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She shakes her head, refusing to say a word, and Zade takes a step closer, her face breaking with fear. “I’m not going to ask again.”
Sawyer’s hand flies up against Zade’s chest, pulling him up short. “Watch it, man. That’s still my fucking sister you’re talking to.”
“What’s with your family?” Zade mutters. “Not a damn one of them knows what’s good for them.”
Sawyer clenches his jaw, Zade’s comments only making the tension between them rise. “You don’t want to go there right now, Zade,” Sawyer warns. “Fucking question Cara and that’s it. But if you put a fucking hand on her, I will end you. You hear me?”
Zade holds his stare for a moment before turning back to Cara, her hands violently shaking in her lap. “Do you have any idea just how fucking lucky you are right now? If it weren’t for your brother being here—you’d already be dead. So before you decide to hold back from me, keep that in mind. Now, tell me what the fuck I need to know.”
“Hartley Scott,” she says, tears running down her face. “I report to Hartley.”
“FUCK,” Sawyer spits, his hands at his temples. He walks up and down the length of the couch before coming back to the center and looking at his sister. “How could you be so fucking stupid?”
Cara throws herself to her feet. “Stupid?” she screeches, shoving her brother hard. “He was going to kill you if I didn’t give her up. He had the fucking live feed with the sniper right on your goddamn chest. What the fuck was I supposed to do? I’m not losing you for this bitch.”
“You lie,” Zade growls. “You fucking lie to save your brother, and then you call me.”
Cara scoffs, falling back to the couch. “Right, because calling you has always worked out so well for me in the past. Check my phone, asshole. I’ve tried calling you at least five times just this fucking week. Have you answered any of my calls or even attempted to call me back? I don’t think so.”
Frustration burns through me, and I watch as she crosses her arms over her chest as though she’s the one who’s been wronged here. “Uhh, I don’t want to alarm anyone,” I say. “But do we need to be going?”
All five of them look up at me in confusion, and I let out a heavy sigh. “She was on the phone with Hartley when I got here. He knows I’m here.”
Dalton grunts in frustration. “Fucking hell, Cara. Is it really so goddamn hard to keep your mouth closed?”
Sawyer inches toward his sister. “Lay off,” he tells Dalton. “She told us what we needed to know.”
“And what?” Dalton argues. “You think that’s it? That she gets to just walk away because she cooperated? Fuck that, man. You know that’s not how it works.”
“Alright,” Zade says a moment later, realizing this is only going to get ugly from here on out. He turns to Cara, not looking pleased about any of this. “Grab your shit. You’re coming with us.”
She stiffens on the couch, her eyes wide as she looks up at him. “To your penthouse?” she questions nervously. “You’ve never invited me back there.”
“Don’t fucking mistake this,” he growls. “I’m not inviting you to stay with me. You’ll be locked in my cell until I figure out what the fuck to do with you.”
She throws herself to her feet again, her hands flying out. “No. Absolutely not. I’m not some bitch you can just order around.”
“Yeah,” Zade scoffs. “You are.”
Sawyer shakes his head, looking at his sister. “Just get your shit, Cara. Fighting it is only going to make this worse.”
She looks up at her brother, hitting him with a big doe-eyed stare. “Don’t do this to me,” she whispers. “Not when our family is already falling apart. We’ll never be able to come back from this.”
“Now, Cara,” he says, something breaking in his tone. “Don’t force my hand.”
Cara holds his stare for a moment, realizing she won’t be able to get herself out of this one, and with that, she turns on her heel and storms off toward her room, Dalton and Zade following behind.
Easton, Sawyer, and I make our way out of the small apartment, and as the door closes behind me, I know that I will never return here again. A heaviness spreads through my chest, but I push it aside, not wanting to get caught up on things that simply don’t matter.
After getting Venom’s enclosure loaded into the back of the Escalade, we pile into the car, and within moments, Zade and Sawyer are there with Cara, breaking into my piece of shit car. I shake my head, watching the sight. “They could have just asked for the keys.”
Easton scoffs. “You ever known Zade to do things the easy way?”
