Gypsy Brothers: The Complete Series (26 page)

SIXTEEN

Even the best-laid plans can go awry. That’s the thing about randomness and fate.

You can put double the amount of explosives in your enemy’s motorcycle gas tank; but that doesn’t mean he’ll be riding it.

You can lie to the boy you’ve loved since you were fifteen years old, but that doesn’t mean he’ll believe you.

You can try to kill everyone who’s ever done you wrong, but that doesn’t mean they’ll die.

I’m standing in the emergency room of a crumbling public hospital on the American side of the border with Jase, when several other high-ranking Gypsy Brothers members turn up. My father’s vintage, they were his friends once upon a time. Now, they’re Dornan’s minions, reluctantly or otherwise. And they’re here, overtaking the ER in their burly leathers, waists bulging with poorly concealed handguns. Several police officers and FBI agents are among the throng as well, leaving very little space for the actual sick and injured people who are crammed into the available free space.

One of the guys, a solidly built dude with a long gray beard, comes up to Jase. “You need to get back to the club and restore order,” he says to Jase. “With everyone else out of action, you’re the highest-ranking club member.”

Jase shakes his head. “No, Slim. I’m not leaving my family here. I need to know what’s happening.”

Slim, who is actually not that slim at all, steps closer. “I’ve known you since you were a little snot,” he says, his hand on Jase’s shoulder, “And kid, if I say you’ve got to get back to the club, you get your ass back to the fucking club.”

Jase glances at me. “Come on,” he barks. “Clubhouse. Now.”

I open my mouth to respond that I’d rather stay here, when Jase grabs my wrist and starts dragging me alongside him. “Hey,” I protest, shaking him off. “I want to be here when Dornan wakes up.”

He continues to drag me to the parking lot while I protest, until he does something I never thought he’d do to me.

He shoves me onto the hood of his car, pulls a gun out of his waistband and holds it to my head.

I go to open my mouth and exclaim surprise at the fact that he’s packing heat, when I see that it’s Dornan’s gun. My heart sinks. He must’ve somehow gotten it along with his father’s personal effects. I’m personally still baffled as to how Dornan or his gun survived the blast. I’m even more pissed that Mickey and Donny are still hanging on in their own hospital beds. Who knows if any of them will survive, but at this point, I’m wondering whether
anything
will kill the stubborn fuckers.

I shake as I move my eyes upward, the cold steel of the car hood at my back, straining to see the barrel of the gun that is pressed between my eyes.

“You knew that bomb was going to blow,” he breathes, pressing his entire body against mine, trapping me against the car. I start to pant, suddenly terrified.

“What did you do?” he hisses.

“Nothing,” I protest.

Jase is angry, a tight coil of nerves, rage ready to explode. I see it in his clenched jaw, his deep frown, the way he holds the gun steady at my forehead.

“The doctors have Dornan in an induced coma,” he says bitterly.

I nod minutely. I can practically see black waves of seething anger pouring off him, filling the air between us.

“My brothers are dead,” he says, and he won’t take his eyes off me.

It’s true. I needn’t have worried about Jazz. He was right next to Dornan’s motorcycle when it blew to smithereens, taking him along with it. They’ll be picking pieces of him off the driveway for months. Ant’s dead too, but I don’t understand how
three
of them survived.

“I’m sorry your brothers are dead,” I lie. I’m not.
I’m glad.

He laughs bitterly, taking the gun from my head and letting that arm drop to his side. He digs something out of his pocket and places it on the bonnet of the car in front of us; a small square box made from cardboard. My heart drops.

“I didn’t know you were a fake,” he says dangerously pushing my contact lenses with his finger so they slide across the hood of the car.

Shit!

“I didn’t tell you I was blind as a bat?” I ask casually.

He lasers me with his eyes. “They’re not for improving vision,” he spits. “They’re for changing your eye color. What color are they, really?” He is on me before I can react. He grabs my wrist with one hand and jams the gun into my throat with the other, slamming me down onto the car bonnet again.

“Who’s Elliot?” he asks, pressing the gun to my throat enough to be uncomfortable, without completely cutting off my air supply.

Oh, God. It’s clear he knows I had something to do with the bombs. But does he know about me?

“What?” I rasp around his fingers. “I already told you.”

“Elliot McRae. You’ve been meeting him on your runs, Samantha.” He says my name like I’m a piece of shit. “It’s not just once or twice for a hotel hook-up.
I know
. What have you two done?”

“You’ve been following me?” I ask incredulously.

“I saw you with him at that warehouse. Thought I should know who
else
I was sharing you with. Did a little investigating.”

He digs the barrel of the gun in harder. “Who is he? Your boy toy?”

“He’s just a friend,” I say, coughing. “You’re hurting me, Jase.” I try to push the gun away from my throat, but he lets go of my wrist to bat my hands away.

“Good,” he says. “Then you’ll know I’m serious.
Why
have you been meeting with him?”

I panic, and scan my brain for an answer. It’s getting harder to breathe and a lack of oxygen isn’t helping me come up with a lie.

“Hey,” Jase says, snapping his fingers in front of my face with his spare hand. “Tell me the truth instead of making up another lie.”

It doesn’t matter, does it? It still doesn’t connect Elliot to Juliette.

“He loved me, once,” I say honestly. “Until he left me.”

His grip relaxes slightly and I pant, my fingers still tight around his arm, tears forming at the corners of my eyes.

Something vibrates against my thigh as a high-pitched ring comes from Jase’s pocket.

Looking irritated, he drags his cellphone from his pocket and looks at the screen briefly.

“Fuck,” he mutters, taking a step back. He holds the gun out in front of him, his eyes never leaving mine. “Don’t. Move,” he utters, pressing a button and holding the phone to his ear.

“What’d you find?” he barks, and I hear excited chatter on the other end. The other person seems to have a lot to say, and as I study Jase’s expression, I have the oddest sensation that the voice is talking about me.

His face goes from angry, to concerned, to completely baffled.

“He was?” he asks the person. “Thank you.”

He ends the call and shoves the phone back in his pocket, his eyes alight with something indescribable. Confusion, yes, but there’s something more, a deeply buried sorrow that threatens to burst forth.

In that instant, he suspects the truth. I know it. It’s there, in the way his eyes wander to my covered hip and back to my eyes. I can practically see him doing calculations in his head and seeing the clues stacking up. But at the same time, I know he’s thinking that he’s delusional. That
I
can’t possibly be
her
. That
she’d
never do the things
I’ve
done. That
she
and
I
look nothing alike.

“Jase—” I begin, but he holds his hand up to silence me.

“It’s my turn to speak,” he says gravely, his eyes roaming my body, feverish, panicked, and no matter where he looks, his gaze always comes back to rest on my hip.

I swallow thickly, closing my eyes briefly, because I know what comes next, my soul weighed down by the absolute futility of it all.

Jase opens his mouth to say something but closes it again, like a goldfish that’s accidently been tipped out of its bowl. That stunned, wild look grows more desperate by the moment, and I’m suddenly very sad.

“Before he loved you,” Jase’s voice cracks, “Did he save you?”

My eyes betray me. Me, the girl who doesn’t cry, has tears the size of rivers running down her face. I must look a mess.

“Jason,” I choke.

“Tell me,” he says, his eyes wide and shocked, his hands shaking. “Tell me the truth.”

I can’t.
I can’t do this.

“He gave me a tattoo,” I lie, swallowing thickly. “That’s how I met him.”

Jase’s beautiful face twists into a terrifying vestige of pain and despair.

“You’re lying,” he screams, throwing me across the parking lot. I land on the ground with a thud, my head and my ass taking the brunt of the hard concrete. I see stars as he straddles my hips, yanking at my shirt.

“Don’t!” I beg, pushing his hands away. He ignores me, and shuffles down, his eyes so close to my bare skin, and the light under the artificial street lamps so painfully bright, it is as if I am splayed naked in front of him, all of my secrets and lies in full view.

I squeeze my eyes shut and sob as I feel his warm breath on my hip. I cry as he traces those seven ugly lines with his trembling fingers, virtually invisible unless you’re looking for them.

I have no doubt now as to what he sees and what he knows.

I open my eyes as I hear him choke. He rolls off me, leaning back on his hands in a kind of daze. There are tears in his eyes.

“Is it true?” he asks dreamily, and I don’t know if he’s asking me, or the night air that surrounds us.

“I thought you were dead,” he says to me incredulously, and he is suddenly a scared teenage boy again.

I can’t think. I can’t speak. I’m suddenly mute. What am I supposed to say?

“What the fuck are you
doing
here?” he asks. “
Are you even real
?”

I can’t speak, so terrified that if I speak, that once I confirm his suspicions, he will kill me.

“Answer me!” he screams, leaning over and shaking me by my shoulders.

I am so terribly afraid. “Are you going to shoot me?” I ask him softly. “Or are you going to tell your father what I’ve done?”

My soul is resigned to whatever fate he chooses for me. He deserves that much choice, at least.

He looks shocked. “I promise not to kill you if you tell me what you’ve done. What you’re doing here.” He repeats the phrase again that tears at my heart. “Is it really you?” He shakes his head slowly, half-crazed. “
I thought you were dead
.”

“I killed your brothers,” I finally whisper, half-crazed as it all tumbles out of me. “I poisoned Chad. I held strychnine-laced coke under Maxi’s nose until he overdosed. I planted the bombs that killed the other two.” I suck in a deep breath and start sobbing again. I can’t look at him anymore, so I look up at the sky instead.

He lets go of my shoulders and puts his hands on either side of my face, guiding me up from the position he pressed me down into, flat on my back on the ground.

“
Juliette
,” he whispers, and the way he says my name, my
real
name, sets my soul alight.

“I’m not sorry,” I cry stubbornly, meeting his gaze. “After what they did to me…
none of them suffered enough
.”

His hands on my head grip tighter and I squeeze my eyes shut.

This is it. He is going to snap my neck.

My entire body jerks as I feel a set of lips on my mouth, a fiery kiss that could light up the night sky above us. I can’t help but respond, my body betraying six years of longing and despair in one single moment.

It is better than I ever thought it would be, to be kissing Jason Ross again. His hands move to my hips and jerk me closer, our chests pressed together, our hearts beating rapidly in unison.

And if I said I wanted this moment to be any other way, I’d be lying. Because, it was always going to end like this; in a blaze of glory. He was always going to find out that I am
her
. That I am alive and in front of him, wreaking my vengeance. I hadn’t counted on it being this soon, but he’s smart, and I underestimated him.

“Christ,” he whispers in between hungry kisses. “Julz. You’re here. You’re
here
.” His palms are warm as they slide against my bare stomach, my shirt hanging open thanks to him violently ripping it apart only moments ago, touching every exposed part of my flesh. It’s not a sexual act so much as a desperate one; a touch that begs the question
Is this real?

Finally, he breaks away and I see that his eyes are shimmering, too.

“I’m not going to kill you,” he growls. “Who do you think I am?”

I pull away slightly, my skin on fire wherever he touches me.

“I think you’re Dornan’s son,” I say sadly. “And you just kissed the girl who’s going to kill him.”