I didn’t tell you everything.
Why would she keep Viper going to see her secret?What else didn’t she tell me?
“When did he go see her?” I don’t even remember taking a step toward her until my dad’s hand on my arm holds me back.
“How am I supposed to remember the exact date?” Mom glares at me, then reconsiders. “It was the night after you spoke to us about her. Viper had you go help at the junkyard so he could be sure of speaking to her alone.”
It’s like a rock compresses my chest, and the buzz of conversation around me fades. All I can hear is Jas on the phone, crying hysterically. The night I dumped work and jumped red lights so I could be with her.Too fucking late.
For ten years, I kept my word to her and never told anyone about our baby. The reasons she wanted it kept quiet have long passed. I can’t keep my mouth shut, anyway.
“That night?” I shove Jett’s arm off me. “That’s the night Jas lost our kid.”
“Fuck,” Dad mutters.
“She was pregnant?” Mom sucks in a sharp breath. “Why didn’t you tell us the night before? God knows you said enough.”
She was pregnant. She was alone in the apartment. And when I arrived…
She was curled up on the floor of her mom’s bedroom. Details I never thought twice about before thunder through my mind now. The messy bed. Her tangled hair. Her rumpled clothes.
I catch sight of the snake on my arm. During our week together, she kissed every inch of ink on my body. Except for that one tat.
My gut churns.No.
Jett grips my shoulder. “That’s why she left. Poor kid.”
I couldn’t stay here after what happened.I thought she was talking about the baby. But it never sat right with me. Did she need therapy forsomething elsethat happened?
I back up and hit the wall.What the fuck am I thinking?
“I’m sorry that happened.” Mom doesn’t try and touch me again, though. “But it had nothing to do with Viper going to see her. They just talked, Ty. Well, he talked. She didn’t say anything. You can’t blame—”
Noise rushes back in, blasting through my head, a soundless roar of horror and denial. I don’t want to think it. Can’t believe it. He wouldn’t have dared, not with my girl.It’s the only thing that makes any fucking sense.
“Talk?” I don’t recognize my voice. I don’t recognizeme. “That’s all, huh? You’d put your life on the line and swear thatyour brotherdidn’t touch her?”
The silence is electric. The blood drains from her face. She knows what I mean all right.
“He wouldn’t,” she whispers, but it’s hollow. Means nothing. Because I knew that son of a bitch, too, and there was a cold, hard core that ran through him. A great asset since he was the Bastards enforcer.
Evil aura. Jas’s strange comment jars my brain, taking on a life of its own and crippling me from the inside out.
If Viper decided on something, he was capable of doing anything.
I swipe my hand across my mouth and grip my jaw. Jett’s talking, fuck knows what he’s saying. I’m suffocating. If I don’t get out of here, I’m going to lay him out.
Without a word, I stumble through the house and somehow make it to my bike. I double over, hands on my thighs, and the viper tattoo is all I can see.
There was no reason why Jas was in her mom’s room that night. Not unless she’d been dragged in there. She barely spoke to me after that night. Never let me touch her. And I put it all down to grief, without ever asking herwhy.
My guts heave, and I vomit until all I can taste is blood and bile and bitter, useless guilt.
When I was a kid, I idolized my uncle. After Jas left, he stuck by my side, put up with my black moods, and like a gullible jerk I thought it was because we were on the same side.
If he weren’t already dead, I’d kill that fucking piece of shit rapist.
Chapter Seventeen
