He continued. “I loved my sister the most of anybody or anything in the world. When you two got married, I was happy for both of you. She seemed to even you out and you gave her what she always wanted—absolute adoration and a constant project to work, namely your life. She got herself killed because she could never leave well enough alone. She had to open her mouth when repeatedly warned to not do so, from not just you but me. And Warden, Trace, and Kade, too. Alyssa would be alive today if she’d behaved.”
Derrick didn’t answer right away. “In no world is it okay to victim shame her. She’s dead. It wasn’t like she risked our exposure. She spoke to other Alliance members. Not anyone on the outside. It wasn’t a death warrant. They did it to punish me.”
“No, they did it to punish me.” Judson spoke through gritted teeth. “And you’ve never been willing to see that. Stop blaming yourself. Obsess over Everly if that makes you feel better until you lose attention. Whatever it takes, Derrick. Your refusing to kill a mid-level banker who stumbled on the wrong accounts and didn’t understand what he’d looked at is not why Alyssa isn’t here today. It was always about my family. The leadership role. The fact that I told her in the first place. Her death was a fuck you to me. You just got to suffer in it.”
I hated to make this all about me, but as I listened to them go back and forth about which one of them was more to blame, it dawned on me, that through no fault of my own, I was in the same position Alyssa had been. I knew about The Alliance. More dread settled in my stomach. At this rate I was going to throw up before we landed.
My head pounded. Derrick placed his nose on top of my head before he planted a kiss there. It was the first time he’d done that. “Are you okay?” His voice was low.
I shook my head. “No. Is it safe to go back into the bathroom? I think I might… I’m not feeling well.”
He was on his feet fast before he held out his hand. “I’ll walk you there.”
“Everly,” Judson spoke my name in a calm, slow manner. “You’re very strong. This won’t break you. We’re landing soon. Take some deep breaths. You’re fine.”
Derrick put his hands on his hips. “If she says she doesn’t feel well, you telling her that she’s fine won’t fix it.”
“Actually, it might, since I’m pretty sure she’s just stressed out from us talking about my sister’s death and you killing people.”
They could fight about this all they wanted. I undid my seatbelt and did make it to the bathroom before I lost the contents of my Bloody Mary filled stomach. How long ago had that been? It had been a long time since I puked because of stress, but I’d been that way for most of my childhood. If things got really bad—if I made my father truly mad, if I failed a test I studied for, if some mean girl made fun of what I wore when I was twelve which seemed like the end of the world—I threw up. Now, it only took talk about murderers and murdering to do it to me.
A knock sounded behind me. Derrick’s voice was soothing through the door. “Need anything?”
“A stronger stomach.”
Since I wasn’t likely to get that, I supposed for the moment I was fine.
Thanks to the time changes, it was dinnertime when we landed in Seattle. I’d spent the rest of the flight with my eyes closed, pretending I was on the ground. That had worked pretty well, particularly when it stopped bumping.
Derrick and Judson hustled me into a black car, and we’d taken off to who knew where. I still didn’t feel well, and it was better that I was just a little bit out of it. We weren’t at a hotel but a large house that seemed to be surrounded by cars that looked very similar to our own. Was this the black car brigade?
I followed them inside the house, men I didn’t recognize grabbing my bags and circling round the outside of the house when we went in.
A burst of heat hit me when I walked through the door, the vent clearly right above the entranceway.
“Damn, did you break her? How long was she with you, Judson? Two days? Everly, you don’t look so hot.” Kade strode toward me as two other people rose from where they sat by the window. Trace and Warden.
I gulped. No, I wasn’t okay, but I was back with the five of them for the first time since we’d left Vermont. I hadn’t given that a thought in the midst of this mess. With me were five guys who had come to mean a huge bit more than they should have.
And I had no idea what any of it meant.
Chapter 24
I looked around the room, cognizant that I had all of their attention on me at the same time. Derrick put his hand on the small of my back. “She’s not feeling really well. It got bumpy up there in the air.”
“And we were having kind of an upsetting conversation that probably made that worse.” Judson walked past me into the living room. “Everything fine here?”
Two more faces I recognized scurried out of the kitchen to greet Judson, one of them signing as he did. Constance and Marco, Judson’s staff from the house in Vermont. Apparently, they worked for him here, too.
Trace pointed toward them. “They had this all opened up when I got here. Amazingly efficient considering they traveled to get here in the same amount of time we did.”
“They only had to come from Los Angeles, not across the country. Although I guess Warden was in San Diego.”
Warden shrugged. “I didn’t hustle. I knew how long it would take all of you to get here.”
Marco signed hello to Judson who answered him. They talked about the bedrooms and his concern that one of the water heaters might be getting ready to break. Judson asked him to hold off calling a plumber for two days unless it was an emergency. I glanced away.
“Hi.” I was basically speaking to the room. So far I’d been doing a pretty good impression of a statue. A just puked on the plane statue.
Trace walked over to me, standing right in front of me and next to Kade. “Hello. You really do look like you’ve seen better days.” He placed a hand on my forehead. “You’re not hot. Just a little airsick, huh?”
I nodded. “Guess so.”
He really was so handsome. I hadn’t forgotten it in the time away from him, but here he was looking just as delicious as he had on the beach while I, apparently, looked like death warmed over. Warden rose from the couch. He approached me as well. With the exception of Jud, they were all around me. It should have been hard to breathe. I should have been begging for space. But the twisted part of me loved it. There was… power in all of them liking me.
“Are you up for a conversation or do you need to go take a nap?” Kade asked me, drawing my attention back to him.
I ran a hand through my hair. “What kind of conversation?”
“Of the serious variety.” He motioned toward the couch. “Sit. One of us will get you some coffee.”
Judson left the room just as I moved toward the aforementioned couch, which was black leather and reminded me of the one we’d had until I was fifteen years old. Then my father had replaced it without warning. It had surprised me at the time since he didn’t like to spend undue money, but he’d said it had never been his style.
He’d killed my mother. Maybe looking at the sofa had reminded him of her. I sat down just as Jud came back in carrying a yogurt and a coffee. He placed it down on the coffee table in front of me. “No coffee ’till you eat this. Way too much caffeine and alcohol today and not enough food. It couldn’t have helped.”
I actually was pretty sure I’d eaten quite a lot. “If I consumed any more food I’d explode.”
He shook his head. “You lost everything you ate. So that counts as no food. Don’t argue. Just eat.”
I took the spoon he’d put on the tray and took a bite of the yogurt. Constance and Marco weren’t anywhere I could see, which meant they’d gone off somewhere. It was just me, and the Alliance men. Just like the beginning of my kidnapping.
They all sat. It was Kade who spoke. That wasn’t surprising. It was always Kade who spoke first in the group meetings. Kade who had come to my room to get me after I’d t
hrown up the last time. That was twice now I’d ended up puking around these guys. It was maybe more than I’d thrown up around anyone, ever, other than my nannies and my father.
“I’ve spoken to your father. He’s here in Seattle. We can turn you back over to him.”
I swallowed. So that was that. Judson and Derrick had indicated they might like me to stay somehow, but it looked like I was leaving. Lots of amazing memories that I could never share with anyone. “Okay.”
I really wasn’t being particularly articulate about this. Was I supposed to be thanking them for the time or something? I’d had maybe the nicest kidnapping ever but that didn’t change that our relationship had been screwed up from the beginning.
What was the protocol here?
“Or.” Kade leaned forward. “We all texted on the plane. You stay with us. We all like you. I think it’s clear you like all of us, or at least we’re all starting to feel that way. Maybe more than like each other. Not one of us was ever going to have a normal relationship and now that you know about The Alliance, I’m not sure you can. I mean, how would you ever date someone and not wonder if it was a set up?”
Well… shit. I hadn’t really focused on that but now that he said it, of course he was right.
“You’re not going to throw up right, Everly?” Warden ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t really do puke all that well.”
I shook my head. “I’m not going to puke. How would I stay with you exactly?”
Kade nodded. “You’d stay with us. You’d sort of transfer around. Like you’ve been doing but larger stretches of time. Then when we all came together for things like this you’d be with all of us at this time, too.”
Were they kidding? I looked around at each of their faces and they absolutely were not. If I had something to throw I would have done so. “You guys think that I am just going to follow you around for the next however long doing nothing with myself but spending time with you?”
Kade and Trace looked at each other before Trace answered. “You wouldn’t have to do nothing with yourself. I’d be happy to give you projects like I did in Vermont.”
I could have strangled him. “I had a life before you all interfered in it. I was getting a degree. I had plans. I was going to help people, specifically children.”
“Yes, we knew that from your file.” Trace shook his head. “Obviously, that can’t happen in this scenario.”
“Well it could,” Derrick jumped on the talking train. “She could live with me permanently and visit you all she wants.”
Trace groaned. “I don’t think there are all that many kids she could help in that ranch of yours in Montana in the middle of nowhere without anyone around for fifty miles. Besides, I hate to think of her standing in the snow when you get bored of her and want her gone in the middle of the night.”
Derrick held up two fingers. “That happened twice. Just twice.”
Okay, I was done. I got up from the couch. “Look, I like all of you, for some reason I can’t fathom. I’ve had sex with three of you.” I threw that out there just in case anyone didn’t know. “And I would with the other two of you should the situation present itself.” I was not going to be left in the snow at Derrick’s house in Montana. We’d find some other place now that I had some self-determination back. That was not the point. I had to keep my brain on track.
“Everly.” Trace said my name in that low voice of his and it was everything I could do not to just melt into the ground. I was not going to be distracted. “Don’t you want to stay around? Don’t you want to be with us? We kind of think that you do. Sure, this has not been the most typical introduction and whatever this would be between us would be off the charts different, but do you really want to go back to the way you were living before? Can you?”
Judson held up his hand. “Gentlemen, I think we’ve given our Everly a lot to think about. We clearly have strong feelings for you. But we have the most important issue in our lives to deal with right now so you need to go to your room.”
He was sending me to my room? “I thought I wasn’t your prisoner anymore.”
“You’re not. But you’re not welcome to this conversation either. So you don’t have to go to your room. You can take a walk. Go get some food. Have a run. Go the movies. A bar. Anything you want. But you can’t stay here in this living room.”
Well, that had sufficiently dismissed me. Truth was, I had no money or cell phone. I didn’t know anyone in Seattle, and much as I would adore having a tour I probably couldn’t do that tonight. After the long flight, I could probably use a shower and a good night’s sleep. My stomach would be better in the morning.
I hoped.
I didn’t know where my room was. “Which room is mine?”
“Third room down on the left, next to mine,” Trace answered.
“And mine,” Warden responded right after.
Well, that answered that. I took the long hallway I’d seen when I first entered the house and walked into what had to be my bedroom. Clearly, Constance had done what she’d managed back in Vermont and in the time I’d been having that uncomfortable conversation. I looked around. The room was neat and clean, as all of Judson’s houses had been so far. Some people collected toy cars. Jud collected real estate. I didn’t even know where I was in Seattle.
I’d ask him in the morning.
I closed the door behind me. We’d gone back to his home in Boston and packed so I had what I needed and for the first time in a long time had no clothing emergency laid out in front of me. I rubbed the back of my neck.
They wanted me to just bounce around visiting each of them in their day jobs while they lived life and I just… did what? Fucked them? No, I wasn’t a roaming spread my legs service. This wasn’t going to go like that. I didn’t know exactly how it was going to go but not like that.
A knock sounded, and I opened the door. Constance stood there, holding towels. She pretty much pushed her way through the door and shut it behind her.
“What are you doing?” She spoke in hushed tones.
“I’m standing here.” That couldn’t be what she was asking me, but it was the only thing I could think to say right at that second. It was what I was doing.
Constance shoved the towels down on the bed. “I never in a million years thought I’d have to tell you not to consider staying with these men. They’re bad men.”
My mouth fell open. She seemed to really like them. Certainly, she had a fondness for Judson. Or at least that was the impression I’d gotten in Vermont. “I think… I think they’re complicated.”
“Oh don’t do that thing women do. Trust me, they’re bad men. I’ve worked for Judson’s family since I was a young woman. It never works out for the girls who come and go. His mother was a shell of a person and you know what happened to his sister. Oh sure, individually they seem fine, but they are part of an organization that does those things. I loved Alyssa. I held her the day she came home from the hospital. She was bright with light. That’s what this is. I’ll stay as long as I can help Judson. I promised myself I would. But you need to turn on your heels and run like hell.”
I couldn’t breathe. Having delivered that speech, she walked right out, leaving the towels. I sunk down onto the bed. My mind divided into two. Part of me wanted to do just what she said, get up and run. Constance had watched things I’d never seen. She knew Alyssa and mourned her. The woman knew firsthand just how dangerous a situation this was. The other part of me insisted on doing something that made the first part of me feel nuts.
I doubted her.
This was a woman giving another woman a piece of advice, and I knew even as I sat there that my foolish brain was going to insist that I knew better than she did. I’d spent alone time with all of them. Maybe she didn’t understand the small things that made them the way they were, the layers that had to be peeled to discover the men underneath.
I groaned. Yeah… I pretty much hated this side of myself.
I couldn’t go an
ywhere. My dad was coming tomorrow, and I needed to settle things with him at the very least. I had nowhere to particularly go. I had to figure out my life. For now, I had a bed to sleep in and time to talk myself out of being a dipshit.
The sound of cars outside screeched as they took off. It had to be more than just my guys leaving. I crawled over to the window to look. The whole crowd of people circling the house seemed to be leaving. Doors slammed in the house and a knock sounded on my door.
I jumped up from where I crouched by the window to answer it. Derrick stood out there. He’d changed into a suit, which looked funny on him. His hair was slicked back so that in the bun he still looked more dignified than I’d ever imagined him.
“We’re going. The meeting is happening. Right now.” He touched the side of my face. “You’re really beautiful. I just wanted to tell you that.”
Trace whistled down the hall. “Romeo, don’t make it harder, come on.”
Derrick stepped back. “Get some sleep, Everly. You’re going to need it.”
“What does that mean?”
He didn’t answer me.
I stood there watching them all leave. The others didn’t turn to look at me, not even Kade, which seemed really off. But then again this was the meeting of their lives and they had more to think about than me. Apparently, the whole fate of the world fell to this. I was probably not a blip in their minds, and if I was to stay with them I’d have to get used to that. Whoever was with these guys was always going to be second in their minds.
Not to mention they were all eventually going to want wives and to carry on this Alliance nonsense with their children. What would happen to me then?
I closed the door, changed into the pajamas I’d worn in Boston, and crawled into bed. There had been a time in my life when I’d not been able to sleep in strange beds. No more. Boy had I gotten good at falling asleep wherever I was.
Hard Truths (Kiss Her Goodbye Book 1) Page 26
