Elect

Chapter Thirty-nine Chase

It took us exactly one hour to find out what Nixon had written about. I stared at the writing and had to blink a few times in order to understand it. Could it be true?

“Shit.” Tex sighed. “I really don’t know what to say right now.”

Mo’s eyes filled with tears.

Mil didn’t seem shocked at all, but the girl was impossible to shock. I mean, she was Phoenix’s sister and all that. The girl was tough as nails.

Trace scooted away from me a bit. I didn’t blame her. I would scoot away from me and I was me.

“How do we know this is true?” I pointed at the offending journal and cursed. “I mean, that’s crazy, right?”

Mo lost it. She started bawling and then tackled me into the tightest hug I’d ever felt in my entire life.

I didn’t blame her.

She’d been closer than simply a cousin—she’d been like a sister to me my whole life, and now I finally knew why it had felt that way.

Nixon’s mom had had an affair with my dad. I was never my father’s son. This meant my so-called uncle, Nixon’s dad, was my dad. The man I’d called a monster when I was a little kid… was my flesh and blood. How bad did that suck?

So basically my real father was dead.

Because both wives had cheated.

Both wives had done so to get back at one another.

When my mom had learned of Tony’s betrayal, she’d gone to Nixon’s father, who was my real father.

Nixon’s mother had been in love with Tony. They had an affair for two years and then along came Mo and Nixon. Twins. Nobody would have ever known except Nixon’s dad had suspicions and called for a paternity test.

The minute the truth was discovered both women were screwed.

And both of them died for it.

I released Mo and sighed. “It still doesn’t explain how Trace’s parents died.”

“No.” Mo wiped her eyes. “But it explains so much. Why would your father keep this from you? Why would he keep it a secret? Why would he demand Nixon call him Uncle Tony when he was really his dad? Why would he let his brother beat his son! And on top of that…”—she hiccupped—“we’ve been lied to our whole lives. How do we know who to trust?”

The more I thought about it the sicker I became. She was right. Nixon’s real dad—my dad—Tony—had stood by and watched his son get beaten and did nothing.

He stood by and watched the woman he’d claimed to love get beaten, and did nothing.

One thing was for sure: My dad or uncle or whoever the hell he was, was a monster. And he was hiding something. I was going to either get it out of him or kill him with my bare hands. I’d never felt connected to him, never felt like we were close. And now I knew why.

Both men had kept secrets from us—but why?

“I need some air.” I bolted from the room and ran outside. A few of the men looked at me like I’d lost it. To be fair, I was way past merely losing it and on my way to insanity.

“Chase!” Trace ran out of the house in one of my coats and stopped in front of me. “Are you okay?”

“No, I’m not okay!” I yelled. “How the hell am I supposed to answer that? He wasn’t ever just my cousin!” The cold air nipped at my face. “He had always been like a brother to me—he gave me everything and I—”

“What?”

“I took it all from him. All of it!”

“Chase,” Trace warned. “The men. We don’t know who we can trust. We can’t fight… not now.”

“Shh.” I pulled her close. “Someone’s watching. I can see his shadow, stay close,” I whispered. “And go with it.” It could have been one of our men—but I was starting to become a paranoid lunatic when it came to everyone, especially considering my conversation with Tony. What if they worked for him? What if their loyalty wasn’t mine? The shadow moved, and then disappeared behind the building.

I tugged Trace closer and kissed her forehead, speaking up. “I want you. I need to be with you, Trace. Having Nixon gone, it’s killing me.”

“Chase, you can’t…” Trace shook her head. “You can’t be like this. We can’t do this!”

“We aren’t doing anything,” I said in low tones, reaching for Trace’s hand. “Don’t you?” I looked directly at the shadow, hoping to God I wasn’t hallucinating, I mean, two seconds ago I was pretty sure I had died or something. “Don’t you feel the same way?” I looked above Trace’s head at the shadow and then back at Trace.

She jerked her hand away from mine. “It doesn’t matter what I feel. It’s not about me, Chase.”

“But it is.” I reached for her again. This time her hand stayed firmly in mine. She needed to play along or she was going to die. She didn’t know that, but I did. Because I’d just seen my father watching us from the side of the house. Meaning, he had to believe I’d bought it, I’d follow his assignment.

“It isn’t,” Trace sighed. “It never was.”

I jerked her toward me again. She fell against my chest and looked up into my eyes. “What are you doing?”

I sighed. “What I should have done a long time ago.”

I kissed her, hard, and then slid my mouth to her ear to whisper, “I’m going to shoot my gun. This is very important. I need you to collapse against me, okay?”

She nodded and clung to my shirt as I shot my gun into the side of the coat, making a muffled sound as it rang out into the night air.

Trace collapsed on me.

With a curse, I picked her up and carried her back inside.

The men were watching and hopefully so was my father. He’d think I’d tied up one loose end. Oddly enough, this might make him play perfectly into my hands. The sick thing was, that as much as I’d asked all my men to protect her, nobody ran to my side when I shot her—nobody blinked. My family officially sucked.

When we reached the kitchen I told her to crawl down the hallway and into her room, locking the door until I came and told her all was safe. I closed the blinds to the windows, pulled out my knife and sliced down my arm so that I would have actual blood on my hands. Ripping my shirt, I sliced part of my side, using as much of the blood as I could, and then I bandaged myself up.

A knock sounded at the door.

If it was my father, retribution was going to happen a hell of a lot sooner than I’d first thought.

To my utter shock and surprise, and most likely bad luck, I was knocked to the ground by a fist to the face.

“You son of a bitch. I swear I’ll kill you if you actually shot into her perfect body.”

“Nixon?” I gasped.

“No. I’m an angel of death coming to take you to your maker, you ass. Yes it’s me.”

“B-b-but—” I stuttered.

“We don’t have time. I just had to make sure she wasn’t actually shot. You’re lucky I saw Uncle Tony or I would have shot you on the spot. And ruined everything. Nice ring, by the way.”

“Am I dead?” I checked my body for gunshot wounds and was treated to another punch to the jaw.

“Answer your question?” Nixon tilted his head to the side. “Or do I need to make things more clear?”

“Still an ass.”

“Still more like a brother than your cousin, don’t you think?”

I froze.

“Look, I can’t stay. I shouldn’t even be here. I just needed to make sure they made you boss… What did Uncle Tony say tonight?”

“That I deserved to take your place—oh, right, and he told me to tie up loose ends.”

“Trace.” Nixon cursed.

“Yeah, Nixon. What’s going on?”

“Just act normal.” He paced in front of me. “I’m already dead, all right? But you guys, you’re alive, get it? If this goes badly…”

Aw shit. He was telling me what I didn’t want to know. If it went badly, and he did die, then he didn’t want Trace to mourn him all over again.

“But how are Luca and Mr. Alfero—”

“Sorry. This is where our conversation ends.” Nixon raised his hand to my head and everything went black.