Page 106 of The Moment They Can't Forget

Zoe nodded. She had convinced herself there could be nothing between her and JD, but she’d been wrong if the pain inside her was any indicator.

“And isn’t it just plain sad you felt like you had to hide because your brothers are brainless?” Birdie said.

“Hey,” her man said. “We have a pact.”

“If you mention that pact again, I’m sleeping in the spare room. You are all too protective of her, and it stops now. Zoe should be able to live her life as she chooses and not hide it. You’ve done this to her, Sawyer, and the rest of you,” Birdie said, looking at the brothers. “She’s your baby sister, and the strongest woman I know. She lived in Chicago for a few years and survived. You need to back off and let her be. Let her make her own mistakes.”

“They should have told me,” Sawyer muttered.

“And what would you have said?” Zoe demanded.

Sawyer sighed, then raked a hand through his hair—his go-to when he was trying to work out what to say.

“Damn it, Sawyer, I have been hiding stuff from you and the others for years. Birdie’s right. I need to stop, but I don’t want you coming at me.”

“What things?” Brody and Sawyer said at the same time.

“Many things, and most you wouldn’t like. Things I tried and shouldn’t have but survived. Trouble I got into. I could go on but won’t.” Her brothers looked shocked. “After one of you stopped flying to Chicago each month to check on me, I could breathe. I stopped rushing around experiencing things like a crazy person because none of you were watching me, and I started to just live and enjoy the freedom.”

Her brothers looked pretty stunned by that revelation.

“I’m sorry if that hurts you, but it’s probably something I should have said years ago. I don’t want you and JD to stop being friends, Sawyer. He needs you,” Zoe added. “He doesn’t let people close, but he lets you.”

Her brother’s jaw clenched.

“Sawyer, what you and I did was no different. The hiding, you visiting me at night?—”

“That was different, Birdie!”

“How? Ryder is my friend. The pact didn’t seem to concern you then.”

“You weren’t Ryder’s best friend, which the pact was made for,” Sawyer defended.

“But we didn’t tell him, and you know he wouldn’t have been happy, because at the time, you weren’t the settle down type either.”

Birdie’s words hung in the air as her man let them penetrate his thick head.

“You have this irrational mindset with your siblings, Sawyer,” Uncle Asher said. “I love them too, but they have to make their own decisions.”

Sawyer looked into his mug.

“So, my sweet niece, do you care about JD Hopper?” Uncle Asher said.

“I don’t know,” she said. “But I think maybe I do.”

“Well, I’ll tell you something.” He eyed his nephew. “I would rather she was with a man I trusted and respected than one I didn’t.”

Sawyer’s answer to that was to put his head in his hands and sigh again.

Chapter29

JD went to his house, washed, and changed. After forcing some food down his throat because he knew he should, he then sat and thought about what his next step should be. Sawyer was a hardhead. He would need time to cool down, if he ever did.

He hated feeling hopeless. JD liked action, but he knew that storming around to the Dukes wouldn’t solve anything. They could be a volatile lot! He had to hope that, given time, his friend would calm down. But in the meantime, the one thing he could do was help Vi, and he was doing that today.

Climbing into his car two hours later, like an eighty-year-old because his body was now seriously sore, he headed to the Dukes’ timber yard. Hopefully, none of them were there considering what had just gone down. He knew they usually circled the wagons when there was trouble, and he was counting on them all being holed up in one of their houses, talking about what had happened.

JD wondered if anyone would take his side and thought maybe Birdie? Possibly Ally, but as for the rest, he couldn’t be sure.

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