Page 121 of Tempting Fate

Since my cousin and Zeke have brawled hundreds of times before, I know Toker’s only trying to lighten the situation. It doesn’t work, because as I try to swipe away my tears, they fall too fast to catch. Pulse pounding, my knees turn to jelly, and I drop to the floor. Toker’s on his knees next to me in the next instant. He awkwardly hugs me, rocking me as my sobbing morphs into full-blown wailing.

“Hush now,” Toker soothes. “I know it felt real, but I promise you it wasn’t. All y’all did was sell your breakup like a pair of seasoned pros. Fuck, even I believed it for a heartbeat.”

“What if he meant those things?”

Sitting back on his haunches, Toker softly pinches my chin between his fingers. He makes me meet his searching gaze as he asks, “Did you mean that shit about Venom not being able to protect you?”

“No.”

“Exactly. The pair of you know how to push each other’s buttons… that’s all that was.”

“Hope you’re right.”

“I’m always right,” Toker tells me with a wry chuckle. “The only problem is none of y’all ever listen to me.” Footsteps stomping up the hallway put an end to our conversation. “That’ll be Brutus. I need you to keep cryin’ while I pack your bags.”

It’s not hard to follow Toker’s advice when my heart is pounding like drums in my ears, and I feel like I’ve been whiplashed.

I’m still on the floor, knees to my chest, eyes leaking when my father bursts into the room. The door bounces off the wall after he shoves it open, and he literally punches it out of the way when it flies back in his face.

“What. The. Fuck. Was. That. All. About?”

“I broke up with Ze-ke,” I tell him.

After my voice cracks over my fiancé’s name, a look I haven’t seen for a long time appears on Dad’s face. I recognise it as satisfaction—an uncommon emotion for the hard, unyielding man who raised me to express toward me. He replaces it with sympathy almost immediately, but I know what I saw.

Hunter is right.

My father resents my relationship.

Why?

“It’s been a long time comin’. You made the right choice, Cherub,” he muses with a hint of humour. Lowering his attention from my tear-stained face to the diamond ring I still wear on my finger, he seems puzzled, although he quickly rallies. “Do you want me to give that back to him?”

Every atom of my being screams at me not to hand over my ring. I tamp down on my misgivings as I twist the symbol of my engagement from my finger and drop it into my dad’s outstretched hand. When he curls his fingers around the precious piece of jewellery, my bottom lip wobbles, and I start to cry again.

I peer at my naked hand.

It certainly feels real now.

“Can you—can you return that to him?” I ask with a whimper. From behind me, Toker makes a little noise to remind me of my next step, so I breathe deep, then add. “And tell him that I’ll be out of his room as soon as I can find somewhere else to go.”

Dad brushes his empty hand over the top of my head, and it takes all my willpower not to recoil from his touch. “I’ve got a safe house you can go to. Pack your shit while I tell Venom where to stick this ring, then I’ll take you there myself.”

I know I should be ecstatic that Zeke and Hunter’s plan is working.

I’m not.

With every action, my father is proving that their suspicions are correct.

The words stick in my throat, but I manage to force them out. “Thank you, Dad.”

“Anything you need, little Cherub, you just ask me… and only me.”

I bite my tongue, so I don’t tell him to go to hell as he stalks out of the room.

“Fuckin’ hell, he’s got balls of steel,” Toker announces after checking the coast is clear. He slams the door shut and pulls me back to my feet. “I was in two minds about all this when Hunter laid out the plan, but there’s no denying it now… Brutus’ bent as fuck.”

“If it helps, I even tried to convince myself he had dementia or something. I still don’t completely believe it either… probably never will.”

---