Page 105 of Wreck Me

Skylar Bennett.

That was one of the reasons we’d approached her to begin with.

The other she wasn’t quite ready to be confronted with yet.

Not until she was fully-immersed with us.

After the destabilization that had happened with Damien, we needed somebody who possessed tactical know-how, who knew how to blend into the shadows. And she fit the bill with her Onyx persona.

She would be Justice.

At first Cas had something else in mind for her, but I’d told him all about the goodness in her, that she’d done all of that for the right reasons and had just gotten lost along the way. But with my therapy meets with her, I’d managed to get her to a better place with it all.

So he’d dropped the whole wrecking her approach now.

Although he hadn’t spoken to it, I had a feeling that some of that was also due to Bastian’s affinity for her. He knew he’d be hurt if Cas went after her like that.

And, like I’d assured him, it wasn’t necessary.

We didn’t need to manipulate or force her into it, she was it, and she’d be an incredible asset to The Jackals, and just the balance that we needed.

There was one of those fancy-ass events coming up that I hated that would have a bunch of the elite business leaders in the city getting together for an evening of schmoozing and cocktails, where our parents would be there, Cas would too, and so would Bastian and I. Even Skylar. That was where Cas was going to approach her and officially recruit her to our cause.

Until then, all I could do was wait and try to keep my mind elsewhere.

Attending Luxe wasn’t really helping, though. After being immersed in the innerworkings of King with Cas, my Business Management degree program was a breeze for me. And it wasn’t teaching me anything I didn’t already know. It wasn’t a challenge.

It wasn’t fucking right for me.

It had just been Caspian’s way of taming me and calming me down.

But it wasn’t working.

“Fuck,” I muttered.

I’d been re-thinking the whole thing, looking into getting out there in the world and starting up my own venture using my experience and know-how. It was what that meeting I’d taken the other day had been about, my first step toward all of that.

I doubted that would go over well with Cas and with the way things were right now for him, I couldn’t make these moves known to him yet. It would put undue stress and worry on him when he was already bearing a lot on his shoulders. Besides, I’d rather have things concrete before I told him about it.

I shoved a hand through my hair as I stepped out of my bathroom, dispelling the extra moisture, then secured my towel around my hips. I’d needed a soothing shower to calm myself after the text message I’d gotten earlier today. I’d been able to meditate in there a lot deeper than I normally would, to recenter myself.

I should’ve been prepared and I thought I had been, but expecting something and having it happen were two very different things. With the big tycoon event coming up, I’d figured they’d reach out—or that one of them would. And I’d also known it wouldn’t be pretty. It wasn’t even so much the content, it was the pure act of them making contact again after months of nothing—the way I liked it. It was always jarring and it always pulled me right back to seven years ago when everything had gone to hell for the Rowland family.

When we’d lost Hayley.

We hadn’t come together in our grief. It had torn us apart instead.

Hayley had been the bright spark, the hope of the family. While I’d always been searching and floundering, exploring, she’d been steadfast and determined. She’d been following in my parents’ footsteps and she’d been slated to take over the hotel business.

When she’d died, in a fit of grief and anger, my dad had told me that the wrong child had died, that it should’ve been me. He’d never apologized for it and my mom had defended him.

My relationship with Cas had also been an issue for them and their bigoted views.

Basically, everything I was, they hated and were disgusted by.

Fortunately, I’d moved into King Manor pretty soon after that.

But every now and then I had to fake it and keep up appearances with them. It was a condition for my trust fund continuing to be accessible to me.

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