Page 19 of Lilly

I bring her into my chest and kiss her head. "Nothing's going to happen to us. Or me."

"But you don't—"

"It's not." I turn her toward me and look at her. "It's not gonna happen. But I do need you to be careful. I don't want you going places without me, at least not until my dad goes to a meeting and gets a feel for what's going on there."

"What do you mean?"

"He needs to figure out the mood, the tone of the group as a whole."

"How's he going to do that?"

"Just by being there. When you're around those people you get a feeling, a sense, that things are either calm or hostile, good or bad. When I went to those meetings, all I felt was anger and hostility and the sense that everyone was out to destroy each other. My dad said it hasn't been like that for a long time. The past few years, most of the members got along and looked out for each other. But that could easily change with William gone, and if it does, then all bets are off."

"Meaning they might try to get you back."

"I don't think so. Now that outsiders can be members, they don't want to put in all the time and effort it would take to get me back."

She's quiet. She doesn't believe me.

"Jade, I know you're worried and I wish I could promise you everything will be fine. And maybe it will. Maybe my dad will go to some meetings, nothing will happen, and William will take back his position at the end of the summer. But if there's even a small chance we could be at risk, then we need to take precautions."

"What about Lilly?"

"What about her?"

"Do you think they'd do anything to her?"

"I don't think so. They've never shown any interest in her, at least not that I know of, but I think my dad would let me know if they did."

"Is he ever going to tell her about them?"

"No. He doesn't want her to find out."

"But if she doesn't know, she might do something risky. Something that puts her in danger."

"My dad's scared her enough over the years with his warnings about criminals and con artists that she knows to be careful." I kiss her. "We should get some sleep. Ethan will be waking us up in a few hours."

For some reason, Ethan has decided to wake up at five every morning. It started a few weeks ago, and no matter what we do, he won't go back to sleep. He's wide awake and smiling and ready to start his day, which means Jade and I are also forced to start our day at that hour.

"Then I guess we'll go to sleep." She sounds disappointed as she turns on her side, away from me.

"Are you saying you don't want to sleep?"

"I just said I did."

"With an undertone that said you didn't." I pull her against my body and kiss her neck.

She laughs. "I didn't use an undertone. I'm not even sure what that is."

"It's a secondary tone used to imply an alternate meaning to what you actually said."

"Yeah? So what did I mean?"

"You said you wanted to go to sleep but you meant that you wanted to have sex."

"You got all that from the tone I used?"

"I was right, wasn't I?" I continue to kiss her neck as my hand slides under her pajama shorts.

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