some shit.”
“Okay... so they knew each other. You think something happened?” I ask and they nod.
“We don’t know anything else. We’ve searched through everything over the last fucking year and found nothing.”
I lick my lips, hesitation pulling at my brows. “When you say you looked through everything. What do you mean?”
“Old files and records, random shit our dad saved.”
I take a deep breath and stand.
Fuck it.
“Where you going?” Maddoc asks, low and cautious.
“I have something that might help.”
“The fuck does that mean?” Maddoc leaps to his feet. “Have what?”
I don’t answer but run up the stairs, ignoring all their chatter as I do. I dig the binder I stole from Maybell’s out of the back of the closet where I stuffed it when I got here and head back down the stairs.
They jump to their feet when I appear on the stairs, heading back down.
I lift it higher and Maddoc charges for me.
He glares at the item. “What is this?”
“I stole it from Maybell.” I hand it over, but he only stares. “I think it belongs in your guys’ hands anyway. Take it, Maddoc.”
His face turns hard and he locks his eyes on me as he snatches it from my fingers. He lifts it over his shoulder and Royce appears, pulling it from his hand.
Maddoc steps back, and all three stare my way, anxious and angry. Maybe a little unsure.
“What’s in it?” he asks.
“Look for yourself.”
“I asked you a question, Raven.”
I gesture toward the binder. “Bunch of shit, I don’t know.”
“Did you read them?”
“Flipped it open, saw the letter in the front but didn’t read it or anything else in there.”
His jaw locks. “Why should we believe you?”
I look between the three. “You shouldn’t.”
“Raven,” he growls, and it has my spine vibrating as a small slice of fear hits me.
“Look, I know some things I’ve heard from the girls at the house, but I didn’t read anything in there to know if any of it is true.”
“What is it you think you know?” His voice is clipped. “Just say it.”
“Rumor at the house is your parents ran in the same circle, but only your biological dad made it out of a deal gone wrong. He became a father to all of you, but got locked up a few years later.” I tell them the rest of what Victoria told me, about the moms and Maybell caring for them.
“You were just waiting to use this as ammo?”
“Ammo for what, Maddoc?”
Royce flips open the top and starts rummaging, brows furrowed.
“Everything is in here, Maddoc. Birth certificates, hospital records, staffing reports.” He looks to me, but the anger is gone and something I can’t read covers his eyes instead.
Captain and Royce rush from the room with the binder, but Maddoc only stares.
When I start to walk away, he darts to the side to block me.
His eyes burn with an intensity I’ve never seen. I take a few steps back.
“You have had that this entire time and didn’t say anything.”
“I wasn’t sure I should.”
“No.” He creeps closer, shaking his head. “You’ve had that, all our fucked-up secrets, our fucked-up pasts and problems in your hands and you didn’t say anything.”
I can’t argue, it’s true. I should have given it to them the day I got it, yet here we are.
“You didn’t blackmail. You didn’t expose.” His chest is touching mine now. He tilts my head back with a knuckle under my chin. “You held on to it. Why?”
“Nothing in there is anyone else’s business.” My eyes shift between his when he pulls his lips between his teeth. “It’s your lives.”
He tilts his head, his thumb lifting to brush across my bottom lip. His voice is so low I almost don’t hear it.
“Why you always protecting us?” he breathes.
I inhale a choppy breath, shaking my head lightly. I whisper back, “I don’t know.”
He drops his hand and steps back. “I believe you.”
With that, he goes to meet his brothers.
And I stand there, wondering what the hell I’m doing here.
I head for my room.
Pulling the blanket from the bed, I grab my stash from the drawer and drop in the recliner in front of the window. I unlock it and push it open.
I put the joint to my lips and light the tip, puffing lightly as I spin it in my fingers to get a good burn going.
I run over to my door and flip off the light, the moon giving me more than enough light to be comfortable. I plop into the chair again and