“Could it have been the cartel that put Ivan’s body on display?” I throw out, wondering if it’s all connected somehow, and what else we might have missed.
Gage considers that, then shakes his head. “I doubt it. It doesn’t make enough sense. Ivan’s body being hacked up and placed on that art piece at the gala was subtle. It sent a message, but it doesn’t track with the way the cartel came into the church with guns blazing. They wanted something big and loud and showy.”
I curl my hand into a fist at my side. I feel… on edge. Like all the control I usually have in spades is slipping out of my grasp.
“I didn’t realize the cartel had managed to connect River to Diego’s death,” I tell them. “But they clearly did.”
“Yeah,” Gage echoes. He rubs at his face and finally stops pacing. “I’d ask her if more cartel fuckers saw her after that incident when she tried to kill Ivan, but…”
He gestures helplessly with one hand, and we all know what he means.
Right now, River has bigger issues than the cartel. They want her dead, but she’s struggling to even be present. Struggling to keep her spirit alive.
“I hate seeing her like that,” Ash murmurs. “So fucked up and out of it. It was like she barely knew who we were.”
“She got there,” Knox cuts in. “She stopped fighting once she realized it was us.”
“But then she was just blank. Unresponsive. I had to say her name a few times before she even realized I was talking to her.”
“Yeah.”
Knox stares down at the table, his nostrils flaring as his jaw clenches. It must be hard for him to know he can’t kill or maim someone to make this go away for her. None of us are all that skilled at dealing with emotions. We don’t know what to say or how to act to make things better, and considering what just happened to River, it might be a while before she can surface through all that pain.
Ash looks to me, and there’s something hesitant in his gaze at first. Then he takes a breath, clearly deciding to just go for it.
“How did you survive?” he asks. “After Jade.”
My stomach tightens immediately. Normally, the other Kings of Chaos don’t mention Jade around me. It’s just sort of an unspoken agreement that they don’t bring that shit up or poke at the old wounds. We all do it for each other, not dragging up crap from the past that can only hurt to think about in the present.
But I know why Ash is asking about her now.
I think about how to answer him, and I realize I’m not really sure. Jade was the only woman I’d ever loved as a young man, and watching her be burned to death by a vicious gang to teach me a lesson ripped out a part of my soul.
It was a dark time for me, and there were so many times that I almost slipped away into that darkness, losing myself to the pain. It definitely seemed easier sometimes—easier to give myself over to it than to keep fighting.
Most of what I remember from back then is a void. The dark nothing where Jade used to be.
Even thinking about it now makes the ragged edges of that wound ache. It’s healed a little, enough that it’s not always fresh and gaping, throbbing with trauma and pain the way it used to constantly, but I know that it’s always going to hurt.
It’ll never be fully healed.
Most likely, it’ll be the same for River. She was on her mission to kill the six men on her list because of what they did to her and her sister, and even years after it happened, she still wanted revenge because the pain was still there.
Now there’s this new wound layered on top of that, and it will just compound the whole fucking thing.
Something in me aches for her, and I try to think of a useful answer to Ash’s question, because I know we’ll need to have some kind of a plan to help River in the days to come. We need to do something so that we don’t lose her to the darkness.
Bracing myself, I open up the dead, closed-off part of my heart, allowing myself to experience that old pain almost like it’s new.
As I do, I remember how all-encompassing it felt. How it made it hard to see anything else. It blocked out my vision, my happy memories, making it so all I could feel was the loss. And every time I was alone, with nothing else to do and no outlet for my energy, it crept in a little more, trying to take me down with it.
I remember that very well.
There was always something that pulled me back from the brink of total ruin, though. Something else I could focus on, something that gave me the kind of purpose I needed to keep moving.
And when I think about it now, I realize what it was.
I had them.
My brothers.
In the immediate aftermath of Jade’s death, I had Knox by my side. He was the one who helped me get my revenge on the men who had killed her. And not long after that, we fell in with Ash and Gage.
If I hadn’t had the other Kings in my life, I wouldn’t have made it back out of my darkness. I know that for a fact.
“It was you,” I tell Ash, glancing up at him. “All of you.”
Ash frowns, furrowing his brow in confusion. “But we didn’t really do anything. Gage and I didn’t, anyway.”
“You didn’t have to do anything,” I tell him. “You were just… there.” I look at all of them in turn. “You were there for me, and I knew you always would be, and that was enough to keep me from losing myself completely. That’s what we have to do for River. Hollow words and trying to fix her aren’t going to help. She’s hurting, and it’s a kind of pain we can’t even touch. We just have to make sure she knows that we’re here for her. No matter what.”
They all nod, and it’s clear that my words have taken away a little of their worry. At least enough that they can see a way forward.
Ash looks determined, like he’s never going to let River know loneliness another day in her life.
Gage looks furious, like he wants to find the cartel members and Julian and everyone who ever laid a hand on her and make them wish they were never born.
Knox has that look on his face as if he’s mentally going through his list of “toys” and planning ways to use them on anyone who hurts River.
It helps to see them all so protective of her. I can feel the same urge to take care of her burning in my own chest. I won’t allow her to ever suffer the way Jade suffered, and knowing my brothers will have my back in that goal eases the tight knot in my stomach.
I still feel uneasy, though. Still on edge and unsure of what to do about it.
River is just upstairs, but she seems far away. The fact that I can’t see her just adds to the agitation in my chest and the unsettled feeling spreading out to my limbs.
The house is secure, and anyone who broke in to try to hurt her would be in for a rude fucking awakening, but still.
I want to be near her.
I need to be able to see that she’s okay.
So I slip out of the kitchen while the others are talking and go back upstairs.