He nodded and watched as his half-brothers shuffled into the room. Xander was, as usual, dressed in a three-piece suit. Killian wore work clothes, although the last time he’d heard, Killian’s construction company was the largest in the tri-state area. He should be in a suit. All the Ganas brothers were successful.
“We stopped by last night.”
Ryker cocked his head. “Why?” It wasn’t like they were close.
“To make sure you were okay. Dad called me to let me know you were here.”
“Really? Hoping I was dead or dying, no doubt.” The bitterness dripped from his low words.
Xander shook his head. “The old man knows he was wrong. He just can’t bring himself to apologize. He’s old-country proud.” The Greek heritage was strong in the Ganas family.
Ryker snorted. “The man accused me of being responsible for Mom’s death.” He’d screamed that message at the top of his lungs when Ryker tried to see his mother at the hospital morgue. They buried her on the estate. No one notified him of the service. No one—including his half-brothers.
Killian drew a sharp breath. “We never thought that.”
“You never said otherwise.” Ryker flung the words back at his brother. “And thanks for letting me know when you buried her.”
“He said he told you. Afterward, he ranted about how you didn’t care enough to show up. Hell, we were all mourning. Numb. But when two and two didn’t add up, we reached out to you.” Xander slipped his hands into his pockets as he spoke.
“Yeah, nice to know it took a year for you to realize I wasn’t responsible for her accident,” Ryker fired back.
He’d lost his mom. She was driving into the city to have lunch with him when an accident in front of her on the interstate caused her to swerve. She hit the retaining wall, and the car flipped into oncoming traffic. Thankfully, no one else suffered, but his mother’s neck broke on impact. According to the highway patrol unit first on scene, she was dead when he arrived. But Benjamin, his stepfather, had fixated on the fact that she wouldn’t have died if she hadn’t been going to meet him. Her death became his fault because Benjamin had to have someone to blame and he was the easy target. Always the easy target.
Good ole Ben hated him. The man overlooked the fact his mother had a child out of wedlock, but that Ryker had the audacity to continue his relationship with his mother after Benjamin had asked him to leave the family estate when he was eighteen was unacceptable. Benjamin did everything he could to hinder Ryker from having anything to do with his brothers or his mother. At ten, Xander was the oldest when Ryker left. Killian was eight. He’d visit on the occasional holiday—when his mother’s pleading had become too much for his stepfather—but Benjamin had never made him feel welcome, even though the vicious man loved his mom with a singular devotion.
“It took us a year to find you. I hired a private investigator.” Xander shrugged. “We didn’t know you’d changed your last name from Ganas.”
Ryker smiled tightly. “Your father requested it. He told me he didn’t want me to pollute the waters for his sons.” The bastard had the audacity to offer to pay him off. As if. He took his mother’s maiden name, the name he had before Ben adopted him. Another concession for his mother that Benjamin Ganas told him he regretted.
“Christ.” Killian groaned and dropped into the chair Ryker’d just vacated. “He’s a piece of work, isn’t he?”
“I can think of other modifiers,” Xander agreed. “Ryker, I’m not trying to make amends for him. Lord knows I can’t. However, we’d like to get to know you again. When we were younger, you were our hero.” Xander smiled. “You taught me to stand up for myself.”
“And you helped build that birdhouse. You ignited my passion for building.” Killian added. “And it was you that taught Dimitri to ride that damn mini-bike. He credits you for getting him into motocross.”
“Another strike against me, according to Benjamin, no doubt,” Ryker chuffed in response. Dimitri had been a champion motocross rider and catapulted that experience into launching a new federation of racing that was taking root worldwide.
“You were always there for us. Until he made you leave,” Xander confirmed. “Mom tried to hide how sad she was when you left. But we could tell.”
His nerves throbbed, exposed, bloody and raw. He’d shoved all the heart-wrenching emotions about his mother’s death away, forcing them behind doors he’d never let his mind open again. The sudden appearance of his half-brothers and their admissions threatened to unlock those barriers.
“Why are you here?” He let his gaze travel first to Xander and then to Killian.
“Because I want to get to know my big brother again.” Xander’s voice was deep with emotion.
“I want that, too.” Killian stood and shoved his hands in his jeans pockets. “And to tell you if you ever need anything not to go to cousin Andreas,” Killian chuckled. “He was really butthurt the house he was flipping had bullet holes in it.”
A surprised bark of laughter shot from Ryker. “Well, let me tell you, that wasn’t something we expected.” He winced and leaned a bit to ease his shoulder.
“I hear from your girlfriend that you’re a highly decorated officer.” Xander smiled at him. “I’m not surprised. I always knew you’d be amazing at whatever you set your mind to do.”
Ryker grunted. “I’m just a cop.”
“A captain in charge of a highly-decorated, multi-jurisdictional drug enforcement team. I did a little research after Brianna told us about your commendations.” Xander glanced at his watch. “And I need to go, I have a new client coming into town today.” He placed his hand
