“Why don’t you want her to know the truth?”
Surely there isn’t pain in his voice, but the possibility that there is somehow makes this easier for me. This is nothing like what happened when we were forced to bring Zoe down here. I can’t deny I didn’t know. He’s warned me away from her at least a dozen times, and I didn’t listen. Unlike Zoe, I don’t have an ace in my pocket. I have no way to prove my loyalty when my actions have done nothing but prove otherwise.
“S-she begged me to tell you. I knew it would come to this if I d-did,” I pause, taking a long, painful breath. “I asked her who would love her if I’m gone, and now I know the answer. You will love her. TJ will love her. S-she’ll need you after this. T-tell her I b-betrayed the club.”
He stares at me and I know I’m only seconds away, but the pain in his eyes is evident now, and it kills me to know this will hurt him, too.
“You love her?”
I nod, and the morbid reminder of the rope makes itself known once again.
“And I love you, too, Brother.”
I don’t even think about it. I would change my mind if I did, but my hope and my time have run out.
“Tell her I betrayed the club,” I beg one last time before I step off of the crate.
The rope tightens on my neck, my breath cut off, and I know it’s the last one I’ll ever take. I can only hope that in my death, they give me one last gift, that my loyalty to the club over the last ten years is enough to protect her from the truth. Without them, she has no one.
“Well that was ballsy,” TJ chuckles.
I look up at him, gasping, but somehow crumpled on the floor rather than hanging from the steel beam running across the ceiling.
“You were testing me?” The question rushes out raspy and disjointed.
“Take care of her,” Lynch says close to my ear.
“Welcome to the family.” TJ’s words don’t match his actions when he pulls his boot back and nails me in the ribs.
I guess he’s not very happy that Lynch got all the action up until now.Chapter 35Molly
My throat burns, but it’s nothing compared to the pain in my hands.
When pounding on the door didn’t work, I switched to kicking it, but all that’s done is left me broken and crumpled against the unrelenting heavy wood.
I’m on my feet, eyes swollen from sobbing when the two men who’ve broken my heart open the basement door and walk out.
My sore fists meet Lynch’s chest first. Instinctively, I know he’s the one who carried out the threats.
“All he did was love me,” I wail as my oldest brother stands there and lets me rain my hatred down on him.
“He did more than that,” TJ mutters, drawing my ire in his direction. I’m able to get a hit to his face, and I watch with murderous glee as blood trickles from his nose. Unaffected, he licks it as it pools on his upper lip. “He claims you sucked his cock.”
My eyes widen, and even in my pain, I somehow manage to also be embarrassed.
“I’m not listening to this shit.” Lynch walks away without another word, and a second later, TJ follows.
My knees are weak, threatening to give up on me when I’m left alone, standing at the top of the stairs, unsure of what I’m about to face.
If I run, I can pretend nothing happened. If I walk away right now, I can do exactly what he was hoping for. I can imagine he’s away, looking for a place for us to call our own, and not have to face the truth of what actually happened in the basement.
He deserves better though. He’s earned a proper burial, not denial and the indignity of what the others may do.
Twice, I nearly trip on my way into the belly of the basement, but I’m statue still when his crumpled form comes into view. Frozen at the bottom of the stairs, I cover my mouth to keep from heaving on the floor.
The sight of the rope still around his neck is too much. He doesn’t deserve this. I did this to him. He warned me what would happen, but I was mistaken by thinking love would conquer all. I was wrong in believing my brother, especially after finding love himself, would understand what Briar and I felt for each other.
Scared to touch him, knowing confirmation will gut me, it takes a long moment before I step off the bottom stair and cross the room to his body.
“Baby?” A gasped whisper fills the room, and a rush of cold chills washes over me.
Looking around the room, my first foolish thought is that he’s now a ghost, his soul, loving me so much, isn’t able to find peace in the afterlife, but then his body rolls over, and dead men don’t move.