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I call Everly instead for the nine millionth time.

Voicemail.

Muttering another curse, I stuff the useless thing into my back pocket and return to the kitchen.

Lachlan is at the island, perched on a stool with a beer in one hand and an empty bottle at his elbow. He sits with his head bowed, fingers tight around the glass like it’s the only thing keeping him together.

I’m trying very hard to understand his feelings right now. He had a lot dropped on him in the span of a few minutes, but we need to go to Everly. We need to check on her. Every second we waste is time she could need us.

But fuck, I get the dead, blank look in Lach’s eyes. I get it. This would gut any man, especially a guy like Lachlan who has lived his whole life trying to do the right thing.

“Lach.” I pull the chair opposite him and lower myself down on it, ignoring the prickle of anxiety crackling up my spine. “Talk to me.”

He shakes his head but says nothing.

I have absolutely no idea what I’m supposed to say here. My own head is so full of everything, I can’t even figure my own shit out, but I can’t leave him like this.

“This isn’t your fault,” I tell him, knowing with all the certainty in my entire chest that’s exactly what he’s thinking.

“I pissed him off,” he mumbles. “I drove him to it. If I hadn’t...”

He drops his forehead into his hand.

“Listen to me, you’re dead wrong. That kid did not need any reason to do what he did. We’ve both seen the way he was towards her from the beginning.”

Lachlan groans. “I should have done something sooner. I should have...”

“What?” I press. “What would you have done that you hadn’t already? You stepped in every chance you could. You talked to him, tried to reason with him.”

His head is rocking slightly before I can even finish. “I should have done more. I should have told Everly to leave him.”

“She’s a grown woman, Lach. She wasn’t going to leave him unless she made the decision on her own.”

“He’s my kid, Van. He’s my responsibility. I created him.”

Maybe I’m not the right person for this conversation, but goddamn it, I’m done.

“He’s Ashley’s kid. Hell, it wouldn’t surprise me if there isn’t a speck of your DNA in his entire worthless body. That littleshit is a manipulative, narcissistic psychopath, Lach. Always was, always would be. You can see it in his dead eyes. That is not you. You hear me? You did your best. You did more than most men ever would. But he’s way too much like his mother and there is no fixing that evil.”

His head lifts and his dark, watery eyes meet mine over deeply pinched eyebrows. “I kicked him out yesterday. I took his phone, all his stuff, and told him to get out. I pushed him to this point. I made her vulnerable.” He straightens, expression only darkening. “All that aside, how can I ever look at her knowing it was my son who put his hands on her, who...” he breaks off with a huffing grunt. “He assaulted her, Van. He did the worst possible thing a man could ever do to a woman because he knew it would hurt me. He did all of that, everything, from the very beginning because he knew. He knew I loved her, and he went out of his way to take her apart just to torture me.”

I stare at him, trying to process that flood of information.

“What are you talking about?”

A big hand scrubs over his face and back through his hair. I expect him to fall silent, to ignore the question when he drops his chin to his chest. But he speaks, unfolding the events of the previous day. He goes through the fight with Bron, the disgusting words hurled by the shit dumpster and Lachlan’s decision to finally boot him from the house.

I listen without interruption. I let him get it all out while my chest expands with rage. My fingers curl into the marble countertop, nails biting along the underside as I resist the urge to hunt Bron Shaw down like a rabid dog and put him down.

“It felt so good,” Lachlan breathes. “Getting him out of my life, cutting him off, being ... free of him...” he shakes his head slowly. “I was so happy. What kind of father...?”

“The kind that’s had enough,” I bark. “You did everything for him and Ashley from day one and what did you ever get back in return? Nothing,” I answer for him. “The only thing you did wrong was putting up with them for as long as you did.”

“How am I supposed to look Everly in the face after this?”

I am not amused when I smack the counter and Lachlan flinches. “You face her like the man who fucking loves her, you idiot. That’s our girl and she needs us, so you need to pull yourself together, put your damn shoes on and get over there.”

“Brewer said—”