Through all the chaos, Chloe wished she could read lips as Crescent confidently entered the room and approached David’s table. She watched the seemingly casual conversation as he and Christopher stood across from each other, the other Family members looking on with a mixture of awe and confusion on their faces—they, too, believing Christopher was long dead. She quickly shook off the women trying to give her comfort for the death of who they believed to be her father and stood next to Jack to listen to the exchange.
“I’m no coward,” Crescent said. “I have been nothing but loyal to this Family.”
“You were only loyal to him,” Christopher replied.
“I have never done anything for this Family that wasn’t expected of me.”
“Does that include nearly beating an innocent woman to death?”
Crescent gave a malicious smile and cast a sideways glance at Chloe, ignoring Christopher’s question.
“We have much to discuss, and this is not the time or place. We will meet upstairs in thirty minutes,” David said as he stood. “This will be a private meeting. Your men will not accompany you.”
Crescent nodded in assent and left the ballroom.
“Christopher should leave before someone actually recognizes him,” Chloe said. “Eyes are lingering too long.”
David turned to his Family. “Gentlemen, with the exception of those I have given previous instruction to, please make your way to the conference room upstairs. I’ll meet you shortly.”
Christopher turned to David. “I’ll wait for you upstairs.”
“With Crescent? Alone?” Chloe asked, trying to mask the concern in her voice.
Christopher gave Chloe his not-to-worry smile. “I’ll play nice if he will.”
Chloe watched him walk away, surrounded by the other men of the Family, knowing that Crescent had never played nice in his life.
***
When Chloe entered the Red Room a little while later, she expected to find blood flooding the floor. Instead, Christopher and Crescent leaned against opposite walls, silently scrutinizing each other and what the situation had become. Chloe took a seat near Christopher and tried to envision what the future of the Family would be now that Matthew was dead, Christopher was not, and she was in charge of New England.
She studied Crescent, but his demeanor gave no hint as to what he was thinking, except revulsion as he stared into the eyes of what should have been a dead man. Chloe knew Crescent well enough to know that, should the opportunity present itself, Christopher would be just that once again. Crescent was a killer and enjoyed it immensely. Chloe was more like David in that she would consider all angles of a dilemma before doling out any consequences. She had to wonder, however, if the circumstances called for it, if she would be able to be a killer as well.
“Why do you hate her so much?” Christopher asked Crescent.
“She is a stain on this Family. Everything she is, and everything she represents, has been a lie since the day she was born.”
“Aside from a scar, which you deserved, she hasn’t done anything to you.”
“That’s not the point.”
“Then what is the point?”
There was nothing but loathing and anger in Crescent’s eyes. “The doctor made a mistake in his decision and we have all been made to suffer because of it.”
“You all have been made to suffer?” David asked from behind Crescent. Nobody had heard him enter the room.
Crescent turned and faced him, glaring. “There were poor decisions and mistakes made on Mr. Parnell’s part because of her. Business would have run more efficiently but for the fact that every time he made a decision, she was figured into the equation. Everything Mr. Parnell did, every decision he made, revolved around her.”
“And me leaving just made life more difficult for the Family, Mr. Crescent?” Chloe asked.
“Not as much as your obvious ascension will.”
Chloe stood next to Christopher and put a gentle hand on his arm as he pushed himself off the wall, ready to defend Chloe’s place in the Family. Her touch told him to keep his cool.
“Now that she is back,” Christopher said, “you’re going to have to get over it. She is in charge and you will give her the respect she has earned.”
Crescent laughed. “Earned? She hasn’t earned anything. Everything she has, and everything she is, she has because she is the bastard child of—”
“Don’t finish that thought, Mr. Crescent,” David said in a warning tone. “No matter your place in this Family, you will not slander my son or her mother. You’re forgetting that Matthew made the choice—”
Crescent wheeled on David, his eyes as black as night. “He had no choice. The doctor made the choice for him and you reinforced it.”
Chloe’s grip on Christopher’s arm slowly tightened the more Crescent spoke. She wanted nothing more than to reach over to the weapons table to find a way to stop him talking for good.
David circled in front of Crescent. “I run this Family as I see fit. Are you questioning my judgment and decisions?”
“I have been questioning them since the day her slut mother got pregnant by your whore mongering son.”
Chloe gasped. David’s fist connected with Crescent’s jaw, making Crescent plant his foot behind him to keep from losing his balance.
Too late, Christopher broke the grip Chloe had on his arm when he saw Crescent raise his arm to reciprocate David’s punch. In the two steps it took Christopher to reach him, David had been hit so hard that he lost his balance and stumbled into the weapons table, knocking its contents to the floor.
Mr. Crescent’s fate was sealed.
As Chloe tended to a dazed David, Christopher exchanged blows with Crescent, who was determined to put Christopher back in his grave for good. As David slowly came to, Chloe moved him to a chair.
Christopher ducked Crescent’s arm and delivered a blow to his ribs, then grabbed him around the waist to throw him to the ground. Crescent’s head hit the floor with a crack and Christopher leaned over him, fist poised above his head.
Crescent began to laugh. “Do you really think my death will matter?”
“It will matter to her,” Christopher said.
“Yours will mean more than mine.”
Christopher cast a quick glance at Chloe, his eyes almost asking her permission. Chloe simply gave a short nod. But in those few precious seconds, Crescent reached above his head, grabbing a knife that had fallen from the weapons table. Christopher brought his fist down to stop him, but Crescent was faster, burying the knife in Christopher’s neck, only to pull it out and do it again until Christopher collapsed, lifeless, on the floor.
Blinded by rage, Chloe grabbed the first thing she could reach. She threw it as hard as she could and heard a low grunt escape Crescent as he began to stand up. The handle of the hatchet was almost flush with his arm while the head was buried in his shoulder, pooling with blood, and set just below the scar Chloe had left him years earlier.
Unaffected, Crescent took the knife from Christopher’s neck and began to approach Chloe. The gunshot almost deafened her as it echoed in the room. Her eyes still focused on Crescent, she saw a small hole in the middle of his forehead begin to slowly seep blood and brain matter, then watched him fall to the floor. David sat in his chair, the barrel of his gun smoking, and gave Chloe a mixed look of relief and despair. It was then that the events of the last few minutes came to reality in her mind and she made her way over the Christopher, once again holding him as she laid his head in her lap and stroked his hair. This time, however, there were no words of apology or goodbye, just an overwhelming feeling of loss knowing he would not be coming back from the dead. There were no tears, only certainty and shock.
David put a hand on Chloe’s shoulder. Knowing they still had business to attend so, Chloe gently laid Christopher’s head on the floor and followed David out of the room.