don't match." Tapping a line with her fingertip. "My dad had me do the family books since I was sixteen. I know when numbers don't line up."

"Meaning?"

"Someone was moving money through him." Tapping again. "This payment goes out two days after that one, then another account receives almost the same amount. Leo was gambling. He was stupid with money, but he wasn't moving it like this."

She'd come prepared, not with money, but with evidence. Most people came in begging. She came in with highlighted printouts.

"Where did you learn to read transactions like this?"

"My family."

"Your father?"

"Yes." Like she didn't want to explain. I let it go.

"Your brother took something that doesn't belong to him."

Her hand stopped over the papers. "What did he take?"

"A ledger."

She stared. "Leo doesn't have a ledger."

"He did have one."

"What was in it?"

"We're still figuring that out."

"Who does it belong to?"

I didn't answer. She watched my face.

"The Iron Vanguard?" Something cold settled in my chest when she said it.

"How do you know that name?" My voice dropping.

"I don't." Quickly, then correcting herself. "I've heard it before."

"You just said it."

"I've heard it before." Fingers digging into the table edge. "My father's friends. At the country club."

That changed things. Not much. Enough.

"Your father knows the Vanguard?"

"I said I've heard the name." Lips pressing together.

"That's not what I asked."

"I don't know what my father knows." Eyes not leaving mine. Scared but she didn't step back. Quietly stubborn. That was in her file.

"What I do know is Leo wouldn't steal from people like that."

"He might not have known what he took."

Her face lost color. "You think that's why he's being held?" Voice smaller.

"Yes, I do."

"Is he alive?" Her throat moving as she swallowed.

"He is." Her shoulders dropped a little like she'd been holding her breath for minutes.

"Can I talk to him?"

"No, not yet."

"Ryder, please." Saying my name like it might change my mind.

I shook my head. "You don't understand what you're dealing with."

"Then explain it to me." Chin lifting again.

"The Vanguard are looking for the ledger. They think he gave it to you."

Her face went pale. "I don't have it." Hands flat on the table now.

"I know you don't."

"You believe me?" Looking up.

"I do, because if you had it, you wouldn't have walked through that door."

She glanced around at the men and tattoos and bikes and weapons on the wall, then back at me.

"Maybe I didn't know what it was."

"Maybe not."

She went quiet, then closed the folder with a sharp breath. "I can help you find it."

"No."

"You haven't even heard what I can do. I'm good at noticing patterns, I can follow where money moved." Words rushing out.

"The people we're dealing with don't care how good you are with numbers."

"I do."

"That isn't enough."

"Then what is enough?" Voice getting sharp.

"Experience you don't have."

Her jaw tightened and a flush crept up her neck. "I can learn."

"Not fast enough."

"Then teach me."

Jace let out a low whistle. I ignored him.

She looked down at the papers, then back at me. "I need to do something. I can't sit at home and wait while my audition is in three days and my family thinks I'm throwing everything away again." Hands balling into fists.

"You need to go home."

"I can't, because if I leave, I don't know what happens to him." I knew that feeling, the need to keep moving because stopping meant thinking. I hated that I recognized it.

She gathered the papers, shoving them back too fast, one tearing at the corner. "I don't have eighty thousand dollars. I could sell my cello, my family could help, but they'd involve the police and you said—"

"They'll involve the police."

She stopped, eyes flicking away. She'd thought about it more than once.

Then she looked straight on. "I'll stay here then."

The room went quiet. Jace stopped grinning.

"You don't know what you're asking."

"I know enough."

"No, you don't." Looking around at the men watching her and the locked doors and the cameras. Her throat moved but she didn't step back.

"I can't sit at home and wait." Quieter this time.

Most people would have run after seeing that photo. She'd walked in and now she was asking to stay. That took a different kind of nerve.

I looked at Marcus, then at Jace, then at the rest of them. "Listen up." Loud enough that the guy in the garage stopped working. "She's collateral to me. Until Leo is found and his debt is settled, she stays inside. Nobody touches her. Nobody threatens her. Nobody uses her as leverage against another member. Nobody treats her like club property. Her debt is between her, Leo, and me. Clear?"

Marcus nodded once. "Clear, boss."

Jace sat up straighter, grin gone. "Clear."

"Clear," the others echoed.

Evelyn's eyes lifted to mine, something in her face easing. Not trust. Relief. Shoulders dropping a fraction.

"Okay." Barely there.

"Get Tessa." I tipped my head to Marcus.

He nodded. "On it."

Evelyn picked up her bag, fingers still trembling. "When can I see Leo?"

"When it's safe."

"And when will that be?"

"I don't know."

She exhaled, almost a laugh. "You really don't like giving straight answers, do you?"

"I give straight answers when I have them."

For the first time her mouth curved a little. "Fair enough."

Tessa appeared from the back room, hoodie zipped, boots laced. "Show her upstairs."

Evelyn followed toward the stairs. Halfway up she stopped, hand on the railing.

"Is he really alive?" Voice small.

"Yes, he really is."

Her eyes closed for a second. "Okay." Then disappeared upstairs.

I waited until footsteps faded before going into my office and shutting the door. The room smelled of gun oil and old coffee.

I opened the bottom drawer. Leo's photograph was still there. Hands tied behind the chair, bruise darkening his jaw. Behind his arm, barely visible, corner of a brown leather ledger. Date on the back was Tuesday, two days ago.

Second drawer, notes we'd collected. Vanguard asking questions around the docks. Someone watching our routes. Someone inside the club had been talking.

And now Evelyn Thorne was upstairs.

She walked through my door believing she was offering herself as collateral for her brother. She didn't know the truth. If the Vanguard believed she knew where that ledger was, they wouldn't care whether she actually had it. They'd come looking. And if they were already watching the clubhouse, they'd know exactly where she was.

I looked toward the ceiling and listened to her footsteps overhead. I'd just brought a target inside my own walls, and I wasn't sure how long we had before someone came for her.