Page 45 of Dangerous Promises

It stabs me through the chest to think that Victor was ever going to allow him back onto our property and into our lives.

Of course Sage doesn't know the full story. How could she? I'm not sure I even do.

I still remember the day my father kicked Chet off the property. I was only very young. Too young to understand probably. Victor was older, though, and he should've known better.

We were hiding in the bushes when, back then, Uncle Chet had come barging through the gates of the property covered in blood and in the middle of a meltdown that slung accusations of my father betraying him. My mother had grabbed Vic and I, pulling us away from his path of wrath.

Father had come out quickly, an imposing figure of stability against his brother. I don't remember much of what was said. Just that Chet had been cut off. He was no longer welcome in our business or our family for what he'd done.

There's only one thing Father said that stuck in my mind. "I know you want to chase her memory, but we don't mutilate little girls around here, brother. No matter what their fathers have done."

That one quote stays playing over and over in my mind as I stub out my cigarette and make my way to bed. The inside of the house is quiet, all our people outside by the lake on this warm night.

My tattooed hands clench as I push open the glass door and stand on my bedroom balcony to overlook them. Isla is downthere with the others. Making connections that feel too far away for me now.

My father disowned Chet because he wouldn't let go of his vendetta against Dimitri. Then we held peace between our families for years.

Whatever Chet wants now is clearly the same thing he wanted back then. Sage. Like always, she is at the center of everything. Victor must have known why Chet wanted to hurt her so badly. Or did he simply not care?

My father always made a big deal about family and succession. Whatever Chet held against Dimitri was enough for him to be disowned forever. I've never been anything like my father, but like a mirror of my relationship with my own brother, disowning Chet can't have been an easy choice.

Over a decade later and Chet still can't let it go.

I release a deep sigh and lean against the railing, watching the stars twinkle in the open sky.

What were you thinking, Vic? Why do this? And why hide it from me?

Sadly, I know the answer to the last one. He couldn't trust me. He knew I wouldn't approve.

There's a knock on the door and I look over my shoulder to see Isla has left the party below and is coming to join me on the balcony.

"Good news. Your new car should be here in a few days," she says, smiling as she leans against the rail with me.

I let out a small laugh, mostly at the hilarity that I'd completely forgotten about what that little heathen had done to my car.

"It comes with all the upgrades you wanted this time," Isla says, jostling me with her elbow. I just shake my head, my mind once again distracted by Sage and what her presence means for my family.

"Don't be mad at her for it," Isla says on a sigh and my eye instantly twitches. "She was only-"

"Trying to kill me?" I finish for her, huffing out a laugh and finding my muscles tense of their own accord.

"I was going to say get your attention," Isla says, a knowing smile on her face.

I roll my eyes and don't bother to respond. Because whether either of us likes it, Sage has always had my full attention and she knows it.

I look down over the men walking around our property, some setting bonfires as the sun sets while the braver ones enjoy the lake. I never paid much attention to anything beyond my own needs while Vic was alive, so now I can't even tell if I have the loyalty of my own men.

"Do they trust me, Isla?" I ask, gesturing down to where they are. "They certainly trust you."

"They do," Isla says. "Not a lot of them trusted Victor. With Victor there was division. A select few invited in to see what he really planned and all it did was sow discord amongst the rest. Who couldn't fully trust that your brother's motives were right anymore."

It shouldn't hurt me to hear that. But it does.

"I suppose they were right," I say, fingers clenching the railing, hating the words as they come out.

"Big thing for you to say," Isla says, brushing her hair back from her face in the wind.

"Doesn't mean he should've died for it."