Page 151 of I Will Revel in Glory (Death by Daybreak MC 3)
“You really think I’d knock you up and not support you? My mom would never look at me the same way again.” It’s one of the few times he’s ever mentioned his mother, and I’m intrigued. I want to know more, but now isn’t the best time. Later, when we’re alone. “So. You want to learn to play or what?”
“So long as you learn from the safety of my lap, I’ll teach ya,” Beast agrees, and I smile, leaning back against him and closing my eyes.
“I’m ready,” I tell him, and even though the night began in bloodshed and sex, it ends in cards and conversation.
That’s what being a Daybreaker is all about, after all.
So … fuck it. Murder, sex, and poker.
It’s a lifestyle.
The next morning, the men are summoned to church. Not the kind Reba likes, but the other sort. The private boys’ club that takes place in the building behind the main clubhouse. It’s where club business is carried out, and even after delivering the mafia queen’s head, I’m not privy to it.
“Keep this with you and stay inside with the doors locked,” Grainger says grimly, pushing my Magnum across the coffee table toward me. I’m sitting on the couch with Reba, Fem curled up between us. We’re drinking tea together since she doesn’t like coffee, and it’s pouring rain outside. Reba says rain calls for hot tea and contemplation.
So I’m contemplating.
I’m contemplating everything about last night. What it changes. What it doesn’t change.
I need to talk to Cat, but that’ll have to wait until later.
“You got it,” I agree as Grainger takes off, the last of the men to leave. He closes the door and I set my tea down, padding down the hall barefoot to lock it and then activate the alarm. When I come back to the couch and curl my legs up beneath me, tea mug in hand, I look over at Reba.
I know our time to say goodbye is coming.
I’m simultaneously ready for that … and dreading it. Because it means I’ll be alone here with my men. It means that I’ll be pressing play on a new phase in my life.
“They were all worried about you,” I say, referencing our ‘friends’ from the casino last night. Not the ones I killed, but the teenagers. I mean, my peers. They don’t feel like my peers though. I bet they’ve never beheaded someone with a meat cleaver. I sip my tea and pretend like Reba isn’t aware that I did something terrible last night. I didn’t tell her about any of it—obviously, I would never put her in danger by giving her those sorts of club secrets—but I did tell her that I ran into our classmates at a party.
“That’s nice to know,” she says with a distant, wistful smile. She’s been praying a lot lately. I’ve seen it, pausing in the doorway to the kitchen to find her bent over the table with her hands clasped together. The rapturous look she gets on her face when she talks to God looks an awful lot like the one I get when I’m making love to one of the guys.
Reba and I both understand passion and conviction on an intrinsic level, even if we experience those two things in entirely different ways.
“I’m sure they’re upset that I ditched them last night …” I start, grabbing my phone and checking for any tags or messages on social media. There are a few. Trevone asked if he could have my new number since I don’t seem to be answering my old one. Tina Flacco messaged me asking why I was using her name last night, wondering if I wasn’t up to something illegal and trying to blame her for it.
How annoying.
I delete it all. If I never see those people again, I don’t care. Not all relationships are meant to last forever. Some people are just ships passing in the night. But not my boys. Not Reba. Not Grey.
Grey.
I really should call him, but I need to do it without Reba in the room.
I set my phone down and look over at her. She sighs and stares into her mug before lifting her green gaze up to me.
“You don’t care though, do you?” she asks with a small laugh, shaking her head and sliding a single finger around the rim of her mug. “If I’m being honest, I don’t much care either. I want a clean break and a fresh start.”
My throat tightens up, and the urge to apologize sweeps over me again. I keep the words back because at this point, I’ve said it enough. If I keep apologizing over and over again, it’s only for my own comfort. Reba knows that while her connection to me is ultimately what brought the mafia to the Kellers’ doorstep, I’m not the one who pulled the blade across her parents’ throats. I can’t take full responsibility for everything the club and the mafia do, even if it feels like I should sometimes.
