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“It’s not. Obviously,” Leo adds. “But we’re not talking about normal people. We’re talking about sick fucks with more power than they deserve.”
“Yeah,” Alaric says, rubbing his jaw. He leans against the counter. “They would joke about something like that. You have an idea?”
Leo drums his fingers over his jeans. The forest green long-sleeved shirt he has on pulls tight over his biceps. The sleeves are still rolled up, showing off the wounds he suffered from the Pound of Flesh ceremony. The pink, jagged marks only serve to make him more imposing. “I’ve got an idea but it—”
“It’s mental?” Oliver suggests after Leo just stops talking.
Leo shakes his head before piercing me with his dark gaze. “It’s suicide if it goes wrong, and it will take a hell of a lot of trust on everyone’s part.”
My stomach flips like I’m on a roller coaster. Trust is something I’m in short supply of. The memories of hanging upside down over the Saint Lawrence River’s dark depths still plague me. I have no doubt that these three are on my side now, but that doesn’t mean I want to test the waters. From the way Leo is staring at me, though, I think that’s exactly what he wants to do.
“How badly do you want to find out about your sister?”
I glare at him, anger thrumming through my veins, and my fingers twitch to wrap around his thick neck and squeeze. It wouldn’t matter that I wouldn’t get very far, it would just be the act of trying that would satiate me.
Oliver sighs. “You’re an idiot.” Leo shoots him a look, but Oliver just smirks. “No, really, keep talking like that. I’m just waiting for the happy outcome.”
Leo moves forward, and I take a step back. It’s always like this with us. I could plan out our day before it even begins. He says something stupid. I retaliate. He pushes. I pull back. His headstrong ways get the best of him until he realizes I’m right. On motherfucking repeat, day in and day out.
“I think I know where he’s going with this.”
Oliver waves Alaric away. “Just enjoy this with me, professor.”
The eldest out of us rolls his eyes. “Oil and vinegar.”
He’s not wrong. Leo stalks forward again, and the light in his eyes flashes. He loves all of this. I must, too, because I can’t stop the chain of events from actually happening. I never deter from the storyline. “You’re the vinegar,” I tell Leo, lifting my brow.
His voice lowers until it has that gravelly texture that undoes me. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“Sometimes I really hate you.”
“So you keep saying.”
I back into the wall near the door. There’s nowhere else for me to escape. For a moment, I feel like a caged animal when Leo’s arms imprison me, but then I realize he’s the animal and my body purrs in response.
“Don’t get your panties in a bunch.” His thick voice glides over me like hard liquor and smoke.
“Don’t say stupid shit.”
“Don’t take offense to all the stupid shit I say.” I growl deep in my throat, and he rises to the occasion. “Little Miss Astor, you don’t frighten me. You turn me the fuck on.”
“As entertaining as all this is,” Oliver says, though he doesn’t sound like he finds it entertaining at all, “can we skip to the part where Eden cuts your balls off?”
Leo bristles in the same moment I bark out an unexpected laugh. Instantly, Leo backs away, face red.
I kind of love the fact that Oliver doesn’t let Leo get away with shit anymore. Sure, my panties are in a bunch—and soaked, I might add—but the pride resonating off of Oliver is just as much of a turn on.
He crosses his arms in front of his chest. “I think we all know how invested Eden is in finding out what happened to Dee, so if you’ve got an idea, Caveman, spill it.”
Leo gathers himself quickly. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t be Leonardo Jarvis. He mirrors Oliver’s stance, and he damn well knows he looks more imposing than my royal prince ever could. But I’m okay with that. “I say Barclay and I go back in. We play the game. We live the life. We see what we can find out from the inside.”
My heart pinches. I understand his question now. He means there might come a time again when they’ll just have to sit on the sidelines and watch. If they’re playing a part, they have to play it wholly. They have to make people believe. The men in this world are careless bastards. And I don’t know if I’m strong enough to go through that, even knowing what I know.
So, how badly do I want to find out what happened to Dee? Enough to give up the family I just got—no matter how dysfunctional it really is?
And a small, small part of me eyes Alaric and Leo, and I can’t help but think that maybe I’m being played again.
That I’ve been played since the beginning.