Page 35 of Malicious Marriage (Mafia Lords of Sin #9)

CLOVER

O kay, not the reaction I was expecting.

For a few seconds, everything feels like it’s moving in slow motion as Hailey storms toward me with anger blazing in her eyes.

She looks… good. She looks healthy and alive, nothing like I feared.

I’d imagined her captive all these years, struggling against whoever Malcom sold her to or even trying to fight her way to freedom.

I’d also pictured her looking rough and the attempts to access her account were a cry for help.

But she looks completely fine. Glowing, in fact. It doesn’t make sense. I blink quickly as if it will remove whatever magical filter is making Hailey look like she just walked out of a spa treatment. But nothing changes. She looks exactly the same.

What the fuck is going on?

“Hailey? Oh, my God… look at you!” I reach for her with my arms outstretched but the warm, loving reunion I’ve dreamed about ever since I woke up to Hailey’s bed empty is immediately derailed when she slaps my arms away.

“I said, what the fuck are you doing here?”

“What do you mean?”

“What do I mean? How can I be any fucking clearer?”

“I—I don’t understand.” My knotted stomach coils tighter, but thankfully, there’s nothing left inside me to throw up.

I study her face, unable to look away, as if the answer to my confusion lies in her pores.

“Hailey… are you okay? Are you hurt? We came—I came to rescue you! We’ve come to take you home? ”

“Oh, my fucking God.” Hailey paces away from me while dragging both her hands through her hair, messing up her smooth, sweeping bangs in the process.

“I can’t believe you’ve done this. Clover, do you ever stop and think, huh?

” She spins back to face me while grinding her knuckle against her temple.

“Is there ever any kind of thought happening up here?”

“Hey.” Dean suddenly steps in between us, his eyes narrowed. “You might be her sister but you’re moving onto some very thin ice here, so I’d be careful about what you say next.”

“And who the fuck is this guy?”

“My name is Dean. Dean Savoy. And Clover is right, we’re here to help you in whatever way you might need help.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Hailey throws her hands up in despair. “Why are you fucking here?”

“Because you vanished!” I surge past Dean with a yell.

“What did you think I was going to do? Just sit back and let you vanish out of my life so soon after Dad died? I had no idea what happened to you, Hailey! I woke up and you were gone! Just gone! I thought you’d died or that Uncle Malcom had killed you and I have spent the past four years dragging myself over hot coals to try and find you and rescue you!

And now you’re… you’re standing there like nothing has happened! ”

I’m too hot. Every vein inside me bubbles like lava and sweat clings to the apple of my cheeks as I stare down my sister, trying to wrap my head around why she looks like she’s never had a worry in her life.

“Are you serious?” Hailey begins pacing in front of me. “I should have known you couldn’t let it go. You were always like this, Clover. You just couldn’t fucking let things go. Always like a rodent getting into shit that had nothing to do with you, never knowing when you weren’t wanted.”

A sharp noise of anger rises from Dean behind me, but it doesn’t make a difference.

I’m transfixed on Hailey. “How can you say that?” My heart pounds faster and faster.

“We were like two peas in a pod and then Dad died and we were all alone and then a week later, I was all alone because you were gone, and Malcom was acting like he got rid of you! I’ve spent years searching for you, terrified that you were actually dead and all I was going to find were your bones! ”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” Hailey scoffs.

“I think it’s time you explained what the hell is going on,” Dean says tightly. “I’m not here for games.”

“I wasn’t sold, okay?” Hailey rests one hand on her hip as she finally stops pacing. “I wasn’t kidnapped. I wasn’t sold. I wasn’t lost. I wasn’t… anything.”

No. No, that can’t be. That can’t be true. “Then what?”

“I…” Hailey sighs deeply and glances at the barman in the corner. “I ran away. With Duke.” She waves her other hand toward the thickly-bearded barman.

Duke lifts one hand and waves awkwardly.

“You…” I squint, unable to decipher what she said. It’s like she’s speaking in another language. “What?”

“I ran away, okay? I had to. I thought you, of all people, would have understood and just left me to it.”

I’m utterly speechless. My mind is just indecipherable noise as I try to wrap my thoughts around what she’s saying while she continues.

“Malcom wanted to marry me. Because of course he did. The sicko only had dollar signs in his eye after Dad died and I was the one standing in the way. Without me, he didn’t have access to the family or the estate so he wanted us to tie the knot.

He told me so at Dad’s funeral like it was something I was supposed to be excited about.

” Her lip curls. “But I was already in love with someone else.”

Hailey and Duke look at one another, and the anger briefly fades from her face.

“But Duke is from a Russian family and we both know Father never would have agreed to let us marry, so his dying only moved up plans that were already in motion.”

Tears slowly begin to build in my eyes as I struggle to process what’s coming out of Hailey’s mouth. “You never told me any of this. Why wouldn’t you tell me? Why would you leave me and let me think you were dead, or worse? Sisters don’t do that to one another! You were my best friend!”

“And that was the problem!” Hailey snaps sharply.

“You were suffocating, Clover. Everything always had to be about us doing stuff together, going places together, watching shit together. Every weekend you were planning things, you texted me constantly, called me when I was late home. You were more smothering than Dad!”

An eerie silence follows her last words as everything I thought about my close, loving relationship with my older sister starts to crumble.

“I did what I had to do.” Hailey’s voice trembles slightly as she lifts her chin. “And I don’t regret it.”

Duke moves forward a step, but he’s visibly uncertain as his eyes haven’t moved from Dean ever since the revelation that he’s from a Russian family.

“Didn’t you worry that Malcom would want to marry me instead?” I ask hoarsely as Hailey’s body blurs through my tears.

She laughs, and it’s like a knife to the stomach. “I knew you weren’t his type,” she says. “He likes skinny and tall, so even if he did marry you, you wouldn’t be in the same disgusting danger I was in.”

Is this real? Did I pass out from too much stress and now I’m caught in some horrific nightmare? Did I really just spend the past four long, debt-filled years trying to rescue a sister who doesn’t care about me? Who apparently never cared about me?

“You said four years.” Dean’s voice cuts through my tumbling thoughts like a hot blade. “I thought you vanished six months ago?”

“Six months?” Hailey laughs coldly. “Is that what she told you? No, I left the day after we buried Dad. Six days after his death. So we’re actually closer to five years now, considering.”

I have to look at Dean. Everything inside me screams not to because I know what I will see there, but I have to look at him. Turning, what remains of my heart breaks all over again as visible hurt and confusion work their way across Dean’s frowning face. “Four years…?”

“Dean—”

“You spun some pathetic lie again, Clover, didn’t you?” Hailey scoffs and drags my attention back to her. “Even as a kid, you never learned when to stop. All these little lies for attention. It was always pathetic.”

“I’m pathetic?” I snap suddenly, blinking hard so the tears clear and roll down my cheeks. “You’re the one who left! I’ve spent every day since then trying to track you down and rescue you while the family falls apart and my life crumbles! All to save you!”

“I didn’t need saving!” Hailey throws her hands up in exasperation. “I left! I was happy. Duke and I ran for the hills as soon as we could and I wish with all my heart that you'd just accepted that and never fucking came looking. Why couldn’t you leave it alone?”

Why couldn’t I? Why did it never cross my mind that Hailey left willingly?

“Speaking of,” Duke says quietly. “How did you manage to find us?”

Dean clears his throat tightly and it takes him a second to speak.

“We set up alerts on all known bank accounts that Hailey might have had access to. I was working on the assumption that if she had been taken a few months ago, then it had to be money-related, and there were a few quiet accounts in her name that hadn’t been touched since her father died.

An old checking account was flagged so we came to investigate. ”

“Shit.” Hailey sighs. “I knew that was a bad idea.”

“No.” Duke is suddenly by her side and pulling her close while sliding one hand over her abdomen. “We knew it was a risk.”

“I didn’t think anyone would care after four years.”

“Why not?” Dean asks.

Hailey shrugs. “Malcom was never after the family assets for money. He has plenty of his own. He just wanted the businesses. Dad always bailed him out of everything so Malcom didn’t need me to access the main accounts.

So I thought no one would care about the small accounts he set up in our name.

We need the money, you see.” Hailey’s hand moves over Duke’s.

“I’m pregnant. Twins. I just wanted to see if I could access what was left in there and then use that to siphon what we needed from the main accounts. ”

“There’s barely anything in the checking account, though,” Dean says with a strained voice. “Not enough for life with twins.”

“True, but the Byrne millions wouldn’t notice a couple of million slipping away.”

“Millions?”

My heart sinks as Dean speaks.

“But the Byrne fortune is gone.” Dean’s eyes meet mine. “Right?”

Hailey scoffs. “Oh, my God. She really fucking played you, didn’t see?

My father comes from oil, okay? The Byrnes are rich.

Like mega old-money rich. We’ve just always been quiet about it, and a lot of it is locked up in property and business, but there is no way Malcom could blow through all of that cash. ”

There’s a haunting betrayal in Dean’s eyes that’s smothering me the longer we look at one another, and I can’t breathe. He’s looking at me the same way I saw him look at his phone when talking about Trisha.

“Is that true?” Dean asks tightly.

“Dean, I?—”

“Is it true ?”

“I…” I have no words. I’m still reeling from Hailey’s revelation and nothing else makes sense. My lies are crumbling, my life is falling apart around me, and now Dean is looking at me the exact way I feared, and the exact way I desperately wanted to avoid.

“Speaking of,” Hailey says. “Now that you’re here, I don’t suppose you can actually help with that, can you, Clover? Raising kids is expensive and I want my babies to have the best life.”

I can’t think. I can’t breathe. Everyone’s judgmental looks of hatred are so overwhelming that it feels like the walls are closing in around me, and I’m seconds away from being crushed.

I have no other choice.

So, I run.