There would be no coming back from that revelation.
Sure, they would still love me. There was no stopping that. We had their whole lifetimes of memories.
But they would view me through a different lens, would question parts of our lives they never would have thought to before, would think about what it meant to be related to a killer.
That was my cross to bear.
I didn't want it to be theirs.
At least not until life had thrown them some punches. When they had made their own mistakes, been backed into their own corners they had needed to fight their way out of.
It was selfish to keep them in the dark.
But I had been selfless my entire life, had chosen their best interest over my wants, needs, or comforts.
Just this once, this once I was going to be selfish.
And I didn't regret that decision.
Not at first.
Not until two weeks later when I came home from picking up stamps at the post office, never thinking anything of it, that anything could go wrong while I did such a silly errand.
Ryan, Mark, and Eli were at work. Hunter was off with Colt somewhere raising hell, no doubt.
Shane had been the only one home, stuck there because his teacher had threatened him with a D in language arts, and was forced to do a book report for extra credit.
Charlie and I would accept an honest C, knowing not all kids excelled at all things. But a D was unacceptable, was a sign of utter laziness on Shane's part.
Lazy was another thing we wouldn't put up with.
So he was inside reading Great Expectations whether he liked it or not.
Or so I thought.
Until I pulled open the back door into the kitchen.
And fucking died.
There was no denying it.
My heart stopped.
I flatlined.
For how long, I don't know.
But it had happened.
Because there sitting at my kitchen table with a cup of coffee in his hands... and my son beside him was Michael.
"Your son has good manners," Michael said, eyes on me. Eyes so much like my own except there was not a hint of warmth in them, anything at all to make them truly human. Just a monster in a flesh suit. "Invited me in and offered me coffee."
I could feel Shane's eyes on me, so much like his father's, brows lowering down as he took in my tension, likely worrying that he had done something wrong.
It wasn't his fault.
Michael was cunning.
And he wasn't someone you would look at and think of as a threat.
The years had peppered gray into his dark hair, which only managed to make him look distinguished, not old. Prison had given him plenty of time to work on his body, filling it out a little more firmly than it had been when I had known him. And dressed in an expensive gray suit, he looked like a businessman, like someone Shane had seen at the house countless times before.
He likely thought he was just here to see his dad.
"Shane, bub," I said carefully, watching as he straightened. "Why don't you go in your room. See where Daddy is. Tell him Michael is visiting."
He rushed off, skirting out of touch of Michael, as if he suddenly sensed a problem.
"You stay the fuck away from my sons," I snapped, calculating how many steps I'd have to take to reach my butcher block full of knives.
"You robbed me of the opportunity to have my own."
I snorted at that, shaking my head, taking my time, knowing that each second that passed was a chance for Charlie to get closer to home. "Monsters don't procreate. They crawl out of the primordial ooze."
"After what you've done, you really think we are that different?"
"I protected myself against a man who killed our mother. Then the woman who acted as my mother with her absence. And countless others I don't even know about, I'm sure."
"And me?" he asked, angling his head up, chin raised higher than the rest of his face, something our father had always done, something that made my blood turn cold.
"You," I snorted. "I heard all about the terrible things you had done. What did I do to you? Get you in a cage you had belonged in for years before I put you there."
"You took away twenty years of my life!" he roared, rising up off the chair, slamming the cup down so hard on the table that it shattered, black coffee pooling, dripping down onto my floor.
"You should leave."
That was Shane.
My youngest.
But big for his age.
Six foot already, wide as a linebacker. He would be a mammoth of a man someday. As it was, he outweighed the man who was technically his uncle.
And in full-on protection mode, he was a fearsome sight to behold.
"Shane, go back to your room," I demanded, shuffling a few feet into the room. Closer to the knives. Closer to my son who was almost within arm's reach of Michael.