Page 78 of Reaper Released

Marie looks shocked. “What about Dane's fractured arm?”

“Fell out of a tree!” Bran grimaces.

Bernie laughs. “You little fuckers. So you never fought!”

“Not once!” I shrug.

“When we made you apologise after, you always hugged all three of you, even when one of you wasn’t involved, and did that K.F.D. thing. What's that all about? You never told any of us!”

“I would kill for them!” I say.

“I would fight for them!” Dane replies.

Bran finishes with, “I would die for them!”

“Kill for you, fight for you, die for you!” Scar chirps in, and we all smile at her.

“Wait…” Bernie pauses. “When was the last time any of you fleeced us?”

Grimacing, Dane pulls a face. “The other day!”

Steel barks out a laugh. “Holy shit, you guys are devious as fuck. I wish I’d grown up with you all!”

Frowning at Steel, Cade grumbles, “Yeah, that’s just what we needed, another of you fuckers pulling the wool over our eyes. How did we never know this? I mean, six of us brought you up, and we didn’t figure it out. We had training in hand-to-hand combat, hostage negotiations, and information extraction, amongst other things, and three pissant kids conned us for years, and you did last week? When? Who? What?”

“Erm… sooo, you know how no one came to take me out for the day the other day? Bran had agreed, knowing he wasn’t gonna make it, so when you rushed around at the last minute, you asked Dane to hang out with me! We saw an opportunity, and we took it!”

“Yeah, I did, and he said why should he? He would rather stick a hot poker in his eye!” Bernie scratches his head, looking confused.

I bark out another laugh. “Yeah, and then what did you do?”

“You fucking little wankers!” Bernie lunges over the table at us, but we lean back and laugh. “You fuckers! Dane protested… really fucking hard about having nothing in common any more. You were just his annoying sister, blah, blah, blah! So I offered him one hundred dollars!”

The whole table erupts.

Dice grins. “Fuck, Bernie, he fleeced you!”

“You reckon? Add expenses on top of that too!”

Steel high-fives me. “My wife is a criminal mastermind!”

Bernie sinks his head into his hands. “Nearly eight hundred dollars you guys fucking spent. I should have known you were up to no good when you didn’t come back!”

Turning to Steel, Bernie laughs. “You know what? She’s your fucking problem now, son. See how you like that!”

Crossing his arms over his chest, Bernie huffs. The pas look confused, and I think there’s a little pride in there too.

Steel pulls me into his chest, resting his chin on my shoulder. “Bring it on,” he speaks in my ear, then kisses my cheek. I grin like a motherfucker.

Bernie shakes his head. “Bastards!” he mumbles.

“Let’s make a toast.” Pa Cade rises from the table. “To Ray and Steel and to all those who can’t be here today, to those we’ve lost along the way!”

“To my mum and dad, I love you guys!” I raise my glass.

“To Bas… ” Pa Bernie raises his glass. “He was a dick, but he was still family!”

Pa JJ follows, “To Sebastian and Julie.”

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