At this point, Daniel’s pulled over despite the fact we aren’t home yet. He pivots in his seat to face me, and maybe I’m imagining it, but I see a glimmer of satisfaction in his eyes, like I played right into his hands. Gritting my teeth, I try to focus on his words instead of the dull roaring in my ears.
“I already had a couple of people set things up to play into the story I fed them. Elysium ran away from her abusive father to live with her boyfriend of her own volition. I have people knocking on doors on the neighboring farms to see if anyone will verify the abuse and to Thomas Miller’s true nature.”
Everett beats me to the punch. “Julian will never agree to let them into the house; we store too much there and can’t risk moving shit if we’re being watched.”
Daniel’s eyes flit to where he’s still restraining me before he says, “Exactly. Which is why I had people go shopping and rearrange Mr. King’s house to make it look like she’s been living with him for months. That’s where they’re going to talk to her.”
Ev’s fingers loosen on my wrist rather than tighten with his rage, like his subconscious wants to set me free to do what he can’t. Because he knows as well as I do that we can’t protect her… not there.
The others have never been allowed inside his personal residence, and Julian hasn’t let me back in the house since I killed Sophia, turning his pretty tiles into a checkerboard of red and white. So much blood, and only a bit of delicate skin to keep it all contained. Just a few cuts in the right places and the thing that keeps you alive can turn on you, drowning you from the inside out.
The police will be watching. She’s going to need to stay there for at least a few days to keep up the illusion, might already be there. She won’t come back, can’t let her go.
Everett’s voice is faint, but I force myself to concentrate on the words, to pull me back. If I kill Daniel now, I’ll get locked up again, and this time they’ll lose the key.
“Thanks for the ride.” His door slams behind him before he opens the one beside me. “Come on.”
Slowly sliding out of my seat, I watch the lawyer’s face as he sighs in relief. So thrilled his plan is working; separating us.
He barely waits for me to shut my door before he’s driving off, leaving Ev and me to walk the rest of the way home. It’s only a few blocks at this point and the sun that’s already starting to set sends shadows dancing everywhere to lead the way.
“He wants to get her away from us,” I warn him, strumming my fingers along my thigh as we walk. “Weaving lies, snipping threads; all of King’s horsemen and all of his men…”
“Tone the crazy down a notch, will ‘ya?” He runs a hand through his hair, the haggard look on his face more prominent than before. “She’s been on better footing with Julian lately, it should be okay. If she smooths things over with the cops and gets the story straightened out so they can see what a son of a bitch her father is, we can work it in our favor. We get an order of protection for her against him, then the next time he gets too close to home, we have a perfectly legal excuse to kill him, claim it was self-defense or whatever.”
My stomach twists though as I try to get him to understand. “When has Julian taking an interest in someone ever ended well for anyone but him?”
Tongue in cheek, he stops in his tracks, pivoting to pin me with a look. “What kind of shit goes on in that house?”
Withdrawing my knife from my pocket, I rub my thumb over the faded ‘G’. “The sort that breaks people.”
“You just left her there?” Everett’s pissed off voice starts to pull me awake, when I didn’t even realize I’d fallen asleep.
“Yeah, because I was going to have my hands all over your girl and look like a creep putting her in bed.” Maverick scoffs. “Wasn’t about to deal with a pissing match when you were bound to come back in a bitch-ass mood. I kept an eye on her like you asked, and now I’m going the fuck to bed. Later.”
The door slams shut behind him as I pull my head up from the dining room table, stacks of clothes folded up around me. One of the rooms was converted into a kitchen/ dining room, and it’s a good central point between everyone’s bedrooms to fold the laundry so I don’t need to go as far to put it all away.
Rubbing a hand over my bleary eyes, I get up and roll my stiff shoulders. “So did you catch them before you got arrested?” He gives me a confused look that I return. “The people you were hunting, I mean.”
Recognition lights up his eyes as he finishes crossing the distance. He looks like hell despite apparently just getting out of the shower. It’s only been a couple of days, but a lack of decent sleep and stress will do that to a person.
“Mav didn’t fill you in?” he asks, and I narrow my eyes.
“Fill me in on what?” Whatever has this beast of a man cringing, I’m sure it’s not something I want to hear, especially two seconds after waking up.
Scrubbing a hand down his tired face, it morphs into one begging forgiveness. “Fuck, don’t hate me. I swear, I just-“ he sighs heavily, shoulders slumping “-I didn’t want you to get upset.”
Wrestling with my unease, I try to push my annoyance aside. I’ve been safe at home while he was stuck sitting in a cell. Whatever he was doing obviously didn’t go according to plan, and was bad enough that even Julian was stressed out.
Choosing my words carefully, I push past my feelings and look at things objectively. “I appreciate the fact that you were trying to protect me. But for the record, I really hate being kept in the dark intentionally. It makes me feel not only like you don’t trust me, but… small. Like you guys are just humoring me with pats on the head before sending me off on my way so the men can handle the important things. Not exactly the kind of bone I want you to throw me.”
His lip twitches, but it fades away as quickly as it arrived. “Now that he lost everything, your dad struck some sort of deal with Julian’s competitor. They broke into one of our businesses.”
I can feel the blood drain from my face, not sure what to say. I’ve been trying to forget that the man even exists, and it hasn’t been as difficult as I’d have imagined lately. We’re in our own little world here, everything else seeming a million miles away. And with the men inside these walls, I might as well be hiding in a den of wolves, hiding in the shadows they cast.
“That-“ he gestures to my face “-is why I didn’t want to tell you. You just stopped being so skittish; I didn’t want you to be freaked out.”
Licking my suddenly dry lips, I ask, “Did you kill him, then? Is that why you were arrested?”
