Nate(34)

“Want my daughter? Fuck yes. You have kids?”

“I don’t, no. Val was the first in the family to have them.” Graham winced, reaching for his beer again. “Is that why you’re asking about Duke? Is he making things hard on Quince? Fuck, of course he is because he’s a dick.”

I nodded. “He’s been quiet lately. I was wondering if I needed to be gearing up for a fight that I can’t see coming.”

“Oh. Well.” He thought about it, taking another sip of his beer. “I mean, if Quincey and Nova are with you, then there isn’t much he can do. Right? Unless…”

“Unless?” I raised an eyebrow.

He took another drink of beer and grimaced as he swallowed. “Man, I don’t know if I should say anything. I mean, that’s for Quincey to tell you.”

“Quincey isn’t sharing. If I need to know something, then I need to know. I can’t fight a battle if I don’t know all the plays.”

“Yeah. Yeah. I can see that. But I feel like I’m betraying her if I tell you.”

I couldn’t fault him, but it had to be said. “This is Nova. She’s who we’re all protecting at this point.”

He grunted. “Fuck.” He hissed that word. “I know, and I can totally see Quincey not sharing because yeah, I can’t imagine what she’s going through right now. He’s been in her head all her life, literally. She’s probably detoxing from his toxin, you know? There’s absolutely no way he’ll go to any of us to move against her. No way in hell. He knows that’s a lost cause. We all hate him, but the only move I can see him making is either declaring you unfit or declaring Quincey unfit.”

“He has no standing against me.”

“Yeah. I wouldn’t think so. He’d know that, too. You’re stacked with everything. Job. Money. Family. Connections. I can only imagine shit you might’ve pulled when you were younger, but I can’t see any judge taking him seriously. So, then, it’s Quince.” He was grimacing again.

“I have to know, Graham.”

“I know. Just feels wrong to tell you this way.” He took another drink, downing half his beer.

I had yet to touch mine.

“Fine.” His shoulders slumped down. “She’s not had an easy life. Duke fought for custody of her, and he fought nasty. He went deep into our mom’s history, pulling up a history of drug use. And it wasn’t that bad. I mean, it was, but it wasn’t anything current. She had a time in her life when she got dark, and she sought out drugs. That’s when she met Duke. It was a bad couple of years, but she got sorted. She and my dad are happy again and have been for a long time. She lost Quincey, though, and the way the lawyers painted her, it was bad. Real bad. I was young, but I remember when they’d come back from the courthouse some of the times. I just felt empty, like I knew something bad was going to happen. But yeah, I’d imagine he might try that with her. Dig up and air whatever dirty laundry that fucker can.”

“With what? I need to know what ammunition he might use.”

“Him, to be honest. He’s the bad shit in her life, but that’s not how the lawyers will put it. She had an eating disorder for a good while, and I know it’s cliché with the dancing world, but it happened. They might say other things, but I think that was the biggest issue for her for a while. She wasn’t taking care of herself.”

Jesus.

My mouth dried up, thinking about that, thinking about Quincey being in that position. She was full of fight from the moment I met her. She’d only been about the fight.

“But, yeah. It’s him. He’s the root of anything bad she’s been through.”

I sighed on the inside, because damn. That meant a lot of personal hell Quincey was going to go through.

“You think he’ll do that to his own daughter? His only flesh and blood?”

He considered my question, his fingers tightening around his glass. “Yeah, man,” he bit out. “Quincey was always a possession to him. He wouldn’t allow anyone else to have her, and I have a hard time believing he won’t think the same about Nova. In his mind, Nova became his when Valerie put Quincey down as her guardian.” He gave me a hard look. “You’re the card he didn’t plan for, so with you in the deck, I’m not sure what he’ll do. I wouldn’t put it past him to go after Quincey, though. If he got her out of the way, then it’s between him and you.”

I nodded, feeling a heaviness that was always there, but I was just reaffirming what I already knew was coming. “Thanks, Graham.”

He picked up his beer. “Do me a favor?”

“Yeah.”

“I know your group. I know battles aren’t anything new to you guys, but in the process of all this, try not to hurt my sister? And don’t let her know I was the one who told you about her history. We all lost Val, Quincey, too. On the surface it won’t look like we’re grieving, but we are. Each person in our family pushes that shit deep, though we still feel it.”

I nodded. He wasn’t saying anything I didn’t understand. “Not planning on doing either.”





*



I waited until the drive back home to call Mason.

He picked up after the first ring. “You hanging in there?”