Page 81 of Mind Pucked

“Two games before the accident, I accidentally threw an elbow that clipped Coach in the nose,” he admits with a wry chuckle. “I helped to stop the flow of blood…” He pauses for a moment, but I think I understand where he’s going with this.

“And you kept the tissues, and had it tested?” I ask.

“Yep,” he says with a sigh. “Then both Lyla and I gave our blood to be tested. A couple days before the accident, the tests came back as a match, meaning he was our father, and I had another half sister. The only reason we knew to check with Coach was that Lyla’s mother kept a journal that named him as a fling she had around the time she got pregnant with Lyla.”

“And you just hoped he was one of our mother’s flings too? That was kind of a long shot, wasn’t it?” I ask with a bit of irritation I just can’t shake.

“Well, no,” he sighs. “As it turns out, our mother kept a journal as well. I took it from the house the last time I went home before the accident…about a week before, I think. I’d seen the book among some of Mom’s things that your father kept in the closet. It didn’t even look like it had been touched in years, but I found it while looking for evidence, and after looking through it, it was clear it was a good thing your dad never saw it. Or if he did, he played dumb for having the evidence right before his eyes that there was a possibility I wasn’t his son.”

“My guess is he knew and hoped you were his,” I admit. “He always wanted a son to carry on the family business…though little did I know what that family business really was.” I snort as I finally sit back down. “I’m still kind of trying to process that one.” I chuckle, but it feels odd to do so.

“Yeah.” Preston laughs a little too, but it’s weak and forced. “Well, our mother talked about three men…your father, a salesman from Indiana that she was with a time or two, and then Coach. The only person who matched Lyla’s mother’s journal was Coach of course. We put two and two together, and bam…we became brother and sister essentially overnight. I guess Coach gets around.”

“I wish you could have trusted me with more of this information when it first came to light,” I snap at him, though I don’t mean it.

I don’t think I do anyway.

I feel like if I had known, I could have helped figure all these things out for them. It doesn’t matter to me that my father is the villain in all this…well, it matters to me. But more than anything, I would have died for Preston to be safe and protected.

“And what, Ami? Risk your life too?” he asks, with heat in his own tone. “Because I would have never been okay with that. Hell…” He pauses for a moment—out of irritation, I’m sure. “I’m not even okay with you knowing now, for those same reasons.”

“I could have handled it, you know. I’m a grown woman and can take care of myself,” I snarl, sounding more like an animal than a human, but then I come to my senses. “Sorry,” I mumble. “I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at myself.” Tears begin to spill despite my resistance to them.

“You have nothing to be sorry for,” Preston says, but I don’t agree with him. “And you don’t need to beat yourself up either.”

“We’ll see,” I say. “But I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to live without you, and now Jackson and Hayden. At least for now he’s still letting me work for him, so I’m still Hayden’s nanny. I would die if he took that from me too.”

“You aren’t living without me,” he says. “I’m right here.” His voice is full of conviction. “I just have to stay dead a little longer until I figure out how to deal with all this. It’s not going to last forever, and if you just talk to Jackson, maybe you can work things out with him in the end…but until then, there’s only one thing I need you to do.”

“What’s that?” I ask, not sure I have the strength to do much else.

“Just live every day as normal as you can,” he says, and I nearly snort a laugh of disbelief.Normal? I’m not sure I know what that is anymore.“Be the bestyouyou can be, and live life happy and normal.”

“How?” I ask. “It’s going to be so hard. Damn near impossible even.”

“I know, but you have to do this…for me,” he adds. “Do you hear me? I give you no other choice than to be as brilliant and amazing as I know you to be. This will all work out in the end…promise me,” he says.

“Pres—” I begin to protest, but he stops me before I can say anything else.

“Promise me,” he demands, and I can hear the need in his voice for me to say that I do.

“I promise,” I say, and even though I don’t know how I can really promise something like this, I do it anyway, just for my big brother to feel peace.

“I have to go, Amelia,” he says. “I won’t have this phone after the call is over, but I will call you every third day around the same time. It’ll be a different number each time. I won’t leave a message or anything if you don’t answer, so just know I’ll call again in three more days’ time.”

“Okay,” I say with more tears tracking down my cheeks. “I love you.”

“I love you too, Amelia,” he says, and then he’s gone.

The call goes dead, and I delete it from my phone log for good measure. I don’t know how much control my father has over things on my end, but I don’t want to take any chances.

Not where my brother’s involved, but I do plan on one thing—I will get revenge for the pain that man has caused Preston, Jackson, Hayden, me, and everyone else he has ever wronged with his higher-than-mighty mindset.

It’s time for the reign of the Mafia boss I didn’t even know was my father to come to an end.

22

JACKSON

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