Long gone was the impeccably groomed Nox with the perfectly styled hair who wore bespoke three-piece suits. This guy looked like an outdoorsman. And wholly unfamiliar.
“Christ, Nox, do you even possess a mirror?” Gideon asked, momentarily diverted, his voice shaking. “Are you living off the land somewhere? Hunting, fishing, chopping your own wood?”
“This isn’t about me, dickhead.”
God, Nox and Gideon were always so insufferable. They loved each other but they mixed about as well as oil and water. They could be so exhausting. And if Cade’s exasperated expression was anything to go by, he thought so too.
“Stop this shit,” Cade barked, immediately silencing their brothers, who blinked into their cameras in astonishment.
In the past, Cade would’ve attempted to redirect the conversation with some random unrelated comment. This was the first time in literal years that he’d actually raised his voice at them and directly commanded them to stop.
Kenny rolled her lips between her teeth to hide her grin as the other two hung their heads deferentially and muttered surlysorries.
“Kenny, what do you mean Smithleftyou?” Cade demanded to know.
Not so grand when that bossy voice was directed at her.
“I think the statement was pretty self-explanatory.”
“Where are you right now?” Nox asked, his voice only slightly less bossy than Cade’s.
“I’ll tell you only if you promise not to interfere.”
Three remarkably similar glowering faces stared back at her without comment.
Well, four could play that game. She plastered her own glower on her face and maintained a stubborn silence.
“Defineinterfere.” Unsurprising that Gideon, the most easygoing of the four of them, was the first to break the silence.
“You will not show up here unannounced. You will not threaten to kill or otherwise maim Smith, and you will absolutelynotcontact him in any way, shape, or form whatsoever,” she itemized, then sucked her bottom lip into her mouth as she considered her words. “And no badmouthing him to me either. I don’t need to hear your unsolicited opinions about my choice of husband.”
“That’s unreasonably restrictive,” Nox protested.
“You’ll respect my marriage, my husband, and me,” Kenny insisted.
“The fucker walked out on you, Kenny. He clearly doesn’t appreciate you or deserve you,” Nox said, his straightblack brows beetling. “So why protect him from our—um—gentle reproaches?”
Cade facepalmed, while Gideon nodded in agreement to Nox’s preposterous question.
“He had his reasons for doing what he did.”
“Are you okay?” Cade asked, his voice grave.
Kenny gnawed at her upper lip before shaking her head.
“Not really.” Her voice was small and shaky, revealing a vulnerability that she would usually keep hidden even from her own brothers.
Gideon swore beneath his breath.
“You can come and stay with Beth and me for a while, okay? We can?—”
“No, Gideon, that’s…that’s unbelievably generous, but you don’t have the space.”
“We have two houses,” he scoffed.
“One of which is your workplace.”
“It doesn’t…”
