Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
Stone
They say the truth will set you free, but will it really?
I rap my knuckles on the table nonchalantly, with my features schooled. I look the epitome of at ease, just the way I’ve been trained. While Cole and Jace study me intently with worry gleaming in their eyes, I push back on my chair enough to kick my feet up onto the table and chuckle at how quickly they both jump to their feet as if on guard.
“Chill the fuck out, you’re making me angsty,” I admonish.
“Angsty? You’ve no fucking clue who is about to walk through that door, have you?” Jace rushes out as if he’s been holding his tongue.
“No fucking clue.” I shrug. “Hence why I’m sitting here waiting for someone to tell me.”
Cole laughs. He’s the joker of the two—or three, if you count the other guy in the equation with their little family setup.
“My girl has always been intrigued by you,” he says, and I narrow my eyes on him. “She said you’re all mysterious and shit.”
I scoff.
Mysterious, my ass. I’m a mystery to myself, at least.
The outside door to the gym chimes, and the guys share a look while I settle back in my chair and place my hands behind my head, doing my best to act as cool as a cucumber when inside I’m boiling with a pent-up need to unleash hell on someone. I just need to direct it to the right person. At that point, the door opens and in walks the serious-looking guy I almost killed, and behind him, a giant of a man so tall he rivals me. Still, I remain seated and act unfazed despite knowing the chances of me getting out of here unharmed are slim, but what do I have to lose?
“You can leave us,” Mr. Personality says, and my lip twitches at my new nickname for him.
Jace’s gaze darts to mine, then back to Personality. He broadens his shoulders like a pitbull, one I could tear apart with one hand despite seeing his epic cage fighting skills. “You don’t own this place, and we’re doing you a favor. A thanks would be nice.” He lifts his shoulder and gives a cocky smirk.
The guy behind Personality stares. I can feel those blue eyes studying me, but I feign knowing and stare ahead at the wall, like the dark spots of old blood splatter are more interesting than him.
“Thanks,” Personality grits out like it killed him to admit it, and I smirk. He really is a jackass.
“No problem. Come on, Jace, let’s go get drinks.” Cole elbows Jace, then steers him toward the door.
“I’m not a fucking server.” His grumbles can be heard as the door closes behind them, and my attention is drawn to the mountain of a man who pulls out a chair, swings it around to face me, then falls into it with a wince.
I eye him up and down. He has to be in his forties, with a short buzz cut similar to my own, and those haunting blue eyes I only now realize are also like mine.
My heart stops at the thought and my boots fall to the floor with a heavy thud as I stare back at a man I know I should know, yet I don’t.
Pain slices across my forehead, and I try not to react.
He sits forward and places his hands on the table and steeples them, letting me know he’s not a threat.
“Do you know who we are?” His gruff voice fills the room, authoritative and concise. He’s used to being in control, a leader.
“No.”
He glances at Mr. Personality.
“He’s telling the truth.” He speaks to his partner, but his gaze doesn’t leave mine.
“You shot my brother.”
So, they’re brothers. I drag my finger over my lip. “I did.”
“And you saved him.”
I nod.
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why did you save him?” He tilts his head and narrows his eyes.
Slowly, I scrub a hand over my head, then I shrug, deciding to hit them with my honesty. “It felt right.”
“Why didn’t you kill him when you had the chance?” So, they know I could have killed him and chose not to.
My throat becomes dry, and I struggle to clear it. “It felt wrong.”
He drags his hand over his jaw, then nods toward his brother, who places a file down in front of me.
I stare at it blankly.
“Go ahead and open it.” He motions with his hand.
Sweat gathers on my forehead as heat spreads through my veins like wildfire.
Whatever is in here is the key to my past, and for the first time ever, I’m more terrified of that than my future.
I shake my head, and he sighs.
“Your name is Keenan O’Connell, the youngest of the O’Connell brothers.” My eyes ping-pong from one man to the other. “Our brother.”
I suck in a sharp breath.
“Then where the fuck have you been?” I snap and stand quickly, sending my chair backward as my muscles bunch tight to the point of pain. “Huh? Where the fuck have you been?” My voice grows louder, and I unravel in a frenzy, pacing the room as I tug on my head. “Where?” I bellow.
“The important question is, where have you been?” Mr. Personality’s words still me, and I turn to give them my attention. My quizzing glare encourages him to elaborate almost immediately. “Where have you been, Keenan?”
“My name’s fucking Stone!” I jab my finger in my chest. “Stone! Say it!” I roar.
He swallows harshly and remains calm. “Where have you been, Stone?”
“I’ve been in literal hell, motherfuckers. Now, tell me everything I need to know,” I demand, and my pulse pounds in my ears.
“When you were fifteen years old, you were shot at our family warehouse. You weren’t meant to be there, and as far as we were aware, you were dead. We later discovered it was our uncle who shot you to cover up his”—he clears his throat before continuing on—“untoward behavior.”
I scoff. Is this prick for real? “Untoward behavior? Seriously?”
“He was a trafficker who raped our sister-in-law and mother. He’s a sick son of a bitch that died too quickly.” My eyebrows raise at the hatred pouring from him. “His death should have been more excruciating and painful, and I wish every fucking day I could have made him pay.” The leader speaks up, and my heart races at his admission.
“So, this uncle of yours wanted me dead, and I survived, huh?”
“Ours, you said uncle of yours. He was our uncle, yours too.” His eyes hold mine, but I refuse to be drawn in.
I wave my hand. “What-the-fuck-ever. So why does my family want him dead?” I tilt my head toward his brother, then I right my chair and slide into it.
Personality holds his hand up. “We haven’t finished the topic we were discussing.”
I balk at his odd behavior, but he ignores me and continues. “Considering your refusal to accept the research I configured”—he motions toward the folder—“I’ll enlighten you further.” I roll my eyes, allowing him his moment to shine. “Don O’Connell must have been informed by emergency services that you were still alive. That message was never passed on to us. We grieved your death.” He steps forward, and his eyes analyze mine. “Our mother grieved the death of her youngest boy.” All I hear is the name like acid on his tongue.
“Did you say Don?”
He rears back.
“Yes. Our uncle. Ours and yours.”
“He was my uncle?”
“That is correct.”
“You killed him?”
“Not me personally, but one of my brothers.”
I sit forward, suddenly seeing these men in a different light. “Who did you say you were again?”
“Jesus Christ. I thought you said his medical records didn’t show too much brain damage?” the leader chimes in.
“Don’t be so fucking obtuse; it’s a lot for him to take in,” he snides back.
“He has a lot to take in?” He wafts his hand out in front of him. “He’s fucking alive and sitting there and acting like he doesn’t know us.”
“He doesn’t,” Personality snaps back, and I want to high-five him for siding with me.
But I’m pissed because they’re talking about me as if I’m not here, just like they do. Like I’m meaningless and don’t exist.
“We’re the O’Connell family, descendants of an Irish Mafia family. This is Bren, your oldest brother and current don, and I’m Oscar, the intelligent one.”
I ignore all the other shit he said and latch onto the important part. “Mafia?”
“Yes. Much like the one you were taken to, but we aren’t…” He drags a calculated finger over his lip as he studies me.
“Sick sons of bitches that destroy innocent women and children,” the leader, Bren, finishes.
Personality’s jaw sets, and he closes his eyes, almost as if giving himself a timeout, then reopens them with a steely determination. “Thank you, Bren. What my brother is trying to say is, we’re a Mafia family who does not dabble in the skin trade.”
My eyebrows furrow. “You don’t do auctions?”
Bren’s face turns bright red, and I feel his anger radiating from him.
“No,” his brother answers for him.
“What about compounds?”
“What the fuck do you know about goddamn compounds?” he roars, forcing me to rear back.
Oscar leans over the table, and his blue eyes darken as they lock with mine. “Someone once told me to step out of the shadows and into the light. Let us be your light, brother. Let the light guide you home.” His words send an arctic chill through my bloodstream, rendering me speechless, and I’m powerless but nod in confirmation while his words play on repeat in my mind.
“Let us be your light, brother. Let the light guide you home.”