Page 22 of Risk
I swivel and stare at him, not phasing him in the least. “You’re not helping things, Conan.”
“That’s not my job, Kenna. My job,” he says, pointing at his embroidered VP patch, “is to keep my family safe and alive. That family, in case you’ve forgotten, includes you.”
“That stopped a long time ago, Conan,” I whisper, tears now trailing down my cheeks. “You all abandoned me and sent me away like I was nothing more than a nuisance. You chose sides, as you should have because Risk is your brother, I’m not denying that, but it still hurts. I’m a realist and know that your loyalty is not to me. I’m not asking anything from you, any of you. Please just go. Keep living your lives and forget I even exist, you’re all good at doing that.”
“That’s a low blow, McKenna,” Conan barks. “You two couldn’t even be in the same room as one another without y’all fist fighting. We did what we thought was best by giving y’all some space from each other. We never stopped caring about you, sister, we simply were giving you a time out.”
“Fuck this, I’m done,” Kodiak mumbles. “Regulator, Rev, pack her shit, and the little menace’s too. We’re getting out of here and taking them back toourturf where we will be getting answers.”
“Dammit. Y’all aren’t listening to me!”
“Because everything coming out of your mouth is pure shit,” Risk grumbles. “You aren’t pushing us away, the sooner you realize that the sooner we can get shit taken care of.”
When I go to argue, a hand cups over my mouth. “No more, darlin’,” Conan insists. “This has been decided. You can come willingly, or we’ll force your hand. Decision time is over. Pack your bags, Kenna, or we’re going to do it for you.”
My eyes widen when I realize that if they go through my things, I’ll be exposed. There’s no changing their minds on this and if I don’t comply, they’ll discover things about me I never want them to know.
“Okay, I’ll pack,” I say, surrendering.
CHAPTER
FIFTEEN
Risk
As I sitin the living room, I ask my brothers, “Was that too easy? I thought she’d give us more of a fight.”
“Yeah, she gave in too quickly. I expected more of her mouthing off before she gave in and followed instructions. Did you see the way her eyes widened when she realized we weren’t messing around and would pack up her shit on her behalf?” Conan questions.
“She’s hiding something, and whatever that is, it’s big,” I acknowledge.
“We’ll get to the bottom of it, eventually,” Kodiak presumes.
“I can do some investigating while she’s gathering her shit,” Regulator offers. “Might as well, so I have something to do while she’s in the other room seeing as she kicked us out and won’t let us do jack shit.”
“I’ll help,” Midas volunteers. “I don’t think she’s going to be an open book with us.”
“You’re right about that,” I offer up. “Did you see the way she yanked that woman into the room with her? They were whispering with their heads together as they ushered us out of the bedroom.”
“Something ain’t right,” Conan mumbles. “What is she protecting? Doesn’t she know that we’ll never judge her, especially if she’s an unwilling participant?”
“I don’t think she has figured out we know more than the simple fact that she’s in some sort of trouble,” I state.
“It’s not like she gave us the chance to tell her we do,” Kodiak imparts. “But she’s scared of something, and if she’s not going to tell us what that is, we need to find out what it is ourselves.”
Normally, I wouldn’t encourage them to pry on my old lady and invade her privacy, but it’s crucial we know the facts—all of them. Wehaveto know so we aren’t blinded by the truth when it comes out. Because it will, there’s only so far you can bury shit before it gets dug up. “Do it,” I say. “I have a bad feeling about this shit and if she’s going to try and pacify us with half-truths, a lot of people are going to end up getting stuck in the crossfire.”
“You all realize that we’ll most likely end up at war, right?” Kodiak presumes.
“I’d walk through the gates of hell and take on Lucifer himself if that’s what I had to do to keep her alive,” I avow. “I already destroyed her once; I gave up on her and I won’t be doing that again. Because of what I did, she didn’t have anyone to go to and ended up doing shit that she shouldn’t have had to do. That’s on me.”
“That’s on us,” Conan opposes. “We all let her down when we didn’t stay in touch with her after we sent her away on a Greyhound to her mom.”
“A mom we never met. Are we sure she even exists?” Midas inquires.
“I don’t think she’d lie to me about that,” I contend. “Don’t get me wrong, they weren’t close by any stretch of the imagination, and she never reached out to her, not even after we got married, but I never questioned the reason why she chose to go back to a woman who meant so little to her.” I recline back in the seat and toss my head back, closing my eyes in self-contempt. “What the fuck was I thinking?”
“That things were getting toxic, for all of us,” Regulator reminds me. “We all thought it was the best solution at the time. How did we know that it was the worst decision we could’ve made for her?”
