Page 80 of From the Ashes

“No.”

“Crew.” I drop into one of the chairs across from him. “You need to sleep.”

“I don’t have time,” he says without looking up at me.

“Yes, you do. Nothing is going to fall apart while you get a few hours of shut-eye. So why don’t you tell me why you actually snuck out of Kovu’s room like a naughty teenager?”

He sighs and tears his gaze off the screen, but he doesn’t look at me. Instead. his eyes fall shut, and he rests his head back against his chair. “Caleb was right.”

“I doubt it, but go on.” Nothing my uncle said was anything other than complete bullshit, but if it has Crew tied up in knots, it’s better we talk about it than let him wallow in self-pity, which appears to be what he’s doing.

“I can’t be with Camilla in the long term. I’m too old for her. She has her whole life ahead of her, and I’ll be holding her back.”

I roll my eyes and scoff. “That’s what has your boxers in a twist? That you think you’re too old for the woman you’ve already fucked and fallen for? Don’t you think it’s a little late for this revelation?”

His eyes pop open, and he glares at me across the desk. “Of course it’s not the first time I’ve thought about it. But he’s right. I don’t know if I want another kid, and she needs one to be her heir. Plus, how’s it going to look at parent-teacher conferences when I’m twice their mother’s age?”

A laugh escapes my throat at the idea of Crew ever going to something as normal and mundane as a parent-teacher conference, but it just earns me another glare. “You’re being ridiculous, I hope you know that. If you don’t want any more kids, that’s fine. The rest of us would be more than happy to knock her up as many times as she wants, and you can be as involved or not involved with their lives as you want to be, but that doesn’t mean you can’t be with her. That doesn’t mean you can’t still love Camilla the same way you did before you had this epiphany.”

“I don’t?—”

“Yes, you do.” I cut him off. “You absolutely love her. We all do. It’s clear as fucking day to everyone because that’s the only reason Caleb would use her against us.”

Crew opens his mouth to argue, but I cut him off again. It’s rare he lets me get away with something like this, so I’m going to make the most of it while I can.

“What we have with Camilla is as good as it gets. There is no one better. There is no situation where she’s not our perfect fit. She is everything we always wanted, and sure, we each might need to make some concessions to make this work. I don’t know about you, but I’d give my left fucking arm if it meant I could keep Camilla forever. But maybe I just care about her more.” I shrug, holding the smile back from my lips.

“I care about her,” he snaps. “I wouldn’t be thinking about giving her up if I didn’t.”

“You need to get your head out of your ass before you lose her, because after all the shit we’ve put that girl through since we dragged her into our lives, she isn’t going to put up with any more shit, and I don’t know about you, but I don’t think I’ll cope with another week of her living at the De Marco estate.”

He stares at me for long seconds, and I think he’s going to argue with me, but instead he sighs. “I don’t want to fuck it up for all of you. It’s better I dip out now before things get any more serious.”

“You think she’ll stay if you decide you don’t want her anymore? Because I’ll tell you now that she won’t. She’s in it for the long run with all of us, and if you fuck it up, the rest of us are going to be taking it out on you.”

I lean back in my seat as I watch the cogs tick in his head. He has a lot to think about when it comes to his relationship with Camilla, but we also have other things we need to deal with. “Did the cleanup crew get everything done before the cemetery opened for the day?”

He nods, flicking his eyes to the screen and back to me again. “Just. The van was pulling out at the same time the first car came in to visit someone, but they’ve assured me there wasn’t a trace of our presence left once they were done.”

“Fucking Caleb,” I growl. “He made all that mess, and we were the ones stuck picking up after him.”

“Hasn’t it always been like that, though?” He raises a brow at me. “We need to track him down and end this. We got too fucking close tonight. We all could have been taken out, and there was nothing we could have done to stop it. Hell, if Camilla had stayed where we left her, all four of us would be dead. The fact that the little brat can’t do a single thing she’s told saved our lives.”

I chuckle. “She was right to call on all of them, including the Thornes. I don’t think even I would have called Noah in the same situation, and he and his men were what got us across the line and made them back down.”

Crew nods and folds his arms across his chest. “She’s good at what she does. John taught her well, probably better than some of the other heirs.”

“She’s fucking incredible. I’ve never seen someone so young step up so seamlessly. She and Luca have stepped into their roles, and there’s been no dips in their profit margin despite the circumstances of John’s death.” I just so happened to check the numbers a few days ago in preparation for our meeting next week with the five families.

“If we’re going to continue our relationships with Camilla, we need to decide how we’re going to go on because I can’t see how the Syndicate can continue running as it does while we’re intimately involved with one of the leaders of the five families.”

I sigh. That is something we’re going to need to work out, but not today.

Today, we just have to figure out how to keep surviving.

CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

CAMILLA

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