AllFreeNovel
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Killing doesn’t scare me. I’m not afraid of death, but more afraid of being used to hurt others. I want to be in control of my actions, and Xav wants to strip me of my choices.
I won’t be a weapon to be used by others.
“I saw you running down the road, your clothes half torn off, and I was driving home. I had a mark in my trunk, he was a priest in the next town down who was hurting kids. The gossip reached me when I was doing errands for my Dad, and I decided to see if they were true. Unfortunately, they were, and I took care of my own needs instead of helping you,” Orion sighs. “It’s been bothering me more and more, and I never feel regret. You deserved better from our fucking town in a lot of aspects.”
My jaw drops as I stare at him. “Thank you,” I whisper. I press my lips together as I think. “I did deserve better, but Farrelsville High School followed Derek a little too well.”
Derek sighs, rubbing his face. We’ve talked, and we understand each other much better now, but he knows what he did was shitty. He can sit with it for a bit.
“Anyway, that’s not why you’re here. I need you to tell me why you were helping Derek, and how that all started. I need your side of things, so he doesn’t have to repeat anything or feel like he needs to apologize for something. I don’t shame people for who they care about,” I shrug. “None of us do. We talk about it when we can, and I wasn’t around to do that.”
I shake my head as I think about how ridiculous that comment is.I was kidnapped and held hostage in a mental hospital. It makes talking about relationships a little difficult.
Turner moves lithely to rub my back, and I hum softly. It feels good, and helps to ground me. Nothing about this conversation is easy.
“I work for Grant, or at least I did. I want a piece of him before he fucks off this planet,” Orion grumbles. “I helped him with the campaign as needed, was the excited worker bee and talked up his strengths, but I was also his enforcer when things went south. At times, people wanted to strong arm Grant in his campaign because they wanted to introduce a new medical protocol for psychiatric care, or tried to screw him over. I tortured the offender, and either let him go, used him as an example for others, or disposed of him where no one would find him.”
Derek cracks his knuckles nervously, and I wonder why. Orion glances over at him and sighs. “Grant wanted to see how far he could make his son bend, so he dangled his wife’s continued health in front of Derek, and told him to kill two men who had crossed him.”
I glance at Derek and he shrugs. “Dad thought I would crumble, but my goal was to find you. I took everything that makes me human, and locked it away. I didn’t complain, I just made them scream. The worst thing for me, is the blood didn’t bother me, the killing, the clean up… none of it disgusted me. Everything I did was so we could find you as quickly as possible, it just took way longer, Len, than I thought it would,” Derek says, staring at the counter.
“How long it took, isn’t what matters, you all found me. And you came for me,” I tell them all. “I just feel so disconnected from everything, I want to know what I’ve missed.”
“You always were a gossip,” Turner teases me, brushing my shoulder with a kiss over my sweater.
“Was not,” I laugh. I watch as Roark pulls plates for food, and I smile. “Need any help with that, big guy?”
“Nope, keep pumping Orion for information, I’m enjoying watching how uncomfortable he is,” Roark chuckles.
Orion rolls his eyes. “Don’t steamroll over the new guy,” he rumbles and my eyes widen.
I was giving him the third degree for Derek, but is he the new guy? Hmmm.
“Baby, what’s with the look on your face?” Roark asks, glancing over at me.
“Processing,” I murmur. “I’m alright. So what’s Mr. Williams’ purpose for turning Derek into a killer? Did you need help doing what you do? I’m confused by that part.”
“Blackmail,” Derek grunts. “My father wants to tie me to him forever, so he now has a recording of me brutally killing the two men he asked me to.”
My mouth drops open. I take a breath before I shake my head. “We have to be able to fix that, right? You can’t go to jail for this, and your father is petty enough to leak that video to someone,” I gasp.
Orion puts his hand over mine, glancing down as if he’s surprised by his actions. “No, Greg said he’d take care of the video. I’m not sure how, but I’ve seen how large his network of contacts is. Derek won’t go down for this.”
I notice that he carefully didn’t use my name, but chose to ignore it. I’m just glad he didn’t call me little girl again.
“Good,” I sigh. “Is this conversation going to bug anyone if we continue as we eat?”
The guys all shake their heads and Roark hands out plates of food. I take a bite before we continue, and moan.Holy fuck, is this good.
My eyes close as I process the flavors of the chicken, cheese, and pasta.
Swallowing, I open my eyes to find they’re staring. Blushing, I shrug. Their gazes are all heated, but the only one I find surprising is that Orion’s is too. “I missed your food, Ror. I missed everything about you guys.”
Turner squeezes my arm knowingly. He had refused to move too far, forcing Orion to move farther around the counter. I smirk as I notice this, firmly reminding myself to stay in the present, or I’ll drown in what ifs and could haves.
I don’t have time for that tonight.
“So the videos will be taken care of, oh shit, what about Eric? You said you killed him, did Greg have to help with that too?” I ask.
