“Only the six of us around that table today, plus Curtis.And I won’t file it with probate until you give the go-ahead.”
“If Dad’s lenders had found out about her, about the offshore account you set up...”
“Everything was being monitored.There’s no evidence anyone connected knows about her.”
Did that include Vaughn?The worst and only one of his father’s lenders left, who’d killed Curtis.“My father is dead, I have a sister, the lo—” Nic cut himself off.He was sure that what he was about to say, what Garrett used to be to him, was no longer true.
“Her father is dead too,” Dennis said quietly.He stepped closer, clasping Nic’s shoulder.“I’m sorry, but I was keeping her safe as best as I could within the bounds of legal ethics.”
The rational part of him, sidelined by his earlier anger, understood that.Hell, that same part of him might have done the same.Had done the same in not telling Cam the whole story at first—for his safety.And Cam didn’t even need protection.“I’m sorry for snapping earlier.You did what you thought was right.What you could do.”
Dennis squeezed his arm.“Thank you for saying so, even if you’re still coming to terms with it.”They laughed lightly before Dennis grew serious again.“I’ll deliver updated probate documents to you by the end of the week.”
He disappeared toward his office, and Nic hesitated with his hand on the conference room door.He was eager to talk to Lette, to get to know his sister, but he felt like his awkward teen self all over again, not knowing where to begin.Not wanting to scare her with his intensity or the truth of the situation they were in.He could approach her like a witness—he was good at handling those—but she wasn’t a witness.Lette was his sibling.All his life he’d been an only child and now he wasn’t.What did he know about being a brother?He absently ran a hand over his hip, the left one, and a frame of reference clicked into place.
Cam.
He’d been around Cam and his brothers in Boston.Witnessed the love and devotion they had for each other and their family, even when they weren’t always on the same page.They came together and held each other up when it counted.Cam could pick up a phone, say he needed them here, and Nic had no doubt they’d get on a plane as soon as possible.
But Cam wasn’t his only frame of reference.Others clicked into place.
Aidan and Danny, together with their sisters and nieces and nephews, the Talley clan tighter than any he’d known.
Jamie with his sister and utterly devoted to his nieces.
The lengths Mel had gone to for her deceased brother.
Eddie and his other SEAL-team brothers who’d kept Nic alive, who’d hauled his injured ass out of the field and back to safety.
He already was a brother, but now he was a brother by blood too.He could make this work.What all those examples had in common was trust.Which was what he needed to start building with Lette, especially if he was going to keep her safe.
Taking a deep breath, he pushed open the conference room door.Lette jumped a little, twisting in her seat to look over her shoulder.Her blue eyes were still a bit wide, as they had been when he’d vaguely warned of the danger that required the extra security, but they were also determined, bravely holding his gaze.So much like his own.
“Just me,” he said, one hand raised as he gently closed the door.
“I’m not usually this jumpy.”
He took the seat next to her.“Garrett still jumpy enough for the both of you?”
“My brother cannot sit still to save his life.I don’t know how—” She cut herself off, brow furrowed.“I mean, my other brother.”
“It’s fine, Lette.”
“No, it’s not, because I did know about you.”She reached beneath her shirt collar and lifted out a chain, and on the end of it was something he never expected to see again.“I’ve always known I had two brothers.”She handed him his high school class ring.
He turned it over in his palm, thumb running over the bearcat on each side and the ruby on the top, remembering how he’d shoved it into Garrett’s hand the day they’d fled.He felt Lette’s gaze on him and he let her look her fill, eyes still locked on the ring as he tried to wrap his brain around the fact he had a sister and she was sitting next to him.“They always said I looked like you—all limbs, blue eyes, same smirk, especially when I was arguing.”
He glanced up, smiling.“I’m almost afraid to ask what else they told you about me.”
“All good, Nic.And any time we got news of you, through the military grapevine or when you’d give a press conference about a case you won, we’d celebrate for you.”
He’d had this whole family, one member of which he didn’t even know about, all of whom celebrated for him.Yet without him.
“And your celebrations?”he asked hoarsely, wanting to know about the others he’d missed.
“Garrett’s graduation from East Carolina, though I was only five, so I don’t remember much.”
“Did he play?”Nic couldn’t help asking.
