The sadness in his eyes grew until he blinked it away. “Kyle was killed a year after you were born.”
“Killed,” I repeated without thought.
Bram scratched the side of his beard, looking unsure. “It was a dangerous time for the club. Factions were beginning to form. To try and stop that, my father, who was the president at the time, had someone tamper with Kyle’s bike. He ended up dying in an accident, leaving behind a wife and twin boys.”
“Why him?” I blurted.
Bram didn’t answer.
“You don’t have to tell me. I can assume. Wyatt gave me a little bit of backstory on the club,” I said.
“And what did he tell you, exactly?”
“Just that your father kept pulling the club into bad stuff like drugs. There was more money to be gained. It damaged not only his family, but Roe’s as well.” That pretty much summed up what Wyatt had told me. I took a second to think if I was leaving anything out. “He also said that the club is doing better with you as the president. You got the Rebels out of the bad stuff.”
Bram seemed to quietly mull over everything I’d said. “My father had Kyle killed because he was loyal to me. He was one of two people I was closest to. Rhett, my father, knew he was losing favor with most of the club and wanted to scare members from siding with me. He was a very greedy man. Greedy for money. For power, which he had as president. He wasn’t a good father. All that mattered to him was the club, and toward the end, he fought dirty to keep it.”
I knew what it was like to have a greedy parent. “How’d you get rid of him?” I asked.
Bram stared down at me as if searching for something. “Maybe it would be best if we saved that story for another time.”
“Did you kill him?” The question kind of just fell out of my mouth before I could stop it.
He looked away from me, making me realize that I probably shouldn’t have asked that. It wasn’t the smartest thing I’d ever done. I didn’t regret it, though.
Bram walked away. For a second I thought he was so offended by the question that he just wasn’t going to answer. Then he took a seat on the sofa and locked eyes with me. “What if I did? How would you feel about that?”
I shrugged before grabbing the double frame that had my pictures in it off his desk. “First, admitting that to anyone, including me, isn’t the smartest thing to do. If you killed someone, you should keep that a secret.”
He smiled.
“Second, if you’re worried I’d view you differently, don’t.” I took in the picture of me cheering at a football game. It was one of the last games I had cheered at. It had been cold out. The sleeves on our uniforms were long at the time, which was helpful. The bruises on my arms were perfectly hidden.
“Not a lot of people would be unfazed after learning something like that,” he said.
“Is the way I judge people broken?” I shrugged again. “Maybe I’m so desperate for you to care for me that I’d ignore your red flags.” I glanced at him. He looked equal parts worried and horrified. “I’m kidding. Do you think I would have taken a crowbar to your motorcycle if I was desperate? I already went through that pathetic phase years ago. I learned a lot from it.”
“Then why are you so accepting of someone killing another person?”
Who was I to judge? If he had killed his father, he wouldn’t be my only parent to kill someone. At least the person he mayor may not have offed had been a bad man. The same bad man he hadn’t wanted me around and had given me up to protect me from.
“Charlotte?” he said, pulling me from my thoughts.
“Would you judge me?” I asked. “Would you view me differently?”
He frowned. “If you killed someone?”
I felt the need to challenge him. Just like I had done with damaging his motorcycle. I wanted to see if he’d abandon me. Better to do it now on my terms instead of later when I foolishly let myself trust him.
“What if I watched a good man be killed and I didn’t try to save him or utter a word to anyone of how he truly died? Would that change your opinion of me? That my silence let his killer get away with it. Would you ask me to leave and never come back?”
He didn’t answer. He looked too stunned to.
“What would you do, Bram, if you knew I was capable of such a thing? Would I be a disappointment? All those sacrifices you made for me and this is how I turned out.”
He sat there, eyes locked on me, unblinking. The longer he stared at me, the harder his expression became. “Are you talking about Noah, Charlotte?”
I couldn’t mask my shock fast enough and it was all the clarification he needed.
