Page 8 of Dukes of Peril

If she hears the apprehension in my voice, then she doesn’t mention it. She just says, “Oh.”

“I’ll be in… after,” I promise.

After I find a way to fix something. After I pick up the pieces–at least some of them. I don’t know how to tell her that I can’t be what she wants. I can’t save West End. I can barely fucking save her. But I guess I don’t need to. This is a secret that only the two of us can really know: Bruin–much like Lucia–is just a name. It’s not imbued with divine grace. It doesn’t make me special or qualified orgood. It’s just a series of letters on the end of a driver’s license.

But if she wants me to try, then I will.

That’s the only reason I pull away.

“Hey, Nick? Could you…” She hesitates, teeth digging into her plush bottom lip.

I press, “What?”

“Could you bring Sy with you?” she asks, pulling the blanket higher. “Later, when you come to bed?” After a short silence, she adds, “It’s just… I sleep better when he’s–I mean, he knows how to–”

I nod. “Yeah, I’ll bring Sy in with me.”

There’s a flash of surprise in her eyes, as if she’s expecting my mood to turn at the request. The truth is, I’m not gatekeeping Lavinia anymore. The thought of her belonging to Sy and Remy isn’t so bad when I already know she’s mine. If anything, it makes her feelmorelike she’s mine, as if nothing in this world ever truly could unless I was sharing it with my brothers.

That is, if they can keep her.

I find Remy in the den, tipping back a bottle of scotch.

Crossing my arms over my bare chest, I prop myself against the jamb and watch him swallow it down, pulling a face when he looks at the label.

“Fuck, I hate scotch,” he croaks, pinching the bottle between his knees to hold it steady as he screws the cap back on one-handed. I look him up and down, and beneath the exhaustion there’s something else. The tremble in his limbs from the Scratch working out of his system, the red eyes from being up for days, the random bruises mottling his skin. He’s coming off a fucking bender.

His hand is shaking.

“You good?” I ask.

He looks up at my tone, carefully absent of any inflection. “Oh, I’m fucking stellar, Nicky. I just leaped off a cliff. My dad wants to lock me up and then kill my best friend. I’ve got one good arm and half a Duchess.” He leans forward to place the bottle on the coffee table, but he doesn’t straighten, the line of his shoulders cutting a dejected figure. “Man, I’m not having the best day ever.”

I nod, thinking over his words. “And whose fault is that?”

Slowly, he raises his gaze, eyebrows dropping to a scowl. “You can’t put all this on me.”

“Not all of it,” I agree. “I should have seen it–your dad being the Baron King. I was around him enough. Plus, I’m the one Lionel’s got beef with. That’s got nothing to do with you.” This is the problem with Remy and Sy. No tough love whatsoever. If someone’s got to tell Remy how it is, then it has to be me. “And maybe if you’d been taking care of yourself, you wouldn’t have been up on a cliff, losing your goddamn mind and taking our Duchess with you.”

“Oh, that’s rich.” He gives a low, humorless laugh, eyes flashing bitterly. “Last I heard, you were the one taking her to see my father for a fun little round of Russian Roulette. Are you really going to pretend you haven’t been our albatross for three years running?”

“Yeah, I’ve fucked up,” I admit. “But I’m fighting like hell to be better. What are you doing?”

Remy inhales deep, nostrils flaring. “I can’t do this right now.”

“Then when, Remy?” I hold his gaze. “When you get your hands on some more Viper Scratch? The next time you go off your meds? Maybe during your next paranoid delusion about everyone being out to get you? I guess I can catch you at the next funeral. Mine, Sy’s,Vinny’s…”

“Stop,” he snaps, digging his fingers into his temple, eyes clenched shut.

I look at him, this guy who used to be the life of West End, and all I see is the living embodiment of misery. “What happened to you?”

Remy gives me a long, incredulous look. “You want a fucking list?” He throws his hand in the air, ranting, “I didn’t ask to be like this. You think I like being paranoid? You think it’s fun being completely fucking unable to rely on your own executive function? You think I liked seeing the look on Vinny’s face when she–” The words clip off, and I don’t even know which way they were going. When she saw him with Haley? When she jumped off that fucking cliff with him? He doesn’t finish, though. He just hangs his head, fingers clawing roughly through his hair as he grits out, “You don’t know how hard it is.”

“You’re right. I don’t.” A silence swells between us, because I might have impulse issues of my own, but I can’t actually imagine what it’s like to be in Remy’s head. Probably chaos. “But right now, we need a fighter, and the one thing I do know is that you’re not fucking fighting.”

His head snaps up. “What are you talking about? I fight all the damn time!”

“You fight for DKS. For me and Sy. You’ll fight for Lavinia. Hell, you’ll fight just because you don’t like the color of someone’s shirt.” I jerk my chin toward the bottle of scotch. “But you don’t fight for yourself, Remy. You let everyone else do that for you.” He just stares at me, unblinking as I turn away. “That’s our albatross.”

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