Page 52 of Captured Pawn
Sophie closed her eyes, turning off any insight I had into what she was thinking. Knowing how smart she was, I knew she was remembering… trying to pick up on clues she might have missed, but considering she’d only been eleven when her father died, I’m not sure how much she might have been aware of back then.
A full minute passed before she spoke, opening her eyes and pinning me with a sad glare.
“My father… he worked for the Knights like Matty?”
My throbbing headache was getting worse as I nodded.
“That means he helped you break into places? Set up illegal surveillance? Crack safes?” Her voice shook on her last word.
“He did a lot more important jobs as well, but yes… those were some of his responsibilities.”
I could see her trying to come to terms with the fact that the father she’d known and loved had lived a totally secret life she’d not been aware of.
“The car accident. He died in a car accident… just like Matty.” It was a statement, not a question.
Nathan and I shared a look. We both appreciated how smart Sophie was.
Nathan saved me from having to say the worst words. “Our father died in that same car accident… alongside your father.”
Sophie gasped, looking between my brother and me, her mouth agape in surprise. “What?” Her head shook slightly in disbelief. “Why didn’t I know this before now?”
“You were a kid, and Matt wanted to protect you from knowing the truth about your father.”
“Bullshit,” Sophie said, shrinking back even farther away from me. “He just didn’t want me to know whathewas doing. But I had…have… a right to know.”
I felt her growing anger. “Which is why I’m telling you now,” I added softly.
“Liar. You’re only telling me the truth because I overheard your goons gossiping about me and my family.”
How I wished that was the only reason I was coming clean. Unfamiliar guilt crashed in and renewed the throbbing in my shoulder and head. I should have waited to have this discussion until I felt better, but I was in too deep now. I needed to pull the Band-Aid off, and rip open the wound completely.
I reached to hold her hand in mine again, praying it wasn’t the last time I got to touch her.
“Unfortunately, I’m telling you the truth now because it’s time to do what I need to do to truly keep you safe. And not only because of my promise to Matt, and indirectly to your father years before. But because like it or not, you are a Locke. And like your father and brother before you, you have taken an active role in crossing the Bishops.
“I was naive to think that retrieving the items from his safe would make Maximillian Bishop back off. He sent Angela into our home with a gun and no doubt instructions to retrieve what we took and leave us both dead.”
Nathan added, “She may have failed, but there will be others coming. I don’t know when, or how, but things are escalating, especially now that we’ve taken back the proof from his safe that he was directly responsible for the hit on our fathers. Not only that, but we now have the proof that his grandfather swindled both our grandfathers out of their entire fortune back in Ireland. Everything that bastard owns he stole from our families and Nick and I are done letting him get away with it. That means all of us have a fucking bullseye on our backs.”
I was grateful that Nathan had spoken the final blow to Sophie.
She shook her head back and forth as if to reject his words. More than anything I wanted to pull her down to lie next to me. To hold her in my arms and tell her nothing would hurt her on my watch, but I’d already failed her… so many times. I hadn’t protected her father or her brother, so what made me think I could keep Sophie safe either?
Which meant there was only one thing left to do.
A single tear streaked down her face. I so wanted to reach out and swish it away, but instead I went in for the kill.
“Which is why it’s time to close the security business. I’ll get you set up with a new name in a new city far away from here. You just graduated from college. You have your whole life ahead of you. You can start over and have the life you deserve.”
“The life I deserve?” she shouted. “Living completely alone, far away from anything and anyone I’ve ever known? Far from the people who knew and loved my brother?”
Her voice cut off, yet I knew she had so much more she wanted to say. Was I even on her list of things she didn’t want to leave?
Her panic was real, but anger and sadness were commingled, twisting Sophie up into knots before my eyes.
More than anything, I wanted to comfort her. To tell her how much I wanted her here, beside me, from now on. But I’d been selfish enough to take her into the Bishops’ estate the night before and I wasn’t going to be selfish this time. If I cared for Sophie, I needed to let her go. To get her as far away from The Compound and anyone with the name Knight or Bishop as I could.
“I’m sorry, Sophie. I wish it could be different, but you’ve wanted to escape ever since I brought you here. You should be happy. I’m finally going to set you free.”
