Total pages in book: 180
Estimated words: 176012 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 880(@200wpm)___ 704(@250wpm)___ 587(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 176012 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 880(@200wpm)___ 704(@250wpm)___ 587(@300wpm)
Reeves had him thinking he was trapped.
“My mood was hurting my mother,” he continued. “I didn’t deserve to be around Quinn. What if the web got bigger? What if I made another serious mistake?” His eyes redden. “I didn’t trust myself anymore.”
And I didn’t know what to say. That feeling is easy to muster when you’re young. You haven’t made enough mistakes to know there will be a hundred more before your life is over.
“That’s why you wanted to leave the moment you got here,” I say, my voice gravelly.
He nods slowly. “The new leadership at Green Street wanted me gone. They believed a founding member with a deed to the property threatened them.”
He was supposed to be on the plane back to Dubai over a week ago.
I don’t blink. “And Quinn was why you stayed.”
He can’t stop the smile that starts to form as he drops his eyes to the floor. “I just wanted to protect her at first,” he tells me. “Noah Van der Berg and Farrow Kelly were pissing me off.” He laughs a little. “I remembered how good it was to have her around. And I wasn’t about to leave her alone to make all the mistakes she was begging to.” He raises his eyes to me. “But the way she looks at the world, Madoc… I was...”
His chin trembles, and I have a lot to unpack right now. Not only his future but hers.
But there’s one thing he doesn’t have to say out loud. He’s in love with her.
“And if you go to jail?” I press. “You covered up a crime. You own a building used for mob business.”
I know he handled the arrangements to have the body buried once the police are done, and something happened with Hugo Navarre. The cops got word that his own people ran him out of town this evening. He could be back, but he’s gone now. Was that Lucas’s doing?
Between that and what Kade told us, Lucas has been getting everything taken care of in case he had to go away.
But his tone is soft and calm. “I love her, and I told her. And now, I just want you to be proud of me again, even if it takes fifty years.”
My eyes burn, and I drop my gaze, not sure how to respond. How could he think I wouldn’t be proud of him?
But even as I think it, the disappointment of hearing him with Quinn at her house earlier—and then seeing them together—still lingers. I knew all the years I helped raise him that he was a good man, but that threw me.
We would’ve handled Drew Reeves together. Quinn, though…
God, I love him, but he hid from me for years. Is he going to leave again? Does he really love her, or is she an anchor?
“Drew Reeves is around,” he tells me. “You need Hawke and Jax to be monitoring cameras. In Weston, as well.” He hesitates, then levels me with a calm stare. “Quinn won’t leave her house, but my phone is linked to the cameras installed around her property. The cops have my cell. The code is 1793.”
I swallow hard, realization dawning that a lot has been going on that I didn’t know about. He put cameras up outside her new house? I wouldn’t have thought of that. I need to get his phone back.
“I’ve already contacted a lawyer,” he says. “They’re on their way.”
Quinn
Lucas seemed so calm. In handcuffs and more relaxed than he’s been since he’s been home. I guess there’s relief in it all being over. No more secrets. No more dread over whether people will find out.
But what happens next has opened a new level of worry.
Everyone stands in my living room, watching me pace across the decrepit foyer. I look at my phone again.
It’s only been an hour since he was arrested and all the cops took their bright lights out of our neighborhood and back to the Falls. But it feels like it’s been a year. Why isn’t someone calling me? Tate, Juliet, Fallon, Jax, Jared, and Madoc are all at the station, I’m sure.
I refused to go back to the Falls like my brothers wanted. After the way they just treated Lucas and me, it felt important to stand my ground. But Madoc did make all their kids stay with me. Farrow, Mace, and Codi hang close too.
I wish they’d all go. They’re eyeing me like I’m a timebomb. I’m not dangerous.
But I can’t just wait here. I check my phone again. No texts. No calls.
I glance at the time, noting it’s after ten.
“Who the hell turned him in?” Dylan asks the room.
A few gazes shift to Farrow, to which he cocks an eyebrow. “It wasn’t me,” he blurts out.
Aro says, “You’re not as innocent as you would like them to think.”