His words, and the knowledge that Garret knew his secret the entire time, weighed down on Eli like a heavy stone.
Garret continued. “I wasn’t going to let that happen.”
“But everything else?—”
“My father raised me with his fists,” he said, already anticipating the question. “His father did the same to him.” Garret’s hands, folded across his chest, started to tremble. “I didn’t know another way. That’s not an excuse. It’s just what happened.”
“You’re right. It’s not an excuse.”
“No, it’s not.” Garret’s gaze dropped to Olivia’s midsection, then moved past her, as if looking at someone who wasn’t there. “Marlene tried to teach me. She was patient with me, more than I deserved. I loved her. I loved her and I failed her, and then I failed you.” The expression on Garret’s face was one Eli had never seen before. The hardness was gone, as was the posture, leaving only raw emotion. “Break the cycle, Eli. Be better than me. Don’t fail them, and don’t fail yourself.”
Eli’s throat closed. Behind him, no one said a word or moved, not even Olivia. He closed his eyes as a breeze blew by, carrying the sweet scent of sugary cinnamon pastry. That was enough.
When he opened his eyes, his voice was rough. “What happens now?”
“I’m turning myself in,” Garret said. “The High Council, Siberia, whatever they want. I’m done running. I only broke out to protect you.”
“We’ll escort you to the council,” Killian said. “Jacob, take him into the warehouse with the others and help Cliff keep an eye on everyone. Sloane, call it in.” Sloane pulled out her phone and stepped away to make the call.
Garret pushed off the shipping container and held his wrists out to Jacob, who secured them with Lycan-grade restraints. The older man didn’t resist, didn’t even flinch. He just stood there as the cuffs clicked into place, sealing his fate.
“For what it’s worth,” Garret said, “Marlene would have been proud of you. She would have been so damn proud.”
Eli watched them lead his father to the warehouse. Garret didn’t even look back.
Chapter 16
Olivia watched as the warehouse door closed behind Garret, and everyone else scattered off to finish the cleanup. Then it was just her and Eli, alone together for the first time in three months.
She hadn’t planned for this part. When Garret had approached her on the street yesterday, she’d been terrified and then furious and then terrified again, all within the span of seconds. The man was enormous, and his resemblance to Eli had been so jarring that she froze on the spot. He’d spoken fast and given her the information in clipped, efficient sentences. O’Grady was alive. Eli was walking into a trap. Gave her where and when, then told her to call whoever she needed to call. And then he was gone.
She’d stood on that sidewalk, absorbing his words, then pulled out her phone to call her father. By the following day, Killian had assembled the team and they made their way to Boston. Garret was already waiting for them on the docks to walk them through the layout. She’d insisted on coming, and her father had agreed on the condition that she stayed in the van.
The plan had been simple. Get Eli out alive and secure O’Grady and his accomplices. And then, she would look Eli in the face, say what she needed to say, and leave. She had rehearsed it in her head the entire van ride up here, choosing her words carefully so they were clean and final. But then Garret spoke. And in that moment, the speech she’d prepared crumbled and then she didn’t know what to say.
“Olivia.”
She turned. Eli faced her, his hands at his sides. He looked awful, shadows tattooed under his eyes, his beard scraggly, and his hair long and unkempt. His clothes looked ratty, his jeans sporting holes in the knees where the fabric had worn away from wear.
Her wolf ached at the sight of him.
Shut up,she snapped at her animal, then tried to recall the words in her speech.
“I don’t know where to start,” he said.
“That makes two of us.”
He took a breath. “I’ve had a lot of time to figure out what I need to do, and now that you’re standing in front of me, I can’t remember any of it.”
“What you need to do,” she repeated. “To do what?”
“To get you back.”
The words hung between them for the longest time. These were the words she’d been waiting to hear, but now that he said them, all she could think of was everything that had happened since that night he left. Of the past three months. Ninety-four days of waking up alone. Ninety-four days of her phone not ringing, of staring at the door, waiting for him to walk back in. Of lying awake at two in the morning, wondering if he was dead in a ditch somewhere. Ninety-four days of hating herself for even caring. He’d put her through all of that. And hearing Garret’sstory, understanding why Eli was the way he was explained things, but it didn’t erase them.
“I don’t deserve you,” he said, breaking the long silence. “Leaving you like that, after everything you said to me. You were right. About all of it.”
“I know I was right.”
