Page 28 of Cruel Debts (Killers of Port Wylde #4)

TWENTY-FOUR

TRINITY

Pissed didn't begin to describe how I felt about this whole situation. Pissed, while touching lightly on the feeling, was only the tip of the iceberg.

I was livid. I was furious. I was outraged on behalf of my brother, and of myself.

I thought these bastards had more loyalty in their blood. Turned out, when life handed you an easy out, sometimes, you just took it.

I settled into a routine.

Get up. Eat their food. Ignore them. Shower. Ignore them. One word answers when absolutely unavoidable. Eat more of their food. Inconvenience them. Sleep.

Rinse and repeat.

So far, the only person whose nerves it was getting on were Hawke's.

Asher looked like he thought they deserved it. Liam?—

Well, Liam was something of a wildcard.

One minute, he wasted his time watching me, his eyes full of regret and frustration. The next, he was storming around the apartment grumbling to himself. And any time he wasn't doing either, he was conveniently missing from the dorms, unreachable and unavailable.

He didn't answer calls, texts, or requests for communication of any type. Not even from the other two.

And if they could play these games, then so could I. The difference being, I could play them so much better.

I might want to fuck them all within an inch of their lives, but I had self-control. And when a man acted like these three, the desire to crawl into their arms diminished quite spectacularly.

Currently, I was posted up on the couch, spread across it quite excessively in order to force them to the other seats. There weren't enough for the three of them, though, so Asher was just leaning against the wall like a statue, watching me.

It was unnerving.

Not as unnerving as Liam glaring at the wall instead of the TV. Or Hawke staring at my feet.

Who the fuck stared at someone's feet for an hour without speaking?

Hawke, that's who.

I shook off the weird vibes and decided to just stick to the plan. Once everything was in place, I'd just strike out on my own again, and things would be back to how they were before these three walked back into my life.

The fact that I'd never know what their dicks felt like was a sad reality, but I'd get over it.

Hawke stood while I was mid-brood and poked me in the foot with the edge of his phone. "Hey, Trinity?—"

"She won't talk to you," Liam muttered, flipping open his phone. "She's taken a vow of silence, apparently."

I jerked my foot back and tucked it under myself, huffing quietly. "I don't speak to traitors and liars."

"Told you," Liam said proudly, though the pride in his voice was dull and not at all his usual tone. "Stubborn. Just like?—"

"Like Tank." Hawke's brows quirked as I looked up at him from under furious brows, daring him to say more. "Maybe we should ? —"

"We don't have the time right now," Liam growled, tossing his phone on the coffee table in front of him. "We're busy with our job, Hawke. You know this better than anyone."

"Yeah, well, maybe we should make time, man, I dunno." He scratched the back of his neck as he shot a glance in my direction. "For her."

I was still ignoring them. I was. But when the asshole who spent more time bullying me than breathing said they needed to make time for me, that they needed to do something for me, I was all ears.

I could listen and still ignore.

Asher growled his answer. "We have to deal with the shit at home before we can deal with everyone else's shit."

"Tank is our home," Hawke said with a frown. Which was hilarious to me.

Of all the guys, Hawke had been the least eager to let Keehn in their little circle. He'd been the most resistant to making him a friend. But now, here he was, championing my brother's cause, after all these years, simply because . . . what? Was he feeling guilty, finally?

Had he finally started to regret his mistake?

"What the hell are you kissing ass for all of a sudden?

It's not like you like her." Liam jerked a thumb in my direction, and I nearly forgot I was supposed to be ignoring them as a hiss climbed up the back of my throat.

"Who are you pretending for? You were the first of us to move on after discovering he was gone. "

"But I'm also the one who found out there was a fake," Hawke insisted, and the fucking curiosity just kept growing and growing. Had they been looking for him? Or had something just happened to fall into their lap that revealed the forgery, the fake, to their eyes?

I couldn't ask, though. That would mean giving up on the vow of almost-silence.

"Both of you just shut up," Asher growled, running his hands through his hair.

"I'm so tired of listening to it. The discussion is over.

Done. Hawke, you have a job to do for the contract with the Guild.

Get it done." He turned to Liam next, and the fucker didn't even say anything, just stared at him until he stood up, shouted his frustration, and stormed out the front door.

I looked at Asher, but he refused to meet my gaze.

Only when Hawke left, and only after the door had been shut for a few minutes, did he finally turn his attention on me.

I wasn't so sure anymore that I wanted to give him a second of my time.

"Pretty Bird?—"

"Don't call me that." Only someone who cared about me got to call me things like that. "What do you want, Asher?"

"I want you to understand."

"I understand just fine." Sure did. I understood he and the others had their priorities.

And Keehn wasn't at the top of that list. I understood that they lied, they all lied, and they had no intention to correct that mistake had they not been caught out on it.

And I understood that this was all just a job to them.

Including me, and keeping me safe. Whether it was for Minnie, or my parents, or Keehn and their stupid fucking blood oath, at the end of the day, I was nothing more than a contract.

A job. A thing to complete and then forget about.

The thought was sobering and sad.

"You know what, Asher? Just forget it. Just fucking forget it.

I'll just do what you guys want of me—I'll sit in my room in this damn place, miserable and sad, and alone, like I always am, and I'll give you no more problems, and you can just do whatever it is you need to do, and forget about what I want. "

Asher paled. "That's not?—"

"When your job is over and you catch this fucker who's causing you problems, then you can just ship me home and wash your hands of me. Once it's safe to turn me loose, I'll get out of your hair, and you won't have to see me ever again."

I meant it, too. I meant every fucking word.

Just not in the context that he expected it.

Sure, I'd be gone. They wouldn't have to worry about me or Keehn ever again. Mostly because I'd find him on my own. I'd finish what they should have, and when Keehn saw what had become of his friends, he wouldn't blame me for bailing, either.

He'd be so sad to find out just how disloyal, how lazy, how forgetful his friends really were.

I stood up as Asher sputtered for an explanation, for a request, for whatever bullshit he was about to say, and marched off to my room, slamming the door behind me with a frustrated scream.

I shut the lights off. I tugged the curtains closed.

I crawled onto the bed and pulled the blankets up over my head.

And sobbed for the disillusionment of my childhood fantasies of these knights in shining armor who were really nothing more than masked monsters with their own agenda.

One that didn't involve their past.

Or me.

The next morning was more of the same, with one distinct difference: the guys were acting strange.

And not like, oh I ate something funny strange or I did something bad and don't wanna talk about it strange. No, this was full-on personality swap level strange, and it concerned me.

Strange like this meant they were up to something. And I didn't like that.

I woke up to breakfast, which felt odd on its own, but the fact that Hawke was still standing behind the island, wearing some stupid apron with a silly cartoonish character on it around his torso, was almost too funny to ignore.

I did, though. Ignore it, that was. I didn't pass up on the food, though, because damn, that shit smelled delicious. And I was hungry.

The guys watched me as I ate, shoveling their own plates down as fast as humanly possible. The second their food was gone, they scattered like roaches, rushing back to their rooms as I was left sitting alone, wondering what the hell had happened to replace them with semi-normal human beings.

I would probably never know.

An hour later, they started reappearing in the common rooms, taking up seats on the couch, in the chair, at the island.

All of them had something in their hands, and were busy little bees, though the second I wandered too close, they hid their activities.

I wasn't allowed within three feet of a screen before they'd subtly shift, or they'd switch screens.

Now I was more than curious. I was dying of FOMO. The desire to know what the hell they were up to was literally torture.

And they fucking knew it, too.

I didn't miss the knowing grin that cracked at the edges of Hawke's face any time he hid his activities from me. Or the way Asher would make his shit look more interesting, until I was near, and then he'd shut his screen off and yawn, stretching like he was tired.

For lunch, they ordered food out without telling me, but the twist was that it was my favorite comfort meal: a greasy burger, crispy fries, and a milkshake with sprinkles.

Now I was doubly suspicious of their actions.

But that's what they wanted. Every few seconds, when they thought I was dying a little too much from the need to know what was up, to ask them why they were acting differently, they'd look over at me like they were waiting for something.

They weren't going to get me to crack. Not happening.

About an hour after we ate lunch, I got the first offer for fun and was immediately on my guard.

"Hey, Trin, you wanna go work out? I'm gonna hit the gym for an hour or two." Liam, ever the opportunist, who'd seemingly forgotten how the last session in the gym went for both of us.

I turned my nose up at him and shook my head.

When he left, Asher tried his hand next.

With a rakish grin that didn't fit his face, he leaned over the back of the couch and sighed dramatically. When I didn't react, he did it again, and again, until he finally gave up and turned around to pick up his phone.

His voice was loud enough to carry across the room, probably intentionally.

"Oh, well, shit, that new museum of art opened up today over in Khula City.

I wonder if I've got time today to go see it.

I do love the arts, and supporting a local business is a good bonus.

" His eyes trailed over the room until he met my glare in the mirror on the wall.

We held each other's stares until finally, he broke eye contact and swore, tossing his phone back down on the table in front of him.

Hawke wasn't as sneaky. No, everything Hawke did he did with intent. And that's how I ended up with a plate of one of my favorite snacks sitting in front of me on the island.

He shoved the plate toward me with a single finger, smiling hesitantly. "You still like these, I hope, because I sure as fuck don't."

I blinked stupidly down at the plate, stunned that he'd go to such lengths to please me. And then it dawned on my stupid ass.

This wasn't him being nice. This was a bribe. A guilt payment, to earn forgiveness.

"I'm still not talking to you," I huffed as I snatched the plate from the counter and marched into my room.

Their newfound eagerness to please did nothing to negate the fact that they'd fucked up. And it wasn't enough to convince me to stay.

The second an opportunity arose, I wouldn't be here anymore. They could do whatever they wanted, but I wouldn't come back. And they'd have nobody to blame but themselves.

Won't let me work? Fine. Won't let me leave? Okay. Won't treat me with some basic respect, tell me the truth, or apologize? Whatever.

But don't expect someone to sit around and wait for you to change on your schedule instead of the one they're on. We didn't all have the same amount of time left to us to do with as we wished.

I couldn't stay here forever, looking for a brother I didn't know how to find, playing house with three assholes who'd given up on him and me, pretending I could avoid the perfect fucking life back home if I pretended hard enough.

Something had to change.