He sighs, and we face off in my bedroom, looking at each other across the distance between us. Ash doesn’t look upset, just concerned.
“River.” He says my name a third time.
“Ash,” I shoot back, not looking away.
Either he doesn’t want to argue, or he can see I’m not going to back down and takes the stubbornness as a good sign, because after a moment, he sighs and gives in. He motions for me to walk through the door and then follows me down the stairs and into the kitchen.
Gage, Knox, and Priest are all gathered around the table, and the clock on the stove says it’s just after seven in the morning, which explains why I’m so fucking tired.
They all look up when we walk in, but before anyone can say anything, Priest gets up and comes over to me.
There’s still a little of that haunted look on his face, and his sharp blue eyes are heavy with worry and pain.
He tugs me into his arms, and I let him, knowing that he needs this.
He clearly understands how fucked up I felt after Hannah’s death, but I know I fucked him up by leaving. I know what that means to him and how he worries when he can’t keep me safe.
Priest breathes me in for a second, holding me close. He buries his face in the crook of my neck, and I can feel his lips moving against my skin, even if I can’t make out what he’s saying. His arms are tight around me, and there’s a palpable possessiveness in it, as if he’d rip apart anyone who tried to take me away from him.
When he finally lifts his head, he pulls back a little and looks me over. I’m not sure what he’s looking for, but his eyes scan my face until he’s satisfied. Then he leans down and kisses me, full of feeling.
I kiss him back, hands braced against his chest, and it pushes a bit of the numbness away.
We eventually surface for air, and Priest sweeps his thumbs over my cheeks and then steps away.
No words passed between us, but we didn’t need them. He knows how I’m feeling, and I know he understands how hard it is. There’s nothing we really need to say out loud.
When I look back at the table, Ash is sitting down, stealing pieces of bacon from Knox’s plate. All four of the Kings turn their attention to me, like they’re waiting to see if I have anything to say.
And as it turns out, I do.
“I’m going to destroy Julian,” I tell them, running with Ash’s idea from back in the shower. “I’m not just going to cross his name off a list, the way I did with his father and the others. I want to wreck him. I want to tear his life apart watch him twist himself into pieces about it. Then I’ll kill him.”
Knox barks a laugh and grins brightly at me. “I fucking love it,” he says. “Hell yes. It’s what he deserves. Hell, he deserves worse, but this is so goddamn good.”
Gage clears his throat, and we all glance at him. He’s usually the voice of reason, the one who puts the brakes on crazy plans and makes us think about the consequences of things.
There’s a determined set to his mouth, so I don’t think he’s going to tell me no, and even if he did, I probably wouldn’t listen. But I wait to see what he’s going to say all the same.
He tugs at his lip, like he’s thinking it all over.
“He deserves it,” Gage says finally. “That and worse. Nothing you could do to him would be a step too far after everything.”
“That’s what I’m saying,” Knox puts in.
“But,” Gage says, emphasizing that word. “We have to think about everything that could be coming. We have to play it smart and be prepared.”
“What do you mean, what could be coming?” I ask him.
“We fucked up the wedding. Not even the way we intended to, but now he might know that we planned to fuck him over in the first place. He could come after us for that.”
“He killed her sister,” Priest says flatly. “I’m pretty sure that makes up for whatever we did to him. He got his revenge.”
It hurts to hear it put that way, like killing Hannah was just a move on a chessboard, a little bit of revenge for us making things harder for him. But I know what Priest means.
“Also, Julian might not even know we had a plan in the first place,” Ash points out, chewing on a piece of bacon.
“He saw us trying to escape,” I tell him. “He accused me of orchestrating the attack, but I denied it.”
“Did he believe you?” Gage asks, his eyes narrowing.
My skin prickles as if spiders are crawling over my body, but I force myself to replay that last confrontation with Julian in my head. He was furious with me for trying to get my sister out while the cartel members were shooting up the church, but I do think he believed me when I said we hadn’t planned on them showing up—because it was the truth.
“Yeah.” I nod slowly. “I think he did. The cartel attack was real, so as far as he knows, Hannah and I were just taking advantage of an unexpected opportunity.”
Just talking about Hannah and everything that happened makes bile rise in my throat, and for a second, everything goes hazy like I’m going to pass out again. But I force it back and make myself focus and stay standing. I have to be strong and deal with this. It’s not like I can just never talk about Hannah again, or think about what happened. If I’m going to make Julian pay for it, it’ll be at the forefront of my mind the whole time.
I drag in a deep breath and steady myself. I can be strong for Hannah.
“That’s good.” Ash nods, giving me an encouraging look. “If Julian doesn’t know that we planned to double-cross him even before the wedding, it will make all of this easier.”
“What do we know about the asshole?” Knox asks. “He owns that boxing gym. What else?”
“That’s his main legit business,” Gage says. “Like the club is for us. We can go after that and destroy it somehow, but most of his income is from illegal sources.”
“Do we have any idea what all he has his fingers in?” Priest wants to know.
“I’ve seen him go to a few places,” I say, speaking up. “When I was tailing him before.”
That seems like a long time ago now. Following Julian around Detroit, watching him take meetings and make deals and whatever else. Like life is split into befores and afters and everything before Hannah’s death might as well have happened to a different person.
“We can make some assumptions from the places, probably,” Gage says. “We’ll have to figure out what shit he’s got going on so we can figure out how to take it down.”
“Oh,” I say, grimacing as I remember something else. “He’s also fucking his damn sister. So we can use that against him too.”