because I wouldn’t need that favor.
Anne was right about that. The Towers did owe me. They owed my mother for the years she’d spent hiding me. For the nights she’d spent worrying that I would turn out to be like my biological father, in spite of the happy, healthy life she’d made damn sure I had. And they were going to pay what they owed, even if that meant pressing whatever advantage my inheritance—Money? Property? Companies?—gave me.
“Yes,” Ian said, answering a question I’d almost forgotten I’d asked. “I shot Jake Tower with his own gun. He died quickly, but in a great deal of pain.”
“Well, the general consensus seems to be that he deserved that.” I stood and wiped my hands on the front of my jeans. “So...who’s taking me out of here? You can drop me off anywhere. Seriously. The front lawn is fine.” Just as long as I was on the other side of those countersunk screws.
Kris looked at Kori, whose gaze flitted from Ian to Anne to Vanessa, without once straying to Gran, who seemed to have forgotten we were there at all, while she rinsed dishes and lined them up in the dishwasher.
“I have one more question.” Vanessa met my gaze boldly. “Is there anything you can do to help us get Kenley back? Anything at all?”
I exhaled slowly, pretending I was actually considering the question, when I was really trying to figure out how best to get away with a lie. The safest approach seemed to be avoiding lies altogether, in favor of a marginally relevant truth. “I told you, I never met any of the Towers until today. And they shot at me,” I said. “Ask Kris if you don’t believe me.”
“Technically, they shot at me, but they made no particular effort to avoid her,” he verified. “But that doesn’t mean anything,” he added, and I wanted to smack him for the reversal. “She met with Julia Tower in her home office. And when she told the guards to put their guns down, they did.”
But that wasn’t quite right. “They weren’t obeying my order, they were obeying Julia’s.” And I had no idea why she’d complied when I’d asked her to give it, but I wasn’t going to say that. Everyone was already staring at me as if an alien might burst out of my stomach at any second. “And she was only trying to keep you from shooting any more of her people.”
Kris shook his head. “Julia doesn’t care who gets shot, as long as it’s not her.”
“Her people mean nothing to her as individuals. One gunman is as good as the next,” Kori verified. “Except me. I’m better than the rest. But I’m not theirs anymore.”
“Is that why they took your sister? Are they using her to get you back?”
Kris choked on a bitter laugh, as if the sound got wedged in his throat. “They don’t want Kori back. They want her dead.”
I couldn’t imagine growing up in their world. Playing a lifelong, lethal game of hide-and-seek, where those who were found were either enslaved or killed. Who could you trust? When could you let your guard down?
And just like that, with a sudden devastating clarity, I understood Kris’s paranoia and reluctance to set me free. He’d tried to tell me, but I’d refused to understand; he truly couldn’t afford to let me go if I was bound to Julia Tower.
“If they want you two dead, why are you so sure Kenley’s alive?”
“Kenley isn’t muscle,” Vanessa said. “She’s special. Julia needs her. But I need her more.” And that’s all she seemed inclined to reveal. “If there’s anything you can do to help...”
“I wish I could.” Evidently that sounded like the truth—and it was—because no one even looked at Anne. “But I don’t even know how to make Julia do what I need done. In fact, she tried to kill me, as Kris seems to enjoy pointing out.” I stood again and shoved my chair back, newly determined to avenge my sister after hearing about theirs. “Now, you either get me out of here or I’m climbing out the window. And the only way you’re going to stop me is by killing me.”
And, man, did I hope they recognized hyperbole.
Silence descended as gazes flitted all over the room, as if they were taking a psychic vote. In the end, it came down to a stubborn stare-down between Kris and his sister. “Huddle?” he suggested, and she nodded. Then they left the room