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Ava Rose giggled and pressed a wet kiss to his face. Nothing soothed the soul like the unconditional love of a child.
A truth I hoped would hold up when this Sunday dinner was over. I nursed a glass of forty-year-old scotch as we waited for Emmett and Vanessa since I was still recovering from last night’s indulgence.
Or maybe I was just stalling.
“Sorry we’re late,” Emmett grunted five minutes later. “Nessa wasn’t feeling well.”
“Another baby?” The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them, and I realized that this table and the people gathered around it were my future. My legacy. Every last one of them.
I couldn’t do it.
I couldn’t tell them about stalking, about hunting, and about ultimately killing those alleged men of the cloth who were nothing more than lesser predators than myself.
That particular confession would have to wait.
“Ma, you have something you wanted to say?” If I’d had more alcohol in my system, Jasper’s prodding would have pissed me off. But now, I was totally fucking Zen.
“Yes. In fact, I do.”
All eyes on both sides of the table turned to me, expressions ranging from expectant to bored, except Calvin. He had anger and exhaustion painted on his face like a mask. His resentment and sadness were like a uniform these days, and I knew what I said next would make it worse.
Much, much worse.
“Well,” Calvin growled, “don’t keep us all in suspense.” He reached for the wine glass and paused, choosing the water instead.
Right. “It’s about Dietrich Mueller and Bonnie.”
Cal gasped, his eyes wide with anticipation. “You found out something?”
I nodded. “In a way, yes.” As I gazed deep into my son’s angry gaze, I knew there would never be an easy way to get these words past my lips.
“Bonnie was meeting with Mueller regularly, passing important information about this family, and the Ashby Organization, on to him. I did what I had to do.”
“Bullshit!” Calvin’s voice was thick with disbelief.
The room erupted, at first in shocked gasps and whispered words. I ignored the chaos and kept my gaze on Calvin, my baby boy, who looked disbelieving but devastated because he knew me, knew I wouldn’t lie about this. Knew this was the moment he’d that would make him hate me forever.
“Ma,” Kat said calmly, her voice even. “Please say this is bullshit. Tell Cal you didn’t kill his wife. The mother of his child. Tell him.” Her voice was pleading, needing this part of the story to be a lie.
It wasn’t a lie, and I couldn’t, or wouldn’t, let them think it was, even if it made them feel better.
“It’s true, son. You can believe what you want and paint me as the most evil villain alive. But I had to protect my family.”
“Ma,” Virgil growled at me, angry fire shooting in my direction. “You seriously didn’t kill Bonnie.”
I should have felt comforted that my kids didn’t want to believe this about me, but it only meant they didn’t know me. Not the real me.
“The truth is that I did what needed to be done to protect the family. I didn’t want to believe it. That she and Mueller were having their little tete-a-tetes talking about our organization. I also did it because you, Calvin, weren’t paying attention to your wife.”
“Oh, so now this is on me?” He let out a bitter laugh, his devastation slowly turned to anger. White-hot rage.
“In part, yes. I may have pulled the trigger, but did you know how unhappy she was?”
“Unhappy is a far fucking cry from putting a bullet in her head!” Kat smacked her hands on the table, her glare furious. She ignored Terry’s efforts to calm her.
Calvin dismissed the question. “She was struggling. Being a new mom was hard for her. Why’d you do it? How could you?!”
“Meeting with Mueller had nothing to do with being a new mother. You can justify her behavior however you see fit. Still, the truth is that Bonnie didn’t care about me or Jasper or Kat, or even Virgil and Maisie. She wanted the rest of us gone—in jail or dead, it didn’t matter to her—so she could have a normal life with you and Ava Rose. The fool thought she could change the man she married.”
