by Bo Reid
Tilting my head up to meet Hunter's concerned gaze, I smile at him, squeezing his hand. “I just want to talk to them,” I say, my voice dripping with an innocence I don’t possess.
“Love…” Ranger warns, and I turn to him, reaching my other hand out to rest on his chest, over his heart.
“And maybe rip their hearts out of their chests. We’ll see,” I smirk at him, and he shakes his head. Bending down, he plants a kiss on my lips before moving around me and walking out of the room. Hunter does the same, and I turn to Nash and Emma.
“Staying or going?” I ask them, and I see the hesitation in Nash’s eyes. Two years ago, that hesitation might have crushed me, but today, I get it, and today I don’t need him to reassure me that he isn’t going anywhere; we’re blood, and he’s stuck with me. I nod my head slightly and watch the weight lift from Nash’s shoulders.
“Emma, you’re better set up here for tech stuff, why don’t you guys stay?”
“I can figure out a set up there,” Emma says, running her hand over her swollen belly.
I shake my head. “Naw, you’re already set up here, no use in dragging all your stuff with you. And Nash stays, no one goes anywhere alone,” I say, and Nash rolls his eyes.
“Says the girl who almost always runs off alone,” he quips, and I smile.
“Scouts honor that we’ll play buddy system,” I say, holding up two fingers, which causes Talin to snort-laugh and cover it with a small cough.
“Let’s not pretend you were a scout,” he says, planting a kiss on the side of my head.
“You people are fucking crazy,” Aether mumbles from his place at the table.
I smile. “You have no idea.”
Chapter 8: Siamja
Morana
We all file off the private plane at a small airfield just outside of Helena, Montana when it hits me. I turn to Talin and grab his arm, digging my nails into his bicep.
“Honey, what’s wrong?” he asks.
“I’m going to meet your mother,” I whisper, my voice laced with panic. He smiles, leaning in to kiss my forehead as I try to breathe normally.
“She’s going to love you,” he whispers.
“Fucking doubtful,” Aether says as he walks by, and I stick my leg out behind me, tripping him.
He falls face-first onto the asphalt tarmac and lands with a thud. “Did no one teach you to respect your elders?” I quip as I stare at him, lying on the ground.
“Well, this is going to be fun,” Ranger grumbles as Hunter leans down and hauls Aether back onto his feet. He cuts a glare at me as he leans over to pick up his bag.
“I guess you guys do have twenty years of sibling bickering to catch up on,” Talin says as he pulls me in for a hug, “My mom is going to love you.”
Yeah, we have been together for two years, and I still haven’t met his mother. Why, you ask? Great question. But probably because I’m a murderer, and the reason her son is no longer a federal agent. Also, because how do you explain to someone’s mother that his girlfriend is even dating two other guys who also happen to be her adoptive brothers?
That he lives in the house with her other adoptive brother who she does not sleep with, who is actually her half-brother, and his girlfriend, who is also ex-FBI? Yeah, shit is just a little complicated. So we have never met, and to be honest, I don’t even know if she knows about me, or us, or this arrangement we have going on here.
How much about my life does she know? How much is she going to have to find out about when I breeze into her town and burn it down for her son? Is she going to hate me? Am I going to have to lie?
This is why I was never good at playing mob games; it’s all about lying and secrets. And yeah, I’m good at both but not when that means I have to pretend to be someone I’m not. For most of my life, I have had to act normal, as if I didn’t want to cut someone just to hear them scream and watch the blood run down their skin simply because I thought it was pretty. I don’t know if I’m going to be able to walk into that house, Talin’s childhood home, and pretend I’m fucking normal. And if I need to do that, if I have to act, I’ll lose Talin because I’m not good at pretending.
Calliope is a small town about two hours outside of Helena, and the drive can, at best, be described as uncomfortable. It’s not just the fact that I’m smashed in the backseat with Ranger and Hunter as Talin drives us to his hometown. It’s everything that the town could hold for us. His mom, my mom, secrets he might not want to know about his dad. It’s one thing to know your father is a killer, a mob boss, and an all-around dangerous, dirty man. It’s another to have this idea of the perfect man built up in your head and have someone walk in and smash that picture to pieces. If it turns out his father was dirty, that might break him, and I was never very good at putting the broken back together. Just take a look at my own heart, it is truly a wonder the thing even remembers how to beat properly with how much it’s been torn out, stomped on, ripped to shreds, poorly taped back together, and then forcefully shoved back into my chest.
No matter how much Hunter and Ranger try to calm me down with soothing touches, I’m still a bundle of nerves. I’ve never been good at playing the political bullshit game; I don’t smile on cue or promise anyone the world. I’ve only once met a boyfriend’s mother, and that didn’t go over very well. I mean, no one died, but they forbid him from ever speaking to me again and then moved the fuck out of town to keep him away from the “Valdis Devil.” I’m no devil, though; someone just forgot to tell them I’m the goddamn Reaper. My other two boyfriends don’t have mothers to meet. Well, Hunter’s mom is out there somewhere; at least if she hasn’t OD’d by now, but Ranger’s mom, sadly, didn’t make it past his twelfth birthday.
I don’t know how close Talin and his mother are; I know he has flown out a few times in the last two years to see her, but he doesn’t talk about her much. I don’t know if it’s because I don’t have a mother, so he doesn’t talk about his. Or if it’s because she doesn’t know about me.
I couldn’t even blame him for keeping her in the dark. If I were dating myself, I’d keep me a secret too. No one wants to admit that their partner is a homicidal maniac. Or that they have not only condoned but participated in mass murder, especially not to their mother.
Not every killer gets an Aeron for their parent — the dad that pats you on the head and tells you that you did a great job on taking out a bunch of bangers. Sometimes you even get a Victoria — the mother that walks out before you become a monster. Maybe I’m just lucky; I got both.
We pull up to a small motel on the edge of town, and Talin goes inside to get a room. I’m not sure if he’s planning on staying with his mom or with us. Aether is going to stay at his house and said we could all stay there, but I think a little distance from him is what I need.
As much as I want to hate him, shit comes too easy for us. We bicker a little too much like family. He doesn’t walk on eggshells around me — not like anyone else might, knowing who I am. The shit between us isn’t even how it is between Nash and me. Nash is different from Aether, and he treats me differently — not broken, but not invincible either.
Maybe a part of me wants to get to know Aether. Maybe a part of me wants to know what it was like growing up with our mother, and not around crime. Perhaps part of me wants to know what it would be like to have a half-brother and a whole one; would they make up for the twin I lost? Will I ever stop comparing people around me to Hades?
Maybe that’s why I can’t let myself get close to him. I’m still a killer, and he’ll walk out on me as soon as he gets his mother back.
My heart is safer locked away in a cage.
Chapter 9: Pôribar
Morana
“Are you sure you don’t want to come? We can get this over with,” Talin asks me for the fourth time, and I’m still sure that I don’t want to meet his mother yet.
“I think we should wait until we have all this other shit with the Shay family squared away. No sense in pretending this is
just a friendly visit,” I say with a tight smile.
“Okay,” he says, but I can hear the hurt in his tone.
He wants me to meet her because he loves me. But I won’t be able to get through this job after I see the judgment and disappointment on her face. I can’t protect her and her son if I can’t get through this with a clear head. I need to be able to tell myself it’s okay to be a monster. If I question who I am, if I hesitate even once, that could be my life or theirs. There are too many people counting on me to be the kind of hero I can’t be. I know I’m going to let them down, but that doesn’t mean I have to risk their lives in the process.
It might not be fair to assume that’s how she’ll feel, but let’s call it an educated guess. The likelihood of a mother condoning this type of relationship for her only son is slim, add in the fact that we’re all killers; that we made her son one too? The idea of her being happy to meet me is laughable.
Like if this were happening to anyone else, I would be on the floor rolling, but it’s happening to me, so it’s not that funny.
Talin walks out of the motel room door as my phone rings. I catch the looks Hunter and Ranger exchange, and I know they think I should have gone with him, but that isn’t their call to make.
“Yeah,” I sigh into the phone when I pick it up.
“Found your guys. The Shay’s own and run a dive bar and Harley shop on the edge of Calliope,” Emma says into the phone.
“Great, shouldn’t be too hard to find in this town,” I say.
“How’s Talin?” she asks quietly, and I run a hand down my face.
“Okay, I guess; he just left to go see his mom,” I say.
“And you didn’t go with him?” she asks, as I slip out the motel room door and walk across the parking lot to sit under a small tree.
“No.”
“Why not?” she asks without judgment.
That’s the thing about Emma; we’re not only family but friends. And it’s still surprising how much she doesn’t judge me — doesn’t judge us. She doesn’t hold judgments or reservations about the relationship the guys and I have, not even with a baby on the way. Emma never tried to take Nash away from me, and to this day, she is still the first one to make sure we’re available for each other when needed.
When Nash first found out Emma was pregnant, he was over-the-fucking-moon excited, until the fears and doubts started to creep in. He knew he could support a family financially, but he had no idea how to be a father. He didn’t have one for most of his life, and then it turns out the one he did have was a cold-hearted mob kingpin. That isn’t exactly the best role model for father of the year.
Emma tried and tried to tell him that everything would be fine because that’s what wives do. What Nash needed though was a good old fashion punch to the face, and that’s where I came in. After solid reasoning and reassurance didn’t work on him, I simply beat some sense into his thick skull; Valdis blood really is as stubborn as it can get. In the end, Nash realized he knew exactly how to be a father because he knew what not to do, and sometimes that’s even better than having a road map of what to do.
“How do you think that visit would go, Em? Hey Mrs. Marks, nice to meet you, oh, why yes, I am the reason he is no longer an agent. Why? Well, you can’t be a Fed and date a serial killer; it just isn’t done. Oh yeah, he was involved in the mass murder of an entire MC, but it’s okay, we paid off all the right people,” I say with a false peppy tone.
“Well, maybe instead of that, you could have just given her your name,” she deadpans.
“Em, I just can’t. I’ve only ever met one boyfriend’s parents; it didn’t end well, and I’ve never had to explain my tendency to slit throats to someone.”
“He’s going to be crushed if you leave there without meeting her.”
“I’ll meet her before we leave; I just have to finish all this shit first,” I sigh. “I can’t let her distract me from my end game.”
“Which is?” she asks.
“Getting Talin answers.”
“Not saving your mother?”
“I have no mother. But no, she is not my end game; I’m going to get Talin answers, and if I save her in the process, then so be it,” I shrug.
“You suck at this hero thing, Babe,” she says, laughing, and I hear Nash mumble something in the background.
“That’s ’cause I’m the villain, Darlin’, and I like it that way. Evil has more fun anyways,” I smirk before I hang up the phone and make my way back over to the motel room.
Pulling our door open, I slip out of the cold. “Let’s go,” I tell Hunter and Ranger.
“Where?” Hunter asks.
“Shay’s run a bar on the outskirts of town; we’re going to go have a little chat.”
“Morana, don’t you think we should wait for Talin?” Hunter asks.
“No. I think we should get this over with as fast as possible and go home. I already don’t like it here.”
“You need to remember you don’t run things here, Love; they’re not going to know who you are or why they should fear you,” Ranger says, stepping up to me as I shrug on my jacket.
“Then I’ll just have to teach them a lesson, won’t I?” I smile up at him.
“You’re going to cause trouble, aren’t you?”
“Fastest way to get results,” I wink.
We pull up to the Skull Tavern — the Shay family’s bar and Harley shop. Is no one original anymore? Oh, the big scary bikers that own a shitty bar where they conduct their illegal business. The location that no upstanding citizen dares to enter. And of course, there is a scary skull hanging above the bar, and all the member vests have demonic-looking skulls on the backs, as I said, so not original.
Stepping out of the SUV, we walk up to the front doors to a chorus of whistles and drunken hollers. As I said, I already hate this place. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I have been inside my fair share of run-down biker dive bars; I just like to burn them down when I leave.
I step into the darkened bar and claim a space on an end bar stool. Hunter sits next to me, and Ranger stands at my back, catching the questioning eyes of the patrons as the bartender stalks over.
“What can I get you folks?” he asks.
He’s young, in his mid to late twenties, and fills out his tight, black t-shirt in all the right places. Dark brown hair that he wears just long enough to run your fingers through and pull and dark blue eyes meet mine as I study him. I think it’s been too long since I last had sex, considering I’m about to start drooling over the fucking bartender.
“Information,” I say.
“That costs,” he replies, leaning his hands on the bar. “What are you going to give me?” he asks as he bites his lower lip and his eyes dip down to the open front of my leather jacket.
“I’ll pay,” I say with a sweet smile.
“What do you want to know?”
“Where Victoria Tyler is.” I feel Ranger's arms wrap protectively around me, as Hunter slides a blade into my hand. They hate that I have no tact. I just never saw the point in beating around the bush; I'd rather set the forest on fire.
“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” he says, standing up and straightening his spine. The way he says it, with such false conviction, it’s almost cute, like he thinks I'm just going to let this go. Unfortunately for him, I'm like a dog with a bone; I don't let shit go. And right now, he's my bone.
He crosses his arms in front of his chest and broadens his stance. I hear various patrons moving around, but I don’t move my gaze from his.
“Oh, Honey, I’m pretty sure you do,” I bat my eyelashes at him. “What’s your name?”
“Kesden Shay,” he says his name like it holds power — like it should mean something to me. The only thing it tells me is that I’m in the right place, and he knows the answer to my question.
“I’m Morana, Morana Valdis,” I say, extending my hand out to shake his. He looks at it warily but places his hand in mine.
Before he has a chance to stop me, I yank on his arm, catching him off guard and causing him to lose his balance, falling forward. I reach up and shove his face into the bar. Getting up from my seat, I slide across the bar, wrenching his arm behind his back and pulling him to stand and then move to place my blade across his throat.
“Now, Kesden, I’m in a bit of a hurry, so excuse my manners. But you have something I want,” I whisper as I watch the other patrons move closer to the bar. Ranger and Hunter stand at full attention — ready for anything.
“I don’t know where she is,” Kesden grits out.
“But you know who does,” I singsong, pressing the blade into his neck just enough to stop him from squirming.
“So, I’ll make you a deal,” I say, dropping my hold on his arm and removing my blade from his neck, taking a step back and letting him straighten up again.
“You tell me where I can find whoever it is I need to talk to, and I’ll be on my way.”
“I don’t need to tell you anything,” he says as he crosses his arms over his chest.
“But you will,” I say.
“Look, little girl, you’re outnumbered and on Shay turf. What makes you think you’re walking out of here breathing?” he snorts.
I smile and whisper. “Because you can’t kill someone who’s already dead.”
“What’s this?” A deep voice sounds from across the bar.
I fix my gaze on the man that just stepped through the doors, wiping his hands off with a grease rag and assessing the situation with a calculated eye.
That’s who I need to talk to.
He’s older but radiates power; not the kind of mob-boss power like Aeron had, but enough to rein in these assholes from time to time. He is a classic biker badass, but even he won’t be able to escape the Reaper.
“You run things,” I say to him, it’s not a question, and I already know the answer.
“I do, and who might you be, Dear?” he asks me as I move around Kesden, jumping up to slide across the bar, completely ignoring the younger Shay.