“Oh . . .”
I nodded. “Yeah.Oh.” I finished my coffee, wishing it were something stronger. “He’s not smart, but he’s sleazy, controlling, and apparently fucks really good.”
Savannah choked on her coffee.
“There’s not much Ji and I don’t share,” I told her bluntly. “So when I realized my sister was hooked on shit, I demanded to know why. Apparently because one of his better qualities was that he fucked like a rockstar.” I saw her wide eyes. “She’s over the sex. I bought her a vibrator, the ones with the ears.”
“You bought yoursisteravibrator?”
“She made stupid decisions because she wasn’t getting good dick. I got her something reliable that delivered when she needed it.” I shrugged. “She says it does the job.”
“Your family is very . . . open.”
I could imagine Sav having this conversation with her father and grinned. “We’re close. She was my best friend when I was growing up. Then dipshit happened and we grew apart.” I didn’t like thinking of it. “She cleaned herself up, Mom shipped her off to rehab, and we got our Ji back.”
“That’s good,” she said, watching me intently. “I feel like there’s abut...”
“Oh, there is,” I told her easily. “Jiana’s usually popular wherever she goes, and can also be... wild.” I picked my phone up and opened my camera roll, scrolling to a picture of Nicky. I held it up to show Savannah. “This is Nicolai Spence. He’s three.”
She leaned forward, a smile on her face. “He’s so cute.”
“Don’t let him hear you say that,” I warned her. “He inherited his mom’s ability to make anyone love him, and his uncle’s ability to manipulate.”
“Your sister got pregnant in rehab?” she guessed.
“Touchdown, Cole,” I murmured, looking at my phone before putting it back down. “In his defense, Andy wasn’tinrehab, he was one of the electricians — apprentice electricians — at the time, fixing something in the kitchen or whatever the fuck it was. Long story short, Jiana came home clean from rehab, but she brought more baggage with her than we thought she would.” I cursed. “Baggage sounds so wrong. Nicky’s the best.”
Savannah gave me a small smile to say she understood. “She’s so young.”
“She was seventeen going on eighteen, going on thirty.”
“That’s a lot,” she murmured sympathetically.
“We all got through it, but some dipshits are harder to shake than others.” I looked down at my empty mug. “She had a bad birth; Nicky was difficult in coming out, and she didn’t bond well with him to start with because of it — well, that’s what my mom thinks.” I swallowed against the lump in my throat. “Knox was eager to reclaim one of his favorite customers, and she was in a bad place.”
“Oh no.”
“Yeah, she got high, drove the car right into a wall, and ended up in the ICU for a week.”
“Holyshit.”
“Yeah, not fun. But...” I took a deep breath and met her stare. “She is one hundred percent okay, and a great mom to Nicky.” I smiled, but Sav saw more than I was telling.
“But?”
“But he’s a fucking cunt and I hate him.”
She looked uncomfortable at the use of the C-word, but she nodded. “I get that you hate him.”
“He uses her against me,” I told her quickly. “I was never a fan, he knows how much I hate him, but when I got injured in the championship game and didn’t want to tell anyone how bad it was...”
“Oh no.” She was looking at me with wide eyes. “The pills I saw?”
I nodded once. “Yeah, not my smartest moment.” I set the coffee mug down. “Plus, he knows exactly where I am and what I have access to.”
She was frowning. “I don’t understand.”
“He runs drugs, his mouth, and...”Fuck it.“Places bets with insider information.”
