Oaths and Omissions (Monsters & Muses #3)(33)

“I’m still in the middle of your previous request.”

“Okay.” Holding a folded piece of paper between two fingers, he lifts a brow. “This one comes from the Great Beyond.”

“What are you on about?” Leaning with my forearm on my thigh, I snatch the paper away, untucking the corners. Smoothing it out on my leg, I clear my throat, scanning the page.

The tendons in my neck grow taut, tension slithering along them like a thick sludge.

I look up. “This is Dad’s handwriting.”

Alistair nods.

Reaching the end, I flip it over, certain there’s more. A note, instructions, anything. “It’s just a list of names.”

“A list of whose names?”

My mouth dries up, and I don’t respond.

Can’t, really.

“Surely you didn’t think it’d been me funding your extracurricular activities all this time?” Picking his teacup back up, he takes a drink. “I’m merely the messenger.”

Crumbling the paper in my fist, I glare at him. “Why am I just now getting the message?”

“If we’re aligning destinies, I figured it was time. Now that you’re deep in the trenches with the Primrose family, why not use that to your advantage, and get your revenge on the people who helped bury Dad?”

My father’s face flashes before me, bright and smiling even when his world was falling apart. Blame was crowned on his head, and the weight of his associations came crashing down, resulting in his death at the behest of Tom Primrose.

Tom didn’t act alone, but it would’ve been much easier on everyone if that were the case. The list in my hand proves otherwise, though I’ve worked through the majority of them over the years already.

The realization is almost disappointing. Had I known they’d played a hand, I might have enjoyed their demise a bit more.

Still, I don’t like the idea of Alistair driving the ship. “I told you, I’m not after revenge.”

“I know what you said, brother.” He shrugs. “If that’s the hill you want to die on, fine. But I don’t believe you.”

I leave not very long after that, and not before he reminds me about protecting his image, placing the responsibility of our family’s honor squarely on my shoulders again.

Like that worked out so well the first time around.

Part of me is tempted to head straight home. Maybe take some comfort in the liveliness that Lenny provides, even if she does tempt me in ways I can’t begin to comprehend, given that I’m supposed to loathe her existence.

Lust doesn’t compute with hatred, though. My dick appears to think feelings are invalid, so long as there’s the promise of getting it wet.

Since I’ve made such a big deal at this point about not bedding her, I pass up the turn to the beach house and wind up outside Primrose Manor instead. I sit there for so long, reliving the night everything changed over and over until I’m disgusted with myself all over again.

All I had to do was get in, make the hit, and get out.

Back then, the Primrose family didn’t fully understand the scope of danger they were surrounded in; Tom invested in far more than just property, though, which is how he came to know my father in the first place.

Getting in was simple. A quick scale over the stone wall, the clipping of a cable connecting the security system to the internet, and the picking of the lock to a side door off the chef’s kitchen.

I’d practiced breaking and entering dozens of times at that point. Trained extensively with my father and his mates, before his death. Even so, I knew deep down that I wasn’t prepared.

But I was fueled by anger. Broken and bleeding from the loss of the most important person in my life, and so I let my emotions cloud my judgment.

Didn’t think about how getting caught would affect my family—at that point, my only family was Alistair, and he was just a political science major. I had a modeling job that I’d secured a few years earlier, mostly print work for national corporations and sponsorships, that gave me a certain level of fame on the island and something to do when I wasn’t committing crimes.

We were nobodies, though, in the grand scheme of things. I certainly hadn’t realized my getting caught would change that.

But it did.

Now, over a decade later, I’m wondering what might have happened had I not been so hasty in my need for revenge. If I’d waited for the right time to strike. Maybe there’d be no Primrose empire today, operating as if they don’t have more blood on their hands than I do.

I still don’t know what went wrong, and I think that’s what bothers me most.

My failure.

The lights on the front lawn flicker on, and I take that as my cue to leave. No sense in continuing the war now, when brunch shall be far more interesting.

Again, I consider going to the beach house. Even get to the fork in the road and sit with my blinker on, knowing a good fiancé would be home with his woman more.

Luckily, I’m not the real deal.

Sighing as I pull away from the turn and start back up the road, I wonder why that doesn’t absolve me as much as it should.

Parking in a paid lot a couple blocks from downtown, I get out and walk the cobblestone streets, looking into dim storefronts as I pass, ignoring the crazed reflection looking back. Hardly anyone is out this time of night, but the buildings remain lit, as if that’s truly an effective security measure.