CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
RENA
M y father used to bring me kettle corn. New Orleans has some of the most incredible sweetened popcorn in existence. A few places even add a Cajun flair, although you’d be hard-pressed to find a food there that hasn’t been Cajun-ized.
La Lune Noire didn’t serve the treat because carnival food wasn’t exactly the vibe intended. But there was a little place near the resort that we visited. So, occasionally, my father would stop after work and deliver me a warm bag of my most cherished treat.
The boys liked it, but they didn’t love it like I did. They preferred the pastries, fudge, or more decadent desserts served at La Lune Noire. So, my father always brought it home just for me. Our thing. I don’t know for sure how he felt about me because I was so young and he was a busy man. I can’t say I was the apple of his eye or his precious little girl. The man was, in most aspects, a stranger. Memories in those early years are distorted, gritty with tiny shards of sharpness in the midst of a blurry backdrop .
For most of my first six years, he was a speckle in the blur.
But on the days when he brought me kettle corn, we’d sit outside on the porch and chat about our current events—highs and lows—just him and me. And I felt loved. Special. Chosen.
During our kettle-corn chitchats, he was the best dad in the world.
With the exception of one day. It was blistering hot, not too long before he died. Weeks or months maybe. The air was muggy and oppressive, the kind of heat that sought to consume the entirety of life.
We plopped down out front—him on the bench, me on the wood-slatted swing. With my beloved treat in hand, my wide eyes were trained on his suit-clad physique as I kicked my feet to move. He looked sad that day, a weariness etched into his features. A little bitter too.
And I could feel it. The way the porch swing swayed slower, thwarting the whimsy it usually bestowed. The way the wind refused to blow, leaving us in a sticky residue. The way the birds all flitted away.
Everything was somber. Prepping me.
“What’s wrong, Daddy?” I asked him because I hated the idea of anyone being sad. I much preferred my mother’s notion of freedom, blueberries and rain. Dancing in a dreary field, growth in the gray. I wanted to belong to that, to embody being the light for others.
“I’m disappointed,” he began, and my heart sank for him. Disappointment was a terrible feeling.
He went on to ramble about all sorts of things that didn’t mean much to me, but I was content to simply listen and eat my sugary popcorn. At least he was home, spending time with me. Out of everyone in our family, he picked me to keep him company when he was sad. Pride surged inside my chest. Maybe I could cheer him up. Maybe that was why he wanted to be with me.
But then his eyes rose to mine, skittering a chill down my spine despite the sweltering heat, as he said, “You don’t have what it takes to be a Noire.”
“What?” I muttered, my pulse hammering my temples.
What had I done? I must have missed something in his morose ramblings. Even then, I knew what it meant to be a Noire. That my father owned the city. Our name was royalty, coveted—or so I’d heard. Being told I wasn’t good enough to be one was the worst fate I could envision.
“What do you mean?” I pressed, my lower lip quivering.
He glared at the ground, toeing the weathered boards of the porch. “I’ll be the bad guy for not raising you, which is fucking rich. But at least I’m not pretending. False protection wouldn’t do either of us any good. I’m a lot of things, but I’m not a liar.”
None of it made sense to me. And in my six-year-old brain, I surmised that it was the kettle corn. I’d chosen to love something that wasn’t a Noire staple. I’d failed him.
I wasn’t special. I was a burden.
Kids draw wild conclusions. But even though I eventually knew it wasn’t the sweet-and-salty dessert, that was the last time I ever ate kettle corn. The treat had lost its flavor.
It was only a few sentences within the blathering that accompanied my snack. One of which sculpted itself into my greatest fear. “You don’t have what it takes to be a Noire.”
If life had taken a different turn, perhaps it would’ve been a forgotten string of words, holding no value. But that’s what makes the mind so fascinating. How it knows what to grip or how it sadly clings to the very sentiments that cloak us in shame.
It’s a memorialized encounter in my brain. The day I was told being a Noire was a mountain of prestige and I didn’t have the gumption to endure the climb.
My father’s cruelty was subtle. In hindsight, it was glaring in his absence. Spoken in the narcissism. Hidden in his justification. So that even now, when I recognize the heartlessness of his words, they escort confusion. A question of clarity. Maybe that’s some of the most challenging wickedness to conquer. That which leaves us wondering if we imagined it, embellished something rather benign.
Gaslit.
The pieces are more fleshed out now that I understand he’d found out I wasn’t his at about that time. But the reasoning as to why an adult, who had once supposedly loved me, would feel the need to share that with me is still a mystery.
Through broken sobs, I confessed that conversation to my brothers that same afternoon. I started by claiming that Dad said Noires don’t eat kettle corn, which pissed Axel off to the point of asking me a hundred more questions until I revealed all I could remember. And Ryker kicked a dresser, causing a vase to shatter on the floor before they both cocooned me in their warmth.
As I got older and thought back on that conversation, I often wondered if my father had set our house on fire. Taken his own life. That what he had expressed on the porch was his shame. There was the question of why my mother would have been in the house if that were the case, but still, the possibility festered. Maybe I’d misinterpreted, and his, “I’ll be the bad guy for not raising you,” was a guilty goodbye. I even asked Axel once if he thought Dad had died because I wasn’t enough or because I couldn’t ease his sadness. His eyes welled with tears as he vehemently insisted that wasn’t the case.
But for me, it was all connected. I vowed to never be anyone’s burden again.
I can’t ascertain the depth of trauma rooted in Ty’s nightmares. He revealed enough before our wedding that I’ve pieced together a truly horrific narrative of his first three decades though.
All these years, I’ve believed I was drawn to him because he was a beacon of hope and benevolence in a sea of gray men. I loved those men, but Ty was often shinier. Gleaming and full of life.
But I think it may have been the opposite—that undeniable simmering under his skin. When he admitted to pining for me and told me I was his glimmer of light within his eternal nightmare, it was as though I’d finally become who I’d always yearned to be. For him, I embodied hope. So much so that the thought of losing me had him making it official in the middle of the night.
I’m still swooning. And reflecting on that when Wells leans in close, although not out of earshot of Ty. We’re all sitting by the pool. Ivy and Celeste are swimming with Felicity. Gage and Liam are gathering the supplies for a cookout. Ty is prepping the grill. And Wells and I are lounging in the center of it all.
“How have his nightmares and flashbacks been? Frequency? Severity?” He flicks his gaze to the man in question in an unspoken dare. But there’s a tenderness to it that I’ve noticed is the adhesive of their group.
Gardens out of graves—that’s what Ty said they’d learned to create. And I see the flourishing of life and love and family planted upon a mound of loss. Growth happens in the dirt. It’s inspiring.
Wells’s prodding piques Ty’s scrutiny. He may be wondering if I’ll sell him out. Never. But he is struggling, and Wells would know better than me how to help him, so I glance sheepishly at Ty in question. He offers one quick dip of his chin to go ahead and fill in the man who clearly means everything to him.
“We’re working through them,” is how I begin because I want Ty to hear the we in my words. Something tells me he needs to know he isn’t failing me. We’re simply tackling something as a team. I want to be his partner, his teammate.
When he slid inside me last night after his night terror, it wasn’t sexual, but it was so intimate and beautiful and right . He held on for dear life, his breathing steadied, and the creases by his eyes and between his brows disappeared. And I felt more content than I ever had, like a night bloom coming to life in the presence of darkness. Battling his demons is an honor I’m grateful to undertake. But I don’t think the specific tactics need to be revealed to Wells.
He sifts through his Sour Skittles, mining for the reds and yellows, before snapping his eyes up to mine. “And how often are you working through it?”
Ahh. Yes. I didn’t share the particulars .
Another dip of the chin from my other half tells me it’s fine to respond.
I dig for my own Sour Skittle treasures, greens and purples, and banish any worry from my tone. “You’d have to ask him about flashbacks. But as for nightmares, at least once or twice a night. Sometimes, he doesn’t wake up. He yells and thrashes and drifts back to sleep.”
By the tawny-brown Adonis’s quirked brows and his head slanting in dismay, it would appear that Ty wasn’t aware of the ones that don’t wake him. But he should be. The man is haunted, tortured, ensnared. He needs a breath of freedom more than anyone I’ve ever known.
I hope I’m it.
Ty returns to his grill work, and Wells smirks at me.
He leans in close as he forages for more reds and yellows, his voice intentionally lower now. “Ty is the best of us. He’s the gold in a pile of coal. But he can’t see it. He’s stuck in the soot. I have a hunch you’ll change that.”
My chest inflates with ambitious expectations. “You think?”
“I know,” he assures me with a grimace at his candy bag.
“How do you know?” I ask in skepticism, still worried this will all be dismantled as quickly as it was assembled. “Is that merely the conclusion you drew after he woke me in the middle of the night to force me into a wedding ceremony that was only a formality because he’d already forged all the paperwork?”
He chuckles, still shaking his Skittles with a furrowed brow. “People do crazy things when the stakes are high.”
Trading his bag for mine, I laugh at his perplexed squint. “I like the purples and greens.”
A grin hikes up his cheeks. “See? You’re the missing piece.”
“Not exactly,” I argue, spilling some into my palm. “There are five colors in Sour Skittles. We still need to find someone for the orange. Maybe Felicity will assume the role when she’s a little older. ”
“No,” he states adamantly. “This shit will kill ya. I don’t want to pass the bad habit on to her.”
“It is an odd habit for someone so health-conscious,” I observe.
Content with his new bag, he meets my eyes. “You might remember, I used to smoke. That was worse.”
I hum in thought, recalling his smoking days and intrigued about the switch. “Candy is a coping mechanism for me too. What made you switch from smoking to Skittles?”
A puff of adoration flows from his lips as his focus swings to his wife. “A fiery redhead. My Little Storm hates the smell of cigarettes.”
My chest squeezes from both his words and the love written in his glowing gaze. “You quit for Ivy?”
He glances back at me with a nod. “Before we even met. I knew I wanted her and that she detested the smell. So, I did the work.”
I roll my bag up to save some for later. “How did you know you wanted her before you ever met?”
“I’d been a friend of her father’s for some time, so I was acquainted with her from afar. And I just knew. Felt it. She was mine. And I loved her before we were even together.” He pauses there, waiting with a stare that’s boring into my cheek until I grant him my attention. “Sound familiar?”
The implication makes me blush. It would seem I wasn’t so sly about my crush on Ty. “Yeah,” I whisper.
Eyes still planted on mine, he palms my head. “It would to Ty too. You were his long before that spur-of-the-moment ceremony, Rena. You’ve always belonged with us.”
Choking down the emotion that’s knotted in my throat, I smile as he rises to join the others. Acceptance as theirs feels far more gratifying than I would have expected. But I guess it’s the same for me; they’ve always been mine.
Now that the house is abuzz with chaos and banter, everything feels a little more real. I’ve been around them all like this countless times, but I was never Ty’s on those occasions. I was Ivy’s and Celeste’s. And I was the Noires’ little sister that Wells looked after, Liam joked with, and Gage protected.
Now, I’m Ty’s. His wife. His family. His future.
It’s mind-boggling.
After dinner is done, I volunteer to put Felicity to bed since that is a rarity for me. The quiet moments rocking her are good for my soul, a glimpse of someday. Once she’s drifted off, I lay her down and saunter out, running into Celeste and Ivy as I round the corner.
They drag me to the balcony off the game room and shove a glass of wine into my hand with beaming smiles beneath the speckled navy sky and distant lights of the Strip. We dish about the main events of the last few days, and my chest swells that I have these Ty tidbits to share with them. That this fantasy is my reality.
“So, he’s attentive,” Celeste concludes with a suggestive eyebrow waggle since I spilled some of Ty’s impressive bedroom skills. “And not opposed to public indecency. That’s a win in my book.”
Ivy giggles. “Totally opposite of Wells, who would shudder if anyone was even in earshot. He’d have to soundproof the city.”
“That’s true,” Celeste chimes. “Just wait, Rena. You’ll get texts at all hours of the day and night with entire wings of the house off-limits.”
“It’s so ridiculous.” Ivy shakes her head and rakes her teeth over her lip, but she’s clearly pleased that he’s so over-the-top possessive of her.
I’m elated that I get to be included in their mayhem instead of simply witnessing it. That and the wine flush my cheeks as I laugh. “Well, I’ll have to send my share of banning texts, I guess.”
Celeste flutters her thick lashes as she huffs a small chuckle. “Liam will appreciate that. He likes to harass the house with group chats.”
“No doubt,” Ivy says before singing her request for more of the goods. “I bet Ty is romantic.”
I glide my finger along the rim of my glass and bite back a boastful grin. “For sure. I mean, our time has been brief. Although, because we’ve been around each other for years, it feels like longer. And he’s already doted on me: cooking, ordering my favorite foods, making my coffee the way I like, drawing me a bubble bath, buying me a guitar that is more than an instrument—it’s a relic of one of my idols. And you’ve both seen my collection, so you know that, to me, a vintage guitar is better than gold. Even if he didn’t realize the significance, he knew it would be special to me. He gets my music obsession, and he encourages me to talk about my mom.”
They spout responses as we all sip our wine, but the mention of my mother has me switching gears because I think Ty is withholding something, and everything has happened so fast that I haven’t been able to corner him about it.
“That day in my room, why did you give me the phone?”
Ivy doesn’t falter; she jumps right in. “I didn’t like your brothers keeping you from us. It was a tough spot for me to be in because I respect them, care about them. But we love you. We all do, and I needed you to know we’d be there for you, that you could always count on us.”
I love that answer, but they were both in that room with my brothers, discussing my ancestry, which they hid from me.
“You respected them enough to hide that I wasn’t a Noire and loved me enough to give me a phone should I need to call you,” I allow, but I tack on the part that hurts. “But didn’t respect me enough to tell me the truth or insist that they did?”
“We did encourage them to tell you the truth,” Celeste interjects, swirling her cabernet. “Multiple times. Well, I kept my mouth shut because I’m still new to them. But the rest did.”
That aligns. I remember Gage saying they should tell me. That’s when he mentioned Jax and me finding out if we got sick, which is what led me to search medical records.
“It wasn’t our secret to tell, Rena.” Ivy rolls her lips in, guilt coasting over her freckled skin. “That’s why I gave you the phone. I didn’t want to get in the middle. To reveal things or break their trust. That was the best way I could show up for all of you.”
“Okay,” I concede because she really was in a bind. “But now, if I’m truly part of your family, your secrets are mine. Right? So, tell me what the deal was or what I don’t know about the fire.”
Ivy’s face twists in indecision as she grasps my hand. “You are part of our family, but this conversation is best had with Axel. He loves you so much. I couldn’t live with myself if I answered questions that should be directed to him and tore you two apart.”
Irritation flares in my veins even though I understand where she’s coming from. “Does Ty know?”
Celeste fields that, but her response skirts the truth. “He wasn’t in that part of the meeting with us.”
That’s not a no . So, he’s still hiding things from me. Possibly for the same reasons as Ivy. It’s noble. I love that they care about my family. And Ty and I haven’t had much time together, so maybe he’ll spill eventually.
As I’m taking a deep breath to center myself, a commotion filters out to us. Booming voices meld together into an angry racket, and my throat grows dry. I dash for the source of the uproar, the girls both keeping pace. Celeste is the first to gauge the situation, immediately retreating toward Felicity’s room. Ivy grabs my hand as we emerge to find all five of my irate brothers shouting at Ty, who is clearly distressed, while Liam, Gage, and Wells surround him.
“What the fuck do you mean, you’ve been here with her for days?” Axel growls.
That’s bad. He’s usually the calm and collected one.
I rush for him, wrapping my arms around his waist, which instantly softens his features.
He hugs me back, a ragged breath billowing out. “I’ve been out of my mind, Rena.” He grabs my face to tilt it up to him, and his sapphire eyes glisten with hurt. “God, if anything had happened to you … ”
“I’m sorry.” Tears drip down my cheeks. The sight of his pain is disarming. “I needed time to process things. I didn’t mean to—”
Ryker’s bellow eclipses my apology. “You were stowed away here with her? For days. Are you fucking my sister, Ty?”
Axel winces, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Fucking hell.”
Maddox, Cash, and Jax all utter similar expletives. No doubt that none of them want that image in their brains. Ryker is not known for tact or beating around the bush, but it’s still a shock to the system.
“I married her,” Ty provides.
And the world stops spinning. No one moves or breathes or responds for three agonizing beats.
In a swift second—one slow-motion heartbeat—Axel peers at me for confirmation and stomps toward Ty, issuing a punch to his jaw. Ty does nothing to block it. He just takes it, his head flying backward as he shuffles his feet to maintain his balance.
“Axel. Stop!” I screech.
Ty straightens himself, flexing his jaw as Axel rears back for another, but Ty lifts a warning hand. “You get one.”
While Ty’s entire stance is fierce, conveying the threat he just extended, Axel is undeterred. I’ve never witnessed him lose it like that. While that’s concerning, it takes a back seat to Ty’s battered face. I lunge between them so it doesn’t escalate, and Ty immediately coils himself around me like a protective shield before nudging me under his arm toward Ivy and Gage.
The room detonates into an upheaval of pure madness. Cussing and screaming and gangster posturing. In a blink, guns are drawn and pointed in every direction.
It’s ludicrous. Such overkill. I shout that sentiment again and again, but they all ignore me. I’m apparently the guest of honor, but also uninvited to this barbaric testosterone party. Although as I glance to my left, I see Ivy’s gun is drawn too.
What the hell?
It’s Axel’s broken voice that secures my attention though. “How could you do that to her? Trap her like that? Does she even understand what you’ve done?” Then, he casts his leer on Wells. “You knew about this? After ever—”
“No,” Ty breaks in. “He didn’t. None of them did. This was all me.”
“It’s fucked up, man,” Cash mutters, and Maddox echoes a similar sentiment with, “This shit crosses the line. Off-fucking-limits.”
“For all the bullshit you spew about protecting women, Ty?” Ryker snarls, baring his teeth, his finger dancing over the trigger as he glares at my husband and considers shooting him.
“Untrigger that finger, Ryker,” Ivy says in a calm yet stern command, “or things are gonna get ugly real fast for all of us.”
Ryker groans but listens because Ivy is a hero in his eyes, but he returns his triggerless wrath to Ty. “You couldn’t find anyone else’s life to fuck up? You go after the one young and innocent girl, who you knew thought the world of you and would blindly trust you. Jesus, I loathed you for the way you hid Mercy from me, but respected that you were an honorable guy. Putting her needs above mine. Fucking hypocrite. Get your shit, Rena.”
“What?” I gasp. “No. I’m not leaving. I’m a grown woman. And I didn’t blindly do anything. I married him willingly.”
“Only because he’s not telling you everything,” Axel counters.
“And you are?” I volley.
Axel’s remorseful eyes land on me, subduing my anger, but it’s Jax who sidles up to my side and clutches my hand, urging me to walk away.
“C’mon, sis,” he pleads. “Let’s go talk.”
I squeeze his hand back, but I don’t move. I’m frozen, cemented to this floor as a tornado of deceit and lies and clandestine dealings whips through my life, shattering all the relationships that glued me together.
“Get your shit, Rena. We’re going home,” Ryker barks. “Now.”
“Not gonna happen,” Gage says .
And Wells follows up with, “It’s too late. We’ve already called it in.”
I have no idea what that’s code for, but it has Ryker losing his shit and Axel grunting. Maddox, Cash, and Jax all appear to be as lost on the meaning as me.
“Let’s all take a deep breath,” Ivy suggests, her tone a soothing warble. “There’s a lot to discuss. It’s complicated.”
“Call it off,” Axel demands to Wells, blatantly ignoring Ivy before staring at Ty. “I don’t know what your goddamn game is. She’s a pawn for something. I can see it. You’re not imprisoning our sister for some fucked-up, self-serving transaction.”
“Axel,” Wells says with firm compassion, “it’s not what you’re thinking.”
“It’s not a fucking prison,” Liam argues. “No more than La Lune Noire life was for her. Let’s not be dramatic. Ty’s the best man in this room. And we all care about Rena.”
“She may be your sister, but she’s my wife now,” Ty reiterates in a gravelly tenor, eyes firm on Axel. “You need to respect that.”
Despite the turmoil, that unleashes a swarm of butterflies in my stomach.
Axel shakes his head in disbelief, his ash-brown hair tousled. Betrayal slithering around him. “I did not raise her, shelter her, protect her the way I have so she could end up in a goddamn morgue. As of late, I am well versed in the peril that organization poses. Sadly, I’m not being dramatic, and you all know it. If you cared about her even a little bit, you would have waited for us. Talked to me.”
His anguish is gutting. But my focus shifts to my husband, gnawing on his cheek and spiraling to somewhere dark and distant. There’s a two-second pause when I witness the unraveling. When the air grows stagnant and the room pulsates.
Ty glances at me, and his lips quirk into a tentative smile, but it buckles under the pressure. Waning in both its vibrancy and conviction. The spark just fizzles. Is it our spark? Am I watching the fire be snuffed out of my dream romance that has been real for all of four freaking days?
Not just real. He said all the things I’d ever wanted to hear. He molded it into forever and always. Made me his wife.
His. Theirs.
So, it can’t just fizzle in the face of my infuriated brothers.
No. Why would it? Because he won’t fight for me?
My chest cracks, tiny fissures, like you’d see in dried clay. I can feel them spreading, their fingers lurching forward—lungs, sternum, ribs, spine. Soon, I’ll involuntarily crumple to the floor. Because even though I’m not a vampire, that’s what happens when someone stakes you in the heart.
When Ty’s voice slices through that laden pause, the walls and floor and lights all flicker with an I told you so taunt.
And I smell kettle corn.
“I wanted to talk to you, planned to discuss things with you, but I fucked up. Killed the wrong guys. You have every right to be pissed, but it had to be this way. I married her to protect her.”