Poison fucking hated that he had a point. The club was at the very bottom of Mississippi, and Poison had no idea where Beaverton was in Oregon. It could easily take them two days of straight driving just to get there.
“Don’t you fucking tell me that you don’t think we should go,” Poison growled at him.
“I’m not,” Kitty told her evenly. His expression was open and honest. “But Jack says that just because the message was sent from there doesn’t mean she was ever there or is there anymore. It’s a failsafe message, which means that she planted it from that area and it would send if she doesn’t input a password at whatever timeframe she designates. It could be one hour or every day or once a week. There’s no way to know. The only good news we have is that we know she was okay yesterday because we were talking to her.”
None of that lessened Poison’s anger. If anything, it increasedher impatience and need to hit something. “Spit it out. What are you saying? Are we going to Beaverton or not?”
“It’s the only lead we have,” Kitty shrugged, unhelpfully. “That’s up to you, but I don’t want to get your hopes up that we will find anything there. Jack emphasized that there’s no proof she’s there now.”
“Is Jack good at computers?” Tabs asked, bringing attention to the fact that the couple was not alone in the room. “Should we wait until Keys gets a chance to look at the message?”
“Keys would only tell us the same thing,” Kitty said without looking away from Poison. There was something sad in his expression that Poison didn’t like. “And to answer your question, Jack isverygood with computers.”
“We go to Beaverton,” Poison declared, not willing to further sit around and wait. “Does he know where the message was specifically sent from?”
Kitty nodded once.
“Then we go,” she reiterated, her hands on her hips. “It’s our only clue, so we have to start somewhere. She told us not to look for her, but I sure as fuck am not going to do that. Is everyone with me?”
Everyone but Phoenix agreed. “Is it?” the enforcer asked.
Poison turned for the first time, looking away from Kitty. “Is it what?”
“Is it our only clue?” Phoenix asked again, but she wasn’t looking at Poison. Her sharp gaze was laser-focused on Kitty. “It’s not like you to act so reserved,” she continued, a note of accusation in her voice. “You came in here like you had bad news you don’t want to deliver. Spill.”
Kitty’s jaw tightened. “I was waiting to speak to Poison alone.”
But Phoenix and Wendigo were having none of that. “No,” they said together. The two women looked at each other and nodded once. Then Phoenix continued, “If it has to do with MV then it pertains to all of us.”
Poison was about to argue and kick the rest of them out without giving a damn about their opinions when Kitty straightened and rounded his shoulders. “Fine.” He paused, not speaking again until Poison turned to face towards him again. “I’ve kept something from you since the beginning. Two things, actually. You know of one secret, and have never pressed me for it. The fact that you love me that much, that youtrustme that much, means everything to me, Ivy. I have never lied to you, but I have withheld something from you. In the beginning, it could be excused that it wasn’t my secret to tell. Then, if I’m being honest, we got so busy, just hopping from place to place that I didn’t really even think about it.
“And then Christmas came again, and you very specifically told me that you didn’t want to go to Mount Grove with Sissy and Scissors because all of your family is buried six feet under. The words were harsh, but also a wake-up call for me. I’ve been…struggling, trying to find the words to talk to you about this. I never thought I would be woken up to a message like this and now am staring down the barrel of a gun.”
It felt like the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach had grown into an enormous pit of despair. What the fuck? The only secret Poison knew Kitty kept from her was his name. Hislegalname. She had been the one to name him Kitty. Maybe it was a bit on the nose, with him being a cat burglar and all, but at the time she’d been doing her damnedest to piss him off.
But he had a second secret? He’d been keeping somethingelsefrom her?
Kitty didn’t even blink as he stared into her eyes. “Rose is alive, Ivy. She didn’t die of a heroin overdose years ago. She turned state’s evidence and was placed in WITSEC. TherealWITSEC, not Jack’s version.” Kitty held his chin high as he continued, not even pausing for Poison to process the bombshell he just dropped on her. “But her testimony was used, and a dealwas cut. So she broke the rules and reached out to the one person she knew would avenge her: her big sister.”
The room was so silent that one could have heard a pin drop. Poison wasn’t even sure she was breathing. Stiff as a board, all she could do was stare at her Knightmare. Her brain was like mush. What the fuck? Rose wasalive? Her baby sister was alive? The sister she’d watched be buried in the ground right next to their parents’ still-fresh graves?
And Kitty knew. Heknew. The man who had shared her bed for the past twenty monthsknew? And he’d said nothing. Not a damned thing. He’d known the disguised, mechanical voice Poison spoke to every single day was actually her not-dead sister, and he chose to keep his fuckingmouth shutabout it?
“How long have you known?” It was a wonder her voice came out so even. Inside, she was a raging whirlwind of chaos and betrayal.
“I had my suspicions almost from the beginning. The way you two talked… But I didn’t know for certain until that night we met up with Sissy and Scissors for the first time.” To his credit, Kitty didn’t back down. He didn’t make excuses or try to rationalize his actions. Poison wasn’t sure if that made it better or worse.
“So over a year,” Poison calculated. Technically it was a year and a half, but her brain was barely handling the knowledge of one year, let alone nearly two. “You’ve known my sister has been alive for over a year, and you’re only just telling me now?”
“Yes.”
Well, if there was one thing Kitty never had lacked, it was balls.
“If MV—” Poison clamped her mouth and eyes closed for a moment. The moniker she’d used foryearsto describe the mystery voice on the other end of the phone now tasted like acid on her tongue. She let a puff of air out through her nose, trying futilely to center herself. Fury, though, won out, and it was a wonder laser beams didn’t shoot out of her eyeballs when shereopened them. “IfRose,” she corrected herself, “wasn’t missing now, you wouldn’t be telling me this, would you?”
Kitty shook his head. “She asked me not to.”
Poison nodded stiffly, her spine as straight as a board. “And of course you would respectherwishes. It’s not like we were trying to build a life together. It’s not like I didn’t open up my heart and my soul to you, like you didn’t bulldoze your way into my life and completely take it over.” The sarcasm lacing her voice was as potent as venom. “Why would you feel the need to putmyneeds above hers?”
