us. When we were kids before we understood who our dad was, Phoenix was closest to him. To me, Lester was just a man who lived with us while Echo was my dad. But Lester was Phoenix’s dad.
“River, head on to the party with Sunny and Luke. Me and Phoenix are gonna take a walk.”
River dipped his chin to Echo and moved my way. Echo patted Phoenix on the shoulder and shoved him back toward the parking lot. As soon as my brothers were out of earshot I turned to River.
“You okay?”
River glanced at Luke, then the two men’s gazes locked in some sort of manly silent communication that would’ve pissed me off if Phoenix hadn’t just dropped a bomb.
Whatever my brother needed to work out was done when he broke the stare and looked back at me.
“Yeah, sis, I’m good. But this is gonna rock Phoenix.”
“I know.”
“He had a different dad than we had.”
“He did,” I confirmed.
River nodded then turned to Luke and shocked the shit out of me.
“There are a lot of reasons to hate Lester Kent. For the most part, he ignored me, Echo, and Sunny. But he took Phoenix everywhere with him. He taught Phoenix how to work on cars. He even bought this beat-up junker of a dirt bike so he and Phoenix could fix it up. They spent a lotta time together, so it hit Phoenix especially hard the first time the cops came knocking. The second time the cops came with a warrant, we were minors but we were still cuffed and set on the porch while the house was searched. Something inside my brother died that day. There was no more denying who our dad was. I’m telling you this because something was obviously going on when Echo and I walked up. My guess is Phoenix was being a dick. I’m not excusing whatever he said, but I hope you can understand what getting a letter from our dad would do to him.”
Holy wow.
River was being cool. That meant Echo had talked to him. And the only reason Echo would tell River to stand down was if Echo respected Luke. There was no other explanation.
“It’s all good,” Luke answered magnanimously.
I felt Luke’s arm squeeze around my middle and my eyes went to his.
“You need to go home, baby, you say the word.”
That was sweet.
“No. I’m good.”
Luke’s hand came up to cup my cheek, something he did when he wanted my attention but also when he was getting ready to lay it out. He’d do it gently but he wouldn’t hold back.
“Straight up, Shiloh, you can’t bury shit like this. I don’t care what the man’s done, he’s still your dad. You need to leave, we’ll leave. You want your brothers with you we’ll all go back to your place. But you cannot lock this away and carry the burden.”
You need to go home.
We’ll leave.
We’ll all go back to your place.
Luke had gone behind my back to get me to this picnic. I couldn’t say I was happy about that but I understood why he’d done it. He knew I’d try to get out of it. He knew I’d be nervous about being around his friends. He’d also made it clear when he wanted something he didn’t “try” he simply “did” and I would never admit this to him but I was almost glad he’d maneuvered all of this. So knowing all that he’d done, Luke offering to take me home if I needed to go said something. And what it said was he was putting me first.
I liked that.
“This is the honest truth and River can confirm. I laid my feelings about my dad to rest a long time ago. I did this with my brothers after he was sentenced to life in prison. I didn’t have a lot of love for the man before he killed Officer Smith but any I had died when he took that man’s life. I will not be visiting my dad. That is not because I hate him, it’s simply because he doesn’t exist for me. Lester reached out to Phoenix and not me, Echo, or River because he knew it would fuck with Phoenix. Which in turn means he fucks with all of us. Lester is a sonofabitch but that doesn’t mean he’s stupid. Phoenix is tweaked, we’ll circle around him, but it will be Echo who will do what he always does.
“So, Dad will win, because he just earned himself face time with his