Page 185 of Kings & Queen

She put her hand on my arm, and I looked at her. “What?”

“My grandfather, it’s a long story. He’s a Russian mobster, for real, real. Like high up and everything. I think my uncle is too. Anyway, that’s not the important thing. He came to get me, to take me home, but the Kings said no way. Well, I said no way first, but they wouldn’t have let me, anyway.” Amusement danced in her eyes.

“I thought it was only one thing you had to tell me.”

“Oh, right, sorry about that. Yes, the one thing, this is really important. You watch old movies?” She stopped walking. “When Owen and I lived off grid, all we had were movies, no internet. He liked the old-school ones, you know, from forever ago. You ever watchThe Untouchables? Ugh, I’m doing it again.”

She took a deep breath and re-centered herself. I blinked, trying to track where she was going. She proceeded to clear her throat and began a long tirade of shouting and pointing about someone being dead, his family being dead, a house burning to the ground, pissing on ashes. I stared in utter confusion. Apparently, this was supposed to be relevant somehow, but she had completely lost me.

“Okay, so that didn’t go right. And for what it’s worth, the gangster in the movie didn’t actually get his wish. But we did.”

“We did?” I asked, still feeling like I was missing something huge.

“Uh-huh. The Ma…Mask is dead, so is his family. I don’t know how, but my grandfather seems to be the kind of guy who might actually pis—”

An understanding dawned on me as her words came back to me. “He’s dead, you’re sure? His family? Everyone?” My throat constricted as I forced the question out.

“Every last one of them,” she boasted.

My heart soared, and I threw my arms around her and tackled her to the ground. “You’re serious? Like, dead serious?”

This was life-altering for me. This revelation gave birth to freedom. It was the best news I’d ever heard in my entire life, aside from getting to go home.

“Uh-huh. I mean, I didn’t see ashes or anything, but yeah.”

“Oh my god. Misc—Kinsley. Do you know what this means?”

“We’re free.”

“We’re free,” I repeated.

“And now all we need to do is find the other girls. Remember when, every once in a while, at the beginning, Winter would talk, she had an accent. It’s American, by the way. I lived there for a really long time. Traveled all over the South. While it’s hard to distinguish which part, because Texas is bigger than the entirety of the UK. We’re talking twice the size of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. I’m not saying she’s from Texas. That’s not where I’m going with this, but maybe more like Louisiana or Alabama. Maybe even Kentucky, I just don’t know.”

“Sounds daunting. America, I mean.”

“Oh, it’s great, actually. But my Kings are here, so this is where I’ll stay, and now that you’re here, well, one more reason. Back to what I was really trying to say. Summer had a British accent. So that means she has to be here, somewhere. Well, not here, since we’re in the freaking Cayman Islands.”

I shook my head. This girl was not lying. After all the years of not being able to talk, she was apparently making up for it ten times over.

“So we start here, is what you’re saying. We look for Summer, but how?”I asked. My voice sounded small.

“We’ll have to brainstorm that, but Owen taught me a lot of skills on hacking and researching. I know we can’t involve the guys, but that’s okay. We can do this. I know we can. I feel it in my bones. I mean, look, we found each other, why not them?”

“Really? You believe it’s possible?” I asked once more.

“With everything in me, I do.”

We were nearing the house again, and everyone was standing outside. Kinsley immediately stopped talking and grew quiet. Her pinkie grazed mine as we walked side by side.

“Hey, it’s great you two have finally met. Dinner’s done. Shall we eat?” Sophia remarked nervously.

As we reached the back porch of the beach house, I called out to Sebastian. He stopped in his tracks, and I tugged on his shirt. The look of wariness in his eyes made me aware of the lingering tension between us.

“Can we talk first?” I asked.

He nodded solemnly. The rest of the crew went into the house. My eyes landed once more on Mischa. It was going to take me some time to get used to calling her Kinsley. She was excitedly showing my mom and Sophia the tiara Alek had given her.

As soon as we were alone, Bash turned to face me. His expression was dark today, not like his normal self. Was he struggling with something deeper than our fight? Normally, he loved coming here, but something seemed off. I wanted to ask, but I needed to apologize first.