Chapter 33 Willa
Willa
“Why are you here, Eden?” I track her as she paces the room, running her fingers over the edge of the windowsill.
Roses decorate the ledge, and she pauses on a fallen petal, delicately turning it between her fingers before letting it float to the floor.
“You couldn’t just suck it up.” Her face is cold—emotionless. “He should have gone with me from the start.”
“What are you talking about, Eden?”
“Father,” she snaps, catching herself and rolling her shoulders back like she’s hardly able to collect herself.
Tension radiates as she slowly tilts her neck, like she’s trying to stay calm. Her small fingers clench at her sides.
Eden has always been a ball of nerves. A live wire. She is rarely calm, especially when things are out of order, but I’ve never seen her quite like this. Like she’s walking a thin line and on the verge of snapping.
“I was always a better match for Kincaid.”
“Then keep him,” I offer.
Her gaze turns ice cold. “Don’t you get it?
I don’t want Kincaid. I never wanted him.
Just like you didn’t. But after you fucked everything up and stopped doing your duty as his fiancée, one of us had to step up and try to mend fences between our families.
I tried. I told him, and he wouldn’t listen… but I tried.”
Eden clenches her teeth. Her hands ball into tight fists at her sides as she squeezes her eyes shut.
“But just like his brother, he was hung up on you. Not that it stopped him from fucking me and anyone else he pleased. But still. What did you do to them? Why do you always get everything? You don’t deserve it.”
My eyebrows pinch. “What are you talking about, Eden?”
She’s never overly sweet. A byproduct of my parents spoiling her endlessly. But this is beyond a tantrum. The things she’s saying are downright vile.
“Dad deserved better, but you were always too selfish. All you cared about was yourself and Dean.” Eden levels me with her gaze.
“I thought I could fix it, but then you left and messed everything up even more. I tried to get you to come back—to show you what was right in front of you. I knew if they scared you enough, you’d realize he was a bad idea.
They had one job, and they couldn’t even do that.
Why would you stay after they almost killed you at the motel? ”
My eyes widen as I process what Eden is saying. “You’re the one who sent the men who fired on the motel in Vegas?”
They could have killed us with how recklessly they were shooting. I’m amazed no one got caught in the crossfire.
“But Kincaid—”
She laughs. “You think Kincaid had the balls or the intelligence to clean up this mess? To send men into his brother’s territory? God, you really overestimate him.”
“You did it? You sent them? They almost killed me.”
“They were just supposed to scare you. It’s not my fault that Kincaid’s employees are worthless. I suppose that’s what I get for trusting men who believed me when I told them I’d make it worth it to them.”
“Why, Eden? Why would you do this?”
“I already told you. To get you to come back.”
“But Kincaid and I were over; there was no fixing it.”
“There’s always a way to fix it.” Her voice pitches. “Dad taught us that. But you decided to take the easy road and just give up instead of trying to clean up your mess. Don’t you care about your family?”
“Dad only cares about himself, so why would I care about him?”
“What about me?” She’s out of breath as she stands at the end of my bed.
“You didn’t just leave Dad, you left me.
The ranch is falling apart, and Dad can’t keep it up anymore.
The cattle can’t even graze on our own land.
Without Ironside Ridge, we won’t survive.
A payoff won’t keep us afloat more than three years.
We needed the steady cash flow from the mineral rights. ”
“Maybe this is what we deserve. Maybe it’s karma. Dad helped Tate poison those cattle. He created his own problems.”
“He was securing our family’s interest, Willa. Why can’t you see that?”
I shake my head, not understanding anything she’s saying right now. Eden is talking like someone I’ve never met before.
She drags her fingers through her blonde hair. “Why has everyone given up so easily? First you. Now Dad. If I’d have known when I stole that will that he was going to just hand it over—”
“What will?”
“What will?” She laughs, but it’s laced with anger. “Dean’s grandpa’s will. Did you really think he died without one? And now Dad is going to just give it to Dean to get back at Tate. He’d rather Dean get the ranch to satisfy his own vengeance than fix this.”
“The ranch is Dean’s?” It’s nearly a whisper.
“Of course it is. His grandpa always favored him. Everyone knew that.”
We did. He loved both of his grandsons, but he didn’t trust Tate’s influence over Kincaid for good reason.
“They found the will?”
She rolls her eyes. “It was never lost, Willa. But I never expected Dad to hand it over to them. Now everything is all fucked up. All because you couldn’t stop being selfish.”
“I’m selfish?”
“Yes! You had Kincaid. You had everything. And you gave it all up—him, your family—just so you could go back to Dean. How could you do that to us?”
Her eyes are glassy but cold. A strange mix of emotions. A storm on the verge of breaking.
“I love him.”
“Love.” She laughs. “Of course. Because that’s what matters in all this. He’s a biker. A felon. God, if it had just been him in the cabin like it was supposed to be, this would all be over—”
“What did you just say about the cabin?”
Her gaze drifts behind me like she’s remembering it, and I think back to that night.
Bits and pieces have returned, but it’s mostly hazy. The cabin was dark when I got there.
Moonlight and shadows.
The floor creaked.
The porch groaned.
But the figure shrouded in darkness was small. I thought it was a trick of the light. Or that I was seeing things wrong. But I saw correctly. The figure was female.
“You’re the one who shot me.” My eyes widen.
“It wasn’t supposed to be you. I thought you were still with Dad.” The first crack of emotion breaks in her voice.
“If it wasn’t supposed to be me—” My eyes widen. “You wanted to kill Dean.”
“He’s the problem, Willa. With him in the way, you can’t see it, but we can fix things.”
I’m shaking my head as she circles the bed, walking over to me.
“He wants to destroy our family. Everything we’ve worked for. You can’t let him do this.”
She pulls a gun from her purse, and I scoot back on the bed so fast I must pop a stitch because pain lances through me.
“It’s all a mess, but we can fix it. He taught us we can fix everything.
We can—” Eden holds the gun up, not pointing it at me but waving it around.
Tears fall from her eyes, and she’s no longer making sense.
Her eyes are wild. Disconnected. Like something inside her snapped, and I don’t know if it can be put back together.
“Eden, don’t do this. Please,” I plead with her. “You’re my sister.”
“You’re right, I am your sister. And you turned on me for him. Can’t you see he’s coming between us?”
“Dean didn’t do anything. Dad did.”
“Dad loves us.”
“No.” I shake my head. “He doesn’t. Dad only loves himself.”
“I just—” A sob rips free from her throat. “I just tried to keep it together. It’s all falling apart.”
“I know.” I reach for her hand, but she backs up. “I’m sorry.”
I truly am. While I’ve been angry, resenting my father for how he’s manipulated me over the years, I was too distracted to see what it was doing to my sister. They set her on this pedestal. Held her to perfection. And now, when it’s all falling apart, she can’t handle it.
“I never wanted this. Let’s just talk. We can sort this out. I won’t tell anyone what you did. I promise.”
“I tried to kill him.” Her voice cracks. “I wanted to kill him.”
“But you didn’t.”
“I could have killed you.” Regret floods her voice. “We already lost Mom—”
“I’m alive. You didn’t kill me.” The words nearly clog in my throat.
I know I should be angry at Eden for all she’s done, but as tears stream down her cheeks, I see the five-year-old girl who used to crawl into my bed in the middle of the night when she’d wake up to Mom and Dad yelling.
I see the teenager who looked so much like our mother, that after Mom died, she cut her hair and bleached it.
She did everything to distance herself from those features just so she could stand looking in the mirror.
Tears make rivers down Eden’s cheeks.
Anger floods out. At herself. At me. At Dean. At everything.
Hate is a delicate thing. So easy to grow but difficult to contain.
Eden waves the gun around, no longer in her right mind, as she stumbles back a step. She accidentally knocks a machine, unplugging the monitor and setting off an alarm.
“I’m sorry, Eden. I love you.” The words do nothing to stop her sobs, but she needs to hear them.
I should have said them more often.
So many mistakes have been made. We’ve both done unforgivable things. She needs to know I don’t blame her.
A commotion comes from the doorway, making Eden jump. She drops the gun as Dean and Kincaid rush into the room. The second Dean sees the gun, he draws his own.
I don’t care about pain.
About the blood seeping through my hospital gown.
I don’t care about anything as I throw myself at Eden to stand between him and her. I throw my hands up, shielding my sister.
“Don’t. Please, Dean, don’t. It’s over.”
Behind me, Eden sobs. Dean lowers his gun, and tears stream down my face.
Eden starts to shake, and I feel it in my chest. The weight of our entire lives is being lifted off us. The things we did for our father. For our home. The things we fucked up.
Eden slides to the ground as Dean wraps his arms around me, holding me up when I almost fall.
A doctor tries to come into the room, but Kincaid holds the spot at the door, refusing to let anyone through.
“Is everything okay in here?” the doctor asks, glancing at the mess in the room.
“It’s fine,” I answer, but I’m looking at Dean. “It’s fine. We just accidentally unplugged a machine.”
His jaw ticks in anger. I get it because I feel the same. But this is done. I refuse to let one more person go down because of my father’s mistakes.
I slip out of Dean’s arms and onto the floor, sitting beside my sister while he walks over to the doorway to deal with the doctor. She is no longer crying, just staring off. Physically, she’s here, but she’s distant in every other way.
“Eden…” I reach for her hand.
“Did you see the blood on Dean’s shirt?” Her eyes stay locked on the wall in front of us, her voice nearly a whisper. “There was so much blood.”
“I saw.”
“Dad was going to meet them to hand over the will today.” Her glassy eyes meet mine. “He’s dead, isn’t he?”
I glance at where Dean and Kincaid are talking by the door, covered in too much blood for the other person to still be standing.
Maybe I should lie to Eden to make her feel better. But we’ve both been lied to so much.
“Probably.” I sigh.
Turning my head to Eden, I expect her to be crying again. But her face is blank. All emotion gone.
Her eyes meet mine. “Good.”