We Will Rise (Syndicate of the Legion #4)

Prologue

PROLOGUE

CREW

TWENTY-THREE YEARS AGO

I drag my feet up the stairs of our apartment building.

It’s a run-down shithole, but it’s all we can afford right now.

Between working full time at the docks, finishing my GED, and caring for my son, sleep isn’t anywhere near the top of my priority list, and I’m really feeling it.

I’m still young. Way too young to have a three-year-old son, but I wouldn’t change it for the world.

The first time I saw Bishop, I knew there was nothing I wouldn’t do to keep him safe, even if that meant working sixty-hour weeks just to keep a roof over his head and food in his belly.

A yawn claws its way up my throat, and I don’t bother trying to swallow it. I may only be seventeen, but my body is weary from the long days and lack of sleep.

I reach the top floor and crack my neck from side to side. Kayla has been on edge recently, and every day when I come home, I have no idea what I’m walking into.

She’s a good mom. Or at least she tries to be. But her demons weigh on her more heavily than I would like. I hate leaving Bishop with her for so long each day, but my brother lives down the hall from us with his own son, who is just a couple of years older than Bishop is, so I know there’s always someone looking out for them.

Kayla was my first love. We met at a party neither of us were old enough to be at. I was trying to escape the foster home I was stuck in while Caleb tried to gain custody of me, and she was escaping her own father. Just the thought of that piece of shit makes me want to bring him back from the dead just so I can kill him again.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get the honor the first time around, but he deserved a much more painful death than drowning in his own vomit after overdosing on heroin.

The bastard probably enjoyed his final moments, riding his high while the rest of his body shut down.

But all I can be grateful for is that he no longer walks the earth with his daughter and our son.

I’m still pulling my keys from my pocket when I hear it.

Crying.

A cry I recognize all too well because I’ve been hearing it in the middle of the night every night for the last three years.

I fumble with the keys, almost dropping them three times before I finally get them in the lock and shove the door open.

A glance around our one-bedroom apartment should find both Kayla and Bishop, but neither of them are in sight.

They must be in the bedroom.

I throw my duffle bag down by the door and close the distance between me and the bedroom in a few long strides.

It’s not until I push the slightly ajar door open that I find Bishop standing in his crib screaming. His face is beet red, and tears track down his cheeks.

I start moving toward him, my heart stuttering in my chest at the thought of his mother leaving him here by himself. But when I round the side of the bed, I realize that’s not the case at all.

Kayla lies motionless on the floor beside the bed.

Who do I check on first?

Was someone here? Did someone hurt them?

Just the thought that I didn’t keep my family safe makes my stomach roll uncomfortably, but I force it to the back of my mind.

I can throw myself a pity party after I make sure they’re both okay.

I quickly lean over the crib and pluck Bishop from the secondhand bed we thrifted for him when he was a baby. He’ll need a real bed soon, but we’ve been putting it off because there’s not much room for one.

“Hey buddy,” I murmur, holding his small body against my chest. “You’re okay.”

“Mama.” He points as another wail escapes his throat. If you’d told me four years ago that a tiny human would have the power to break my heart with a single sound, I would have laughed in your face. But somehow that’s where we are now. “She’s sick.”

“I know, bud. I’m going to check on her, but I need you to go out into the living room. Can you do that for me?”

“I watch TV?”

“Yeah, Bishop. You can watch TV.”

I carefully put him on his feet, and a little sniffle almost makes me pull him straight back into my arms, but I have to check on Kayla, and I can’t do that while he’s in here.

He eyes his mom for a moment, indecision crossing his green eyes, but the idea of the television has distracted him momentarily.

He takes off out of the room, his bare feet hitting the linoleum floor as he rushes out to find the remote. Hopefully Kayla left it somewhere easy to reach or he’ll be back here in a few minutes.

I drop to my knees beside her, my eyes moving over her body looking for injuries. She’s in her usual home outfit: a pair of sweatpants and a T-shirt. It’s been warm out the last few weeks, so she hasn’t been bothering with a sweatshirt.

But that’s when I notice the arm covered by the corner of the comforter.

The tourniquet is still wrapped around her arm, and a needle lays next to her hand.

My stomach rolls as I stare at her for a moment, frozen in place. Fate can’t be this cruel. Can it?

I shake myself off and ignore how heavily my heart beats in my chest.

“Kayla?” I say quietly, my voice shaking ever so slightly as I reach for the wrist closest to me to check her pulse.

But as soon as my fingers wrap around her tiny wrist, I realize just how cold she is first, and then that her heart isn’t beating.

Panic slams into me as I drag her against me. “Kayla? I need you to wake up for me.” I keep my voice as even as I can, but it breaks beneath the emotions battering into me.

Her entire body is ice cold as it presses to mine, and my stomach rolls with something akin to dread, but I can’t let myself accept that she’s gone. I won’t.

She wouldn’t leave me like this.

She wouldn’t leave Bishop.

I shake her limp body, hating how light she feels in my hands. When did she lose so much weight? Wouldn’t I have noticed her not eating? But then again, I’m barely home, and when I am, I try to spend all my time with Bishop.

When he was born, I promised myself I wouldn’t be a deadbeat dad like my father was to Caleb and me, but instead I’ve been a bad partner.

A rough sob escapes my throat. “Kayla, please.” I choke as I lower my ear to her chest, but all I hear is silence as I press my cheek to her cold flesh.

She’s gone, and it’s all my fault.

If I’d just been home more.

If I’d just made sure she was taking care of herself.

If I’d just done things differently, maybe she’d still be here to watch our son grow up.

The thought of Bishop has me shooting a look at the wide-open bedroom door.

Somehow I have to tell our little boy that his mother is gone and she’s never coming back.