Damaged (Boys of Winter #2) - Sheridan Anne Page 0,15

knows damn well that I’ll bring anyone and everyone down around me just to save myself.

“Let’s get this trial back on track,” Earnest says, looking more frustrated by the second. “You were dancing …”

“Right,” I say, slicing my annoyed gaze away from Carver. “He was forcing me to put on a show for the people around us, and as he was, he was busy telling me his big plans for the future.”

“What plans?” Carver demands, leaning in and making me wonder if he really doesn’t know.

I turn my gaze back to his, somehow still needing him as my comfort within this strange world, despite the way my head is telling me to pull away. “He was planning on taking over leadership. He wanted to rule over you all,” I tell them, looking back at Carver. “Why don’t you put your bitch of a mother on trial? She’s as guilty as they come. I bet she was even the one to put the idea in his head.”

“Watch it,” Carver demands as gasps and whispers are heard right around the table. “That’s my mother you’re talking about.”

I can’t help the scoff that pulls from deep within me. “Fuck off with your theatrics. It’s not like I’m saying anything we don’t already know. That show she put on for the people last night was embarrassing.”

“How the hell did Royston plan on taking over leadership?” Preston demands, getting us back to the point, not bothering with the bullshit nastiness getting thrown between me and Carver. “Sounds a bit far-fetched to me.”

“He said that he didn’t believe I had what it takes to be the leader of Dynasty, and while that question is still up for debate, it’s not the issue at hand. He stated that I was going to be the face of the organization, but I would answer to him.”

“And?” Earnest prompts.

“And I told him that he was fucking insane,” I spit. “There’s no way in hell I was going to answer to a man like him, especially the asshole who killed my parents.”

Carver shakes his head as everyone watches on through narrowed eyes. “You don’t know that.”

I stand, throwing my hands down on the table in frustration. “He admitted it to me,” I yell staring Carver down. “He was pissed because I wasn’t going to willingly conform to his plan, so he pushed harder and said that I either answer to him or he’ll continue in his endeavor to end my life.”

Gasps come from the right-hand side of the room as Tobias looks at Carver. “Is this true?” he demands. “Was your father responsible for the attack on Elodie in the woods?”

Carver shakes his head. “No, he wasn’t. I would have known. He was a proud man. He would have boasted about it in private.”

I scoff. “You mean just how he boasted about killing my parents right after he admitted to trying to kill me?”

Carver stands, the anger pouring out of him in waves. “You have no fucking evidence.”

“He told me. He laughed about the way my mother screamed,” I yell back at him, the emotion far too high to handle. “He told me how he forced her to watch his sharp blade slice through my father’s throat and then did the same to her. So forgive me, but I did what any other red-blooded human would do, and I ended his fucking pathetic existence. Hold it against me for all I care, but I will never live to regret it. Royston Carver deserved to die an excruciating death. I only hate that I didn’t get the chance to drag it out.”

“What happened, Elodie?” Mr. Danforth says to my right. “What did you do?”

I suck in a shaky breath and look back at Carver, feeling the guilt sweeping through me. “I told him to rot in the deepest pits of hell and stabbed him with the dagger I’d stolen from the initiation, making sure to pierce his lung.”

Carver drops back to his seat, silence falling around the room. A beat passes where no one says a damn thing until Carver’s tortured stare lands back on mine. “You had no right.”

“I had every right.”

Cruz’s father clears his throat. “Whether you had the right or not, that’s beside the point. You murdered one of our heads, one of our brothers. That’s not how Dynasty handles things.”

“He did it,” I insist.

“I’m sorry, Elodie,” Mr. Danforth continues. “While I’m compelled to trust your story, you have no hard evidence, just the claim that he said those