Page 35 of Intolerable Bishop

The question was out there now, and I gripped my cup as I waited for Theo or Myles to answer. They looked at one another, and I knew they had. My body shook. Theo was right about one thing. I didn’t want this one place to be turned into another pile of lies. Wayward was already a living and breathing lie, wrapped in the glittery cover of a high-end school.

“We did.” Theo looked pointedly at Ivy, and she shrank back in her chair.

“I didn’t do anything,” she said, her eyes scared.

“I know that, but knowing this is explosive, and even though you’ve proven yourself to be a good friend up to this point, this is not something I’m going to say lightly, so here is your opportunity to not be in the know. If you’re taken and tortured for any reason, then Ren’s life is also in your hands. Are you willing to make that sacrifice?”

“Jesus, what kind of information is this? I feel like I’ve been dumped in the middle of Game of Thrones or something,” I said.

“Right now, I wish we had a dragon,” Theo responded, his eyes never leaving Ivy as she chewed her bottom lip.

“Shit. I’m not that brave. You know that, Ren. I love you, but I don’t want to know things that can put you at risk. Theo is right. Sometimes, it’s better not to know.” She stood and hugged me. “I’ll head to my room. If you need me, call me.”

I couldn’t help staring as she left. Was I so different from other people that I wanted to know? That I would choose to die with the information in my heart?

“Are ya ready, Snowflake? We can wait a few days to tell ya so that this doesn’t upset our summer vacation.” Myles came to me, and as angry as I wanted to remain at him, I just couldn’t. He cupped my face, and a lone tear trickled down my cheek. “I will never hold anythin’ back from ya. We planned on tellin’ ya this, but not until we knew for sure. We love ya too much to see ya in any more pain.”

He set my coffee aside and pulled me into a hug, and I closed my eyes and held onto him. “I believe you, but I hate the secrecy between us. Please keep me in the loop, even if it will hurt me. I’d rather know.”

Myles took a deep breath. “Alright, we swear to you that we will tell ya everything.”

“I don’t agree with this,” Theo said, and as Myles stepped back, I glared at him.

“But is it really your call to make? Don’t I get a say in what I know about myself?” He grumbled something under his breath.

“Fine, but only when it comes to things about you. The rest needs to go through Nash, and you’re on a need-to-know basis,” he said, and his eyes told me that his decision was final. If there was a rank in the room, he just trumped any decision that Blake or Myles made. I hadn’t seen it in action before, but I clearly saw it now.

“Fine, I’ll agree to that for now,” I said, and his brow ticked ever so slightly.

“Then you may want to sit down for a moment.”

I looked at Myles. “Ya really do.”

Well, shit. I slowly walked over to the table and sat down, my eyes going to Myles and Theo and then Blake, who looked as anxious about their findings as I was.

Theo pulled the picture from my aunt’s house out of his pocket and laid it down in front of me.

“That is your mother. The man I’m still unsure about, but it was taken in Moscow. That building in the background is a parliament building, and I’d say it was summer, by the leaves on the trees.”

“Okay….”

“The name on the back is not a misspelling. I searched that name, specifically looking for anyone that was in a position of power with that name from Russia, and this came up.”

Theo placed his phone down, and I slowly picked up the photograph that was at a fancy event. Everyone was dressed as if they were going to a gala in a fairytale. My eyes searched the faces until I found my mum. She looked to be my age in the picture. He slid the image up to display the name Yuliana Mikhailov.

“Now, this name may not mean a lot to you, but it does to us,” Theo said. “The Mikhailovs are the family in control of the lion’s share of all mafia holdings in and out of Russia for the Bratva.” My mouth opened. No, there was no way.

“Now, we all have a doppelganger in the world, and this woman could’ve been a close look-a-like, which is why I didn’t want to say anything to you, but then I found this upstairs in your mother’s closet.” He laid down the second picture. It was a formal photo of my mum with a woman and a man that I’d never met before. As I stared at the photo in his hand, my body began to tremble. “This is your grandmother and grandfather, and this picture is from your mom’s eighteenth birthday.”

“This can’t be,” I said, the shaking in my body getting worse as cold dread settled into my bones. I pointed to his hand. “The men who killed my mother. I saw one of their hands. He had that same polar bear tattoo,” I said, the room closing in on me.

“That’s because it’s the Mikhailov crest. All the men in the family over the age of eighteen who remain in the business, which almost all do, get the family mark.”

I covered my mouth and shook my head as tears formed in my eyes. “I don’t understand…wouldn’t that mean….”

Myles gripped my shoulder. “Aye, Snowflake. Your ma pissed off her family for some reason, and they wanted her dead. They either want you dead or alive, but I’m sure that is why yer ma locked ya in the safe room. She knew they would kill her, but she wanted to save you from the same fate. One that she was hiding from.”

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god.”