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I stare at his hand hesitantly. I don’t trust him or his friends, but if they can get me the training I need to allow my rage free reign and still be able to fight without getting my arse handed to me, then…
I take his hand and allow him to pull me to my feet, wincing as the movement jars my ribs.
“Come on, let’s get you patched up, I’m pretty sure I broke at least a couple of your ribs,” he says with a chuckle.
“You should be lucky that’s all you’ve got,” Wyatt says with a laugh as we start walking. “Rafe could have killed you right there and no one would have said a word to stop it.”
I stumble slightly at his words wondering what the fuck I’ve just got myself into, but Rafael puts an arm around my shoulder to steady me and laughs.
“I’ll explain when you're getting patched up but don’t worry, I think you’ll fit in just fine.”
Rafe had kept his word after I told him about my dad. It turned out he knew exactly who he was, considering he’d just become Damian Monroe’s new personal lawyer, so he explained everything that went on in this town, including our roles in it as their children.
I wish I could say that I was shocked by what he told me but after what I’d seen that night in Kenzi’s house, and knowing that my anger was fast becoming out of control, I was resigned to the fact that it seemed my life was going to be centred around violence for the foreseeable future. I immersed myself in training, fighting, at the club and it wasn’t long before I was tearing apart anyone they threw into the ring with me.
Being with the boys and gaining some control over the way my rage was released helped to calm me enough to ease the nightmares. It allowed me to finally get some rest.Theybecame my new family. Without them I knew that my anger and sleep deprivation would have ended up getting me killed, so I vowed to myself that I wouldn’t fail them the way I failed Kenzi.
My ruthlessness soon had the others naturally deferring to me when it came to making decisions. When our fathers decided that we needed to become more involved in the family business and had us do their dirty work for them, I decided that it was time to start fighting back and making them pay for what they were forcing us to do.
For the last five years we have been showing them exactly what they want to see from us, acting as the kings of this town and being their enforcers, all whilst working to bring them down from the inside out. We have managed to stay under their radar, always making sure their attention is diverted towards one of the many rivals they have throughout the country. But if we were to try to end them ourselves and fail… Well, none of us would make it away from that revelation alive.
Those men are my brothers. They gave me a purpose when my whole life was crumbling down around me, and I would do anything to make sure I didn’t fail them. So here I am, sitting in my truck outside Kenzi’s house, on time, and staring at the message she sent to my phone. Torn between trying not to do or say anything that would make her back out of our newly formed deal, and my need for control, wanting to punish her for being such a fucking brat all the time.
I look up from my phone to see Xave standing in the now open doorway watching me so I climb out of the truck and start making my way towards him.
“Uh, hey, Xave. Tink sent me a message to meet her here,” I say waving my phone in front of me like some kind of white flag waving in surrender. “Where is she?”
“She’s not here, so it’s just you and me,” he says as he looks me up and down.
“What? Where the fuck is she?” I ask, feeling my temper rise at her absence after she was the one that summoned me here. “How the fuck are we supposed to figure out a plan that will actually work if she’s not even here to go over everything we sent you?”
“Who the fuck do you think dealt with every plan she has ever needed over the last six years, arsehole? She’s not exactly known for her restraint,” he says as a smirk rises on his lips. “I mean, you should know, you’ve been at the end of her blade more than once recently. One such incident led to quite a delicious punishment for her, if I remember correctly.”
A low groan leaves me at the thought of Xave and Kenzi together, and he looks smug as he turns around and disappears into the house. I go through the door behind him, taking a look around as I follow him through the house. The place is huge, nearly as big as Rafe’s with its three floors and wrap-around landings, plus a whole lot of doors that could lead to absolutely anywhere if the room we ended up in last week is anything to go by.
I’m half expecting Xave to lead me back down to what Kenzi called her medical room and the thought of going back down there makes a shiver crawl down my spine. With all the shit she had down there, including that weird as fuck St Andrews Cross that she looked at with literal hearts in her eyes, all it needed was chains hanging from the ceiling to make it look like a torture chamber in some fucked up horror movie from the nineties.
The room he leads me to has been set up as an office. It’s so obviously Xave’s space, there are screens on a long desk that goes the length of the back wall, four of which are split to show six images each and are cycling through the live camera feed from not only the inside and outside of the house, including the road I drove up, but also of the forest surrounding the property. I have no idea how far out they are, but from what I can see on the screen there is not even a hint of any trails or roads.
Xave makes his way behind a slightly smaller desk that sits in front of the wall of screens. It has two screens of its own sitting on top of it but they’re not facing me so I can’t see what’s on them. He can though, so as he looks at whatever is on them and his fingers fly over the keyboard in front of him, I take a moment to look around the rest of the office, looking for anything I might recognise amongst the shelves.
“It’s been a long time, Clay,” Xave says, and I turn to see him watching me walk around the edges of the room. “This would probably be the only thing you would recognise now.”
I walk towards his desk and pick up the picture he points to. I smile as I take in Kenzi’s grinning face. The picture was taken on her thirteenth birthday. It was the year we decided to throw her a birthday party. We held it in the treehouse and we were the only three there, but she was so happy that day. It was something she had never experienced before and in the picture she’s sitting behind the birthday cake Xave had got for her, getting ready to blow out the candles and make her wish.
I put the picture back down on the desk picking up the one next to it. It’s of both Xave and Kenzi this time. Xave is standing in a graduation gown with a diploma in one hand and his arm around Kenzi’s shoulders. He looks tired, but the smile on his face is huge as he faces the camera. Kenzi has an arm around Xave’s waist and is also smiling at the camera, only it's not the same happy smile as the one in the other picture, it’s not even one of pride, although that could be there too. No, this smile is different. It’s more unhinged and there’s a glint in her eyes that says she’s thinking of the most gruesome way to cause you pain.
“That was taken when I graduated university,” he says, clearing his throat and taking it from me, placing it back on the desk with no more explanation than that. “I have to say, this is the last place I expected to find you,” he continues, completely changing the subject as he looks from the picture to me, “It seems that we have something in common once again, so let’s get to it, shall we?”
He nods to the chair I’m standing next to so I pull it out and sit down waiting for him to start telling me how we’re going to take down our fathers. He sits there for a few minutes just watching me and it's long enough for the silence to get uncomfortable, which has me clearing my throat. Xave’s lips twitch in a small smirk as he looks towards the screen.
“We’ve come up with a plan for dealing with your parents, but there is something else we need to deal with before that,” he says as he taps the buttons on his keyboard. “I’ve found out that next weekend there will be a man staying in town that will be a guest of your father,” he says, turning to look at me. “His name is Philip Sullivan. I need you to get any information you can on why they are meeting, especially what they talk about during their meeting on Saturday night. Kenzi will, of course, be asking him herself but it would be beneficial to have someone that can tell us if his answers are truthful.”
My brow furrows in confusion as I go over everything he just said. If Kenzi questions him it means he won’t be returning to London alive, but why the fuck are they worrying about this guy when they should be working on building a fool proof plan of attack against our fathers? Never mind the fact that if our fathers were to find out what happened to this guy it could put all our lives at risk.
“You do realise that we’ve only got three weeks to deal with our fathers, right? We should be concentrating on that and not getting information on some no name associate of his,” I say with a scowl.
“He does have a name, which I just told you. And you will do this, Clay,” he looks at me, his eyes cold and his mouth set in a sneer. “If you want us to rid you four of your fathers so bad, you will get me the weekly schedule of a fucking flea if I ask it of you.”
