Page 98 of Bastian's Storm (Surviving Raine 2)

“He’s not her son,” I said quietly.

“Oh, right. Sorry.”

I remembered his words from our first meeting with all the families when he’d threatened to come after Alex when this was over.

“You knew that,” I said accusingly. “You knew his mother was dead.”

“Yeah,” Arden said. His eyes were blank again. “Forgot. My mind’s a little preoccupied.”

His eyes flashed over to the side, narrowed, and he shook his head slightly as if to clear it.

“Did you kill her?” I asked bluntly.

“No,” he said. “Franks put the hit on her. Rinaldo told me about it.”

I didn’t see any trace of a lie on his face. I clenched my teeth a bit. I shouldn’t have been surprised. Franks would choose profit over family, obviously.

“Fucker,” I muttered.

“He won’t be on his own,” Arden said as he nodded toward the picture.

“Yeah.” I shrugged though I wasn’t sure he could see the movement from where he lay on the snow. I stared back at the drawing for a minute. “She treats him like he’s hers.”

“Well, you got that at least.”

I didn’t want to go into the detailed story about Jillian and all that shit. He didn’t need to know any more than he already did, and I didn’t want to spend my last few hours thinking about that woman. I wanted to keep the image of Raine in my head, so I kept talking about her.

“She’s a fucking saint,” I said. “I suck at being a boyfriend. I can’t even get along with her friends.”

Arden nodded his head, and his eyes darkened.

“Lia doesn’t really have any friends,” he said. “That’s my fault. To keep her safe and away from all this shit, I had to isolate her. I did it to protect her, but…yeah, well, she doesn’t have anyone but me. Once she figures out I’m not coming back, she’ll probably move back to Arizona with her mom.”

Raine would at least know what had happened to me. Landon would tell her I was dead, and she could move on with her life. Lindsay would be there for her, and she’d have a shoulder to cry on if nothing else. I couldn’t even imagine how she would deal with it all if she didn’t have Lindsay around, and I felt like a shit for being nasty to her and Nick all the time.

At least they could take care of her and help with Alex.

“I don’t know if Lia is a saint or not,” Arden said, “but she puts up with me. Even when I’m…well, when I’m not the friendliest person around, she still hangs in there. It doesn’t seem to matter how fucked up I am in the head, she always stands by me.”

“Raine’s like that, too,” I replied with a nod. “I can be a total asshole, and she still has my back.”

“Lia knows just when to back off and when to be there,” Arden said. “She knows I’m fucked up, but I guess she just…I dunno…ignores it? She doesn’t like it, but she never gives up on me. She also thinks I don’t do hits anymore, but I do.”

“How do you do that without her knowing about it?”

“She’s in school,” Arden said. “It’s mostly online, but sometimes she has to go to conferences or meet with her professors in person. I plan my hits around those.”

“So you hide it from her?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re crazy.”

Arden laughed.

“Yeah, I’ve got the diagnosis to prove it.”

I stared at him a minute. It didn’t seem like an off-hand remark; it seemed like he meant it. He looked back at me and nodded.

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