46. Riley
“Well?”Maddoc says once we’re all together in the living room.
Logan doesn’t beat around the bush. “Riley’s the heir.”
Chloe squeezes my hand, and the guys all start to talk at once, but even though Logan basically said the same thing this morning, hearing it confirmed has me stunned.
I’m the heir to the Sutherland estate. It’s hard to believe.
“Weird, huh?” Chloe whispers, leaning in.
“Yeah.” I clear my throat when there’s a break in the guys’ conversation. “So, what happens now?”
Maddoc gives me a long look, but I’m not really surprised when he finally answers. “We stick to the plan.”
Dante slings an arm around my shoulders. “We’ll help you collect your inheritance, princess, then get you and Chloe out of town.”
I’m even less sure that I want to go now that it’s not Chloe who’s in danger, but nothing has actually changed. We should still leave Halston. It really is the only way to make sure we’re both safe.
“You on board?” Maddoc asks, holding my gaze.
I swallow hard. I want to say no, but that’s not really an option. And the minute I say yes, everything jumps into fast motion.
The next couple of days go by in a whirlwind as Maddoc and the guys make preparations for me to claim the estate. I’m not much help with the logistics, so I spend most of my time with Chloe, trying not to count down the hours left until they move us both to the safe house they want us to stay in while all the legal stuff goes through.
“We can’t just stay here?” Chloe asks me quietly after Logan finishes updating us on the stepped up security they’ve put into place around the house.
I stare after him after he leaves the room, then shake myself out of pointless longings and answer her. “No. West Point is still out there, and they still want the money.”
She shudders. “Do you really think they’ll try something?”
“If they do, the Reapers will stop them,” I tell her confidently.
Maddoc, Dante, and Logan have already proven that they’ll protect us, and I know they’ve also arranged to have a whole contingent of their gang members escort us to the meeting with the estate manager. We’ll be safe… I hope.
Chloe’s shoulders relax as she takes me at my word, but I can tell something is still on her mind.
“What?”
She bites her lip for a second, then blurts, “I know it’s what we talked about before but things have changed, right? Are you really still okay just leaving all this behind?”
“Leaving what behind,” I joke, “our shitty apartment? Stripping? Because you know I can do that anywhere, and now I won’t even have to anymore unless I want to do it for fun.”
“No, that part will be nice,” Chloe says, shaking her head. “But I meant… these guys. The Reapers. Can you really leave them now? I can see that something’s going on with all of you.”
My heart lurches. I’ve told Chloe that things changed between me and the guys after she ran away, that I trust them, but I definitely didn’t get explicit about my feelings. She was dead passed out the other night when I fucked all three of them, but the way she’s watching me with knowing eyes right now tells me that I haven’t been as good about keeping my emotions in check as I’d hoped.
For her sake though, I need to.
I shake my head, denying how huge and intense the connection between us is.
“There’s nothing here for me,” I lie, trying to put her at ease. The last thing I want to do is have Chloe feel like I’m not going to be a hundred percent there for her as we build our new life together.
“Riley,” she starts, her eyes going soft.
“Shh,” I say, hugging her tight… partly to avoid her seeing too much truth in my face. “It’s fine. We’re leaving. It’s for the best.”
She hugs me back without pushing it, and I’m glad. It’s not that I want to hide the truth from her, because I am falling for the guys. For all three of them. And yes, a part of me wishes I could pretend things were simple enough that that means something. That circumstances were different, and we could stay here in Halston and I could see where it goes with them.
But being the Sutherland heir doesn’t change anything between Chloe and I. I’m still her big sister. I’m still determined to give her the good life she deserves. And even before we got tangled up in Halston’s dirty underbelly and caught the attention of the gangs we’d spent so many years avoiding, I knew that that better life for her wasn’t going to be here.
I can’t leave her. I won’t. And that means I need to leave Halston.
No matter how much I might wish things could be different.