Trevor walked into the dining room at lunch time. He’d showered and brushed his teeth. He wore clean clothes and trimmed his beard. The headache was still there, aching quietly at his temples, but the painkillers helped. Every damn bottle of liquor was out of his room, all the empties, all the half-full bottles, the unopened ones…all gone. He was dry now and brutally wide awake.

Awake and ready to do what needed to be done in order to start fresh. For real this time. None of this half-assed business he’d done before where he lied about himself. Lied to these people, lied to Rebel. Obviously that wasn’t working. It had to end now.

Time for a real fresh start.

The truth would finally set him free.

Everyone at the table stopped eating, went quiet and stared at him.

He looked at all of them. One by one. Even meeting Josie’s gaze and smiling.

“Sit down,” Rachel urged. “Join us, Trevor.” She pointed at his empty chair.

He shook his head and cleared his throat. It was time to clear the air. Time to come clean. It fucking sucked, but he had to do it. It needed to be done.

“No, not yet. I…” He swallowed. “I need to tell everyone something. I need to make sure you all know about me, everything about me. Even Josie.” He looked at the sweet little girl sitting in the midst of all the adults, the only child left on the planet. “Even you, Josie. I need all of you to know everything about my past.”

“You don’t have to do this,” Christian said. “We accept you as you are, Trevor. We always have.”

Trevor’s gaze clashed with his. “You accept me because I’ve been lying to you and not telling you about me. I lied to you, Christian. I lied to all of you.”

They were all quiet again. He saw Christian’s eyes narrow and his jaw tick. Trevor sighed and rubbed the back of his neck.

“What did you lie about?” Rachel whispered.

“I wasn’t a small-time crook who ended up in a country club prison. I told you that when I first met all of you because I wasn’t ready to tell you the truth. I figured my appearance enough was enough for you to handle and you wouldn’t be able to handle the rest.” He pointed at the tats on his neck. “Justin was right about me. I was a gang member, part of the Aryan Brotherhood. I’ve been a member for most of my adult life. My dad was in the Brotherhood too. I learned from him. That’s what this tat of the swastika means, it’s a right of passage, showing I’m part of the Brotherhood. And this one”—he pointed at the four-leaf clover—“this one means I killed a man in prison to signify my allegiance to the Brotherhood. I had to do that or I would be killed myself. Prison is brutal. You have to belong to a gang and prove yourself. Kill or be killed. After I did that they all left me alone. The reason why I was in prison and on death row was because I killed a man. I was in prison for murder. That’s what you don’t know. I murdered the man who was responsible for the gang rape of my sister. The man who sat back and let it all happen right in front of him. I killed my father. I fought with him, killed him, and went to prison for it.”

Again, the whole table was quiet.

“Fuck me,” Adam mumbled.

“I think I’m going to take Josie to the garden to help me pick some tomatoes,” Phoebe said brightly as she stood up with Josie’s hand in hers. “Come on, sweetie, let’s go outside for a bit.”

“But, Phoebe, I don’t wanna go. I want to listen to Trevor.”

“You can listen to him later. We have to get going now.”

“Sorry,” Trevor muttered.

“No worries.” Phoebe threw a smile over her shoulder as she pulled the complaining Josie with her out the back door.

The door shut behind them and the room returned to silence again.

Trevor shoved his hands in his pockets and looked down at the floor.

“Jesus, your own men gang raped your sister, and your Dad watched? Did they kill her?” Adam asked.

“No.” Trevor shook his head. “The virus did that.”

“Your dad ordered them to rape her?” Sebastian said.

“He brought his asshole friends over to my house when I was out on a job. The men in our gang who were the most notorious for their abuse of women. Dad passed out drunk and left them alone in my house…” His voice caught. He swallowed and kept going. “…left them alone in my house to do whatever they wanted to my sixteen-year-old sister. All five of them. My mom had run away from my dad ten years before and moved across the country to try and keep my sister safe from him and his shit. But she was sixteen and angry and thought my mom was keeping her from seeing her dad. She’d been back only two weeks. I was on the verge of getting her on a plane and back to Florida with my mom where she belonged when it happened.”

“Oh my god,” Rachel breathed. “I’m so sorry, Trevor. So sorry.”

He nodded. His lips pressed together.

“I lost my mind,” he admitted. “Didn’t try to hide what I did. And actually, I would’ve killed them all if they’d still been there, or if I’d been given more time to track them down. My dad was the first one I saw after, and I blamed him most of all. First, I’d taken my sister to the hospital, got her on a plane to Florida. And then I shot my dad one day in the front yard of my house when he came over to talk to me like nothing had fucking happened. Like he hadn’t let those motherfuckers gang rape his own daughter. I shot his ass dead and just sat on the front porch and waited for the cops to come and take me away.”

He took a deep breath. “I pleaded guilty and went to prison. That was okay with me. Worth it all to see him dead. I ratted out those motherfuckers, giving them up to the Feds. But I had plenty of years ahead of me before Ruyigi hit and all the guards died. When the end came I was sitting in a prison cell. When there was only a handful of prisoners left alive, the last two guards there opened all the cells. And I walked out. Just like that. I walked out of Avenal State Prison, a free man.”