Page 89 of Laurels and Liquor

“Lydia, stop. We need to talk—”

Whipping my head around to look at Lex, my eyes burn with hot betrayal. “You lied to me. Again. After you promised not to,” I snap, still struggling to get Rhett and Lucas to let me go.

“I know, sweetness. And I’m so so—”

“You’re sorry?!” I shout, shaking now. “Sorry doesn’t cover this, Alexandra. You promised!”

I shriek in frustration, spinning around to Rhett, who’s now on his feet, looking down at me with concern. He’s trying to calm me through our bond, but I slam down a wall between us. He doesn’t have the right to manipulate me like that. Mateo’s refusal to look at me speaks volumes, along with the guilt spilling through the wall he’s maintaining between us. Even Lucas, who I can only feel faintly, doesn’t seem surprised or betrayed by this. And that only hurts more.

“You knew. You all knew and didn’t tell me,” I snarl, looking around at my pack.

Mateo ducks his head, the shame rolling off him heavy and sour on my tongue. Lucas shifts in his seat, letting go of my hand at last, not looking at me. Even Jason doesn’t look surprised by this news. Rhett keeps pushing to get through the barrier I’ve set, but there’s no hint that he’s been caught off guard like I have. The ONLY person who seems surprised is Caleb, but his expression is more confused than angry, which I get. He wasn’t promised truth and transparency, only to have the people he trusted go back on their word.

“Please let me explain. It’s not as simple as it seems, and you deserve to know the whole truth,” Lex begs.

I huff out a few sighs, trying to move away from Rhett. But his grip is too tight, one hand around my wrist, the other holding my upper arm. His ice-blue stare is too intense, too full of things I don’t want to see right now. I want to be angry with him, with all of them. But the longer I stand here, unable to escape the flood of feelings coming down my bonds, the harder it becomes to maintain that fury. Feeling their contrition, their guilt, the longing for me, all the while struggling with my own feelings of hurt and betrayal, is confusing and unhelpful.

I stop fighting and focus my energy on sorting through the tangle in my chest, pushing out anything I don’t recognize as mine. Rhett loosens his grip just enough for me to pull away, and I move to sit in one of the armchairs, glaring at Rhett as he tries to follow. Pulling my knees to my chest, I look at Lex expectantly. Rhett moves to come to me, but I growl low in my throat.

“You just… don’t. Don’t move,” I snap through gritted teeth, clutching my knees a little harder.

I catch Mateo shifting uncomfortably out of the corner of my eye, and Rhett sinks back into his seat, frowning. But I can’t let myself give in to their touch right now. I have to figure out how I’m feeling, and hearing her out while I try to do so wouldn’t hurt. It’s not like I could go far, anyway. She relaxes slightly, sitting in a chair by the dining area. Mateo stays on the sofa he’d thrown himself into, and Rhett returns to sit next to Lucas on the adjacent one. Caleb shifts toward me, coming to rest in the seat across the aisle from me. There’s a long moment of silence, but I refuse to be the first to break it.

“I tried to think of other ways to get rid of Seth, but everything would have taken time we didn’t have,” Lex starts, picking her words with care.

I narrow my eyes skeptically, and she flinches as she feels that, even through the wall I’ve constructed between us. Good.

“It wasn’t long after you came back from the wedding when your father—or probably more likely your mother—started to hound us for proof of your pack status. They were calling the bluff. And we didn’t know if we’d be able to get a new court date before the deadline they forced on us. Our options were limited, and it seemed like a mating bond would be the fastest way to secure your safety. But with Rhett on house arrest…”

Lex trails off, shrinking back into herself, expression darkening. I can feel her swirling doubt, guilt, the resurfacing of her fear. I try to finish her thought, but nothing makes sense. With Rhett on house arrest, I wouldn’t be able to go to him and bond?

“We made a pact, Lex, Lucas, and I, long before we ever met you. I vowed that I wouldn’t take a bond mate until my pack mates were free to do the same. You didn’t want me to be forced to choose between protecting Lydia, and breaking my promise to Lucas,” Rhett says, speaking first to me and then to Lex.

“I thought about it. I thought long and hard about asking you to choose. But I couldn’t do that. And before any of you say that it would have been an easy choice, even if everyone agreed, it would have meant forcing Lydia to go into heat, and to only have Rhett there to break it. I think we can all agree that none of us would have been happy with that outcome,” Lex says, raising her voice for a moment as Lucas and Rhett both open their mouths to object.

I frown as I consider. Setting aside the swoop of instinctual fear at the mention of forcing my body into heat, would I have been able to go through my heat without all of my pack mates there? Maybe, but it wouldn’t have been easy on me or Rhett. I remember flashes of my heat, remember the absolute, all-consuming agony that would come whenever one of them was out of my line of sight, even for a few moments. It was only because I had every one of them there with me that I was able to make it through that week. And then to add the guilt of knowing Rhett had broken a promise for me…

“When Lydia came to us and said she was taking her supplements, I made a choice. Seth had to go, one way or another. She was ready for us, and it was time to stop pussyfooting around. So yes, I made arrangements with my father to fake Seth’s death,” Lex finishes, words firmer now.

“She brought me in only once she had a plan in place,” Mateo adds in a low monotone. “But once I heard it, I couldn’t say no. I didn’t like the idea of not telling y’all, but I still agreed not to.”

We all feel their embarrassment, but she doesn’t deny it. “He did object, but I wanted to make sure you all had plaus—”

“Plausible deniability,” Rhett, Mateo, and Lucas finish in annoyed unison.

I roll my eyes at that. That seems to be her favorite two-word phrase. At least she has the decency to blush.

“So, The Valencia. That’s what he wanted?” Lucas asks, the question bursting forward like he’d been dying to ask since the conversation started.

Lex barks out a single ironic chuckle. “Oh, no. The heartless gargoylewantedBright Hills. I told him to pound sand and he could have The Valencia,” she spits.

I furrow my eyebrows for a moment before it dawns on me. Bright Hills Estate is the first property Lex ever acquired, the one she had to break away from her father’s company and form her own to complete. Because Leopold St. Clair didn’t think it was worth the cost it would take to restore it. Asking her to give up her metaphorical first-born child is low, even for his standards.

“He didn’t like it, but eventually agreed, so long as he could get it for a price insultingly below market value. It’s only been six months, and I know for a fact he’s already made his money back twice over,” Lex continues with an annoyed huff.

“I thought your father was an upstanding businessman. How could he possibly help you commit a crime like this?” Jason interjects, and it sounds more like an accusation than a question.

Lex throws him a patronizing smile. “Of course, he is. And his friends in high and low places help him stay that way. My cousin, Gideon, acts as a consulting lawyer for St. Clair Holdings, but his real job is to be the middleman to the Argentieri Crime Family.”

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