Page 23

James

M y plan to only be away from home for one night went out thewindow when Jackson and I touched down in Miami and discovered the target had changed his plans at the last minute.

It was a full thirty-six hours later when the opportunity arose to slipthe poison in his drink without anyone seeing me. And it was less than three minutes for the guy to take a mouthful of his drink before dropping dead on the spot, seemingly of a heart attack.

He led an unhealthy lifestyle so the chances of an autopsy beingcarried out were slim, and even if one was conducted, the poison wouldn’t be detected. My job was done.

The time waiting for my one opportunity to administer the poisonwasn’t wasted though. I filled Jackson in on the conversation I’d overheard my father have with Welch, along with what happened to Willow when I’d tried to get her to push past the pain and recall her memories.

When we weren’t monitoring our targets every move, we spent thetime trying to figure out what the fuck my father and Welch could be hiding.

Frustratingly, Jackson couldn’t hack into either my father’s or Welch’semail seeing as every Legion member used Smarttech encryption software to protect their communications. The irony wasn’t lost on either of us that it was our program that was preventing us from getting the information we needed.

The other problem we had was neither of us knew anything aboutWillow’s life. Without any clue as to what her real name was, we didn’t even have a starting point.

I did have one hope though. Cleo. I was banking on her rememberingsomething once I told her that I was pretty certain the fake IDs she made all those years ago were for Willow and her mom.

Typically, Cleo was on a job, so I didn’t get to speak to her until I wassitting in the cabin of the plane, waiting for the pilot to do his checks so we could take off.

Jackson had opted to stay in Miami for a few days. Brody wasscheduled for another underground fight, this time against an undefeated opponent. It was being hyped as the fight of the year, and it was bound to be an intense fight, but I had better things to be doing.

Like my wife.

“Hey,”Cleo said, her face appearing on my laptop screen. She’dchanged her hair again, this time her blonde pixie cut, a flaming red.“What’s up?”

“What happened?”I replied, momentarily forgetting the reason for ourcall when I noticed the faint bruise painting her cheekbone.

She waved her hand over her face.“My target got a bit handsy.Nothing I couldn’t handle though.”

“You sure? Say the word and I’ll change my flight to your location,and deal with the fucker.”

Cleo could take care of herself, but that wasn’t the point. She waslike family to me, and I wouldn’t stand by and watch someone I cared about getting hurt.

She giggled.“Calm down, Superman, the fucker is currently inhospital having his appendage reattached. And if they manage to fix him, officers are waiting by his bedside to take him into custody. He’s going to jail for a very long time. Seriously, James, you need to give me more credit.”

The tension eased from my body.“Fine. But if for somereason he doesn’t go down, please let me handle him.”

She rolled her eyes, but the grin on her lips widened.“Sure. Now,what’s up? Your message seemed urgent.”

“I’m emailing you a picture. I want you to have a look.”

She was silent as I loaded up my emails and attached a picture ofWillow. The ding on the other end of the call let me know Cleo had received it. Her brows furrowed as she stared at the screen before recognition dawned in her eyes.

“I know her. She’s the girl Welch wanted me to make fake IDs for,”Cleosaid, her face moving closer to the screen as if she was inspecting the photo closer.“She’s older in this picture though than the one Welch gave me.”

“That’s Willow.”

Her eyes immediately jumped back to the screen.“Willow, as in yourwife?”

“The one and the same,”I replied as I clicked on the photo I’d sent toher, my mouth instantly going dry at the sight of Willow.

Fuck, I couldn’t wait to get home to her.

“Huh. What a small world,”Cleo said, moving back from the screen.“So, what does this have to do with me?”

“I heard my father on the phone a few nights ago. He was talking toWelch, and he said that Welch had better hope Willow didn’t remember or it would cause problems for Legion.”

“Remember what?”

“If I knew that, I wouldn’t be speaking to you right now,”I snapped,rightfully earning a scowl from Cleo. I scrubbed a hand down my face, giving myself a minute to collect my thoughts.“Willow doesn’t remember her life before Peartree House. When she was taken there, she was whipped until she forgot her past.”

“She was whipped?”Cleo said, her face paling.

“Yeah. Repeatedly. And now, if she ever tries to recall memories ofher past, all she feels is phantom pain. She was trained like a fucking dog was trained to salivate at a bell.”

Cleo covered her mouth, her eyes widened in horror.“That poor girl.How the hell did she even end up in Peartree House? Welch told me he was helping her and her mom to start a new life after her dad was killed in a car crash.”

“You and I both know Welch can’t be trusted,”I replied, murderousrage filtering through me at the thought of Kevin Welch.

It was a shame he was a Legion member, otherwise he would havebeen six feet under by now.

“Do you know what happened to her mom?”Cleo asked, the colorslowly returning to her cheeks.

“I don’t even know her mom’s name. Or her dad’s, for that matter.That’s why I’m speaking to you. Can you remember anything else from that time? Like what their real names were, or where they lived?”

“Fuck, James. That was what, five years ago? I barely rememberwhat I did yesterday. Oh wait, yes I do. I was biting a cock off.”

“Eight,”I replied, doing my best not to snap again. Cleo was my lasthope of finding out information that could help me work out what the fuck my father was hiding.

“Christ, was it really that long ago?”Cleo sighed.“I’m sorry, James. Idon’t remember. I’ve created so many IDs over the years, they all blend into one. I bet you don’t remember every one of your targets?”

It was my turn to sigh. Cleo was right, as soon as a target was dead,I put them out of my mind. I’d lost count of how many people I’d killed over the years, and other than my most recent target, I couldn’t remember the names of any of them.

“Wait,”she said suddenly, my heart leaping into my throat in the hopethat she might have remembered something. She leaned forward again as if she were taking another look at the picture, and as she did, her teeth sank into her bottom lip as the cogs whirled in her head.

“I flew into Raleigh,”Cleo said, her gaze fixed on the screen, but noton me, and as she spoke, it was as if she was talking to herself.“I’m sure of it. I was in England, and Welch contacted me to ask for a favor. I flew to North Carolina, and I met him just outside of Raleigh.”Her eyes met mine again, a flash of determination in them.“I can’t be certain, but I think I remember Welch saying Charlotte. Maybe Willow and her mom lived there?”

It was a start. Cleo had previously mentioned Willow’s dad had diedin a car crash. I quickly opened up a Google tab and searched for how many fatal car crashes there were in Charlotte in 2017, the year Willow would have been ten. The results showed there were seventy fatalities.

It was by no means foolproof, her dad might not have died inCharlotte but it was better than working with nothing.

Cleo and I finished our call when my pilot came out to say we wouldbe taking off shortly. For the duration of the flight back to Minnesota, I was glued to my laptop, trying to find out as much information about the car crashes that had happened eight years ago in Charlotte.

When the plane landed, and I gathered my belongings, more thanready to get the fuck home and spend the night buried inside Willow, my phone rang.

I muttered a curse at seeing my father’s name flashing on thescreen.

“Dad,”I answered, hoping like fuck he hadn’t discovered that I wastrying to dig up information he clearly wanted to keep hidden.

“James,”he said, his voice as cold as ever.“I’m sorry to have to tellyou, but your mom passed away a few hours ago.”

It was another night before I went home. When my plane landed fromMiami, I drove straight to my father’s house. By the time I got there, numbness had seeped in. My father told me my mom had died peacefully in her sleep.

My gut told me differently.

But there wasn’t anything I could do, he’d already had her bodymoved to the morgue before he’d called me, so any chance of me examining her body wasn’t going to happen.

I spent the night sitting in my mom’s room, staring at her empty bed,and going over in my mind what my father had told me about how she’d passed away.

When the morning came, my father and I spent the day going overpaperwork and discussing funeral arrangements, but whenever I tried to get him to go over the events of the day before, he changed the subject.

He was hiding something, but he had nothing to gain from murderingmy mom. And yet, the more time I spent with him, the more I was convinced he had some involvement in her untimely death.

Needing to get away from my father, and the stifling memories thehouse held of my childhood, I drove home when night fell again.

As I expected, my house was in darkness when I arrived, the staffwould have been in their quarters, and no doubt Willow was tucked up in bed too. While I’d been in Miami, I’d been desperate to fuck her as soon as I got back. Now, with the solemn weight hanging over me, it was the last thing I wanted.

But I ached to see her. I wanted to feel her pressed against my body.

Leaving my bags in the trunk for my staff to deal with in the morning, I tiptoed through the house to my bedroom. Sure enough, the moonlight seeping through the gap in the curtains lit up Willow’s small frame under the bed covers.

Stripping out of my clothes, I got under the covers, finding Willownaked as if she had been waiting for me. I pulled her against my side, not giving a fuck if I woke her. Once she was back in my arms, tension oozed from my body.

“James? You’re home,”she said, her voice thick with sleep.

“Yeah.”

She nuzzled against my side.“I was worried.”

Her voice was barely a whisper and as soon as she said the words,my body stiffened. Part of me wanted to push her away, tell her that she had no right to worry about me, and to get the fuck out of my bed.

Instead, I pulled her closer to me and kissed the top of her head.“What were you worried about, Mouse?”

She let out a contented sigh as she nuzzled closer.“You didn’t comehome after the first night. I…I missed you.”

I didn’t reply for a minute, debating whether to tell her the truth or totell her to go back to sleep. I wasn’t the sort of man to have long, in-depth conversations with the woman who was in my bed for the night, but Willow was different. Maybe because she actually listened, and didn’t pretend to be interested in what I had to say or had ulterior motives.

“The job I was working on ran over,”I said, the next words still notfeeling real even as I said them.“And…my mom died.”

Her body froze against mine before she wiggled out of my hold soshe could look up at me. Her eyes roamed over my face, sadness filling them.“I’m…I’m so sorry.”

I swallowed.“I’m not. I’m glad.”Her brows furrowed in confusion.“Maybe glad isn’t the right word. I’m relieved . Relieved that she’s finally free of my father.”

Willow didn’t reply, but her gaze burned into the side of my face. Isighed before shifting on my side to face her and finding myself wanting to open up to her.

“Truthfully, my mom died years ago when my dad cut out her tongue.”

She gasped, horror creeping across her face.“Your dad cut out hertongue?”she replied, disbelief in her tone before she sucked in her bottom lip as if she’d just remembered she wasn’t supposed to ask questions.

I tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, and her body relaxed. Foronce, I didn’t mind her asking questions. I would have been curious too, it wasn’t every day you found out a human being was capable of cutting the tongue from the mouth of another human.

“Yeah. It was after he disowned Kiera. My mom begged him to letKiera come home, but of course he didn’t. When he got fed up with my mom constantly asking, he got several of his men to hold her down while he cut out her tongue.”I paused as the memory of my mom’s terrified screams filled my ears.“She died that day. Maybe not physically. But her soul died the day he took her voice. She was never the same after that. No longer the mom who smiled with happiness whenever her kids were around. No longer able to sing as she baked in the kitchen. She was dead inside, and the only way my father could cope with her being around was to pump her full of drugs.”

Willow remained quiet, a slight crease between her brows as shelistened. I’d never spoken to anyone about my mom. Sure, my close friends knew what had happened, but I never told them how having her tongue cut out by the man she once loved affected her so deeply.

Yet with the way Willow listened intently, I couldn’t stop talking. Therewas comfort in her silence.“My dad was always an asshole to her. He used to beat her black and blue, but his treatment toward her was worse after that day. He never let her leave the house, and acted like she didn’t exist.”I snorted when the irony hit me.“Huh. Maybe I’m more like my father than I ever was willing to admit.”

Still, she didn’t speak. Only now, her silence pierced my heart morethan learning my mom had passed away.