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He shifted his weight and rested his elbows on the bar top. “I went to school with them. I’m still in contact with people who run in their circles, I’m sure. I can dig around for you, find out whatever you need to know. About their families and where they live. Where they work. There’s no need for you to go anywhere near them.”
I narrowed my eyes, not liking any of the words coming out of his mouth. He was missing my point. What I really didn’t need was someone taking my power. Again. “I need to face where it happened. Coming back to Psychos tonight made me realize that. I need to stand there and know it’s never going to happen again.”
He shook his head. “Do you even hear yourself? You’re playing with fire. Taking stupid risks in the hope of feeling something that isn’t grief over your mom. I’m not letting you do that.”
Not letting me? He didn’t get it. It wasn’t about my grief at all. It was that they’d stolen something from me that night. My confidence. I needed it back. I didn’t know who I was without it. “I get you’ve never felt powerless. It’s not your fault you grew up male, white, and with money. But that isn’t my story. I can’t walk down the street without seeing them in every face. I can’t fucking sleep at night, Vaughn. I close my eyes, and they’re always there. I need to prove to myself that I can be around them and not freeze. I don’t want to be taken by surprise, like I was at the hospital.”
His teeth dug into his perfect bottom lip, hesitation still in his eyes, but maybe a little bit of understanding too.
I took my chance to drive my point home. “I don’t just want to know where they live. If they’re married and have families. I want to know the things they don’t admit to their wives. I want to know all their deepest, darkest secrets.” I put the over-scrubbed glass into the drainer so hard it rattled. “Then I’ll use all of it against them to really make them hurt. I can’t win against them as a group. I need to work out a way to divide and conquer. Work out how best to hurt each of them individually.”
Vaughn watched me intently. “You’re really serious about this, huh?”
I stopped what I was doing and stared him dead in the eye. “If you’d experienced the things they’d done to me, you would be too.”
He swore softly under his breath. “Pieces of fucking shit.”
“To say the least.”
He steeled me with a hard look. “If I take you, and I mean if, Rebel. If I take you, you have to wear a mask the entire time. They can’t know it’s you. You rattled Leonn today just being in the same hospital as him, and then he went running to Caleb. I don’t know what they’d do if they knew you were there.”
I waved off his concerns. “Not a problem. Plenty of costumes require a mask.”
“And you stay with me. You don’t wander off.”
I saluted him. “Yes, sir.”
“I’m serious, Rebel. My dad clearly wanted you taken care of. I was a shitty son while he was here so the least I can do is watch out for you. He would have wanted me to treat you like a sister.”
I remembered the way Vaughn had looked at me that night at the hotel, before I’d realized who he was. He was stupidly attractive with his dark features and a smirk that did things to my insides.
I wasn’t sure I liked him talking about me like I was his sibling. I’d never had a brother or sister, but if I had been as attracted to a blooded relative as I was to Vaughn, I would be checking myself into therapy before I ended up on some reality show, confessing to the world how nobody understood our special love.
Fucking hell. The sister thing needed to get nixed in the bud. “Then let me have my half of the inheritance.”
He sighed. “It’s not that easy.”
It never was when it came to money.
A roar from War’s side of the bar came up, and I glanced in their direction. They were all staring up at the big-screen TV, where a hockey match was playing.
All but one guy. I hadn’t even seen him come in, but my heart gave a happy squeeze.
Fang crossed the room to lean on the bar beside Vaughn. “Hey, Pix. Can I get a beer, please?”
“Politest damn biker I’ve ever seen,” Vaughn muttered.
I pulled down on the beer tap, letting the amber liquid run into a clean glass. “You could stand to be a little more like him, you know.”
I pushed the beer across the bar to Fang and waved him off when he tried to pay. “On me.”
“Can I get one,too?” Vaughn asked.
I poured a second beer and sent it in his direction. “Three dollars.”
“You just gave him one for free!”
“Yeah, well, there’s no sibling discount around here.”