Chapter 16 Kreed #2
“In exchange for what?”
She was quick and knew my father a little too well. Donovan Corvo didn’t do anything for free. Not even for his son. My silence was answer enough, heavy and damning.
“Kreed,” she pressed. “What did you agree to give him?”
My fingers strained over the wheel. “I don’t know.”
Her light-blue eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”
“It was an open-ended debt. He gave me what I needed, and I agreed to repay the favor when he called it in.”
“You didn’t.”
“I didn’t have a choice,” I said, briefly meeting her horrified gaze. “I was out of time, and he had what I needed. A way to find you. That’s all I cared about. Any debt would be worth the price as long as I got you back.”
She chewed on the inside of her lip. “And now he’s wanting to collect.”
“Seems that way.”
“Do you have any idea what he might want from you?”
“I have an inkling,” I admitted. “He likes to keep me guessing, likes to maintain the upper hand. It’s a power play.”
“I don’t like this,” she muttered, genuine fear creeping into her voice.
Neither did I. But she didn’t need to know exactly how deep that truth ran or how worried I actually was about what my father might demand.
Her eyes flashed up suddenly, tracking our route through the windshield. “Wait. This isn’t the way to your house. Where are we going?”
“I’m taking you to Brock’s house first. You’ll be safer there.”
“I didn’t ask you to drop me off.”
“Are you saying you want to come with me to my house. My dad is going to be there,” I stated the obvious with one eyebrow raised.
Her answer came without hesitation. “I’m not ready to let you out of my sight, Kreed Corvo. Not after everything.”
“You sure you want to do this? You know how my father can be, not to mention what he is capable of. I’m just not sure it’s good for you to see him just yet. I can swing by and drop you off at the house. You don’t have to come with me.”
Her jaw set in a stubborn way I both loved and found irritating. “I’m not scared of him.”
“You should be,” I said quietly, meaning every word as I flicked on my blinker. I had to admit I wanted her in my sights, not that I didn’t trust my brothers to protect her. I just felt better when she was with me.
And in the most random time, I realized…
Fuck, I’m falling in love with her.
This had to be a bad idea, especially when Kaylor dismissed my suggestion of her staying in my car.
This fucking girl. She was killing me. She wanted to grab a few things from her old room while I talked to my father, and against my better judgment, I agreed.
Why was it suddenly so hard to deny her anything?
Kaylor disappeared up the grand staircase the second we stepped through the double front doors, her soft footsteps fading quickly against the polished hardwood.
I tracked her movement, watching the way my hoodie hung loose on her frame until she rounded the corner at the top and vanished from sight.
Only then did I force myself to turn and face the direction I really didn’t want to go.
My father’s study waited at the end of the hall like a tomb, or a throne room, depending on your perspective.
The door stood halfway open, spilling amber lamplight across the Persian runner. I paused at the threshold, my hand finding the door frame and gripping it hard. The familiar scent hit me immediately: expensive cigar smoke layered over leather-bound books and the faint chemical tang of wood polish.
My father sat behind his massive mahogany desk. Every surface in the room gleamed, not a paper out of place. Everything was precisely where he wanted it, exactly as he demanded.
He didn’t glance up when I entered, just kept methodically flipping through a stack of papers in front of him.
“Sit,” he said, his voice smooth as aged whiskey.
Gray strands of hair were peppered near his temples.
He was dressed casually, well, casually for Donovan Corvo, in a muted, dark-green sweater and black tailored pants.
I chose to remain standing and leaned against the door frame, crossing my arms over my chest in a posture I knew would annoy him. “You’ve got what you wanted, old man. I’m here. You can stop pretending to care about anything beyond a return on investment. What do you want?”
He looked up then, slowly, and a familiar smirk carved its way across his face, reminding me of Mason. They shared the same sly grin. His pale green eyes found mine. I was the only one of my brothers who hadn’t inherited them. I’d gotten my eyes from my mother. “You think so little of me, Kreed.”
“You make it too easy,” I shot back, my jaw tightening.
Lacing his fingers together on the desk, he said, “I’m glad you brought Kaylor along tonight. She’ll be considerably safer here than anywhere else you might have hidden her.”
I didn’t question how he knew she was here.
I had hoped she could sneak in and sneak out without him being the wiser.
I should have known better. Nothing in this house went unnoticed by him, thanks to high-tech security and staff.
The casual possessiveness in his words enticed my protective streak.
“Cut to it,” I snapped, pushing off from the door frame and taking two steps into the room.
“You didn’t hand me that auction location out of fatherly goodwill.
You don’t do anything for free. You never have. ”
He leaned back in his leather chair, causing it to creak softly. “My fee is remarkably simple, actually. You, your brothers, and Miss Steele will come back to live here under my roof.”
I barked out a harsh laugh. “You can’t possibly be serious.”
“I’m always serious about business arrangements.
” He gestured with one manicured hand toward the empty chair positioned across from him.
“You and your brothers will move back in by the end of the week. Effective immediately, you’ll finish out the semester here, attending your regularly scheduled classes.
I’ve already spoken with the school administration and your individual teachers.
They’re expecting all of you back on Monday morning, including Kaylor.
” He paused, letting that sink in. “Kaylor will make up whatever coursework she missed during her...absence. And with football season concluded, you’ll put your after-school hours into something considerably more useful than playing gang leader—studying, specifically. ”
“You’ve already arranged everything?” I said, disbelief and fury mixing in equal measure, making my voice shake. “Before even telling me what you wanted?”
He gave a small, dismissive shrug that made me want to put my fist through his smug face. “I’ve always preferred to stay several steps ahead of potential complications. It’s how I’ve maintained my position. Besides, it’s not like you can say no.”
I laughed again, but there was absolutely no humor in the sound this time. “Why drag her into this arrangement? This is between you and me. Leave her out of whatever game you’re playing. I’m the one who owes you a debt.”
My father’s gaze sharpened. “Because she’s the only real guarantee I have that you’ll actually comply with the terms. You’d walk away from me without a second thought; you’ve proven that repeatedly. But you won’t walk away from her. You can’t. It’s written all over you.”
I bristled. “And if she refuses your generous offer?”
“Then I’ll remind her that I am still her legal guardian as per the terms of her father’s will. This arrangement benefits everyone involved. She’ll be protected here, properly protected, with resources you can’t provide. And at school, under my direct influence. I’ll see to her safety personally.”
The way he said it, like she was another asset to be managed, made my blood turn to ice. “She’ll hate it here. She already hates you for what you’ve done to this family.”
“She can hate me with every fiber of her being.” His expression hardened.
“My priority isn’t earning her affection or winning her approval.
It’s maintaining order and control. You, your brothers, the crew…
that’s what actually matters. That’s what fell completely apart when you started playing the hero for that girl. ”
My chest squeezed. “You don’t need her to control me. If you want me committed to the crew, I’ll do it without Kaylor being involved.”
He ignored my protest entirely, leaning forward this time with his elbows on the desk, fingers steepled beneath his chin.
“Tell her that if she agrees to stay here peacefully until her eighteenth birthday, which is in just a few months, I’ll expedite her inheritance immediately.
Full access to her trust fund and everything her father left her.
No strings attached, no arbitrary delays, no legal complications.
She’ll be free to leave once she graduates and do whatever she pleases with her resources. ”
“You haven’t drained her accounts?”
“No, I’m not a complete monster. I never wanted her father’s money. I wanted justice.”
Well, Donovan Corvo’s sense of justice, he meant, which bordered on the line of revenge.
He also wanted the Vipers, control of their business and territory.
He wanted to be the king of Elmwood, and I doubted he’d given that dream up.
And with her father dead and Rusty shaken, the Vipers were weak.
If there was ever a time to strike, it was now.
“And if she doesn’t agree to your terms?”
He tilted his head slightly, a ghost of a smile touching his lips. “Something tells me she will.”
Fury rose hot and familiar in my chest, threatening to choke me. “This is bullshit.”
He met my glare head-on, not flinching, not backing down even an inch. “You’ve always needed someone to provide structure and control, Kreed. You just prefer pretending you can live without it, that you’re some kind of free agent. But we both know better.”
For several seconds, the silence between us stretched taut as a wire, vibrating with tension. I hated being backed into a corner. But I couldn’t risk Kaylor, not while he held this kind of power over her future.
He was right about one thing, much as I hated to admit it. He had the upper hand in this particular negotiation. For now.
“Fine,” I relented, the word tasting like ash in my mouth. “I’ll tell her about your offer.”
“Good.” He smiled with genuine satisfaction. “See? That wasn’t so difficult after all. We can be civilized when we try.”
I turned sharply, my pulse still pounding hard enough to make my vision swim slightly around the edges, but my mind was already racing ahead, back upstairs to where she waited, trying to calculate how to explain this new trap we’d walked into.
“You have no idea what difficult actually looks like,” I muttered under my breath, low enough my father hadn’t heard as my legs ate up the hallway.
How the hell was I supposed to tell her I had traded one cage for another?