The drive home was long, Luca was driving slower than his usual Fast and the Furious speed which was weird. It was like he wanted to spend some time with Jack before the chaos started again. If I didn’t know better I’d think Luca has a soft spot for Jack, but he’d never let on of course. Luca doesn’t let his emotions out easily. Instead, he makes a joke of every little thing or makes you think he’s horny, one way or the other.
We pull into the compound and all get out.
Falcon walks up to the car and looks at us all noticing another member of our crew. He raises an eyebrow at Kace and nods to Jack. “Who’s the lookalike old man, Kace?”
Kace swallows as Jack walks around and we all stand in a group by the car. “Falc, this is Jack… Jack Colt.”
Falc opens his eyes wide and looks from Kace to Jack and back to Kace. “Holy shit, as in…”
“Yes Pres… as in dearly departed Dad, alive and well… well, as well as you can be sans a leg,” Jack says and pulls up his trouser leg showing his prosthetic.
One of the bikers at the gate nods to Jack and lifts up his trouser leg to show off his prosthetic too, and they smile at each other in a mutual understanding.
“We have many wounded brothers here, returned from service. I don’t know your story, Jack, but you’re welcome here for as long as you need. Plus, you raised a pretty fucking cool kid, so you’re all right by us.”
Jack snorts and bumps Kace’s side who’s still looking far too serious. “You have a fan club. Good for you, kid.”
Kace finally breaks into a small smile and Jack grins back at him. “There ya go. Okay, take me inside, I need a beer.”
Falc chuckles and nods. “Heard a lot about you, but I’m disappointed our paths never crossed in the Agency. Different divisions and all, but I think we’ll get along just fine you and me, Jack.”
“Same. You were an asset to the Agency, Falcon. But enough of the sappy shit, you got a woman who doesn’t mind a stump? Could do with a good—”
“Oh, Jesus!” Kace blurts out, and we all break into laughter while I link my arm in with his as we all march inside the clubhouse.
The club is in full swing. Molly’s playing pool with some of the club girls and looking a little tipsy already and I smile. She fits in here a little too well. Axel is sitting in a chair near her like he’s on guard watching her, which I find a little strange. I thought that would have been Noah, but he must be doing something. Eli is watching the television behind the bar. He stands out like dogs balls, the man is literally the Hulk just less green. And Blair is, of course, still in the hospital, so I know why he’s not here.
As we wander in I can’t help but notice the room falls into a kind of silence as everyone turns to notice Jack—a stranger in the room. But then Axel and Eli gasp as Noah comes racing out carrying his notebook lost deep in thought. The three men all race toward Jack, Noah not even looking as Axel and Eli study him carefully and Noah looks frantic, lost in his computer.
Axel and Eli both stop, taking deep breaths and look to Kace not saying anything. Kace nods and they smile at Jack. Noah, still lost in his computer finally looks up, his eyes flash across to Jack and then they open wide. His computer falls slightly from his hands, but he catches it while he opens his mouth fully and blinks a couple of times and then shakes his head like he needs to get on with it.
“Hey Jack, good to see you… but the Board is meeting tonight and if we’re going to do something we have to do it now!”
Noah kinda killed Jack’s return and happy celebration with the other SO7 members, but I guess when in crisis you have to deal with that first and you get your pleasantries later.
“Okay, we need to sort out a plan of action,” Kace says.
I turn to Kace and take a deep breath, I know he won’t like what I’m about to say. “I need to go and talk to Ares and Ezra.”
He looks down to me furrowing his brows and shakes his head slightly. “Umm… what?”
“I need to do this, Kace.”
He slumps his body, running his fingers through his hair and looks deep into my eyes. I stare back showing him how much I need this. I want to talk to them. Try and see them for who they really are. See if I can figure them out.
He grits his teeth and nods. “Okay. But be careful and take a brother with you. Maybe Ruin,” Kace says, and he nods to Ruin who’s standing with Molly. He nods back and starts to walk over to join us.
“What’s up?” Ruin asks.
“Lily wants to see her brothers, I need you to supervise. Don’t let them touch her, and any signs of Lily becoming worked up you pull her out. Understand?”
He nods and looks to me as I smile at him weakly. “Got it! Keep her safe at all costs. You good to go now, Lil?” Ruin asks.
My stomach swirls on itself thinking about being with my brothers without Kace. But I have to do this. I have to face them sooner or later. And why put off tomorrow what you can do today, as someone insightful once said.
Ruin places his hand on my lower back and leads me away toward the holding cell area, where they’re being held. I can’t help but wonder if they will be even more withdrawn being held captive here against their will, or will it do the opposite? I have no idea what to expect. I do, however, notice the big gun Ruin picked up on the way down to the cells as we step down the long corridor, toward the darkened room.
The hall is lit by only one window, it’s a small rectangle and is up really high, almost to the ceiling, so the place is quite dark as we walk in. I notice the room at the end of the hall, which I’m assuming is the cell, and as we walk in front of it, it’s not what I was expecting.
No bars, no black wrought iron to hold people in.
It’s an actual room with just one door.
The door has a peephole latch on it and Ruin opens it up looking inside.
“Hey guys, you have a visitor. I’m gonna open the door if you behave, comprendo?”
“Yep, go for it. We’re chained to the wall so it’s not like we can go anywhere anyway,” a male voice replies.
I don’t know them well enough to comprehend whose voice it is.
“Lily, back up against the wall please,” Ruin demands, and I nod stepping back against the hard brick opposite the door.
Ruin opens the door and inside are the two men who were at my funeral. The two men who tried to kill my friends. The two men who have the same blood running through my veins… my brothers. My veins pump harder and my ears ring slightly. A cold sweat riddles my skin and I breathe faster just by looking at them. They both stare at me and instantly step forward with small smiles on their faces.
“Lily!”
“Stay there guys, don’t freak her out,” Ruin says.
They nod and each brother takes a step back.
I take them in, their hair is blond, a little darker than mine but it still has the same feel to it that mine has. They look like me, which means I must look like him…
Oh God, my chest tightens slightly as I gnaw on my bottom lip.
They’re a little older than me, they look worn like they’ve seen a lot of trouble in their lives. It’s obviously not been an easy road for them, but it’s in their eyes, the pleading in them, the desperate way they’re looking at me like all they want to do is hold me that’s the most confusing for me. It’s a look of love, of a brotherly love, and I don’t understand it.
They don’t know me, not the real me, how could they?
We’ve never met…
“Lily, take a breath,” one of them says and I hadn’t even realized I was holding it. I gasp as I take in a deep lungful of air and they both seem to relax their shoulders slightly. He seems like the older one of the two, the bossier one, so he must be Ares.
“You’re Ares?” I ask.
He half-smiles and nods. I turn to my other brother who looks similar but different in his own right. “Ezra?”
He nods and does a slight wave through his handcuffs. I wince slightly seeing that they’re both cuffed and then the chains from the cuffs are attached to the walls behind them. I want to try and make this a little less tense, so I slide down the wall and sit down against the opposing wall looking inside the room. My knees come up in front of me and I wrap my arms around my legs for comfort as I observe my brothers. They both exhale and seem to follow suit, taking a seat on the ground from where they both stand in plain sight of me.
“I’m glad you came to see us,” Ares says while I continue to gnaw on my bottom lip.
“Why would your mom care about protecting me? Why did she ask you to do that?” I ask wanting to get straight to the point.
Ares looks to Ezra and he nods to him then they both look back to me. “Because young girls in our industry don’t fair too well. We’re lucky, our mom had boys. The men sell their daughters for business deals in our line of work, Lily,” Ares offers.
A cold shiver runs over me and I tense up, almost working a hole through my bottom lip. “Why are you there if you hate it so much?” I ask.
Ezra tenses up and shakes his head as Ares tightens his fists into hard balls flaring his nostrils. “When our dad, Gael, died, our uncle took over everything including taking care of our mother… so much so that they got married. Our uncle is far worse than Gael ever was. Our uncle was instrumental in making Gael who he was. We wanted to take Mom and get out of the life, but Uncle Luis told us if we ran he’d find us and he would kill our mother painfully and slowly right in front of us. We couldn’t risk our mother’s safety. She’s too scared to leave. While she’s there she is treated okay. But if she were to leave, who knows what torture would await her. We stay to keep her alive and safe. It’s against our will… but there is… no other way,” Ezra says a slight break in his voice letting me know this isn’t some mind game he’s playing. He’s being completely serious, and his mother’s life is on the line here. He’s only stayed there for her. I was judging them for being horrible people when really they’re just looking out for family.
I’m softening toward them, but I don’t want to. Internally I’m struggling, I shouldn’t feel compassion for them, but I guess that’s my damn personality.
“So after all of this, you’re just gonna go back… to them?”
“We don’t have a choice. Our Mom is out there… with him,” Ares replies.
“There’s always a choice.”
“What about your choice?”
“What do you mean?” I shake my head slightly confused.
“Your choice was taken away from you.”
Jolting my head back in shock, I furrow my brows. “Again, what do you mean?”
“Kace… you didn’t want this life, did you? The running… the fake death… all this?” Ares waves his hands through the air, his chains rattling as they go.
Furrowing my brows, I purse my lips together in a tight line. “You don’t know what I want.”
“You were happy before…” Ezra suggests.
“Was I?” I ask honestly.
“Well, are you telling me you’re happy now? At least you were safe,” Ares jabs.
“But what is safety if you’re not really living. Who cares if you’re safe, you can go through your entire life and not actually live it.”
Ares and Ezra both open their eyes a little wider.
“People don’t jump out of airplanes because they want to play it safe. If they didn’t then they would never get to experience freefalling. It took meeting Kace for me to realize that that was what I needed. I needed to fall to live.”
“You’re comparing your relationship to throwing yourself out of an airplane?” Ezra asks.
“Sometimes it’s nice to live a little dangerously… don’t you think? I might be freefalling, but Kace is the wind keeping me afloat.”
They both raise their eyebrows as thumping footsteps echo down the hall and I notice Kace walking toward me.
“You okay?” he asks looking down at me.
I nod and he smiles at me, then looks into the room where my brothers are watching him closely. “Lily can you gave us a sec.” He looks to my brothers. “We need to make a deal with you two.”