Total pages in book: 66
Estimated words: 62197 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 311(@200wpm)___ 249(@250wpm)___ 207(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 62197 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 311(@200wpm)___ 249(@250wpm)___ 207(@300wpm)
“Where are we going?” I asked as Trev climbed back into the driver’s seat.
Madeline crossed her legs and leaned back. “Going to get your man.”
Twenty-Six
Than
There wasn’t even a name that I could give to the fucking twisted shit that had been going on inside me since I’d been told that my brother had been taken to Ocala. Losing my best friend, watching Crosby die right in front of me, the light leave his eyes, it had marked me in a way I would never get over. I still had nightmares, reliving it. Seeing him stare up at me. Whisper Halo’s name. Trying to tell me something I hadn’t understood back then.
But my brother? I’d not recover from it. If Blaise Hughes took his life, I was done. They could hunt me down and string me up too. I didn’t fucking care. I couldn’t lose Ransom.
Which was why I was following a nice older lady by the name of Ms. Jimmie to Blaise Hughes’s office, uninvited. Why Forge was beside me I didn’t know. He hadn’t been forced to come inside with me. Hell, I hadn’t even asked him to. When I’d gotten out of the SUV and started for the house, he had followed.
Ms. Jimmie smiled at us as she stopped in front of the door to Blaise’s office. “I’ll leave you here then,” she replied before she walked back in the direction she had come.
She hadn’t knocked or asked if we could come in. That should be a warning right there. Not even the damn housekeeper would interrupt him without invitation to.
I stared at the imposing dark mahogany door. “You don’t have to go in there,” I said.
“Yeah,” Forge replied, “I do.”
Shaking my head, I tried again to change his mind. “No reason for both of us to put our lives on the line.”
Forge didn’t move.
I cut my eyes at him. “You know how risky this is. What if Noa’s attempt doesn’t work?”
We’d left her there in the G-Wagon with Madeline Hughes. Both her and Branwen. Not waiting for the outcome. I didn’t trust that a woman could convince Blaise Hughes of anything. Even his wife. The man was known far and wide for his ruthlessness. Most called him the Devil and believed it.
“If it was Oz’s life, would you stand back and let me go in alone?” he asked, finally meeting my gaze.
No. I wouldn’t. We weren’t all related, but the ties of family ran deep. We’d been raised as family. Trained as brothers. Even in this life that I sometimes wished I could walk away from, I never wanted to walk away from them. I wasn’t fighting for a break from the darkness anymore. I’d found my peace, my solace, my center. Montana had become all that for me. She was what I had been missing in life.
As fucking angry as I was at Noa Raines because I needed to take my pain out on someone, if she was that for my brother, then I understood every-fucking-thing he’d done in order to have her.
He didn’t deserve to die for it.
“All right then,” I replied with a nod, then lifted my hand to knock. Just opening the door and walking inside could get us both shot before we took the first step. I had some things to say before that happened.
I heard the rumble of deep voices inside. My dad was probably in there. I didn’t allow myself to think about his reaction to my showing up here. He’d looked so fucking stricken when Linc told him that Blaise had sent Gage Presley to take Ransom out of a hotel room in Manhattan, where he’d been with Noa. He wouldn’t like this. It would scare the shit out of him. Mom had fought hard to keep Ransom and me out of this life when we were kids. It was the end to their marriage. But we’d chosen Dad and the family. It had broken her heart, and although we still visited her and called, she wasn’t a part of our world. Not really.
For reasons like this one right now. What she had always feared the most. Losing one of us.
The doorknob turned, and Levi Shephard opened the door. His eyes went from Forge, then locked on mine. I could see the displeasure in his eyes.
The silent What the fuck are you doing? was clear even if he didn’t say a word to us.
He turned back to the room of men. “Than and Forge,” he said, but nothing more.
I heard my father’s curse and a heavy sigh, which I assumed came from Linc. Jonas—Forge’s dad—wasn’t in there. He’d stayed in Madison to oversee things there, along with Oz, Locke, and Fender.
Levi turned back to us. “Fucking stupid,” he muttered under his breath as he stepped back for us to enter. He was referring to the two of us. That didn’t bode well for us.