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“Plus another mess of yours to clean up,” Andrew retorted. “This time a fucking murder. I tried to keep your name clear of it, but she found out.” He edged back from her. “I don’t know what you’re so pissed about. You got exactly what you’ve always wanted.”
Naomi’s eyes narrowed. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
I hid a grimace. So much for the happy reunion.
Andrew jerked his gaze away from her and out the window, but not before I saw the flash of pain in his eyes. “It means you coped with her bullshit a long time ago by staying as far away from her—from us—as you could. This time, you almost succeeded in making it permanent.” One hand clenched briefly on the blanket. “You left me thinking I’d driven you off to your death. You could have told me you were alive.”
“Right,” she snorted, though I heard the guilt behind it. “And risk one of your self righteous gung-ho-Saberton reactions?”
Brian shifted, muscles in his arms tense, and I had a feeling he was poised to put a stop to the bickering. I laid a hand on his arm and gave him a slight headshake. Sometimes the best thing for old, dirty laundry was a little airing. He frowned at me then gave a grudging nod.
“Someone has to watch out for grandfather’s company,” Andrew was saying. “But you could have had a little faith in me.” He turned back to her and shrugged, a hurt, bitter look on his face. “I don’t know why I expected anything different. You abandoned me before. You abandoned me again.”
Naomi’s jaw dropped. “I never abandoned you! I was off doing my job.”
“Which was chock full of the thrill you adored,” he replied with a sneer. “It was a bonus that it happened to help Saberton.” He waved a hand in our direction. “And now you’re off working with the people who are trying to undermine us.”
She gave him an Are you insane? look. “Zombies are being tortured and used. People have been kidnapped. My boyfriend has been captured.” She returned his sneer in force. “This isn’t about undermining anyone or anything. It’s about righting a despicable wrong.”
“Where do you draw the line at despicable?” he demanded. “Do you think it was all roses and lollipops for the people you lied to, stole from, tricked, or planted things on during your little spy games? And apparently murder didn’t cross the line.” She jerked as the last one hit home, and he lifted his chin. “As for zombies, Saberton wouldn’t have even known about them if you hadn’t stolen shit from Ivanov.”
She hauled herself up and snagged the crutches. “This is all my fault?” Her voice remained steady, but I spied the quiver in her lip. She’d already been carrying the guilt of how Saberton discovered the zombies. “You’re blaming me for your attitude of ‘They’re not like me so I can screw them over all I want’?” Tears welled in her eyes. “You never used to be so hateful,” she said. “What the hell happened to you, Andrew?”
Regret shadowed his face before he steeled his gaze. “While you were off thrill-seeking, I was stuck taking care of business.” He didn’t have to add stuck with Mother. That came through loud and clear.
“Your business sucks.” She crutched to the door but when she reached the hallway she stopped and spoke without looking back. “No matter what you tell yourself so you can sleep at night, it’s not okay to kidnap people for profit. And, yes, zombies are people. So get over yourself, Andrew.” With that she hurried down the hall.
“The business was all I had!” he shouted after her, voice shaking with long pent-up emotion. “You found a way out and never looked back. Maybe I needed—” He broke off, turned away. “Fuck,” he breathed.
Needed . . . an escape? A way out? A new life? It was obvious he loved his sister and wanted out of his mother’s shadow. Andrew’s armor had a chink in it, though I had no idea how big of one.
I cleared my throat. “This is the perfect opportunity to walk away from Saberton, y’know.” His shoulders sagged. Maybe, I thought. Just maybe.
He drew himself up and faced me, his expression all cool business again. “Walk away from Saberton,” he echoed, voice stiff. “You believe this is a perfect opportunity for me to walk away from a career I love and my grandfather’s legacy?”
Crap. Me and my big mouth. I fumbled for anything to say that could possibly salvage the moment, but in the next instant his composure crumbled, as if he simply didn’t have the energy to maintain it.
“Saberton is my life,” Andrew said, voice rough. “It’s who I am. I can’t abandon it. I can’t—not even to get away from our mother.” A soft sigh escaped him. “Julia’s talents made it easy for her to stay away.” He spoke with soft precision, as if trying to win an old argument with himself. “My talents bound me in close. It’s simply how it is.”
A sudden wave of unexpected sympathy left me at a loss for words. Julia/Naomi had left her family behind but could still keep doing the covert ops spy adventure shit she loved. S
he changed employers, but the job itself remained pretty much the same. It had never even occurred to me that Andrew might love what he did just as much—probably because the whole financial-business-power-tie-boardroom thing seemed tedious and dry and dull to me. Yet for Andrew to “walk away” was a much bigger sacrifice, I realized with chagrin. I didn’t know a lot about the business world, but somehow I doubted he’d be able to step right into another high-level position anywhere else. Plus, anywhere else wouldn’t be Saberton.
A quick glance at Brian told me he’d realized the same thing, though there wasn’t much sympathy in his eyes. Sighing, I looked back to Andrew, but he’d managed to regain his bearing in those few seconds and spoke before I could.
“We have an agreement,” he stated. “I’ll help get Griffin and Marcus Ivanov out in exchange for my release. That’s it. And we have that only because I know it’s in Saberton’s best interests to not give Jane Pennington a reason to fuck us over, even though my mother doesn’t see it my way.”
Best interests? My sympathy vanished like a popped soap bubble. “Whatever,” I snapped. “You look like shit and need to get your ass cleaned up before we walk you into Saberton Tower.”
Brian gestured toward the door. “Come on, Saber,” he said. “Once we take care of that we’ll meet with Gentry to make the final plan.”
With that, I left the guys to their business and headed downstairs. Naomi sat on the sofa in the living room with her foot propped on the coffee table.
“Just like old times,” she said with a weak smile.
“You gonna be okay?”
“Sure. Old shit. New twist.” But she let out a long sigh. “We used to be so close. I played games with my grandfather that turned into real work. Andrew was the so-called responsible one, focused on boring stuff.”
