Page 79 of Devious Gambit

I groaned.

“So, who is she?”

“What?”

“The girl you fucked over.”

“Fuck off.” I turned my back on her and stepped into the bathroom to take a shower. I was already weighed down by guilt I didn’t want my own sister to contribute.

“I’m joking, by the way,” she called after me.

“About what?”

“Ma. I haven’t told her you’re back…yet. I’ll let you breathe first.”

I turned back to talk to her face to face. “How about not telling them anything, and I’ll turn up Christmas day happy as a lark to hear the great announcement and eat gingerbread.”

She pointed to the window. “It’s snowing, how nice. Do the right thing, Jace. Go see our mother.”

“I will tomorrow or the next day or the day after.”

“What’s her name?”

“Who?”

“The girl you screwed over.”

“You’ve got it wrong.”

“Speaking of screwing…” she started, “I heard you’ve had a couple of mysterious tragedies at school.”

“Which ones are you referring to the death or the rape?”

“Rape? Ick, it’s never ending. There used to be quite a bit of seedy, toxic behavior when I was at KVU. They never came near me, of course.” She signaled for Celli to go to his bed in the corner of her office, because he was getting excited with me being around.

“He probably gets sick of hanging out with chicks all the time,” I said in his defense.

“You two should start a little boys club.”

“We might just do that.”

“He’ll need walkies soon.”

“I’ll take him, we can talk about booze and cars.”

“Not girls?”

I shot her a classic Luxon dirty look. “No.”

She glanced off to the side, caught on a thought. “There was always four.”

“Four?”

“Witnesses and victims always said there were four men in black sweats and balaclavas.”

Ice snaked down my spine, making me cringe. I still hadn’t fulfilled my end of the bargain with Gallagher. “Still the same.”

“Really? I’d like to think it’s not the same four guys.”

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