22. Jamison
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
JAMISON
Iwas learning how to suck up. That sentence alone should have been enough to get a man shot out of mercy. Unfortunately, no one in my house had offered.
Reeves had looked at the delivery room, then at me, then at the delivery room again, and said, “This is excessive.”
That was how I knew I had gone too far.
Reeves Calder had been raised beside me. His father had been my father’s second. His older brother was Marcel’s second. His younger brother was Harrison’s second. Calder blood existed for Crow blood in the same ugly way Crow blood existed for territory.
Second hand was bloodline. Paired so young that by the time you understood loyalty, it already lived in you. Reeves had been mine since we were six.
He had watched me break my first boy’s nose behind a riding stable because the little shit had shoved Marcel. He had been there when I first learned how to make a grown man afraid without raising my voice.
I had taken bullets for him. He had taken blades for me. We had carried each other through enough bad rooms that his opinion on my spending had weight.
Which was unfortunate.
Because his opinion was that I had lost my fucking mind.
“It’s not excessive,” I said.
Reeves stared at the open velvet case in front of him. “There are eleven necklaces.”
I leaned back against the edge of the table and lit a cigarette because if I didn’t, I would have to acknowledge the heat crawling beneath my skin. “Women like jewelry.”
“Women also like apologies.”
I exhaled smoke slowly. “That sounds like poverty thinking.”
“It is spoken language.”
“Jewelry is language.”
“Then you appear to be screaming.”
I looked around the room.
Fine.
There was a lot.
The first floor of my Harlan residence had turned into something between a luxury vault and a funeral for my dignity.
There were flowers in quantities that had taken over rooms. White peonies.
Blush roses. Cream gardenias. Pale pink orchids.
Buckets and buckets of them, arranged by men who kept glancing at me as if I might kill them if the stems faced the wrong direction.
Which was unfair, I had only threatened one florist.
And only because he had said seasonal limitations with a tone that implied nature was my superior.
There were boxes from every jeweler in Harlan worth robbing. Diamonds. Pearls. Platinum. A ridiculous sapphire bracelet because Sienna once wore blue to some winter event and I had remembered against my will.
A collection of first edition art books because she liked old paintings and human effort. A key to a rehearsal studio I had bought two blocks from her current one because her existing security offended me.
There was also a small antique box containing hair pins made of diamonds and black enamel.
That one had been a mistake.
Because the second I imagined my fingers sliding them into her hair, pinning up those soft dark waves while she sat still for me, something violent and hot had gone through my body and I had ordered three more sets because apparently restraint had left the building.
“I’m not screaming,” I said.
Reeves looked at a second delivery being carried through the side entrance. Two men struggled under the weight of a refrigerated floral trunk.
He blinked once. “No. Of course not.”
I ignored him.
That was usually best for morale.
The problem with sucking up was that no one had taught me the rules.
I knew how to get a man to sign over a shipping corridor while smiling as if the idea had belonged to him. But this had no operational manual.
No acceptable amount of money that could undo three years of treating Sienna Bellemere like a public inconvenience when she had been standing there with her hand out, asking for one harmless piece of me.
Hand, please.
My jaw tightened.
I took another drag from the cigarette.
I had trained her out of it.
She had stopped. And the silence had been unbearable, I hated everything lately. Mostly myself, which was new and deeply inconvenient.
“You don’t think it’s enough,” Reeves said.
I looked at him. “What?”
He was standing near the table, expression controlled. He did that when he was deciding whether speaking would get him fired, shot, or merely glared at until lesser men developed ulcers.
“You keep buying things because you don’t think it’s enough.”
“It isn’t enough.”
Reeves stared back.
That was the problem with a second hand. He was the man assigned to your shadow by blood and history, which meant every now and then he forgot survival and told the truth.
I flicked ash into the tray. “You done?”
“No.”
“Unwise.”
“You asked me to prepare the convoy. I did. You need me to set up communication at an estate that has apparently chosen to cosplay the eighteenth century. I did.”
“And?”
“And none of that changes that you need to speak to her.”
My grip tightened around the cigarette.
“I’m going to speak to her.”
“When?”
“When I arrive.”
“And if she doesn’t want to speak to you?”
My mouth curved. “Then I’ll speak anyway.”
Reeves sighed.
Actually sighed.
Beside me, in my house. Unbelievable.
“You know,” I said, “there was a time when seconds respected danger.”
“There was a time when first hands didn’t buy eleven necklaces because one girl stopped calling them a nickname.”
I pointed the cigarette at him. “Careful.”
His expression didn’t change. “Always Sir.”
Underneath my anger, guilt moved like acid.
Veil got twelve angles of Celeste beside me. Now, society accounts to put her name next to mine. I ground my teeth hard enough pain moved through my jaw.
Tomorrow morning, at the hunt, I would speak to her father. I would tell them Celeste’s name did not belong near mine again. Then I would explain what would happen if anyone told Sienna about it before I did.
Politely, if possible.
Violently, if necessary.
I was developing sainthood by even considering the first option.
The gifts went into three cars.
One car for me and Reeves. Two for apology freight.
The flowers took their own refrigerated van because apparently romance required climate control.
The jewelry came in two locked cases with biometric seals.
The ballet things sat packed in soft cream tissue, which had taken a woman named Alina forty minutes to arrange before Reeves told her she could stop trembling because I rarely killed people over ribbon.
We left Harlan late morning.
The road toward the Bellemere retreat curled through too many trees. I despised the view. Eventually, after five hours. The estate gates appeared after a private bridge, pale stone pillars wrapped in climbing roses, Bellemere crest cut discreetly into iron.
Reeves was staring at the gates as if he had just witnessed my whole downfall.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing.”
“I can hear your silence.”
“I was remembering the first invitation.”
Ah. The first year.
Someone had expected me to attend because I had recently become engaged to Sienna. I had written absolutely fucking not across the invitation and sent it back. Then I had made a note in the family system.
Avoid lake cult.
I’d forgotten about that. Only to be reminded, after I grilled the receptionist for not telling me about Sienna’s retreat. That was yesterday before Celeste’s name appeared beside mine.
The gates opened.
The retreat spread beyond them like a painting made for people who used inheritance as a personality.
My gaze locked onto it on one of the signs.
House Alder → East Walk.
A fucking sign. Pointing straight to where Sienna slept. My stomach dropped so hard my fingers curled against the seat.
“Reeves.”
Reeves had his tablet out already. “Sir, I’m pulling the estate map.”
“Pull staff records.”
“I requested access.”
“And?”
“The Bellemere office declined.” Reeves did not look up from the tablet. “Their exact wording was that Crow equipment would be unnecessary and intrusive at a private family retreat.”
I laughed once.
The driver’s shoulders tightened.
“Unnecessary,” I repeated.
Reeves nodded. “Intrusive.”
Unfucking believable.
The Bellemeres did not think like Crows. They had no idea how many ways a girl could be taken, shot, drugged, drowned, locked in a room, poisoned by a glass of lemonade, or pushed off a fucking scenic overlook.
Sienna had been here for days.
I had left her available, the realization hit with enough force that my lungs tightened. My enemies knew she was mine. I went to try to call her again.
My phone had no signal. Of course it didn’t. I stared at the useless black screen and felt something old and ugly wake under my ribs.
“I want the tech fixed.”
Reeves looked at me then. “If you roll Crow tech across their grounds without permission in the first five minutes, you’ll start a family conflict before seeing her.”
I glared at him.
He returned his attention to the tablet. “I’ll establish private communication from the vehicle array first. Low footprint. No visible sweep.”
The cars stopped before the main house.
The Bellemeres received us with old wealth polish.
Sienna’s father came down the steps first. Her mother stood slightly behind him. The Family gathered near the terrace.
“Jamison,” Sienna’s father said. “This is unexpected.”
Reeves stepped out behind me, tablet in hand, eyes already moving over rooflines and access points.
The father’s gaze flicked to him. “And Mr. Calder.”
Reeves inclined his head. “Mr. Bellemere.”
“Your presence is rather unnecessary, isn’t it? This is a family retreat, not a Crow security operation.”
I hated anyone, that treated my second as a paid bodyguard. Reeves was used to being insulted by men who mistook restraint for rank.
He didn’t care.
I, unfortunately for everyone, fucking cared.
“Say that again,” I said.
Sienna’s father looked back at me. For half a second, the old wealth mask slipped. Fear suited him better.
He recovered quickly. “I only meant your second hand needn’t trouble himself. We have staff for arrangements.”
“Reeves is not staff.”
A few people near the terrace went quiet.
“Jamison.” Reeves said.
I ignored him.
Sienna’s mother lifted her chin. “No insult was intended.”
“Then you’re lucky.”