5. Cam
5
CAM
Church was quiet this morning. The five empty chairs at the table seemed to mock me, as if the extended absence of our brothers was a cardinal sin I didn’t know about yet. But maybe that was just me.
Embry was fine.
Nash was fine.
Folk, though...
My gaze drifted to him as Embry outlined the progress his crew had made on the Whisper Farm site in the last week or so since Mateo had been gone with the others. The new stable block Saint had fast-tracked so Liliana could keep her odd-shaped horse forever.
Folk had the best face for pretending he was paying attention when I knew he wasn’t. He liked Chappie well enough, and he loved Liliana, but he didn’t care about the price of cement and bricks or the durability of roofing materials and how much we’d spent on them. He cared about people, and his person wasn’t here.
Knew how that felt, but if his heavy eyes were anything to go by, I was bearing it better than him.
The meeting broke up. Embry and Folk left—Embry to go back on site, Folk to round up prospects to help them build a life beyond bikes and beer. College courses. Trade qualifications. A new fucking dawn.
Nash stayed, frowning at budget spreadsheets that hurt his brain, because we hadn’t had Folk in our arsenal twenty years ago when brothers like Nash had needed him.
I made him the breakfast the others hadn’t had time for. “What are you doing today?”
Nash shoved the iPad away. “Physio, finishing the chopper River forgot about. Then I’m taking Orls for an appointment before I pick up the timber load, then I need to start servicing the next rigs out?—”
“All right, all right. Sorry I fucking asked.”
Nash grinned. “Why did you ask? You need me for something?”
Beyond the million and one things I already relied on him for? Not a chance. “I’m around today if you need me to come to hospital with you.”
“Nah.” Nash wrapped his inked hands around the buttie I’d made him. “I’ve got it.”
Shocker. My sister and her men had closed ranks around the baby she carried, keeping the rest of us at arm’s length, as if they didn’t want us too attached to the life growing in Orla’s huge belly. As if it wasn’t already too late for that. But... they wanted space, and I loved them too much to deny it, even if it stung to be shut out of something that meant the fucking world to me.
I let Nash eat, playing to my strengths by keeping him fed and letting him know he had my ear if he needed to talk.
He didn’t though, even with Locke and Rubi gone, and my VP had always been more astute than most people gave his pretty face credit for. “Something on your mind, brother?”
So many fucking things. My fingers itched for a cigarette, but I was making a conscious effort to smoke less around him. “What makes you say that?”
Nash pushed his plate away. “You look constipated.”
“Fuck off.”
He didn’t fuck off. He sat back in his seat and drank more tea, waiting for me to spit it out.
“I’m worried about Folk. I think you should talk to him.”
“Me?” Nash cocked his head. “No fucking chance.”
“Why not?”
“We don’t have that kind of relationship. He’s a wise one, remember? A Knower. There’s nothing I can say to him that he doesn’t already, like, know .”
“About what?”
“No clue. And that’s the point, isn’t it? I love that brother, but he’s not easy to get to when he’s in a fucking mood.”
I blew out a breath, drumming my fingers on the table. “That’s what Embry said.”
“Good. What do you need me for?”
“He didn’t want to talk to him either.”
“Maybe you should talk to him then.”
I scoffed. “That’s not a good idea.”
“Why not?”
“He thinks I’m a fucking idiot.”
“You said that about Locke and it wasn’t true then either.”
I chewed on that, still craving a hit of toxic smoke to settle my thoughts. “Okay, maybe I haven’t pissed Locke off as much, but I fucking know Folk’s still salty about the Doherty thing.”
“How do you know ?”
I didn’t, but that wasn’t the point. The point was... actually, I didn’t know. Or maybe I did and the answer was as basic as I was: Folk intimidated me, intellectually at least, and I didn’t fucking like it.
Another sigh rattled from my lungs. Saint would’ve known the answer, but he wasn’t here, and I couldn’t have this kind of conversation with him over the phone. I needed to see his face—his forest-green eyes—and understand every nuance of what he was trying to say. I needed to touch him, and that wasn’t happening until he came home, and there was a whole other conversation I needed to have with him.
You’re Polish by the way, in case you didn’t know.
Fucking hell. Contemplating that gave me goosebumps. I forced my mind back to Folk, but it only drew my thoughts to Alexei—a presumed Folk expert, but I’d learned recently that he wasn’t. Not about stuff like this. Folk understood Alexei, but that shit was one way.
“ Veles is a simple man, but that is what makes him so intricate. I do not understand men like him. Trust me, I have tried.”
Fuck’s sake. What did that even mean?
I had no idea, and festering over it got me nowhere.
Back in the room, I caught Nash staring into space. I pulled my foot back to kick him. Remembered he had a bum leg and poked him instead.
He blinked. “What?”
“Sure there’s nothing you want to talk about, brother?”
His gaze flickered with a conflict so brief I swore I imagined it. “I’m all good.”
“You must have a lot on your mind.”
“Yeah, but I’m trying not to lose brain cells to things I can’t control.”
Not for the first time, I saw the parent Nash was destined to become. As calm as Folk, as patient as Decoy. As fierce and protective as Embry and Mateo combined, and as self-contained as my sister had always been. Somewhere along the line, Orla and Nash had become the same person, and this brother was giving me nothing.
The conversation returned to business. Nash was shit with numbers but efficient as fuck at everything else. We got a lot done, even down to conspiring to make sure River was elsewhere for the health and safety audit happening next month.
“Locke’s too nice to chin him,” Nash mused, “but he keeps unfixing all the fixes and I don’t even think he’s doing it on purpose.”
I snorted. “Sounds like River.”
“Does he have ADHD?”
“What?”
Nash was eating again. Another sandwich. “Locke said he’s a lot like Willow, so I wondered.”
“It’s not ADHD. They went through all that with him when we were kids. Remember that push-bike accident... no, you don’t. You weren’t there.”
“Before my time.”
I nodded, slowly. There were a lot of brothers—and lovers—I struggled to accept hadn’t been in my life since forever, but Nash was probably the hardest. I’d never told him, but I reckon we all fell in love the day his uncle rocked up on the compound with Nash on the back of his cruiser, and thinking about why Fergus McGovern had felt the need to uproot a teenager from the only life he’d ever known churned my stomach.
Cos I knew why now— Viktor had told me.
“Earth to Cam?”
River. You were talking about River.
I rubbed my lips. “Rubi understands all this better than me, especially now, but that hit to the head fucked River up. Scans were clear, but he’s never been the same. Add in everything he’s been through on top of that...” I trailed off as River emerged from the garage with a ladder. “The fuck is he going with that?”
Nash leaned back in his seat, tracking my chaotic youngest sibling. “Want me to check?”
“Nah, we’ll find out soon enough. Why are you asking about River’s brain? Something else happen?”
“ADHD can be hereditary.” Nash tipped forward again. “The midwife asked if there was anything in your family, and it was all we could think of?—”
Nash’s phone lit up. He snatched it off the table, taking the call without stopping to look at the screen, even though Locke had checked in ten minutes ago and I could see Orla from where I sat, giving the prospects at her disposal the royal fucking run around. “Yeah?”
The caller spoke and pure aggression stole over Nash, violence so potent I pushed back my chair, already halfway to pandemonium. “What in the ever-loving fuck are you calling me for?”