LOGINChapter 222: Not Well Reese Pamela.That was the woman she had been reborn as.“I don’t care what she calls herself,” I said. “I want to speak to the woman I knew. The label is irrelevant. Let me see her for herself.”Ryan shook his head. “She does not want to speak to you. Or to any of you. She never wanted this house to find out she was alive. In her version of the story, you and Roman have a talent for destroying whatever you put your hands on.”A laugh escaped me before I could stop it. “You are taking yourself out of that sentence now? I thought ruining things was a family sport. When did you get a pass?”“I cause a different kind of damage.” He almost smiled. “Leave me out of your particular mess. What Dahlia and I have is a partnership. That is all. We understand the terms. We respect them.”“What is the shared target, then?” The anger was back, cleaner now that the shock had somewhere direct to point. “What is the thing that made a dead woman and you sit down at the same tab
Chapter 221: Moving Too Fast Reese She was alive.All these years, Dahlia had been alive.The sentence did not fit in my head. It kept sliding off the facts I had learned to live with. “What did you do?” My voice came out raw. “How do you take a woman who never belonged to you and hide her for more than a decade? How do you let your own brothers mourn a grave that was never full?”Ryan did not look ashamed. He pointed at the chair across from him as if this were still a conversation that could be managed with decorum.“Sit down—”“Do not tell me to sit down, Ryan.” The volume jumped before I could stop it. “We buried her. Roman buried her. I stood there and I—” The rest tangled. “And the two of you have been laughing. Playing the rest of us for fools.”“Keep your voice down.” His eyes flicked to the door. “Let me explain.”“Explain what? How you pulled it off? Where she is? I want to look her in the face and know if every conversation we ever had was a performance. If I was just con
Chapter 220: Back For More? Reese I did not knock.Frustration had burned the courtesy out of me somewhere between the living room and Ryan’s door. I put my shoulder into it and the thing flew open hard enough to bounce off the wall.He was in a chair by the window, bent over a tablet, brows drawn tight. Whatever was on that screen mattered. The second he saw me he flipped the device facedown and sat up straighter, glare already loaded.“What are you doing here? Back for more?” The sarcasm came easy, even with one arm bound. “And I'm guessing closed door means come in now?”I looked at him properly. Bare chest. Sling holding the shoulder I had driven into a wall that morning. Tablet hidden like a dangerous secret. “You are awfully quick to cover a screen I could not even see from the door. What are you hiding, Big Joe?”He glared so hard it looked like he wanted to throw a punch. “You dislocated my arm. Get out.”I did the opposite. I walked in and let the door shut behind me. “If y
Chapter 219: Paid Actors LizzieI was still walking the argument in circles when the knock came. It was not Reese. Reese would not knock on his own door.“Who is it?” My voice came out thin. The headache behind my eyes had turned the whole afternoon into a pulse.“It’s me.” Roman.I dragged the back of my hand across my face and sat up straighter, as if posture could hide the wreckage. “Come in.”The door opened and he stepped through with Miles against his chest, the baby’s cheek squashed slightly into his shirt, headphones gone now, pacifier absent. Roman offered a half-smile that looked almost apologetic. “Hope you don’t mind. Just took him from Ramsey.”“Of course not.” I shifted over. “Sit.”He sat with a low groan and, before I could prepare myself, held his son out. “Take him for a second. My arms are done.” The child was in my lap before the protest or excuse could form.For a full second neither of us moved. Miles looked at me. I looked at him. It was a ridiculous, serious
Chapter 218: Then Keep Bending Reese “Lauren claims she has Nathan’s unsent letters,” I said. “They suggest he was afraid of the tapes going public. She also eavesdropped on my conversation with Lizzie. The bitch recorded it.” Roman frowned for a second, then snapped his fingers as the name slotted into place. “Lauren. The White heiress. The delusional one.”I almost laughed. “Don’t tell me you forgot who she was.”He exhaled, eyes on Reginald’s portrait above the fireplace. The painted version of our father looked down on the living room with the same cold patience the living one used on the driveway. “She’s not memorable. There’s just something about her being in this house that sets my teeth on edge. Might be the fact that she’s sleeping with her brother.” “She told me she’s adopted.” I let out a short, incredulous breath. “Worst lie I have heard in a while, and that is saying something in this family.”Roman’s mouth twisted. “Obviously a lie. She’s trying to sand the edges of
Chapter 217: I Found Letters Reese The water in the stone pool at the side of the manor was as dark as I remembered.No one came here. That was the point. It sat too close to the trees, too far from the polished paths the family preferred, a leftover piece of the grounds that had never been worth civilizing. It was the only place left that did not want anything from me. Especially my sanity.Nothing in the house was meeting in the middle. Lizzie would not keep the child for my sake. I would not stand by and watch her erase it because of a fear that belonged to people who had already failed her. Those two sentences had been circling each other for an hour and neither one had budged.I had not meant the threat the way it had come out of my mouth. I wanted her to understand I was not playing. That this was not another year she could bargain into ten. That I would not smile and call it love while she treated our child like a problem to be solved in private.That did not mean I would f







