Page 124 of Heart Of A Goon II

He snickered to himself. “Don’t tell me Zoya has feelings?”

“Your auntie has always had feelings.”

The minute auntie left my mouth his expression turned serious. “Why do you want me to die?”

“Huh?”

“I’ve always loved you, Bean.”

“Menace, what the fuc⁠—”

He turned and looked me dead in the eyes. “You are my sister. My baby sister to be specific. I don’t claim that other shit, but Constance Caselli raised you like her own. I raised you like my own and that’s because you are.”

Fucking emotions were getting the best of me. “What happened to them?”

I had never known what happened to my parents other than they had died. It wasn’t until we were older that we learned they were murdered. Our lives changed, and Menace had to grow up overnight. He went from a high school student to being in charge of three siblings and making sure we stayed together.

It couldn’t have been easy having your childhood ripped away from you. Going from being responsible for yourself to three other kids. He didn’t have a prom, graduation, or experience all of the things that we did while we were in high school.

My uncle used to pop in and out, but eventually that stopped. Even as a kid, I could tell when someone had given you their ass to kiss. We weren’t his priority, and he didn’t care what happened with us.

Menace did.

Angie did.

He took a deep breath and looked over at me. “Nash had them killed because of Case House. He wanted something that wasn’t his, and he got it.”

“Is that why you changed our last names?”

“Exact reason.” He spit onto the sand. “I’d fucking kill myself before I ever have that name tied to us. He fucking took our life from us, Zoya. The life that was promised to us for greed… his own fucking brother.”

My stomach turned as I rubbed my hands and looked over him. He wasn’t rubbing his hands together because this was anger. He was as upset as he probably was when he found out.

The anger never left him because how could it? It wasn’t like we got a second chance to do this shit over again. We couldn’t rewind the tape and have our parents with us again.

“Fuck, Maverick.” My stomach was in knots hearing what really happened to my parents.

My heart hurt that they were casualties of greed. Neither of them deserved that, because they were good people. Daddy just wanted to work and make a living. I remember him always traveling for work and coming home with treats for us.

I was old enough to know that relationships and marriage weren’t perfect. As a kid, I witnessed my version of perfection. I witnessed the love that they had for each other, the love that they had for us. My mother was always so jumpy, and we lived to scare her. She’d hold her chest and let out a nervous laugh because she was so scary.

My hands flew to my mouth as I sobbed, thinking about how scared she probably was. How she thought about us all the way to the end. Before thinking or pleading for her life, she probably prayed for her children’s lives before hers was taken.

When I looked over at Menace’s face, his was no longer dry. Tears fell down his face like they did mine. I broke protocol and put my hand into his.

He didn’t jerk his hand away, instead, he closed his hand on mine as we both silently cried for the lives of our parents. Lives that were taken so senselessly. They didn’t deserve to die.

“A lot of shit I hide because I never want y’all to hurt like this. They’ve been gone a very long time, but I feel that shit like it happened yesterday. Some nights I see their bodies in that morgue and wake up in a cold sweat. Being your brother means being your protector. Physically and mentally, and you struggled so much in your teens, Bean.”

I thought back to my attempt at ending my own life and then at him. “Is that why you slept in my room for two months after that happened?”

For months after I had been released, Menace slept in my room on the floor. He refused to let me out of his view, always making sure to check in on me. Even when I went off to college, I remember him always showing up and pretending like he needed something. As I thought back, I was almost certain that he did that because he wanted to check in on me.

“Say what it is… stop using filler words. After you tried to kill yourself.” Don came and sat beside me.

Me and Menace still held hands, and he grabbed my hand. “Yeah, that.”

“Say it, Bean.”