Page 21 of Savage Hearts

It was fucking ironic that I should care about this, considering what we were doing to her. We could spin it however we wanted, hiding behind the reason of Silas’ newest obsession, but there was still something wrong with the way we were treating her… keeping her.

Killian made a low, noncommittal sound in the back of his throat. “Should have, would have, could have. Hindsight is fucking twenty-twenty,” he commented, his voice gruff.

One of my eyebrows rose at the double meaning in his words. I steepled my hands together and rested my chin on top of them, looking up at him.

“You think I’m making a mistake, letting Silas keep his obsession.”

He scoffed. “I’m sure it’s not only Silas’ obsession anymore.”

“I didn’t hear you protest much back in New Orleans.”

“Would it have made a difference?”

I shrugged. We both knew it wouldn’t have.

“Not every woman we interact with will be a carbon copy of Lilliana. You know that, don’t you?”

He scoffed. “Then you’re stupid. Lucky for you and Silas, I won’t fucking fall for that shit. I’ll protect us.”

“What shit?”

“That fucking innocent act she’s got going.”

I didn’t answer him. I didn’t think it was an act.

“We’re the ones who took her, not the other way around,” I reasoned. We were the monsters in this story, not doe-eyed Mila Hayes.

“And it won’t be long before she figures out why and uses that against us. Honestly, I thought you were better than this. It’s not like you to be led around by your dick.”

“Careful, little brother. I’m still the head of this family,” I said quietly.

He shook his head but smartly didn’t respond.

We might be pretty evenly matched physically, but I could still kick my little brother’s ass if needed.

Both brothers.

His shoulders sagged, and he looked away. My heart pinched at the sight. It had been a while since Killian looked like he needed me, and all I could think about was the teenage boy who’d looked at me in horror and self-loathing when he realized it was his mistake that caused us to leave the mob.

I never blamed him for it, and Silas didn’t either.

But Killian blamed himself, and sometimes, I thought that was even worse.

What he didn’t understand was that, even at the worst moments of my life, even when I felt lost, unsure of how I was going to keep them safe, a small part of me was happy for the attack.

I hated that we had to leave the organization—thefamily—behind, leave our family legacy, the very one I had trained my whole life to take over one day, but I was fucking happy to take my brothers away from our abusive shithead father.

I was happy Hayes had killed him.

Just as I knew Mila wasn’t all that brokenhearted that her old man was dead. And perhaps that was why I couldn’t kill her. Because underneath the façade she wore, she still looked like me at sixteen.

“I’m gonna go back to the company,” Killian muttered after I hadn’t spoken for a long moment. He turned around and walked out of there before I could say anything more.

The company was a corporate building owned by the Irish mob. It was a front that housed the more legitimate side of our businesses.

But it hid some of the most hideous secrets of the world.

It was where my brothers and I spent most of our time, but lately, I hadn’t wanted to hole away in there all that long.

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