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“Quiet!” Freddie roars. He picks up my mug and hurls it at the wall. There goes a perfectly good Tetley tea bag—if it was a Yorkshire Tea, I’d hope he’d have shown more respect. Freddie advances, squaring up to me shoulder-to-shoulder. “What did you do, Callen?”
“Look, I had an opportunity.” I back away slowly and hold up my hands. “Don’t tell me you wouldn’t have done the same.”
I stumble on a broken ceramic shard. Stupid mug.
“The Dukes protect people.” Freddie follows me. “We don’t kill for revenge. We’re not the Killers Club. That’s not who we are.”
“But this is different,” I insist. “You know what he did. I had a chance, and I took it. If I came to you, you’d have stopped me.”
“And for good reason! How many more people did you kill tonight because they got caught in the crossfire?” he asks, shaking in anger. “Time and time again, I’ve given you chances. So many fucking chances. I asked you to join the Dukes to offer you a lifeline. I gave you the opportunity to prove yourself and show that you’re one of us, and this is how you repay me?”
“Wait, you did it?” Seb frowns in confusion. No shit, Sherlock. Keep up! “But how did you get past security?”
I shrug. “I might have had some help.”
“You got her to do it.” Freddie’s nostrils flare. “How? Did you blackmail her? What did you threaten her with?”
I laugh coldly. “Your little angel didn’t require much persuading after I gave her the best orgasm of her life.”
Seb’s cheeks flush in jealous anger. If they’re going to kill me, they may as well know the truth about their precious fucking princess.
“You’re lying.” Freddie refuses to believe it. “She’d never be interested in you.”
“Why don’t you ask Seb?” I grin. “He’ll tell you that’s not true.”
Seb’s mouth opens and then closes again like a gasping goldfish. “I… I…”
“You never told Freddie about what happened between us that night, did you?” I goad him. “How you walked in on me fucking her. How you saw how badly she wanted to fuck me, so you joined in.”
Seb’s guilty expression confirms what I’m saying is true.
“What did you do to her?” Freddie demands. “Where is she now?”
“Beats me,” I reply. “She did what I asked, then left. She’s smart—smarter than you two give her credit for.”
“You could have killed her!” Seb dives at me, but Freddie hauls him back. “You’re a monster!”
They think they’re superior, but the difference between me and them is that I’m not afraid to face the truth.
I’m not like Seb. He became a Duke to break out of his family’s mould and do something meaningful, but he doesn’t admit that he gets his kicks from the violent parts of our jobs. He likes making them pay.
I’m not the same as Freddie. He presents himself as gallant and wanting to right past wrongs, but he’s blind to how we’re no better. He needs to embrace his true nature. Only he can’t because of his skewed perception that it’d justify what happened to his family.
Bram, if he’s still alive, is just as damaged and broken. He thinks being a Duke will put his skills to good use, but he never saw that he was swapping one set of rules for another.
I am done pretending and complying with Freddie’s bullshit rules. I’m unapologetically me, and until they can face who they are, I’ll never belong here.
“You think the Dukes are protectors, but we’re not,” I say. “We’re killers, and I’m the only one with the fucking balls to say it. Rose is gone, and who can blame her? You thought bringing her to a safe house and playing happy family was what she wanted, but you were wrong. She saw us for who we are, and she fucking ran.”
“She ran because of you!” Freddie explodes. He’s delusional. “You made her detonate a fucking bomb and left her alone! That’s why she’s gone!”
“Here we go again with the poor Rose sob story.” I put on a childish voice and stick out my bottom lip. “Boo-fucking-hoo, Rose is the victim! Rose is a princess who we need to sweep in and save!” My jaw sets, and my eyes narrow into slits. “You don’t know a thing about her. You’re both living in a fantasy world. Until you snap out of it, you’ll see nothing clearly. You’re mad at me, but this is your fault. You’re the ones who brought a stranger into our lives. What did you think would happen? Did you think we’d all skip off into the sunset to live happily ever after? This is real fucking life, and that’s never going to happen.”
“You’ve broken our rules for the last time,” Freddie growls. His muscles flex through his shirt. “Leave, or I’ll rip your throat out.”
“There.” I point at him. “That’s the man who I came to work for!” I shake my head. “Not the pussy who can’t face his true self.”
I thought that working with them would help me. I even had some bullshit idea that it might turn me into a better person and give me a new family to look after, but it’s only shown that I don’t belong.
