“It’s up to you to decide which one of us is better suited to take him on,” I finished.
I hadn’t seen Shay fight yet.
River glanced away and sucked his teeth, always reluctant to make quick moves. Even more so in this case when his only source of profiling came from an underground club where it’d be weird as fuck if Shay didn’t come off as sharp and guarded. But we didn’t have time to dick around, and I seriously didn’t want to ban the boy.
When someone was in trouble, we wanted to help, despite what our reputation might indicate.
“We know what it’s like to lose family,” I pointed out.
“Yeah, I know.” He raked his teeth over his bottom lip before he blew out a breath. “It’s his guilt we’re fucking with here, Reese. That’s what bothers me. For him to seek out Sadists for punishment means he feels he’s done something to deserve it.”
Of course. I assumed it had to do with the loss of his family.
The tragedy had made the papers, which River had dug up in his search. Mother and father asleep on the third floor, along with the youngest child, an eight-year-old girl. Three brothers had been asleep on the second floor. The fire had started in the basement. The eldest brother, Shay, living at home while in college, had woken up first and called 9-1-1. Then he’d yelled for his parents while dragging his brothers outside.
I hoped to get the rest of the story one day. The parents had died in the fire, and the sister had passed away in the hospital a few days later.
We had a lot of unanswered questions since River didn’t want to dig too deep, and one of them concerned another parent, namely Shay’s biological father, and whether or not he was around to give Shay support. Because the man who’d died in the fire had been multiracial, as were the younger children, so we assumed the mother had been married before.
I leaned back against the wall, resting my arms along the edge. “Before we can make him realize he probably has nothing to feel guilty about, we have to get him out here where he can’t escape. Where he has to face what we’re telling him.”
And we had the tools and knowledge to do it.
River nodded slowly, thinking, and kept his gaze glued to the water as he walked closer to me.
He’d made his decision. He was just rummaging through his brain for any alternatives before he gave me his answer.
“All right…” He came to a stand right before me and lifted his gaze to my chest. “He’s a technical fighter like you.”
Unlike River. If he wanted to defeat someone, he needed to observe his target for a while.
He read people. I dealt with them.
“This isn’t a case, Riv,” I murmured. Because I could see his dissatisfaction about the whole thing. When we turned forty last year, we’d retired from the private sector as we’d promised each other. Now this, our community, this kink haven, the house, was our home and source of income. We’d made it out alive, we were pretty set financially and didn’t have to touch our savings, and he was worried we were sliding back and tempting fate. “Hey. Look at me.”
He glanced up, expression open and hesitant, something he never showed anyone else.
“This isn’t a case,” I repeated. “We’re helping a member of our community.”
“With some controversial methods that we haven’t used since we were in the field.”
I smiled a little. “Controversial methods are what we do best.”
His mouth twitched, and I grinned before he narrowed his eyes at me.
“Don’t pretend to be pissy.” I chuckled and leaned forward, resting our foreheads together. “You on board?”
He sighed. “You know I am.”
There we go.
Two
Shay Acton
She would’ve turned ten today…
This day was going to suck.
I scrubbed my hands over my face. Aunt Mel was preparing breakfast downstairs, judging by the sound of cupboards opening and closing. The TV was on in the room next to mine, which meant my brothers were awake.
Should I remind them? Or leave them be and think it was an ordinary Friday in the last couple weeks of their summer break.
At the sound of a knock on the door, I forced myself to sit up. “Yeah?”
TJ opened the door and poked his head in. “You’re awake.” He flashed a dopey grin. “We’re going out soon, right?”
“Yeah, of course.” I cleared my throat from sleep and planted my feet on the floor. “I’ll meet you downstairs for breakfast.”
“Okay, cool.” He closed the door again.
I released a breath. He probably didn’t remember it was Myah’s birthday. When I was thirteen, I definitely didn’t pay attention to family members’ birthdays. Levi could be the exception. He was only eleven, but he’d remembered the date last year.
After pulling on a pair of jeans and a tee, I made sure I had all my belongings in my overnight bag. Then I left the guest room and ducked into the bathroom to take a leak and make sure I looked human.
TJ got to pick our last activity a week ago, so it was Levi’s turn today. We’d probably go to a museum. He was the family’s own little genius, and his most recent obsession revolved around mapping out our family tree. It combined his loves for history, religion, and analyzing data.
Whenever I came over here to Aunt Mel’s, Levi had something new to share, be it about his paternal grandmother who’d come here from a Japan in shambles, his great-great-grandfather who’d fled slavery in the South, or his grandfather’s mother who had escaped Poland during the war. My mother’s second husband, Terrell, came from a long line of people who knew what running for your life meant. It was why they’d dedicated their lives to serving their communities and accepting as many as possible.
Terrell’s family had taken in my mom and me with open arms. I’d been a cocky five-year-old with anger issues. Dad—Terrell—had taught me how to
