AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She looks at me wide-eyed, and it takes me a second to realise that it's because I spoke for Ace, and he is the head of this family or whatever the fuck they call it.
Ace has clearly realised this, too because he steps forward so that he’s next to me and adds, “She’s right. It will be paid; I’m sorry that I didn’t make that clear before.”
His apology throws her again, and she’s left gaping at him like a fish. We really need to talk and decide our next steps though so I decide to encourage her along, “Why don’t you go and let anyone who is still here know about the vacation time and then come and find us and let us know how many are staying?”
She nods rapidly, her eyes still wide as she turns around on her heel and rushes further into the house.
Once she's gone, the guys all relax a bit more, and Ace scrubs a hand over the back of his neck as he turns back to look at us, “Fucking hell, I forgot how they treated the staff.”
“So did I,” Malachi agrees.
“I didn’t, but my father treated them a hell of a lot worse than yours did. That woman actually spoke to you; if that were one of my father's staff members, they’d be shaking, staring at the floor, and most likely wouldn’t be able to get a full sentence out.” Rome says grimly.
“That’s fucking horrible,” I reply, knowing that it’s not strong enough, but there’s not much else I could add. It’s despicable.
Rome nods, his eyes dark, “I hated it. Some of my worst beatings were simply because I spoke to them like people and respected them. I was kind to them, and kindness was a weakness as far as my parents were concerned.”
“I’m sorry. I’m glad you were though.”
“Me too,” he replies with a smile and then reaches out his hand for me, and I thread my fingers through his.
Mal claps his hands together, “Alright, we need to decide what we’re going to do next, but I need a fucking coffee, so Ace, where’s the kitchen?”
I feel my eyebrows draw together in confusion, “Why would you need directions? You guys grew up together; surely you’ve been here hundreds of times?”
Ace starts walking, flicking on lights in the house as he says, “My father insisted on saving electricity and having only the very essential lights on. I fucking hated it.” He explains when I raise an eyebrow in question and then answers my previous question, “We weren’t supposed to be friends, remember? We were actually supposed to be enemies.”
“If one of us were ever found at the other's houses, we would’ve been used as a bargaining tool and most likely ended up dead,” Rip adds.
“I had completely forgotten about that,” I reply and then add, “Do you want some help turning lights on? There’s a hell of a lot of switches?”
Ace grins as he nods, “Yes, please, Blue.”
“If it was a rule of your parents, then you might want to tell the staff that it’s okay to leave them on in case you create panic by turning them on all the time,” Malachi points out.
“Oh shit yeah,” Ace agrees and then looks around before shrugging and calling out, “Hello!”
The same woman from before comes running out of the hallway, her eyes once again widening as she watches me turn on a light and then sees all of the other lights on.
“Erm, yes, sir?” she asks.
“Please, call me Ace, and just a heads up, the lights don’t have to be turned off all the time. It's the evening; it's dark and we need lights on in the house. If you could let anyone who decides to stay on know, that would be great,” Ace grins, his smile completely disarming.
She simply nods and then rushes away again.
The poor woman isn’t going to know what to do with herself after this; it’s definitely not what she’s used to. Now that the lights are on, I can see the interior much better, and as Ace leads us further into the house and hopefully toward coffee, I can’t help but be nosey. It’s full of dark old furniture and fading red patterned rugs, the décor actually looks like it hasn’t been updated for a long time, but the effect is still elegant.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Of course, the other thing I notice is that it's vast. Huge, in fact, and has old paintings on the walls and all sorts of memorabilia of times gone by. It’s pretty fascinating, and if we ever get to the point where we’re genuinely safe being here, I’d love to know about the actual origins of the town and maybe even what happened to make everyone fall out and the fifth family disappear. I still can’t entirely accept that the fifth family is actually mine.
All evidence suggests that it is, which means that hopefully, there is something in the house that will be able to explain what happened if we can get to the house, that is, after what the guys said about the coastal road I’m starting to doubt that we’ll be able to get up there when we finally do go and besides that, finding out what’s going on with the guy's parents and who is killing them off is more important than checking out my connection to this place, it can wait and I’d rather know that they were safe and that we’re not going to continue to have people fucking trying to kill us every five minutes.
The kitchen is surprisingly modern and absolutely fucking spotless, so much so that I feel bad about messing it up. Not that we’re going to mess it up, but it really is that clean.
“Take a seat,” Ace offers as he points to the small and scarred table in the corner of the room that doesn’t match the rest of it at all. When he sees our confusion, he sighs, “The staff was only allowed to eat in here and, of course, had to make do; that table is probably as old as the original part of the house.”
“Oh, that’s pretty fucking cool, actually,” Mason replies, “Our parents completely gutted our house, stripped it right back, took absolutely all character from it, and modernized it completely, so only the outside looks like it’s the same house that our great, great, however fucking many greats it is, grandparents built. I remember being really mad at them for it, and it’s why I love old buildings so much now.”
