Chapter 29 Mia #2
“No, that’s not it,” I mused as I thought about it. “Of course they do, they know you.” I stood, and he sat back down in the chair as he watched me. Although completely aware of how surreal this was, my mind was on the problem. And then I realized what it was. I turned to him cautiously.
He looked pleased that I figured it out.
“How could you not tell them?”
“They have a very important football game coming on Saturday. If they win, they play in the conference championships. If they win that, they may be one of the colleges to go forward to the playoffs.”
“Bullshit.” I shocked myself more than Onyx when I cursed.
He tipped his head back and laughed out loud. He had such a pleasant laugh. He should do it more often.
“For once, it is not bullshit.” Onyx stood and crossed the room to look out the window. “They need to focus. This weekend is huge for them, especially without Gray.”
“You need to tell them.” I looked at him in exasperation. “They’re jumping at shadows, and they don’t know!”
“I will when I’m ready.” He leveled me with a hard glare. “That means I will.”
I nodded. “You need to be nicer to Quinn.”
He smirked at me. “Never been very good at fake.”
“Your brother loves her completely.”
“He was dropped on his head as a child.”
I snort-laughed, and he gave me that small smile again. “Why try to bamboozle me with knowing all about me?” I asked him seriously.
Onyx’s smile faded slightly. “I think I have all I need from here.”
“Your subtlety is poor.”
“The only thing about me that is.” He winked.
“Do I tell them that you were here?” I asked as I took a step forward.
“No need, they’re already coming up the stairs.”
How did he even know that? The guy was like Batman. Onyx opened the door just as Ash was reaching for the handle.
“Onyx?” Ash looked confused and then slightly alarmed that I had been in here with him.
“Onyx?” Jett echoed as he appeared behind Ash. “What’s going on?”
“Your room,” Onyx said regally as he swept past them both, and I followed, eager to see how he was going to play it out.
Ash took my hand in the hall. “Are you okay?”
I was. “Yeah, you?”
“I’m good.” He gave me that smile that made my knees weak, and I had to reprimand myself to stop falling for him. Ash Santo was a player.
As we crowded into Jett’s room, I saw that none of Ava’s clothes were out of place. Unlike Gray’s. The place was immaculate. It did not surprise me that Jett would have some form of OCD.
“What brings you here?” Gray asked his older brother, and I saw the lingering anger between the two of them.
“I found your janitor.”
I had not expected that.
“Where?” Ash demanded.
“Not for you,” Onyx said sharply. “I came to tell you that I have him. Your girlfriends are safe.”
“I want to talk to him,” Ash insisted stubbornly.
“And you will, after Saturday’s game.”
“How long have you been here?” Jett asked as he looked between me and Onyx.
“Long enough to hear Mia here be called a slut downstairs by your house elves.”
“What?” Ash demanded angrily.
“They implied she was a bit loose.” Onyx turned to me. “Are you?”
“No.” I was losing the feeling of newfound camaraderie I had with him.
“Who said it?” Ash asked me, and then he shook his head. “It doesn’t matter; I’ll sort all of them.”
“There’s no need,” I said to him. “Honestly, you put me in a living situation with you and told the world. Your cousin accused me of the same thing on Sunday, so how is this different? So what if one more person says it? I know that I’m not.
” I was tired of all the stigma. “And you know what? Even if I was, it’s my body.
” I looked around the room. “As long as I’m okay with who and how often I have sex, I really don’t care about what anyone else says. ”
“I like this one, she can stay.” Onyx only had eyes for Quinn when he spoke. Quinn ignored him. “Well, my job here is done. I’m going to go.”
Quinn looked relieved, the twins exchanged a look, and Ash’s head was still bowed, his hands curled into tight fists. Ava was watching me, and when I met her look, she mouthed What?
“Hold up.”
Onyx’s head tilted back as he sighed. “Mia, don’t do this.”
“Do what?” Gray asked me.
“Close the door. Your brother has something to tell you,” I instructed. I watched the older man turn and fix me with a heavy stare.
Ava was the one who locked the door, shutting us all in.
“Speak,” Gray demanded.
His brother gave a disgruntled sigh. “It was not my plan to tell you until after Saturday, and if you win, then after the next game.”
“What are you delaying telling them?” Quinn spoke for the first time. Her dark eyes ran over the tailored suit and the man in it. “You found them,” she said softly.
“I found them, and I have, as a dutiful member of society, turned them and their operation over to the authorities.”
“What?” Jett was white as a sheet.
“Anonymously, of course.”
“You turned them in?” Gray asked, his voice was dangerously low.
“I did.” Onyx swept his gaze over the three of them. How very much he cut the figure of an older, superior brother, I realized. “My brothers, my cousin, my family are not ruining their lives for this. Quinn’s loss is tragic, but—”
“Be very careful of your next words,” Gray warned.
“But they are not directly responsible. Your revenge is on a set of concrete steps. Quinn has told us all that she changed her mind. She told them. Your baby was not going to be handed over to anyone who was not you, Gray.” His voice was low, gentle even.
“You cannot throw your life away on something that was a horrible, tragic accident.”
“They chased her,” Gray said defiantly. “They harassed her.”
“I acknowledge that. But had Quinn not run, had she gone into the meeting, would you have changed your mind and gone through with it?” he asked her directly.
“No.” Quinn shook her head as she watched Gray with so much pain in her eyes it broke my heart.
“No.” Onyx reached over and grabbed his brother’s shoulder.
“It’s over, baby brother. Let this pain go.
” He pulled Gray into him, and I saw Gray resist, and Onyx whispered something into his ear.
Gray stilled, and then the stern, unmovable Gray let out a sob.
His arms reached around his older brother, and Gray broke down.
Onyx clutched him tight to his chest, and I had to look away.
Silently, I rose, and grabbing Ava’s hand, we unlocked the door and left them to their pain.
In Ash’s bedroom, Ava looked at me, her eyes filled with sadness, but her look turned quizzical when she saw me frowning.
“What is it?” she asked me quietly.
“Onyx,” I told her.
“He’s intense, isn’t he?” she said as she wiped her eyes.
“Yes, he is.”
“What is it?” Ava asked me again as she saw my frown. “Mia?”
“He knows a lot about me,” I confessed as I met my best friend’s curious look. “Ava, I think he knows who my dad is.”