Dead Man Walking (The Fallen Men 6)

“We had nothing,” I shouted, eyes wide with shock as all the toxicity of my youth cracked through the surface of my gut and surged up my throat, hot and chemical on my tongue. “Loulou and I didn’t give a crap about diamond tennis bracelets and our wedding cake topper of a house. We wanted parents who kissed our skinned knees and held us close as we watched movies as a family on a Friday night. We needed quality time and affection, Mum, not just gifts and bragging rights. We needed parents, not society figures. If you don’t understand that after all this, after watching and feeling the way these heathens love each other and have loved us, then I’m sorry, but you don’t deserve them. Maybe you don’t even deserve Loulou and me.”

Phillipa blinked at me, huge tears rolling down her skin, crumpled softly with the years and sorrow like creased silk. To be so beautiful on the outside and so woefully weak, so ugly inside was such a tragedy.

Something tickled my cheek, and when I lifted my fingertips to my skin, they came away wet. Of course, I had to cry when I was angry. I couldn’t even be badass like my sister in anger.

Still, I tilted my chin and stared my mother down, refusing to feel guilty for speaking my truth even though it hurt us both to hear it.

“I love you,” I told her honestly, voice so soft and flailing I wondered if she could even hear it. “I love you, Mum, but I love you because you’re my blood. I love them”—I gestured to the family at my back—“because they earned it. I hope one day, you can earn it too.”

A sob exploded from her throat and burst against her hands as she tried to catch it in her palms.

I forced myself to walk away, to channel my inner Priest and remain unmoved by her tears. For too long, I’d capitulated to Phillipa. Because she was weaker, she needed my love and patience, but it was long past time she stood up for her daughters and, honestly, for herself.

So I turned on my heel and moved over to the couch where my sister sat dumbfounded. I offered her my hand with a little smile. “Come get ready for the party with me, big sister? I think I left an old Cosmo here somewhere. We can take a quiz to see what kind of man you’ll end up with while you do my hair.”

Loulou looked up at me with glistening eyes just a shade darker than my own, eyes that were velvet with tenders and wet with pride. I knew she remembered that night so many years ago when I’d read that silly quiz, the last night we’d lived under the same roof before Dad hit her and kicked her out for dating Zeus.

“You know I love you, right?” she whispered through the lump in her throat I felt mimicked in mine. “You know I’m so fucking proud of who you’ve become, right?”

Hot tears pooled on my lower lids. I struggled not to blink so they wouldn’t fall. I’d just been as emotionally badass as I’d ever been, and I wanted to maintain that for at least as long as it took to walk back to Z and Lou’s room in the clubhouse.

“Yeah,” I breathed. “No matter how lonely I’ve ever felt, I always knew I had you.”

“Jesus,” Nova interjected with a little cough. “You tryna make grown men cry?”

We both laughed wetly at him as Lila punched him playfully in the shoulder, but it was a good way to break the tension. Maja went to console Phillipa, and I respected that. They had their own friendship, and truthfully, I was glad my mum had someone to comfort her because, for once, it couldn’t be me.

“You ready to make a biker babe transformation?” Harleigh Rose crowed, jumping to her feet and rubbing her hands together with an evil little grin.

Lila whooped as she got to her feet and hip-checked H.R. “Yes! Let’s get gorgeous.”

“Already gorgeous, Flower Child,” Nova noted with a lazy up and down look at his woman. “But you wanna lose some clothes, I’m down for that.”

“Me too,” Boner added with a lecherous wiggle of his dark brows.

Nova shoved to his feet and pinned him in a headlock. “You hittin’ on my woman?”

“If I had a chance in hell, I would,” Boner asserted even though Nova was choking off his air.

I laughed; the feel of it, of them, warming my belly like a shot of Z’s favourite whiskey. There was relief there too, knowing that in all the chaos and fear of the serial killer haunting my life, at least I’d found my place in life, the one home where I knew I’d always belong. It wasn’t what I’d always imagined it would be growing up—a nuclear family, a stable job, a normal life—but thank God, it was so much more than I ever could have hoped for.