Page 49 of Tyler's Rule
Red flooded Cassie’s cheeks. I watched her piece together the fact he’d known. And hadn’t told her. Abruptly, she launched forward and out of the room.
Shade started after her.
I touched his arm, connecting to his gaze for an unspoken thanks.
Shade’s lips tugged into a half-smile. “We’re siblings. She’ll forgive me far easier than your sorry arse.”
He left to hunt her down.
“Hold back a minute,” Arran asked me alone.
Of all the crew, I’d known him longest. I’d come to him for work, hearing of his reputation, and he’d given me everything I’d asked for. A team of my own. A caseload I dictated. I trusted him, with everything but the full truth, and alongside knowing me, he was the only one who could question this more deeply. Only he had that background knowledge.
Quiet understanding and concern filled the way he watched me. “Are the Athertons on their way back?”
I confirmed it with a nod. I’d called off the brothers’ hunt when standing guard in the hall.
“I’m assuming you’d prefer to be based here while this situation is ongoing.”
“Wherever Dixie needs me to be. I’ll work around it with my crew.”
My job had been my life for years, taking me away from the warehouse far more often than I was in it. I could handle a change.
Arran narrowed his eyes. “Anything more you want to tell me? Because I have Shade locking up an ex-guard but refusing to say why. A prospect standing guard over a half-dead businessman. You, I can understand for keeping Dixie’s confidence. I respect the fuck out of that, but…” He stalled. Worked it out. “Then Shade’s doing the same. How did I miss that?”
The warning in my gaze told him to stop. “If Dixie wants that information shared, it will be. Otherwise Shade will make an example of Buck so other recruits know not to cross us.”
Arran then asked a question I wished he hadn’t.
“Does she know? About you.”
My thoughts stalled. Slunk back to a dark place of pain and horror. I swallowed. “In part.”
“How big a part? Because I’ve known you for years and I’ve seen the fallout. I count it in bodies.”
“Respectfully, I don’t need counselling.”
“Considering everything she’s embroiled in, or about to be, she should have the full story.”
I shook my head once. “I have no intention of making her pity me. She knows that my family is dead. That’s enough.”
His haunted expression called bullshit on my claim. Arran stood and moved around his desk to rest on the corner, taking a minute over replying. Perhaps weighing up how hard he could push me. “Secrets damage relationships. Particularly thekind you’ve had to handle. Ask me how I know. Fuck. I have experience in this area. I can help.”
He was wrong. I didn’t deserve Dixie, and I’d done enough to coerce and force her to be with me. “If Genevieve stayed with ye because of anything other than love, how would that feel?”
His lips flattened, telling me everything, but I didn’t want to hear his opinion. Whatever Arran thought of me, I moved on before he could voice it.
“On a separate topic,” I said. “Kane’s name is all over the press. He won’t lie low for long, so we need to offer what identity protection we can.”
Arran considered that, his continued scrutiny telling me he hadn’t lost interest in the topic of my fucked-up history. “I’ll talk to Detective Dickhead, though I imagine Lovelyn will shield Kane from the cops. She wields some influence over her father. Alongside that, Kane could also use a crew name. Got any ideas?”
“Not yet.”
“Ask around the crew. Shade came up with Riot for Riordan. He could have suggestions.” He paused. “Perhaps don’t include Convict, or he’ll start calling him some shit that’ll stick.”
On any normal day, I would’ve laughed. Instead, I got up and left, the need to be near Dixie too strong to ignore.
Chapter 19
