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Caleb opened his mouth, but nothing came out. There was guilt in his eyes, which made things worse.
“Did you think that it was an accident that Caleb chose you?” Callum laughed and shook his head. “Maybe you aren’t very smart.”
“What?” Callum’s words confused me.
Caleb’s cheeks turned red, and he was looking everywhere but at me. “Don’t,” he begged.
“No, no.” Callum walked forward slightly. “She should know the truth.”
Caleb’s eyes grew wide with panic. “You said—”
“Shut up,” I snapped, turning my attention to Callum. “Tell me.”
Callum nodded. “Caleb pursued you on my orders.”
“Why?”
I ignored the sharpness in my chest. I didn’t love Caleb anymore, and I really didn’t know if I ever had. Still, the knowledge that Caleb was only with me for some convoluted reason stung.
“I’m shocked that your father never mentioned it,” Callum said. At the mention of my father, his fingers wrapped harder around the handle of the knife and all the mirth was gone from his eyes. “I thought we would be the first people on his list when he put it all together, but I guess it worked to our advantage that he’s got a lot of enemies.”
My head was racing as I thought through what Callum was saying. What the hell was he talking about?
Callum must have realized my confusion. “Your father put mine in prison.”
This made me laugh. “My father?” Callum was fuming, but I couldn’t stop the laughter bubbling up inside of me. “He’s not exactly known for working with the police. After all, he’s a fucking criminal.”
Callum stepped toward me once more, but Caleb stopped him.
“Your father is a criminal. He’s a piece of shit who threw my father under the bus when he realized that he was skimming a little bit off the top of your daddy’s millions.”
Things started to click into place. “Your father was laundering money for the cartel.”
Caleb nodded. “He was.”
I laughed harder. “And he was stealing?” I shook my head at the two of them. “Apparently, the apple doesn’t fall far from the idiot tree.”
Callum bared his teeth at me, but I was having some sort of weird out of body experience where I was disassociating from the danger that I felt. “You should be thanking your lucky stars that he just went to prison. Normally, the cartel makes an example out of thieves.” I bared my teeth slightly as I looked at the two of them. “And their family.”
“You don’t think we suffered?” Callum asked, his voice dangerously low. “Our entire lives went to shit while you and your family lived in the lap of luxury, our family fell apart. We lost everything.”
The anger in Callum’s voice was unlike anything I’d ever experienced. I’d grown up around criminals, but I understood them. Murder wasn’t personal when it came to the cartel. It was business. That was why I’d never been certain that they were responsible for what happened to my mother and brother.
“Why go after my mother?” The words were thick in my mouth. Angel was my father’s only son. If they wanted to hurt him, I could see why they’d go after my brother. But my mother was a helpless woman, and they’d brutalized her.
Tears prickled my eyes. “She did nothing to you.”
There was no guilt in Callum’s face. “I didn’t like that she didn’t think Caleb was good enough for you.” He shrugged. “She was a bitch.”
My face grew hot, and I rushed forward with a scream, ready to tear Callum’s eyes out. Caleb grabbed me around the waist, hauling me away as I kicked and screamed and threatened to kill him. “Calm down,” Caleb ordered.
He turned to his brother. “Can you stop it!” His hands were shaking as he pinned me against the wall.
“Why?” Tears streamed down my cheeks as I looked at the guy who I’d once loved. “Why?” I whispered again.
Caleb gulped. “I was high…”
I slide down the wall, curling into a ball as the weight of everything slammed into me. For months, I’d clung to the mystery of what happened to my mother. Now, I realized that she’d been a victim of something that had nothing to do with her.
