Page 106 of Queen of Anarchy (Dirty Broken Savages 2)

The fact that she had to sneak out of the house to see me says it all.

So I don’t know what the issue is. At the same time, though, this is more like the Hannah I remember. She’s not docile and cowed, not hunched in on herself.

The resemblance between the two of us is stronger now, with her facing off against me in the kitchen, so angry she’s nearly shaking.

“You don’t… want to stay with him, do you?” I ask thickly, almost afraid to hear the answer.

If I have to convince her that Julian is a piece of shit and she has to leave him, this could get so much more dangerous and complicated. I can’t imagine why she would have bonded with him, but it has been a long time, and I don’t know what things have been like for her. I thought she was dead, and she didn’t have anyone else in her corner. So maybe that created some kind of fucked up Stockholm Syndrome type thing that makes her think she needs him.

Hannah’s eyes widen, her head jerking back as if I slapped her.

“No, I don’t want to stay with him,” she hisses. “But I’m just not going to fucking abandon my son. I’m not going to leave him with Julian. That’s why I haven’t tried to run away all this time, don’t you understand that? I couldn’t get Cody out, and I won’t leave without him.”

“But—”

“No. I don’t want to hear it, River.” She pushes several strands of her blonde hair out of her face, then clenches her hands into fists. “He’s my son. I have to protect him. If I leave, there will be no one but Julian to raise him. I don’t think I have to tell you how bad that would be.”

“Hannah.” I take a step toward her, my throat tight. “You can’t stay there. You don’t… you don’t know how he talks about you. How he sees you. He doesn’t give a shit about you. He doesn’t even give a shit about your kid. Cody is just anheirto him. A prop. Someone to carry on the family line. He sat there at that table last night and traded you away like it was nothing. Likeyouwere nothing. All he wanted was to keep the kid and that’s it.”

“You think I don’t know that?” she fires back. “That’s why I can’t leave Cody. Julian doesn’t care about him as a person. He doesn’t care that he’s a three-and-a-half-year-old little boy who just wants to play and spend time with his father. He’ll turn Cody into a monster like him. Like Lorenzo. And don’t even try to tell me I don’t know how Julian sees me. I’m the one who’s been there with him this whole fucking time. I knowexactlywhat he thinks of me.”

“I… I was just trying to help,” I murmur, my stomach twisting in on itself as guilt rises inside me. I remember the moment when Julian insisted he would keep Cody when he let Hannah go, and how the men all looked to me.

I made that call.

That’s on me.

“I’m his mother,” Hannah continues, her voice shaking a little. “And if it came down to my life or his, I’d pickhisevery time. He’s a part of me. You don’t know what it’s like to be a parent.”

That stings, mostly because she’s right, and it’s just another thing that’s different about us now. She has this whole life, and a kid and I never knew. I can’t even relate to it.

“Maybe I don’t know what it’s like.” I swallow hard. “But you and I both know being a parent doesn’t stop people from abandoning their kids.”

Hannah sucks in a breath. Even though she’s still clearly pissed off, I can tell she knows what I’m getting at. It was our dad who put us in this fucked up mess in the first place.

“I’m not like him,” she whispers hoarsely, tears welling in her eyes and making her soft blue irises shimmer. “Dad abandoned us, but I won’t let my child be a bargaining chip like he did. We have to bebetterthan that, River. We have todobetter. Otherwise, the cycle will never, ever end.”

Shame punches me in the chest, and I press a hand over my heart like I’m trying to protect it from the sudden fierce ache. Even back at the restaurant when Julian first insisted on keeping Cody, I think part of me knew it was wrong to agree to that. That it would mean throwing an innocent child to the wolves. But I was so close to getting Hannah back, so fucking close. It was all I could think about. All I could see.

“I’m sorry,” I choke out. “I just wanted to protect you. It’s all I’ve thought about, all I’ve held on to for years. All I’ve lived for. I couldn’t protect you back then, back when you needed me. There was nothing I could do, and I had to watch them kill you. I had to go on with my life, thinking you were dead and I had failed you. I was supposed to keep you safe. I promised you I would, and I failed. I have to do better thanthat. I have to protect you now.”

Hannah blinks as I finally stop speaking to drag in a breath, and whatever she was going to say before falls away.

Some of the anger bleeds from her face, and she makes a choked noise in her throat before taking a step forward and wrapping her arms around me in a tight hug.

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