Tin Queen

by Devney Perry

  I should have stolen that sweatshirt when I’d had the chance.

  He stood tall, shoving off the car. When I was close enough, his hand stretched out like he was going to catch one of the tears, but he must have thought better of it because he pulled his hand away and shoved it into a jeans pocket.

  “How did you know I was here?”

  “How I’ve always known where you are.” His eyes flicked to the purse tucked beneath my arm.

  “My phone.”

  He nodded.

  “Why?” Not that it bothered me. I didn’t care that he’d followed me. But I asked because right now, I was running long on questions and short on answers. And I’d take whatever he’d give me.

  “The Warriors,” he said. “Thought they might come after you.”

  So he’d put a tracking device or software on my phone to find me.

  “Why are you here?” I asked.

  “Why are you?”

  I turned and took in the prison for the last time. The tall walls and narrow windows. The unscalable fences and unbreakable doors. “I think I just said goodbye to my father.”

  And damn it, the tears just kept on coming.

  I hated my father for keeping us a secret. For lying to me and Mom and May and TJ. I hated him for making me feel . . . less. I hated him for manipulating me.

  I hated that I couldn’t hate him the way I should hate him.

  It wasn’t fair.

  The tears streamed, dropping to the pavement beside my heels. One moment they were forming the start of my river, the next, they were falling into a soft gray hoodie.

  Emmett’s arms banded around me, pulling me close as I cried.

  I buried my face in Emmett’s chest, clinging to him as I let the regret and pain pour from my heart. I was crying too hard to speak but I hoped he could feel my sorrow for the misery I’d caused him.

  He held me like no one ever would and when I finally reined in the tears, he still didn’t let me go.

  “You took the blame for the fire,” I said, the words muffled against his body.

  “Yeah.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I should have burned it down a long, long time ago.”

  I squeezed my eyes shut, holding him tight as I wished for our reality to be different. I wished to rewind time. I wished to go back to the days when I sat on his kitchen counter while he cooked me dinner. When we talked and laughed and kissed and made love.

  If there was a miracle to be had in my life, I wanted it to be him.

  Emmett dropped his cheek to my hair, blowing out a long breath. “I can’t do this.”

  There would be no miracles. No wishes granted.

  The ache that spread through my bones and muscles nearly dropped me to my knees. It shouldn’t have hurt as much as it did. I should have expected this from him because with all I’d done, I couldn’t blame him.

  I deserved this.

  I unwound my hands from his waist and stepped away, somehow managing to keep my feet. I wouldn’t crumble in front of him either. He didn’t deserve to bear any guilt for this when it was my fault.

  “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Emmett.”

  He stared at me like he wanted to say something. He stared at me with his feelings etched on his face. “Everything I know about you is a lie.”

  If he really thought that, then he hadn’t been paying attention.

  Yes, my name, my family, my motivation from the beginning had been a lie. But the moments together, our moments, those had been as real as anything in my life. The moments when we’d fallen in love.

  I did love him.

  He loved me too.

  Those were words we would not voice. Could not voice.

  He held my gaze, silently asking if I was okay.

  I nodded and took one step away. Then two.

  He didn’t watch my third as he spun and strode for his bike parked beside the Nova. Then he was gone.

  I stood there until the rumble from his motorcycle was a ghost on the wind. Then I pulled my sunglasses from my purse and I got in my car on shaking knees.

  I loved him.

  He loved me.

  Words that would forever remain unspoken.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Nova

  “I missed the snow.”

  It blanketed the world, made it a clean slate.

  I needed a restart.

  “It’s pretty outside.” My sister sank into the couch beside me, her gaze shifting out the front window to where the fat flakes drifted to the ground. We’d woken up this morning to a winter wonderland.

  Jack had left for work already. Christian was on the floor, crashing toy cars together while a cartoon played in the background.

  “Are you working today?” she asked.

  “I should be.” I sighed. It was Monday and by the time I went home and changed, I’d be hours late to the office. “But I might take the day.”

  I’d put in plenty of hours last week.

  It had been a week since I’d gone to visit Dad. A week since I’d seen Emmett. I’d driven home from the prison and since home was not a place I wanted to be—alone with my thoughts was a dangerous place these days—I’d spent last weekend at the office.

  It had been deserted except for one of the partners who’d come in briefly on Sunday afternoon. She’d said a quick hello and left me to my work.

  Ira had called me twice and I’d declined each. Eventually, he’d get the message.

  Otherwise, my blessedly boring, tedious work had been a salvation. I’d only gone home when absolutely necessary to change clothes and attempt a few fitful hours of sleep. Then Friday had come, and I’d left the office, but instead of going home, I’d come to Shelby’s.

  I’d found refuge with my sister.

  She’d graciously let me stay the entire weekend. Saturday, I’d slept for fourteen hours. Yesterday, I’d lounged in a pair of borrowed sweats and played with Christian most of the day. And when I hadn’t made any indication of leaving after dinner, Shelby had simply brought another pair of pajamas to the guest bedroom.

  She hadn’t asked why I was here. She knew something was wrong but hadn’t pressed for an explanation. She’d just given me a safe haven until I was ready to talk.

  “Thank you for letting me stay all weekend.”

  “You don’t have to thank me.”

  I smiled at her and took a sip from my coffee, then went back to the window, mesmerized by the falling snow. It was only the first week of November. This storm would blow over and the snow would melt before winter really settled in for the season. But for today, I was grateful for the peace.

  “I went to see Dad last week.”

  Shelby shifted on the couch, stretching for a remote to turn the volume down on the TV. “How’d that go?”

  “Not great.” I closed my eyes, took three heartbeats, then opened my eyes and faced my sister. She deserved the truth too.

  So I told her everything.

  I told her every detail Dad had shared with me about the Warriors. If she was surprised, she didn’t let on. She simply sat by my side and listened, taking small breaks to get Christian whatever he needed before coming back to the couch and letting me purge.

  I told her what she didn’t already know about Emmett. How TJ had really died. How he’d instigated the confrontation with the Gypsies and how Emmett had fired back in self-defense. How I’d fallen in love with the man who’d shot our brother. How that knowledge had sent me over the edge, and how I’d burned down the Tin Gypsy clubhouse.

  God bless my sister for not looking at me like I should be in an asylum rather than her living room.

  Then finally, I’d told her how I’d found out about Dad’s real family. I’d told her that we’d been a secret and that we had two half sisters in South Carolina.

  “Oh, I hate him.” Tears glistened in her eyes by the time I was done. “I thought maybe he was done hurting us. After TJ died, I thought maybe he’d
disappear. And when he went to prison, I was so glad. That’s where he belongs. But this . . . I hate him for this.”

  I was furious at my father. Maybe the hate would come, maybe not. But it would take me years not to be angry. “I’m mad. I feel like a fool. Blindly believing him while he’s lied to us our entire lives.”

  She scoffed. “This is a new low. Even for him. I mean . . . he hid us. How did we not know? How did Mom not know?”

  “He kept us all at a distance. Even Mom.”

  “This would shatter her. All those years that she waited, hoping he’d come to us. If she knew that he was married and had other kids, she’d be devastated.”

  “We can’t tell her.”

  “I agree.” Shelby nodded. “Did TJ know?”

  “Yes.”

  “That little shit.” The sadness was disappearing from her face, replaced by an anger I felt deep in my soul. “He was just like Dad. Cocky. Thought he could manipulate people. He knew about this and didn’t turn his back on Dad. He chose Dad and that fucking club over us.”

  TJ’s knowledge of Dad’s secrets was the fact that hurt the worst. I was so . . . disappointed. He should have known better. He should have done better, for me and Mom and Shelby. We had been his family. We had been there for him every single day. But Shelby was absolutely correct.

  TJ had made his choice and it hadn’t been his family.

  My brother had been young and rebellious. He’d been cocky and bold. He’d walked through life without a care, probably because whatever he’d needed, Dad had given him. All with the promise of being in that goddamn club.

  And he’d died for it.

  “Dad never should have brought him into that fucking club,” she said. “But we should have stopped it.”

  “How?” TJ had been groomed his entire life to be a Warrior.

  “I don’t know.” She looked to Christian on the floor.

  He was mellow this morning, maybe because of the snow. Maybe because it was a quiet Monday morning. But he played and sent us his cute smiles whenever he tore his eyes away from his beloved cartoon.

  “I love Mom,” she whispered.

  “I love her too.”

  “But we are more like Dad than her.”

  It was the truth. Our stubbornness. Our own bold personalities. Our strength. We’d inherited it from Dad.

  “If I had been more like Mom, we probably never would have found out,” I said. My own curiosity and drive had been what had uncovered the truth. “I wanted so badly to win him over. To have more from him. To finally win his attention.”

  “You’ve always wanted more from him. I’ve never understood it.”

  Maybe Shelby had known all along it was impossible. Unless I’d been born a boy and part of his club, I’d have always been second tier in Dad’s life. Was that why she’d never tried hard to win Dad over? TJ hadn’t had to try at all. He’d always been Dad’s pride.

  “I guess . . . because he counted on me,” I said. “Like he always knew I’d be there and when the time came, I didn’t want to let him down.”

  “He let us down.”

  Over and over and over again. “It hurts.”

  “It hurts,” she whispered, her eyes on her son.

  Christian would never know his grandfather. Shelby wouldn’t allow it. She’d never take her child to a prison and I doubted there was a picture of Dad in the house.

  “I’m sorry.” I put my hand over hers. “For believing him. For bringing this all up.”

  “Never be sorry for the truth. I’m not sorry. It hurts, but I’m not sorry.”

  “Shel—” I stopped myself as I took in my sister’s face. She wasn’t Shelby. Like I wasn’t Nova.

  Her name was May. She’d always been May. Outside the walls of my childhood home, outside my own damn head, she’d always been May. The only person who called her Shelby was me.

  I’d been so determined to prove myself to an unworthy father, to earn his love and loyalty, that I’d clung to his lies. To his names for us. Even Mom had no trouble calling us May and June.

  It was me who’d kept that tie to the past.

  “May.” Her name was May. “I’m sorry for calling you Shelby.”

  She shrugged. “It’s okay.”

  “No, it’s not. You don’t like it.”

  “Not especially.”

  “I don’t like the name June,” I admitted.

  She laughed. “Then change it.”

  “Nova feels like Dad’s. It feels like the lie. But . . .”

  “Nova belongs to you.” She squeezed my hand. “It always has. I was never Shelby. It was never who I wanted to be. But you’re Nova, not because of him, but because it’s who you are.”

  “Would that be weird to change my name?” How would I explain that to my coworkers? Or anyone, really? “Jack’s going to think I’m crazy.”

  She gave me a soft look. A knowing look. And the realization hit.

  “He knows,” I breathed.

  All these years I’d thought Jack didn’t know about our father or our childhood. But he knew.

  “Of course he knows.” She nodded. “You give your truths to the man you love.”

  Jack knew about us. About our family. He’d always known. He called her May because that’s what she wanted to be called, not because her identity was a secret. Because she’d given him her absolute trust.

  “God, I screwed up with Emmett.”

  “Have you spoken to him?”

  “No.” What else was there to say? He’d made himself clear at the prison. I was a liar, and he didn’t trust me. And I didn’t blame him in the slightest.

  “What are you going to do?” May asked.

  “What is there to do?”

  “You love him.”

  “I love him.”

  She shifted, leaning close to kiss my cheek. Then she got off the couch and picked up her son from the floor. “Should we go get dressed, buddy?”

  He rambled something in his two-year-old speak to her as they started upstairs for his bedroom.

  My coffee mug was empty. The snow had stopped falling outside and the sun was shining bright, the white nearly blinding. There was the slow drip coming from the gutters, the flakes already beginning to melt. As expected, it wouldn’t last long and the roads were probably already plowed and clear.

  I picked up my phone from the end table and shot off an email to my boss that was hours too late, explaining I wasn’t feeling myself and wouldn’t be in the office today. Then I climbed off the couch and hurried to the guest bedroom, stripping off my borrowed clothes for the outfit I’d been wearing when I’d come over on Friday night.

  When my sister and Christian came downstairs, she didn’t seem at all surprised to see me pulling on my coat with my car keys in hand.

  “Drive safely.” She smiled.

  I pressed a shaking hand to my heart. “This is probably stupid.”

  “Probably.”

  “He’ll probably slam the door in my face.”

  “But he might not.”

  He might not.

  I hugged my sister goodbye and kissed my nephew, then drove home for a quick shower and change of clothes before getting on the interstate.

  No trip had ever taken so long. The road stretched on endlessly and the miles passed at a glacial pace, even though I broke every speed limit. But finally, hours later, a familiar green sign welcomed me to Clifton Forge.

  Driving through town again was like seeing it with a different pair of eyes. This had been enemy territory for so long that I hadn’t really let myself appreciate it. I wanted to go to the diner downtown and sit at one of their booths instead of picking up takeout. I wanted to swing into the coffee shop for a latte and scone. I wanted to wander along Central and show my face to this community.

  So far, I’d only viewed this town as a temporary guest. As an infiltrator. Now, I simply wanted to belong.

  If Emmett would have me.

  He was probably at work, which meant,
unless I wanted to wait all day, I’d have to find him there. So I made my way along the familiar route toward the garage.

  How could I drive into the lot? How did I show my face to his friends and coworkers? How could I look at the rubble that was the former clubhouse?

  But I kept driving, swallowing my fear.

  The storm had come to Clifton Forge today too, but in the warm early-afternoon sun, the roads were only wet. Patches of brown grass were already poking through the melting snowbanks.

  The Clifton Forge Garage came into view and my heart pounded so hard I felt it in my fingertips. I gripped the steering wheel tighter and eased the Nova into the parking lot.

  The steel building was bright beneath the afternoon sun. The bay doors were open and as I parked, the sound of an air compressor hummed in the background.

  Shit. What was I doing here? I should have waited but it was too late now. I’d have to face them eventually, right? I took one last fortifying breath, mentally bracing for the censure I most certainly deserved.

  Don’t look at the clubhouse. Don’t look at the clubhouse. I didn’t need to see its ruins, not today. It was bad enough that as I shoved my door open, I could scent the lingering smell of fire and ash on the breeze.

  My heels had barely landed on the pavement when Leo came striding out of the garage. He had a red rag in one hand and a wrench in the other. There was no confusion on his handsome face, just cold scrutiny. He might not have met me before, but he knew exactly who I was.

  I steeled my spine as he approached. Here goes.

  Leo stopped before me and crossed his arms over his chest, the colorful tattoos on his forearms peeking out from beneath the long sleeves he’d shoved up to his elbows.

  “Hi.” By some miracle, my voice didn’t crack. “Is Emmett here?”

  He studied me, his pale gray-green eyes giving nothing away.

  Another pair of footsteps sounded behind him. Dash Slater walked my way. His face was impassive and his gaze as hard as the ground beneath my feet.

  Dash came to stand beside Leo, matching his stance with his legs planted wide and arms crossed over his chest.

  A blockade. A barrier. There was no way I’d get to Emmett unless they deemed me worthy to pass.