Unhinged (Necessary Evils #1)(59)

“And you’d be okay with that? Me having a family? A mother, siblings…?”

Adam was quiet for a long while. “I know I’m supposed to say yes. A normal person would say they just wanted you to be happy, which I do. But a selfish part of me wants to keep you all to myself. I have a family—people who always have my back—but I’m alone in all the ways that matter. It’s just how my brain works. At least, it was, until you. You are the family I’ll fight to keep. Nobody else. If you want to meet your real family, I definitely won’t stop you and I’ll do everything in my power to be whoever you need me to be around them. But the jealous part of me will always want you to pick me…just me, and that’s probably never going to change.”

“I do choose you. I will always choose you. You’re my family, too. And I do feel safe with your family. Safer than I have ever felt, but a part of me wants to know who my mother is, while another part is terrified.”

Adam pulled up in front of the storage unit and put the Rover in park. “We don’t have to decide anything right now except whether you want to open that door and see what was so important your father wrote it into his will.”

Noah stared at the door of the unit. “We’ve come this far…”

“We have. But I can do this alone. My brothers and I can finish this for you. We’ve already got blood on our hands and memories that would break normal people. We have no problem eliminating an army of pedophiles if that’s what it takes.”

Noah’s stomach plummeted. He should just say yes. Let Adam do the hard stuff. But maybe he was right. That wasn’t who Noah was. “Let’s go.”

The key slid home and unlocked with a solid click. The rolling door groaned in protest as Adam slid it upwards, revealing…two storage boxes. Just two. Sitting in a large, otherwise empty space.

Noah bit down hard on his cheek before asking, “Do we take them or look at them here?”

Adam’s gaze seemed to snag on something in the corner of the unit and, for a second, Noah had the irrational thought that somebody was standing there. He turned slowly, following his gaze over and up, heart stopping when he saw the small camera and the blinking light. “Do you think it’s hooked up to something or just there to scare people away?”

“I think it doesn’t matter either way. There’s clearly something in these boxes worth seeing. Snag one and put it in the back.”

“Where are we going?”

“Back to my father’s house.”





*



Once they were back in the Batcave, Noah felt much safer. Nobody could touch him there, least of all Gary. But now, he could never go back to his old life. He hadn’t ever intended to go back, but having the choice taken away from him made him feel sick. He was like a spy who’d been burned, and now, the only way out was through. They had to kill Gary, or Noah would never be safe. He might not be safe anyway. There was no guarantee that camera feed went to Gary, even if he was the most obvious choice.

Thomas had joined them downstairs, along with August and Atticus. The twins and Archer were missing. Noah wasn’t sure about the last sibling, Aiden. There were pictures of the seven of them along with Thomas all over the house, but Aiden disappeared around the time of his college graduation.

There was definitely a story there, but Noah couldn’t begin to imagine what it was. The newspapers referred to Aiden as the estranged son, the one adopted as a teen who just never seemed to take to being part of a large family. There was definitely more to his story, but Noah wasn’t going to pry. It didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. At least, not at the moment.

Adam and Noah sat cross-legged on the conference room table, the file boxes in front of them, while Thomas and the others stood. Thomas gave a nod and the boys cracked the lids on each box. Noah frowned. Inside was a bunch of loose pictures, but not the kind Noah had anticipated. It looked like a camp of some sort. There were boys playing basketball, soccer, or just sunbathing on a dock. They were all smiling, happy. The photos were stamped with the date July 1990.

There were hundreds of them, scattered across all the other items, but one caught Noah’s eye. Ten boys in bathing suits, standing in front of a lake, arms thrown around each other’s shoulders. There was something vaguely familiar about it.

Noah sighed. “Well, I have summer camp pictures. What about you?”

Adam seemed equally perplexed. “I don’t know what I have. Bank records? Copies of checks. Financial documents, legal briefs?”

Thomas snagged the first folder from Adam’s box and handed it to Atticus, who dropped into a chair and started to sort through the papers. The second file went to August, who simply began to flip through the documents like he had a specific target.

“What are you looking for?” Noah finally asked.

August frowned at him. “What do you mean?”

“You’re flipping through the pages so fast. What are you looking for?”

“I’m not looking for anything. I’m reading.”

Reading? How? Nobody could read that fast. Nobody.

Thomas gave Noah a smile. “My son has an eidetic memory. He retains everything he reads even if he appears to skim.”

Noah absorbed that bit of information. “Oh.”

August just smirked like he was used to people being impressed by him, but Atticus snorted, rolling his eyes. He was clearly tired of people feeling like August’s talent outshined his own. Were all siblings this competitive or just murderous ones?