Page 32 of Seizing Control: Part One

It drives home the accuracy of my decision last night.

Announcing that I’m in love with Slash and Zeke will start a war.

A war that my father can weaponise to his advantage.

I understand both men better than they understand themselves. They’ll want me to choose. Between them. Between the club and my heart. Between love and safety. It’s not something I can do.

I love them both.

Different but equal.

Kismet and karma.

“Your father just called,” Joshua, the only junior clerk working with us this morning, announces. He closes the door to the boardroom behind himself and retakes his seat with a sigh. I look at Gabriel, then Veronica, expecting one of them to reply. They peer back at me with speculation in their eyes until Joshua adds. “He wants you to meet him at church in an hour.”

It takes me a second longer to grasp his meaning.

After months of silent treatment, Brutus Mayberry is summoning me.

“Are you going to see him?” Gabriel asks.

“Nope. Fuck him.”

Shrugging semi-apologetically at Veronica’s dramatic shudder over my profanity, I turn my phone over to check the notifications. I don’t have any missed calls from my father. The only person to have reached out is Nadia—she’s texted me a short clip of Zeke, Slash, and Toker swaggering into the main bar together this morning, along with a series of texts that read like the stream of consciousness from a madwoman.

I guess, that’s kind of accurate when it comes to my best friend.

Nadia is equal parts lunatic and lucid.

She is definitely an acquired taste.

NADIA: didn’t take long for the tripod of stupidity to make up… the testosterone is enough to make me gag

NADIA: Fabio looks rested for once

NADIA: did you dry hump your way past third base this time?

NADIA: he still seems tense, so I’m gonna go with no

NADIA: your clam will need a cobweb broom if you continue with this dry spell

NADIA: nice work on Venom’s face btw

NADIA: I particularly like the claw marks

NADIA: they make me miss Sander… I could really go a round or two with him right now

NADIA: he certainly deserves it after ditching us yesterday, post-stalking

As much as her running commentary makes me laugh, the final comment is filled with unnecessary bitterness. My twin has been MIA since yesterday, my phone calls this morning sent straight to message bank, and his absence is worrying. Sure, he messed up at the bank, but he did his best to rectify the situation. If he hadn’t kept me calm while the SUV rode my bumper back to Slash’s, who knows how the fiasco would’ve ended. I’m aware that the Shamrocks will give his shit for leaving me without an escort—I’d rather he manned up and faced the music instead of going into hiding over his mistake.

Sander and solitude are an atomic blast in need of a splash zone.

If he relapses over this, I’ll never forgive myself.

When my stomach begins to churn at the idea of my twin falling victim to his addiction again, I force myself to face the truth of my culpability in this drama. My continuing inability to look after myself is becoming a liability. The fallout from my spiralling behaviour is splashing over my family, dousing them in my filth, drowning them in repercussions that aren’t theirs to manage. It’s something I need to work on now I’ve agreed to remain living with Slash because I can tell that things will get worse before they get better.

Neither Zeke nor Slash will take my decision to put time and space between us well.

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