28. Rowan
TWENTY-EIGHT
ROWAN
Sleepless nights were doing me no favors. Without sleep, I couldn’t concentrate. Without concentration, I couldn’t undermine whatever sick and twisted plot my father had planned for us by taking out the hit on Harper. And with the deadline looming, I didn’t have much time.
There was a short list of people who had cause to want her dead. It began and ended with my own father, who stood to gain the most.
If he knew Harper was still alive, though, why not just call us up and demand answers? It was his usual modus operandi—demand answers, demand results, or heads would roll when they didn’t deliver. He enjoyed the power he held over us. So, he had to want something if he was biding his time. Had to have something over our heads to dangle like that proverbial carrot.
I wouldn’t get any answers sitting here running on empty, though. Tomorrow, I could pay the old man a visit, see if he dropped any hints.
It’d been a long ass time since I walked into his home unannounced. The welcome probably wouldn’t be warm.
Still, I had to try something.
My head thunked on the desk before me, scattering the pile of paperwork. I didn’t bother to even lift my head. I needed the rest, the short period of shuteye. And it wasn’t likely to come when I laid my head on the pillow in my bed. Might as well get the sleep while I could, where I could.
I would call my father in the morning.
When the alarm went off in my bedroom, it felt like I’d only shut my eyes for a few blissful seconds of respite. But the display on my phone told me I’d been out for a few hours. More than I’d gotten in one stretch in a few days.
We were four days away from the deadline, and if I didn’t figure something out by then, I’d never be able to let her return to her old life. And I couldn’t bear the thought of making her hate me by refusing to let her go.
I’d already screwed up her life once. I couldn’t do that to her again.
It didn’t smell like anyone started coffee, at least not from in here, so I made my way to the door, shuffling like a bear fresh out of hibernation. All at once, I realized something was off.
The kitchen was still dark, the stove empty, and on the couch was a lump of what appeared to be humans?—
"No fucking way."
The words escaped me in a whisper, and I had to bite back the chuckle that attempted to accompany my shocked grin.
Laying on the couch, leaning on each other for pillows, were Angel and Harper, the oil and water of this strange foursome, a bowl of half-eaten popcorn on the coffee table in front of them. Harper’s arm was wrapped around Angel’s torso, her head on his shoulder, long legs kicked out behind her. Angel was letting her use him like a body pillow, his arm slung over her shoulder in a protective embrace.
It was like seeing a flash of the old brother I remembered when we were younger. She was changing us all, one piece at a time, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go back to the man I was before. I liked the new me. He was financially comfortable, had a home where people didn’t judge him, and was out from under his father’s thumb. I could be who I wanted, do what I pleased, and nobody challenged my authority or questioned my need for structured itineraries or detailed plans.
I couldn’t go back to a normal life.
But it was nice to think that maybe my brothers could regain a shred of their humanity. That they could get back in touch with the true them under the masks they wore each day to deal with the lives we led.
And it was all because of her .
All she was doing to me was making me weaker. But weak man or strong, I wouldn’t trade it for the world. I would be weak for her if that’s what it took to keep her around.
Angel shifted, and like she was melded to him, Harper’s body followed. I felt a wave of jealousy roll through me. I didn’t like it. I wasn’t one to get jealous, especially of my fucking brothers. Five damn minutes ago, I was happy for him. Now, all I wanted to do was rip her out of his arms and cart her off to my own bed.
I wanted what he had, even if he didn’t know he had it.
Damn this woman, making us feel things out of our control.
I hated to be out of control.
Like a vindictive child, I cleared my throat and set to work in the kitchen, banging around until I saw the pair of them shift around on the couch, grinning when Angel realized how soft he was being and practically jumped away from her like she was a live power wire.
"Fuck me," he spat, slinking out from under her as she continued her downward slump to the cushions.
My grin widened as I turned my back on his fit, cracking eggs into a pan like he would have been doing an hour ago had he not fallen asleep in her arms.
Asshole didn’t even want her. Why was he on the couch with her?
"Morning, sleepyhead." I waited for a response but got none as he stalked right past me and slammed the door to his bedroom behind him. Harper groaned into the couch and curled into a ball, no doubt seeking his heat, upset that the body warming her had moved away. "Hope Harper’s in a better mood than you, pal."
Another groan from the couch, and after a few minutes, she joined me at the stove, a cup of coffee in her hands, a scowl on her lips.
"Oh, hi there, Harper. Nice of you to join me."
I received a grumbled warning in response, and the scowl turned into a snarl of disapproval. "I could have slept another few hours if you hadn’t chased off my heater."
"He couldn’t get off that couch fast enough." I quirked a brow, and one corner of my mouth lifted in a sly smirk. "You could have gotten some good sleep in my bed, you know."
"Fuck off, Rowan," she groused, moving to pop some bread in the toaster. "It’s not the day to fuck with me. I’m not in the mood for anything today."
My shoulders lifted in a cocky shrug as I turned back to the food. "I was just pointing out the offer is open. You can take it whenever you feel like it."
"Well, I wasn’t in the mood for a lecture last night." Her eyes cut to Angel’s door, then Nash’s, her whole demeanor shifting from disgust to sadness. "I had enough to deal with as it was."
Great. She did something with Nash, too. Clearly, that didn’t work out as she’d hoped.
At least one of my brothers hadn’t lucked out last night. Whatever she’d been into with him, it appeared to have had a bad ending. If she and my eldest brother hadn’t fallen out, she wouldn’t have been on the damn couch with Angel.
Nash wouldn’t have let her sleep til dawn if he’d gotten his hands on her. And then I’d be in here alone still, or maybe with Angel acting normal, eating breakfast and drinking a cup of coffee and starting my day like normal.
I wouldn’t be aggressively scraping half-burnt eggs out of a pan in the hopes I hadn’t fucked them up so bad it gave Harper one more reason to hate me today.
"How do you know I was planning to lecture you?" She set two plates on the counter, and I took the nearest one, feeding her before myself. "Maybe I?—"
"Maybe nothing, Rowan Blackwood. You had that look in your eyes, the one that screams ‘you’re in trouble,’ and I was not about to deal with it." She slapped a few pieces of toast on the empty plate and quirked an eyebrow at me knowingly. "You know damn well you were gearing up for a ‘what the hell were you thinking’ rant."
I couldn’t argue that. After watching her nearly take herself and my brothers out with a single stupid move, all I wanted to do was grab her and shake her. I had to physically restrain myself by removing myself from the room so I didn’t throttle her for scaring me like she had.
My whole life flashed before my eyes in a heartbeat, every dream for our future dying as I breathed. Her rash actions had almost taken everything I cared about in this world away in a matter of seconds, and I was beyond angry in the moment. Rage had nothing on the pure terror and heartbreak I went through when I thought they wouldn’t stop. There was nothing I could do to prevent it, to stop it. All I could do was watch on helplessly as she careened toward the same place we’d shoved her off the bridge seven years ago.
Everything came back to that one moment seven years ago.
Why?
It was like watching a movie play over and over on repeat, unable to stop it or rewind it or change it. Like fucking Groundhog Day, I was doomed to repeat the same mistake over and over for the rest of my life.
"You uh, you gonna gimme some eggs here, scout?"
Harper shoved the half-empty plate under my nose, and I smiled, dumping my eggs on it and swapping her servings. "This one’s yours. Enjoy."
She eyed her yellow eggs and then ogled my brownish ones. It was painfully obvious I’d made every effort to give her the not-burnt pieces I could find in the pan.
"Thanks," she muttered, crunching on a slice of toast as she meandered back to the couch and flopped down with a sigh that felt like it carried the weight of the world. "I didn’t feel like cooking this morning. Hell, I didn’t plan on being awake this morning, either, but since I am . . . "
"I didn’t mean to wake you two," I began, but she downed a bite of the scalding eggs and held her hand up.
"Don’t even try that shit. I know when you’re throwing one of those wordless tantrums, Ro. I know you better than you think."
She wasn’t wrong. I didn’t know when it happened, but somewhere over the years, she’d learned everything she could about each one of us. Hell, she knew us better than we knew ourselves. And that in itself was scary as fuck.
"Okay, fair enough."
She shoveled another forkful of eggs into her mouth, mumbling around them. "Why, though?"
"I don’t wanna talk about it," I muttered back, turning my back on her insistent stare. "Eat your breakfast and shut your mouth. I have to get back to work."
I moved to take my breakfast into the office, and like a persistent dog, she followed behind me, her plate in hand, an intense stare boring a hole into my back.
She settled on the futon as I sorted through the file I’d started on my father. But like always, in typical Harper Daniels fashion, her curiosity got the better of her and she wandered over, peering over my shoulder at the work I’d done.
"A file on your dad."
It wasn’t a question.
"You said he was the best candidate. He does stand to benefit from your death, if done correctly. But something‘s not right about the way he’s going about this. I haven’t heard from him, either, so there’s likely a game in play I’m not aware of." I shrugged as she stared at me over the lip of her coffee mug, brow quirked. "Least I can do is pay him a visit and see if I can get a feel for him."
Her mug lowered, and the intrigue and sass turned to concern. "How long has it been since you saw him?"
"Years."
Seven, to be exact .
I walked out of his house that night after doing his bidding for the last time and took my brothers with me to start a new life away from a man whose only aim was to better his own bank account and line his pockets with things that brought him prosperity, power, and status.
"Be careful, okay?" she whispered, a hand resting on my shoulder. "He’s not someone you play with. He’s the cat, and we’re all mice in his world."
"I’m no mouse," I spat, offended that she’d think I wasn’t on his level. That I couldn’t be impartial or outsmart him. "If anything, I’ve been honing my skills for years, while his got rusty from that wingback chair of his."
"Okay, killer, you do what you do. I’ll just pass out on the couch for a few more hours."
I didn’t watch her leave. And she didn’t come back, either.
Apparently, the couch meant the one in the living room, not the one behind me.
Shame.
Anger and jealousy rising in me once more, I threw myself into my work and laser-focused on my new target—my father. A man who lived on the other side of Port Wylde, high up in his mansion, a place that I’d soon be seeing the inside of again.
Because if there was something I needed right now, it was to run far the fuck away from these feelings she stirred in me.
I had to get control again before I spiraled so far out of it that I lost my damn mind.
If it was even possible to regain control now.