Page 41 of The Forgotten

“So that’s it?” I ask. “After all of this, you’re nonchalantly agreeing to kill your father?”

“Everything that’s happened in the past twenty-four hours are the exact things we hoped to avoid,” Aled confirms. “I don’t want to constantly be looking over my shoulder, wondering when the other shoe will drop, and now our mothers can finally heal after whatever bullshit Dad put them through. Seeing it first hand helped me realize that my mother isn’t as selfish as I believe her to be.”

“It still doesn’t make me feel any better about how she deals with things,” Cai grumbles. “The small amount of what I know from Olivia shows how strong she is. She seems to be a much better mother than ours ever was.”

Finally happy now that the blood is off my skin, I toss the towel into the trash can. Gazing down at my clothes, I strip down and toss those into the trash as well since they’re also splattered from the way I was holding her. Pulling on a pair of pajama pants, I call it a day.

It’ll all need to be burned by our men later, but at least now the reminder of Olivia’s suicide attempt is off my body. Moving to the bed, I nudge Balthazar over so I can lay down between them.

“So the three of you are completely fine with staging a coup and killing your dad?” I ask, scowling as I tuck my arm behind my head. “This isn’t some kind of fucked up way to find out my plan and then tell him?”

Cai whistles under his breath, folding his arms over his chest as Maddox shakes his head in disapproval. I know it’s always been us against the world, but I’m feeling really disappointed in my brothers right now. I need to know where they stand.

“You truly believe so little of us, of me?” Aled asks, hurt. “She’s?—”

“Mine,” I rumble. “You don’t deserve her or me. We can review that after she’s safe. I can’t split my focus between things when we’re discussing murdering the head of the CaliforniaWelsh crime family, Aled. As for Olivia, she can speak for herself. You’d better believe that she needs to have a reason to give any of you another chance.”

“That’s fair,” Maddox says, slapping his hand over Aled’s mouth when he attempts a retort. “Hush, Aled. He’s right. Also, don’t think I don’t see what you’re doing, Gareth. Distancing yourself from Dad. I understand why you’re doing it, but you’re fucking stuck with us. Forever. Now, let’s plan our next moves, because Dad won’t be sitting around with his thumb up his ass in the meantime.”

“Four days may not mean that,” Cai agrees. “And he really wants Olivia. There’s no fucking way that’ll happen. I also did something that’s going to piss you off.”

“You crushed up something and put it in the water jug,” Maddox says, dropping his hand with a scowl. Aled looks smug, meaning that he definitely licked Maddox. The way that our older brother scrubs his hand on his pants shows that I’m right.

The words take longer to register, but I suck in a breath as they do.

“What the fuck did you do?” I ask Cai.

“Dad handed me these baggies of pills,” he explains quickly, pulling them out of his pocket. “He said it’ll cleanse the heat blockers out of her system fast?—”

“I practically forced her to drink that shit!” I whisper-shout. “You did this on purpose.”

“I did,” Cai says, appearing ashamed. “She’s not taking that shit anymore since she doesn’t have it. It seemed like the least fucked up thing that he wants to do to her.”

“Any other confessions?” I ask, pulling a knife from my pants.

As soon as they leave, I’ll be putting up every weapon in my room so that Olivia can’t get to it. My little omega is on suicidewatch until I can convince her that we won’t be handing her over to her worst nightmare.

“The antibiotics will also fuck with her heat blockers,” Cai admits. “It wouldn’t surprise me if being around us pushes her into a heat. I imagine that she’s been on these for a long time.”

Motherfucking shit.

“I’ll add a cock ring with a knot to my online cart later today,” I say nonchalantly. “None of you fuckers are allowed near her unless she specifically asks.”

“Wouldn’t want it any other way,” Maddox lies.

I guess that’s the best I can ask for.

“Are we looping the Irish assholes into this?” I ask. “I don’t know how many men Dylan may have brought with him.”

My brothers wince as I distance myself more and more from the man.

“I’ll look into it,” Cai sighs. “I’m locked in, I promise. I won’t get distracted.“

“He missed a ton of important stuff when looking into Olivia,” Maddox explains.

“I don’t think it was all on Cai,” I say. “Olivia lives off the grid. I bet she doesn’t own any part of the home she lives in, and that’s done on purpose. If you choose to look, you’ll see that she’s been a ghost. Someone who’s been this terrorized by her abusers wouldn’t have any kind of digital thumbprint.”

“That’s true,” Maddox grunts.