chased off a bunch of assholes who tried to egg her house on Halloween and gave them a good kicking for it too. I liked to know we were looking out for her, even though she didn't know about that specifically. Sometimes if we came up here during the day, we’d help her out with work in the yard and chat to her on her porch. She didn’t really have anyone which was something I could seriously relate to because aside from my boys, there wasn’t a single fucker in this world who gave a shit about me. And maybe in some small way our visits meant she was less alone, even on the nights we didn’t even go up to the house.
Miss Mabel had even gone one better than letting us hang out in her summer house and giving us sugary snacks whenever we swung by – she’d given us access to another building on her grounds. Right around the back of the property, the manor had a graveyard which included several family crypts dating back to the very first Rosewood to own this land.
Before his death, Daniel Rosewood had built the first crypt alongside a hidden treasury with a stone door which had five locks on it – one for each of his sons so that they could only come and claim the family fortune as a unit, keeping the family united. Over the years since, the treasure that had supposedly been kept in there had been taken out and the Rosewood heirs had handed their keys down when they died until only Mabel Rosewood was left to inherit them. The crypt was empty and derelict now and the five keys had been sitting in a drawer in her dining room, but after getting to know us, she’d gifted us one each so that we could use it how we wanted.
Mostly, we used it to store shit we stole that was too hot to pawn right away. But we’d also taken to hiding other things down there over the years, weapons and secrets and things that could be wielded against us or those we knew. All of it stashed away in case a day came when we might need to use them. There was something about there having been five keys that had always felt like fate to me, like they’d been destined to be ours. And even though the boys liked to laugh about that, I knew they coveted theirs too. The first thing I’d done after getting mine was hang it from a leather thong which I wore around my neck and I never took it off.
We moved inside and Rick pulled the summer house door closed behind us as I headed into the shadows before he switched the lights on. The place was cosy enough with little couches and a table, some playing cards and sodas left here for whenever we showed up. Miss Mable often left snacks out for us too because she was a freaking superstar.
I glanced down at my black shirt and cursed as I spotted the bright pink and orange paint coating it.
"Mary Beth is gonna have a fucking fit when she finds this in the wash," I groaned.
"I think it looks pretty cool," Maverick protested. "But we can't go back out there covered in paint while the cops are still hunting. Maybe Chase has left some of his shit here again. Then I can take the painty clothes back to mine and give them back to you once they’re clean and your evil step mother will never find out."
"Foster carer," I growled. "That bitch is no kind of mother to me."
"Mmm." Rick tugged his own paint covered shirt off and tossed it to the ground before starting to rummage through the stuff piled in the corner of the room.
"What the fuck is that?" I gasped, striding towards him as I spotted a black mark curving over his shoulder.
"What?" Maverick asked innocently. But innocent didn't sit right on him. Never had, never would.
I grabbed his arm and made him stand up and turn back to face me. He had a shirt in his hand which looked like it belonged to Chase, but my attention was fixed on the big ass tattoo he had scrawled over the entire left side of his chest.
"Come on, before the cops show up," Rick teased, ignoring the way I was staring at his new ink and grabbing the hem of my shirt before yanking it off