Page 89 of Selling Innocence

Chapter Eighteen

Hayden

Talk about the last thing I wanted to do…

I’d faced off against some of the worst things without flinching. I’d jumped in front of attackers, breached doors knowing a gunman sat on the other side, walked into situations I knew I might not walk out of.

None of those had made me as nervous as the young woman seated on the swing in the backyard.

Kenz wore her favorite pajamas, the comfortable ones she seemed to always wear when she was especially nervous or upset. It was funny how, when she’d gotten here, I’d known so little about her. Now, however, I could tell just by her clothing or choice of food how she felt.

Did she think we were going to turn her over? That this little family meeting was to tell her we’d sell her off?

Judging from her expression, yeah, she probably did.

Her own father had tried to kill her.

I supposed I could understand why she might jump to that conclusion.

“Stop frowning,” Vance said. “You’ll give yourself wrinkles and who will want you if you do that?” His words were rude, but instead of snapping back, Kenz stared for a moment then laughed.

I might not understand her relationship with Vance—or with Tor or Char for that matter—but I couldn’t deny that whatever strangeness existed between them eased her.

I took a seat in the empty chair across from the swing, putting us in a circle. It felt oddly private and personal, like we were a real family. The sun had set, but the heat and humidity still made my shirt cling to my back.

Or maybe that’s just my nerves.

“So what’s this about?” she asked as she brought her legs up and wrapped her arms around her knees, making herself into a ball. She set her chin on her knees. The worries were obvious on her face, but even then, she didn’t try to hide, didn’t run from the reality.

“You said something to me earlier. You said that until I told you the worst parts about my life, I didn’t get to lecture you about your secrets. You’re right. This doesn’t just affect us anymore, so you have the right to understand what happened.”

“You mean five years ago?” Her gaze moved around between us, pausing at Vance’s hand.

Yeah, she’s smarter than people give her credit for.

Vance sighed, then hooked the thumb of his left hand beneath the glove of his right hand. He paused for only a heartbeat before he pulled the fabric off, the first time I’d seen what he hid beneath it either.

In the dim light of the backyard, I could only see some mangled skin on the back of his hand. It didn’t appear nearly as damaged as I’d have assumed, given how rarely he used it.

He wasn’t done, though. He grasped his pointer finger and pulled, the action sliding off a prosthetic that had all the middle fingers. It left him with only his thumb and pinky.

“Five years ago, I was at the Kylotte Hotel here. It was just chance I was there, really. I’d met a girl in a bar, and we’d gotten a room there.”

Kenz furrowed her brows. “The Kylotte Hotel…” she whispered.

Vance went quiet, so I picked up the conversation. “That’s right. It was all over the news when it happened. You were a teen, but you probably heard about it.”

“There was a bombing there. They found the culprit afterward, said it was because of a drug dispute.”

I tilted my head, surprised she’d know so much. Few details were released about the drug connection, which meant she had information not known to the public. “Yes and no. Officially, they said it was because of contract disputes. Unofficially, they suspected the hotel was being used to sell drugs to high-end clients. That was true, but it wasn’t the actual reason for the bombing.”

She sighed, her guess easy. “Lorien did it?”

“That’s right. He used the person they caught as a fall guy, but Lorien was behind it.”

“You said Lorien is second in a crime family. Why would he do that? That sort of thing would be way too public, and I can’t think they’d want that sort of attention on them.” Her understanding of criminal organizations surprised me, but she was always doing that, wasn’t she?

“He’s a mad dog. He does what he wants, doesn’t follow the rules other families do. Even his mother, who runs the family officially, can’t rein him in. He leaves running the family to his mother and he prefers to take assassination contracts. One went out for a man who was trafficking women and had stolen money from the people he worked with. That man was in the hotel.”

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