shoving her way to stand protectively in front of the men she arrived with.
“Yeah, you remember that thing I needed to explain?” Wyatt interrupts, but I glare at him, making him shut up.
“I’m happy, Viddy, I swear to you. I’ve never been happier in my life than I am right now.”
I look at her, taking in her flushed face and bright eyes. I can see what she’s saying is true, so I step back and relax next to Kai, who remains silent, watching the bikers.
The biker who had been struggling finally pulls free from his friends and tries to move around Megan, but she stops him. “Grim, no.”
He’s closer now, so I study his large muscular frame covered in denim jeans and a black T-shirt beneath his leather jacket. He has a few days’ worth of stubble on his face, and his eyes—
I freeze solid for a moment as recognition dawns.
I slip my hand into the back of Kai’s jeans and grab his gun and aim it at Grim, flicking the safety off.
“Viddy, no, please,” Megan begs as the two other bikers pull their guns, aiming them at me, which makes Megan scream.
“No, stop it, all of you, God fucking damn it,” she curses.
Grim takes a step toward me. “Chicken.”
“Don’t,” I choke. He can’t be here, not now, not after everything.
“Vida, please, I’ve been looking for you for so long.”
“Yeah? Well, maybe you shouldn’t have fucking abandoned me in the first place,” I bark.
“Viddy, who is this guy?” Kai grunts.
“Not that it’s any of your business, but I’m her brother,” Grim growls at him.
“Everything about Viddy is my business. Now, if you don’t want me to rip out your spleen and feed it to you, you’ll back off.”
“I’m her brother,” he snaps once more, but I’m done. So fucking done.
“Once upon a time maybe, but that was a lifetime ago for me. Looks like you found a new family, so go back to them, you’re not welcome in mine,” I spit venomously.
“Viddy!” Megan gasps, shocked.
“No, Megan, I’m sorry. You know I love you, but this was a shitty thing for you to do.”
“He just wanted to find you, make things right—”
“Yeah? And what about what I want? You think I like being blindsided by a ghost in my home?” Her face flashes with guilt because she knows I’m right.
I look at the man who now goes by Grim and lay it all out, the whole burden I’ve been carrying that I never even shared with Megan. I don’t even care who hears it.
“You left me and you never came back. I wrote to you, Jesus, I wrote so many letters begging you to come home.” My arm wobbles a little under the weight of Kai’s gun, so I drop my arm for a minute.
“I didn’t get any letters, Vida,” he replies softly.
“Bullshit. I wrote you one every single day for four years until Mama told me to give up, you must be dead, and it was time to move on.”
He finches and shakes his head. “I didn’t get any letters, V, I swear it.”
“I suppose you forgot your way home, too,” I whisper.
“I have no excuse; I saw things over there that I couldn’t handle—”
I cut him off again with a laugh that sounds dark and twisted. “Couldn’t handle it? You couldn’t handle it?” I repeat, struggling to make sense of his words.
I look him dead in the eye and force my shame out through my lips. “He came to my room every night. He sodomized me until blood ran down my legs, and throat fucked me until I turned blue and passed out. But even then, I prayed for you to come save me. I was twelve years old when it started, and fourteen when I realized I was on my fucking own and if I wanted saving, I had to do it myself.”
I suck in a deep breath and see Wyatt holding my brother back, who has tears running down his face. Megan is sobbing quietly into the arms of one of the other bikers and I’m vaguely aware of Kai’s hands on my hips and his heat at my back, offering me his silent support.
“The day Mama died, he decided I was too old for him, so he sold me, but he still wanted his one last night with his favorite doll.” I take a deep breath and blow it out.
“I couldn’t do it anymore, not one more second, and I certainly wasn’t swapping one cage for