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As we settled around the poker table I'd set up in our den, I knew Savannah’s presence would be an issue for Eoghan, but it hadn’t stopped me from allowing her to join, mostly because he needed to get over himself.

We were all fucked up—Savannah too.

No, she hadn’t killed someone—or many someones—but she’d seen people die and she’d coped with more than most civilians ever did in her relatively short life.

As a result, I didn’t push him when he played quietly, but neither did I let him off the hook.

After dealing the cards, I peered over my hand and took a look at the group around us.

Cin was studying Chadwick like he was a brownie and she’d been dieting for a year. Troy kept eying Eoghan—he was cute in his Peaky Blinders get-up, but I thought it was more to do with her sizing him up for the kill. Savannah was scowling at me and her cards which was totally a bluff—I knew her tells better than she did.

“I have to share something with Conor.”

As an opening line, it wasn’t as smooth as it should be, but it was weighing on my conscience nonetheless and that was supposed to be the point of these meetings.

At least, that was what I’d figured from watching The Queen’s Gambit with Conor .

Eoghan arched a brow. “What do you have to tell him?”

“That doesn’t matter.”

“It’d help if we knew?—”

I sniffed at Savannah. “I’m not telling you without telling him first.” A yowl from the kitchen told me the hellcats were fighting.

I didn’t bother getting up to umpire, knowing that Ren would hightail it out of there in a few.

“How bad is it?” Cin queried, dragging her eyes from Chadwick’s bulging biceps.

“I mean, I guess it’s bad? It’s not the worst thing I’ve ever done though.”

Troy harrumphed. “Guess that doesn’t mean much.” She perused her cards and then Eoghan—in that order—before folding her hand. “Not with you, at any rate.”

“Why don’t you want to tell him?” Savannah demanded.

“Because I think it might make him mad.”

She tossed down a twenty-dollar chip. “You’ll get used to it. Sometimes, you might even like it.”

“I don’t need to know about you and my brother’s sex life,” Eoghan grumbled, throwing a chip into the center of the green baize too.

Savannah cackled. “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. Anyway, don’t pretend as if you’re innocent.

“Inessa might be more close-mouthed than a mime, but she blushes like the rest of us.”

A wicked glint made an appearance in Eoghan’s eyes. “I’ll have to reward her for keeping her mouth shut, then.”

“Make it emeralds. Diamonds are so insipid against her blonde hair.”

Eoghan looked like he wanted to argue, but he apparently saw the sense in Savannah’s logic. “Fine,” he said with a huff. To me, he asked, “You scared he’ll push you away if you tell him whatever it is that’ll make him mad?”

Uneasiness settled inside my soul as I started calling bets. “I don’t like that I’m concerned he’ll do that.”

“Because it makes you feel weak?” Troy asked.

The question was surprisingly insightful, even more so coming from Troy. “Yeah. I wouldn’t have cared before. Now, I care. It sucks.”

Ren, hissing, raced out of the kitchen as expected.

What wasn’t expected?

When he dive-bombed onto my shoulder after bouncing on the sofa.

I managed to catch him before he could fall off and skid onto the baize.

“You love him,” Savannah retorted, fiddling with her chips as she eyed my hold on the cat with an amused eye. “Love makes you all kinds of out of sorts. Just take it as a good sign.”

“Especially with you, seeing as you don’t normally care about hurting people’s feelings,” Chadwick rumbled, his voice low and gritty.

Dumping Ren on my lap, I cast a look at Cin, just to make sure she hadn’t melted into a puddle on the floor as I sniped, “I don’t have to tell him.”

“If you think you should, then do it. Makes no sense not to,” Savannah said with a light shrug.

“I disagree.” Troy tossed her cards onto the table. “I wouldn’t tell him anything. Best way.” Ah, there was the Troy I knew well.

“This isn’t an op. I love him, Troy.”

She sniffed. “Even more reason not to tell him. I love my bees. Didn’t stop me from letting Harrow’s Bees keep them.”

“Harrow’s who?” Savannah sputtered.

“Never mind. Give me a show of hands who thinks I should tell him and who thinks I shouldn’t.”

Savannah, Dead To Me, and Chadwick raised their hands for ‘should.’ Troy and, shockingly, Eoghan, raised their hands for ‘shouldn’t.’

I arched a brow at Eoghan. “Thought you’d want me to be open and honest with him.”

“If it’ll break his heart, why would I want that?”

Would it break his heart?

Or would it lessen the faith he had in me? A faith that was on shaky grounds because of the stunts I routinely pulled…?

He often said that he didn’t want me to change. I took that to mean he didn’t care if I showed up to a party with shitkickers on my feet instead of stilettos or if I wore jeans to a funeral. He didn’t need me to coddle his ma or to keep my nose out of the Five Points.

No, he accepted me.

There was no denying that.

In some ways, with the atonement he asked for, what he wanted was harder. Change, for him, required me including him. It meant a molecular shift in how I dealt with business. But, when it boiled down to it, I had to accept that there was no point in being a part of his life if I wasn’t open to that.

So, I guessed I had my answer, didn’t I?

Rubbing my eyes, I muttered, “I think it’s time for somebody else to share. Whose turn is it?”

“There’s this man who wants me but he won’t ask me out on a date because his friend used to want me,” Cin drawled, tossing a chip down and staring pointedly at Chadwick as she did. “A friend who I texted recently and who hasn’t texted me back… What do I do to pull his head out of his ass?”

I hid a smirk but Eoghan groaned. “Is this going to be about our love lives?”

“It’s going to be about whatever we need, I guess. If that means you need advice on which jewels to buy your wife, Eoghan, then that’s what it’ll be.”

Though he rolled his eyes, he muttered, “Why can’t you have both of them?”

Savannah arched a brow. “See, there’s my kind of thinking. Why wouldn’t Hermione go for Harry and Draco? It just doesn’t make any sense.”

“Are you talking about a throuple?” Cin crooned. “That’s my favorite dynamic.”

Chadwick, though his ears were burning, cleared his throat. “It’s for kids, Cin.”

“Boring,” she dismissed.

“Who the hell are Hermione, Harry, and Draco?” Troy demanded.

“Lyra’s not old enough yet to have read Harry Potter ,” I grumbled to Troy as Ren started purring as he began kneading my lap. “Unfortunately for me, Kat is.”

“I like it. It’s sweet,” Savannah chimed in. “I wish she hadn’t ended up with Ron and that they’d fucked on screen. But hey, it’s for teens.”

“Because teens never fuck,” Eoghan mocked.

Chadwick rumbled out a laugh. “Ever. Abstinence is the only way.”

“Said the bird to the bee,” Savannah sang as she shoved her chips into the middle of the table then, with a pretty smile, chirped, “All in.”

My lips twitched as the rest of the table groused when the majority folded. Only Chad stayed in for the hand.

Ten minutes later, when I peeked at Savannah’s cards before I shuffled them back into the pack, I had to hide my surprise.

My sister from another mister had definitely become better at bluffing—I guessed that was what happened when you became the queen of the Five Points.