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“That was you, Dad, but something tells me that security room going dark wasn’t just for us. I mean, how could it be? No one knew we were coming. And yet, there were no feeds available to capture what was about to happen in that hotel. There was also little to no security on that floor, which was quite unusual as well. My people weren’t even certain they’d be able to get in and get to Callum Prinze since he had so much, but that night they were just gone. The man was unattended, and the only one around was Lucas Gray, a man who worked for you.”
The older man looked up. “What are you trying to say, son?”
“I’m sure you see what I’m trying to say,” Ramses continued. “Lucas Gray obviously had a job. And one was obviously this.” Ramses held up the flash drive. “This confession. It had Callum’s truths, but like you said, these were probably just for me. Justice was going to be ultimately served in another way, wasn’t it, Dad?”
The man laced his hands, and Ramses eased forward.
“Lucas Gray was there to carry out that justice,” Ramses said. “An occurrence that would have happened had no other forces been at hand.”
I think we all knew those other forces. Between the Legacy families and Bru, justice had been served that night.
But it sounded like they had only happened to get there first.
Ramses didn’t continue, but the older man’s silence was everything. He started to speak, but then Ramses held up his hand.
“And if you did have a guy there, one to get that confession and ultimately take out that hit,” Ramses started, his throat jumping. “You had someone watching over the situation. You had someone there with Callum Prinze, alongside him and watching his moves. Maybe even guiding them.”
I looked up, my twin brother as well. Ares didn’t seem to breathe above me.
“You had someone watching over my kid,” Ramses stated, his knuckles touching his mouth. He nodded. “You had someone there to protect her and her brother Bruno.”
The chain of my necklace dug into my fingers, my throat thickening, and Ares’s nostrils flared above me. There was a plead in my twin brother’s eyes in the direction of our grandfather, something deep, and I wondered if I had that too. We’d both had so much darkness in our lives, and just once, we wanted to have some light. We wanted something to be true and to be able to believe in it.
We wanted to believe in someone.
The older man cradled his prosthetic hand, and though I wondered if he lost it that day at that cafe, I wondered more about him. I wondered about his soul and if there truly was something to believe in within him. If people could change themselves, change their legacy.
“Dad?” There was a plead in Ramses’s eyes too, his voice. “Did you have someone on the front lines looking after my daughter?”
Grandpa Mallick looked up, his eyes sad. “I’m the reason someone had to be at the front lines looking after your daughter, my granddaughter.” His gaze cut away. “And Lucas did what he could. Callum didn’t always reveal his moves right away. Things like that fire. The plan there was to save Sloane, make it look like Godfrey went insane, and for Callum Prinze to be the one to save her and bring her back to this town. He didn’t tell Lucas this until the plan was in action and even had Godfrey fire on Lucas, force him to defend himself to make it look good.”
Oh, my god.
“Godfrey Sloane had basically been put on a suicide mission, and Lucas informed me Prinze had been able to convince Godfrey to do it with the promise of keeping his son Bru safe in all this.”
Another lie. Callum had every intention of killing my brother. He was sick, a madman.
“I suppose Prinze thought Sloane’s save would make him look good to the city, to Sloane herself, and to his family.” Grandpa’s jaw tightened. “And everything that happened to her I’ll never be able to forgive myself for. I’m the reason she needed protection. The choices I made.” He squeezed his eyes. “I found out too late where she was. There’d been a leak at Fredrick’s firm. A guy there had been feeding Callum information for years about our family. That’s how Callum knew to get to her in the hospital and about the births in the first place. The traitor even helped with the goddamn adoption.”
His voice rattled the air, and I covered my mouth.
Ares glanced my way. “D said someone who worked for our grandfather helped with the coverup, a lawyer,” he whispered. He looked into the room. “Sounds like that’s how Callum got intel on our family.”
I rubbed my chest, and Ramses nodded.
“We know all about Fredrick’s associate Dane Masterson and found out recently about his passing. He’d been in hiding before,” Ramses said. “I can imagine because pretty much everyone else involved in my daughter’s kidnapping was dead. I’m sure Dane connected the dots that Callum was going after people.”
Our grandfather said nothing, and Ramses leaned forward.
“But that one was on you this time, right?” Ramses asked, both my twin and I blinking. “I could go on about the evidence we’ve gathered there, but I won’t. Dane Masterson’s car accident was you, his death you. It was because that one was personal.”
A short breath left from our grandfather’s lips, his eyes narrowed. “He hurt our family, son,” he said, his voice struggled, tight. “And I can make no apologies for that.”
He seemed to battle something as he stared away, like he had no regrets but wasn’t necessarily at peace with what he’d done.
I suppose those answers only resided with him.
Ramses picked up the flash drive. “You want me to expose Callum then? Tell the world the truth about what he did to our family?”
