Page 30 of Whiskey Kisses

“I said,apologize.”

“Before that, dammit!” he cries.

Making sure the safety is on, I tuck his gun into my waistband, opposite of my own. “You heard what I said.”

“Oh, no, no, no.” He shakes his head, pointing at Evie. “There’s no way you married him, Evelyn! You know damn well what’s at stake, here! We had an agreement?—”

“No, you had an agreement,” Evie says, finally finding her voice. “An agreement to sell me off! How could you do that to me?” A strangled sob bursts from her throat as she comes to stand at my side. “How could you make me marry that asshole? Do you know what he’s capable of?”

“How could you marry this one?” he counters, looking at me. “And you! Using my daughter for your own gain.”

“You’d know all about that, wouldn’t you?” I squeeze Evie’s shoulder, making her look at me. “Pack. Your. Shit.”

She must realize that my patience is running on fumes because she hurries off to do just that. Randall extends his hand in a beckoning motion. “Give that gun back to me before I report it stolen.”

“I’ll leave it at the front gate when we leave.”

He shakes his head slowly. “You have no idea what you’ve stepped in, Tristan.”

“Oh, I think I do.” My phone vibrates; the boys are out front. It feels like it took an eternity for them to get here, but I haven’t been here ten minutes. Keeping one eye on Randall, I text Finn back.

Come up, around back.

Have M and T stay in the car, watch the block.

“Once you leave, do not ever come back here, Evelyn! You hear me?” he yells, rubbing his head. He should have a nice, fat knot, a reminder of what happens when he runs his mouth. “You are dead to me, girl.”

I take a step toward him, and he flinches, tripping over himself to get away. But I just open the door and point outside until he goes. “You’re the whore, by the way. You slept around on your wife until she left you, and now you’re in bed with some of this city’s worst.”

He shoots me a dark look, nearly colliding with Finn, who’s coming up the steps. “Go fuck yourself.”

“Let me know when you’re ready to apologize to Evie,” I call back. “Have a good one.”

Poppy and Juniperwon’t come out from under the bed. I don’t give a shit, but it troubles Evie. “They’re probably traumatized,” she laments, sitting on the edge of her new bed. I tried to give her the rental’s biggest bedroom, figuring she’d need space for all her stuff, but she insisted on a smaller one.

“They’ll get over it.” It’s obvious that Evie’s traumatized too—she’s as much of a mess as this bedroom—but if obsessing over her cats makes her feel better, fine.

“I hope I didn’t leave anything too important behind.” She rubs at her forehead, thinking. “He’s petty enough to burn anything I did.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it. You did the best you could with the time you had.” I pull my phone from my back pocket, bringing up a list of local restaurants. “Now, please tell me they got late-night spots open around here. I’m so hungry?—”

“Wait.” Her eyes well with tears. Again. “My manga.”

Oh, shit.The collection she’s had since she was a kid. Randall wouldn’t hesitate to chuck those. Scratching my head, I look around at the stacks of boxes populating her bedroom. “Are you sure? They might be in one of these.”

“Yeah.” She looks down, wiping the back of her hand across her eyes. “They’re still in my closet.”

“Maybe I can?—”

“No.” She shakes her head. “Forget it … it doesn’t matter.”

“We’ll go look when we know for sure that he’s at work. Tomorrow,” I assure her. “It’s worth a try.”

“I don’t know,” she says, wrapping her arms around herself. “He told me not to come back—the last thing I need is him catching me sneaking around.”

Randall can eat a dick, but somehow, I doubt that’s what she wants to hear. “We’ll do whatever you want, okay?”

“Okay,” she says faintly.

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