Chapter 6 #3
Movement behind me shifts the air.
Phantom.
He’s back upstairs and moves through the space between us like his namesake. His gaze goes straight to Kaylee. He crosses the room and drapes a blanket over her sleeping body with a care that makes my chest ache. His hand lingers at her hair like he’s memorizing the feel of it.
Then his eyes lift to mine.
“You have to trust someone sometime,” he says, voice low.
The words shouldn’t sound like a plea coming from him, but they do. I’m not prepared for the way his words hit me. Nor am I prepared for the dark need inside of me to scream for me to run before there’s no more fight left in me and I give in to my true desires.
He comes to join us. He reaches out, his fingers feathering along the curve of my cheek.
It’s the smallest of touches, yet the warmth and gentleness of it roots my feet to the floor.
There’s nowhere else I truly want to be.
My heart pleads for me to listen. Now I just need to get my brain to jump on board.
“Why do you need to find your brother? Doesn’t he work at your father’s side now? He took Shawn’s place, right?”
My spine locks. I force myself to stand taller even though I feel like I’m balancing on a cliff edge.
I understand the hesitancy in trusting Micah right now, but I hate having to stand up for my brother when he’s done nothing but fight to eradicate the evil from within.
But I have to understand that no one knows that but him and I.
“Sort of. It’s not exactly as it appears. He was working to take down the ring and my father from the inside,” I explain with a healthy dose of patience.
Phantom’s mouth tightens. “That’s going to get him killed.”
“We both know the risks.” It’s not easy to get those words out, but I force them between us.
Phantom looks like he doesn’t trust my brother’s actions at all.
“Look,” I say, frustration cracking my voice. “Believe me or not. That’s fine. All I need to know from you is where you last saw him. He said he needed to give me something that would ruin our father. That he didn’t know who to trust, and he needed to get it to me fast.”
Phantom’s eyes go cold. “So he picked his sister who has a child to take care of and protect to come and what?”
“Easy, Phantom,” Charli snaps. “She’s only trying to help.”
“It’s okay, Charli,” I say, even though it isn’t. “I broke his heart, he’s pissed, and now he doesn’t trust me. I’ve earned that.”
“When you have no one left,” Emilia says quietly, “what else was he supposed to do?”
Phantom’s jaw flexes. “He could and should have called me.”
I throw my hands up and let them fall to my sides, exhausted and angry and terrified all at once. “Tell me where he is and we can both ask him why he picked me over you.”
Silence stretches over the entire room.
Then Willow speaks, voice razor-calm. “It sounds like he is in too deep and doesn’t think he’ll make it out alive if your father gets what he wants.”
My chest caves inward.
“I know Shawn didn’t,” I whisper. “Micah is in the same danger. It’s why I recorded almost all of what went down tonight and sent the video evidence off to a detective back in New Orleans.”
“Good. Can I get a copy of that?” Phantom takes his phone out. Lucky for me, mine is still in the inside pocket of his coat that I still have on.
He gives his number and I shoot him a copy. “I don’t think I got any of you in it, but if I did, sorry. That was not my intention.”
“No worries,” Reaper answers. “Our tech can erase anything.”
My brows go up. “But I already sent it to the detective, remember?”
Storm’s smile is full of mischief when he answers, “He can erase that too, if need be.”
Oh.
Emilia’s gaze softens when it reaches mine. She stands with Storm near the tree in the corner with an arm around her like he’s anchoring her to the world. The lights on the tree glow against their faces and make them look like they live safely within their bubble of love.
“He’s a real piece of work, huh?” Emilia says. “Your dad, I mean.”
I let out a humorless breath. “He’s a power-hungry real estate mogul who wants to stick his fingers into every single money jar there is in the south and work out from there. And he’s done a pretty good job of it.”
Phantom’s gaze stays locked on me as he says, “Why would your name be in the book alongside his?”
He’s not accusing me. I know it, but the sting is real all the same.
My stomach drops. “By blood, no association. Believe me, my father did not put my name in that book. He put me on his hit list if he ever finds me. Now that is true.” I take a step closer, refusing to let the fear gripping my chest keep me quiet. “But am I a part of the Euphoria problem? No.”
Phantom studies me, and I see something in him shift.
The second he chooses to believe me, every muscle in my body relaxes.
That same love that flickered deep in his gaze at Chloe’s shines through even now, and it makes me furious because it means I could hurt him again if I’m not careful.
I lift a shoulder in a tight shrug. “That book helps you, not me. Right now I am worried if he left my brother breathing. We all wear masks. Mine is one of a worried mother and sibling.” My voice shakes on the last word.
“My father’s wealth and ambitions know no limits.
He will end anyone who gets in his way. He thinks our blood is blue and all Devereaux are untouchable.
Except by his hand. That's why I need to find my brother.”
Phantom steps closer, voice dropping into that low rasp that always made my body betray me.
“Is that why you ran from me?” he asks in a deceptively low tone. “Because you couldn’t fathom being linked to a Savage who he saw as beneath your station for his billionaire princess?”
I stumble back as if slapped.
He stares at me with his jaw tight and his eyes blazing with a renewed fury at me.
“How dare you say that?” I force myself not to shake.
“That’s unfair, Phantom,” Charli snaps in my defence.
She moves to my side and hands me a steaming mug of coffee like warmth can fix this.
“It’s okay, Charli,” I say, swallowing the pain.
I set the mug down untouched. “If I’m not going to get any help, that’s fine.
You followed me to Chloe’s. Remember that, Phantom.
And it was you who insisted we come here.
” My voice cracks, but I push through. “It’s time for me to leave.
Charli, can I bother you for a ride to—”
“To where?” Phantom cuts in, eyes flashing. He looks pointedly at Kaylee asleep on the couch. “Did you forget your father is looking for you and our daughter right this minute?”
“My brother is out there,” I fire back. “And I have to find a way to help him. You’re not the only ones with guns I know. I’ll just—”
Arabella steps in before the words can turn into something uglier.
Jinx looks like she might actually shove her gingerbread cookie into Phantom’s mouth to make him shut up.
Arabella’s smile is calm, measured. “You are welcome to stay here while you figure out your next move. Reaper will know what to do, too. Everyone just needs to calm down for a minute and think.”
“You’re right,” I whisper, the fight draining out of me in one heavy rush. “Damn. I don’t know what I’m saying.”
“You’re worried,” Storm offers from across the room. “You all just need to take a minute. Go find a place you can talk amongst yourselves and find your level ground again. It’s a lot all at once.”
He’s right.
I hate that he’s right.
“I wish I could,” I admit, voice thin. “I have no right to ask any of you to help, but Micah is stuck with the Vultures with no one to trust. I can’t exactly blaze my way through my father’s men and pull him out.
” I swallow hard. “I don’t know what happened after I booked it out of there, but I know nothing good is happening after we all kicked the ant’s nest and then you guys took that book. ”
Phantom’s expression doesn’t change when he says it.
“We planted explosives and took out the shipment.”
My eyes widen.
Because that means the night wasn’t just chaos and running and gunfire.
It was a statement and one helluva war move that my father will not stand for.
This is bad. Very bad.
Reaper’s gaze flicks between me and Phantom, and I can see him about to step in, about to take control of the conversation the way presidents do when the room starts to tilt.
But Phantom lifts his hand, stopping him.
Reaper’s eyes narrow, but he lets Phantom say his piece.
His attention falls to the silver chain around my neck like it has done several times this evening. He slowly drags those pretty grays to meet my eyes and when he does, I’m lost in the power for several heartbeats. I can’t help myself.
“Everly, baby. You want our help with your brother,” Phantom says, voice steady, “all I want is for you and me to have a conversation first.”
My heart stutters.
If he gets me alone in a room, all the fight in me will drop away and I’ll give in to anything he asks of me.
I stare at the man who owns my heart, trying to read what’s underneath the words. Trying not to think about the way he carried Kaylee like she belonged in his arms. Trying not to think about the way my body still remembers his.
“I answer your questions,” I say carefully, “and you will help my brother?”
Phantom’s gaze holds mine. “Something like that.”
The fear in my chest doesn’t vanish, but it shifts. It becomes sharper. More focused.
Because an ultimatum from Phantom is something I can work with.
I glance at Kaylee, warm and safe under his blanket, her little fist curled near her chin.
Then I look back at Phantom. A beat of silence stretches, thick with everything we have not said for three years. With everything we are still afraid to touch.
I’m scared. I’m mad. I don’t know where my brother is.
But for the first time tonight, I feel something dangerously close to hope.
And it’s wearing Phantom’s face.