“Why?” he asks, but then I see it the moment he figures it out without me saying it.
“Because my brother is the traitor who set the bomb for Phillip, and now he’s working for him.”
Something suspiciously close to pity crosses his eyes, but I just look away. I remember not wanting to believe my brother capable of it. Then he held a gun on me and demanded to know what the Families were saying about him. You get more answers from someone when you listen to their questions.
And all the questions he asked gave me my answers.
My brother was the traitor. Is a traitor.
I, of course, played dumb and acted like I simply wanted to bring him home, get him help to get off drugs and stuff, and wanted to clear his name from any nasty rumors that said he played a part in something so atrocious.
“My father learned early on that Lathan couldn’t ever be the head of the Family,” I go on, quieter this time as I look down at my hands. “He acts before he thinks. So I was chosen instead. And Lathan never let that go.”
I stand up, because I’m done talking, even though I’m sure they’re just getting started and waiting for me to leave so they can dissect the shit storm they’ve unwittingly stepped into.
I skate to the door before turning around.
“We were all conditioned differently to deal with what we’d one day face. It’s not sunshine and rainbows for a Family child. It’s also not terrible. My parents loved me, and I never questioned that.”
I pause a beat, noting the curious expressions on their faces.
“I grew up with all the kids of the Four Families. But we were the Five Families before Jenkins turned on us. And never did I meet the notorious AJ. He never brought her around. Never groomed her to take over. Her conditioning, if the rumors are true, was the worst kind imaginable. It’s amazing she has enough heart to give a damn about you or anyone. But I’ve seen it. She does care. The only person she’d ever trusted before this club betrayed her. My parents would have never betrayed me. I can’t imagine what that’s like. So cut her some slack, because she may be the only person in the world who cares enough about you to risk it all to save you.”
With that off my chest, I pull open the door, and skate past a bunch of really mean looking bikers. They’re a little put off by my skates, because I’m the crazy chick who has the balls to float like a butterfly up in here.
I head straight for the tequila again, spotting Jude already at the bar and downing shot after shot himself.
“I need clothes from my apartment. Shoes would be great too,” I tell him.
He glances back at the closed doors, then his hard eyes level me with a brutal stare.
“When I decide to be a fetch-it-bitch, I’ll grab them for you.”
I smile, and he mutters something about me being psycho before looking away.
“Seriously. I could use a lift, and they’ll be a while.”
He cuts his gaze toward me again, and he rolls his eyes before pushing away from the bar. He starts to say something, but a heavy hand comes down on my hip, tugging me back.
When my body reacts with little zings shooting through me, I know exactly whose hand it is.
“Don’t make this a problem,” Axle says.
I open my mouth to speak, but Jude is apparently the one he’s talking to, because he answers before I can.
“Keep her out of my face. I think this club has enough friends of AJ’s.”
“Sarah,” I quickly interject, watching as Jude’s scowl forms.
“Her name has never been Sarah. Never will be Sarah. She’s Alexius Jenkins. AJ. Not Sarah. Sarah was just a lie. She was a lie.” His words are dripping with venom as he snatches a bottle of whiskey from the bar and walks away.
Axle spins me around, his gaze leveling me like he’s about to chew my ass out.
“Stop goading him. He’s not himself right now, and he’s got a nasty habit of being unpredictable when he’s pissed,” he cautions.
“He’s being a baby,” I say with a shrug.
Axle studies me for a moment before taking a seat in a stool, releasing me completely in the process. I try not to feel disappointed that he’s not touching me anymore.
He gestures around at all the guys who are loitering in the massive, open space. Couches and TVs are set up, along with a huge dining table. It’s like a home-away-from home sort of setup.
“No one here came to be here because they had a perfect life with normal issues. You end up in this place because you have nowhere else you fit in. Nowhere else that lets you kill the demons. Nowhere else where people don’t give a shit if you beat a guy to death for pissing you off. These guys don’t play nice, and they won’t care who you are if you piss them off enough. We all have triggers, including Jude. Sarah tripped that trigger for him.”