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Prologue
Caleb
Family.
It can mean a lot of things. It can mean the people who share your name. The friends who stood by you during war. The ones you couldn't help but fall in love with.
For me, it means secrets and lies.
Killers and thieves. Each and every one of them.
I look at Boxcar lying on the casino floor beside me. He's still unconscious and bleeding slightly from a fresh welt above his eye. He should have disappeared when he had the chance. He's done it before.
But he couldn't leave us behind. That's not the kind of man he is.
I gently raise his head and rest it in my lap. Handcuffs dig into my wrists. I ignore them, channeling the pain into rage instead, but it tapers off quickly as I scan the wrecked room.
The other girls are bound and gagged by the bar, surrounded by agents with guns. Lilah's knocked out on the floor beside them. As much as that pleases me to see, it's not helpful to our current situation. Fox is out cold. Dante, too.
My heart aches. I realize how hopeless it is.
I dab the blood off Boxcar's cheek with my sleeve. I wish I could tell him it'll all be all right. That he was everything I could have ever wanted in a husband. That he would have been a great father.
But I'm not sure what's real and true anymore.
Secrets and lies. Killers and thieves.
A family forever broken.
But this is the family I chose.
What does that say about me?
Chapter 1
Caleb
“Hey, sweetie, how much for the 9-iron?”
I twitch. Nothing pisses me off more than when random, strange men start firing terms of endearment at me, but I can’t risk losing another sale right now.
I throw on my best customer-serving smile and crane my neck to get a better look over the counter. “Oh, that one is two-hundred and fifty.”
“Dollars?!”
“Yes, sir.”
He waddles toward the counter and his bulbous gut quivers beneath his shirt. “It’s a damn golf club.”
“It’s an antique,” I point out, still smiling.
His eyes blink as if I just spoke some foreign language. “It’s a golf club.”
I hold my breath, trying very hard not to sigh with annoyance. “It’s a really nice golf club, sir...”
“I’ll give you twenty for it.”
Are you fucking kidding me?
