My heart broke because I knew what was coming next.
“They tore us apart.” Joker’s eyes looked glassy like he was trapped back in that moment. He was shaking. “I fought, butthree of those Alphaholes held me back. They called my sister aRogue. I didn’t have a clue what it meant. When Phantom’s dad came to claim me for his son as a Companion, I begged him on my knees to take my sister as a ward too. But he looked at me with disgust. He told me that she was a mutant.A freak. When I yelled at him not to call my sis that, he hit me. He said that if I ever spoke about her again, then he’d give me back to the Institute and make sure that she was executed. I was terrified. He was a powerful man, a General. He could have made it happen. I never saw my sister again. But I knew that no matter how long it took, I would find a way to save her.”
Suddenly, I paled.
Honey eyes and hair.
A Rogue who had spent their life in the ABO Facility.
Wouldn’t his sister be college aged by now?
“Is your sister called Colette?” I demanded, marching to Joker and grabbing him by his arms.
Joker’s eyes widened. “Oh, fuck. Please tell me that you saw her? Is she okay?Please.”
“She’s fine.” A matter of opinion. But I wasn’t telling a distraught brother everything that went on in that place. At least, not when Joker had just relived a house fire where he lost the rest of his pack. I might not be emotional but I could understand that. “She was a friend to me. She has worked herself up into a trusted role. She works for the facility. She’s kind, brave, and smart. She has the same eyes as you.”
Joker started to cry.
Startled, I glanced helplessly over my shoulder.
Immediately, Bird and Phantom joined me with their arms around Joker in a protective circle.
“We found her.” Joker leaned his head against Phantom’s chest. “It’s real.At last.”
Bird blinked. “Of course.This is your mission, saving your sister.It’s why you wouldn’t tell us. Why it was so important to you.”
Joker nodded. “Now you know. I wasn’t only being a dick.”
“Not only,” I conceded. “Except, if you’d trusted us earlier, then you’d have learned that we’re on the same mission.”
“You appear to be all about the blood and death and revenge shit. We took the contract because we thought that it would be a way into the notoriously hard to either find or break into Facility to rescue my sis. It’s taken us years to do that without Colette being put at risk.”
“Who says that the blood, death, and revenge shit and rescuing the Rogues aren’t the same thing? The whole reason that Bird and I had to leave, which we didn’t want to do, was becauseourmission was to also save the Rogues. I promised to break your sister out.”
Hearing that at least stopped Joker’s tears, and the kiss that followed from him was toe-curling enough to make up for the stress of the morning.
Then we’d shaken hands, making a deal to join our packs and take on the Facility together.
Why do I think, however, that there is more to this than Joker has yet told me?
Didn’t Joker say that he would only tell me one secret a day?
“Hey,” Bird calls over from the stove, “clear the table, dinner is ready. No murder shit where we’re eating.”
“Spoilsport,” I mutter.
Joker holds his hands over a grenade. “Don’t listen to the cruel Omega, baby. He doesn’t mean it.”
“He does,” Bird corrects. “Unless you want the chefs to eat all this yummy pasta ourselves…”
Joker and I exchange a panicked glance, before we hurriedly begin to drop the weapons into a faded, green bag by the side of the table.
“Aren’t you going to kiss them goodnight?” I tease.
Joker twirls to me, capturing my lips instead. “Gun play is kinky. Are you into that?”
My heart speeds up.
