Page 70 of By Sin To Atone

It’s not that I want him to care or anything like that. Although there’s something with him. I don’t know. Maybe it’s just how big he is. How powerful. How much in control. Hell, maybe it’s just that we’ve been intimate. He’s my first and my emotions are mixed up. My broken brain trying to make something out of nothing. Like when he cut the steak for me at the restaurant or how he checks that my hand is healing well.

It's all confusing.

No. I shake my head. I chalk it up to emotions being high. I can’t be stupid, even though I will admit that on some level, it’s a relief to have his protection. I need to remember why I’m here. He has no loyalty to me, the opposite if anything. I tried to blackmail him. He doesn’t know me. I’m nothing to him.

As good as his intentions may be, he doesn’t know the kind of people dad was dealing with. The kind that will put a gun to a sixteen-year-old girl’s head. The kind that will pull the trigger if they got the chance. I know that. I was there for it. Played the leading role.

I don’t know what is on this flash drive. I haven’t been able to access more than a few files. I don’t even want to know more. But if the only way Wren and I will be safe will be to give it back to whoever wants it, then I’ll do that.

I get dressed quickly, pulling on my worn but beloved jeans and a sweater. I should have taken some shoes from my apartment, too, but I just slip my feet into these borrowed ballet flats. I bury the flash drive inside the pocket of my jeans and make sure it’s not visible before I head out into the hallway and down the stairs. I can already hear men’s voices coming from the study, where light spills out of the open door. My heart beats fast as I make my way to it.

There’s nothing they could have found on that laptop. There’s nothing to find. I don’t know what questions they’ll have for me, but I should be safe. And once they’re gone, I’ll ask Zeke for one more thing. To move Wren and maybe Rudy, too. To bring them here? No, that’s too hard. I need her somewhere where I can get us out if I need to. This house is a fortress.

Taking a deep breath in, I enter the study. Three sets of eyes turn to me, conversation coming to an abrupt halt the moment I’m inside.

Zeke is leaning against the desk drinking a whiskey. His brother, Jericho, whom I recognize from the other day, is standing with his arm on the mantle of the fireplace. He, too, is holding a tumbler of whiskey. A man I don’t know is sitting on the couch with my laptop on his lap, that gun in its Ziploc on the coffee table beside a bottle of whiskey and an empty tumbler. A fire is burning in the fireplace. It’s not a cold night but it’s comforting hearing the crackling of wood.

I clear my throat.

“Come inside, Blue,” Zeke tells me.

I go to stand next to him. He puts his drink down and wraps a hand around the back of neck to lead me toward the others.

“Sit down,” Zeke says. “Jericho, Robbie, this is Blue. Blue, my brother, Jericho and Robbie.”

I nod, wipe my sweaty hands on my jeans.

“Relax,” he whispers. He walks over to the desk and picks up his whiskey, makes a point of taking a sip while I watch, then hands it to me. He’s making sure I know it’s not drugged. I take it, although I don’t like the stuff, especially after the other night, and drink a sip. He’s right, I need to relax. They don’t know anything. Hell, I hardly know anything.

“Where did you get the laptop?” Jericho asks.

“I already told you, it was her father’s,” Zeke says.

His brother’s eyes, which are different colors, are zeroed in on me like he’s trying to read my mind. “I’d like to hear it from her,” he says with a quick glance in his brother’s direction.

I wonder about the dynamic between them. I think Jericho is older but they’re close in age. What is their relationship like? The two times I’ve seen them together it seems tense. There’s some unresolved history between them.

“It’s my father’s,” I repeat.

“And the gun?”

“My father’s.” I scratch my nose and look up at Zeke who narrows his eyes.

“Well, that’s odd,” Jericho says.

Zeke folds his arms, leaning against the mantle alongside his brother.

“How so?” I ask.

“How so, Robbie?” Jericho mimics.

“Thanks for asking,” Robbie says. Is this some game to them? Robbie continues typing something onto the laptop, so it takes him a moment to drag his gaze to mine. “Funny enough, it’s registered to Imperium Valens Invictum. New Orleans chapter.”

I’m confused. Imperium Valens Invictum. “Am I supposed to know what that is?” I ask, shifting my gaze from the man to Zeke.

“IVI. The Society,” he says.

The Society, as in his secret society. As in The Cat House and whatever else they have going on behind those high walls.

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