Page 103 of Burned

The thoughts are sick within themselves.

There should be no relief. There will be no forgiveness.

“But then you grew into your own. You were a Bachman by blood.” Isobel stares at me. “You had it all at your fingertips.Wealth. Privilege. Power. But you turned away from it. Carlos both envied and feared you while he had you.”

Isobel looks like she wants to reach for me. She clasps her hands tighter. “Something shifted in him when you started talking about joining the Brotherhood and taking your rightful place as a Bachman. Saying the time was coming.”

Rafe puts the pieces together where I can’t. “Lucian had the name, the blood, the natural command — and Carlos knew he was losing control.” He looks at me. “And he feared that when you joined the Brotherhood, his men would follow.”

“Back then,” she looks away. “I read your leaving as something different. Carlos planted seeds in my mind, and when he meddles, things take root.”

She’s alluding to the thing that hangs over the room, clamping the two of us together like a vice in a way that I hate.

I know that no matter what Isobel says, she will never earn my forgiveness.

“Now I see the past for what it was,” she continues. “You started to get under his skin again. This time, in a bad way, one that hurt his pride, his ego, and, if he has one, his heart. He had taken you in, and now you were turning on him.” Isobel adds, “In his eyes, at least.”

I shake my head. “That’s not how it was.”

I only understand loyalty. My thoughts, my actions, everything, go through a filter of loyalty to my people, first.

Yet, my entire life, betrayal has surrounded me.

He thought that my joining my family meant I was turning my back on him. And the whole time I was with him, I thought he was looking out for me, getting me ready.

“I thought we had an unspoken agreement. I thought we wanted the best for one another.” I stare around the room, stunned. I look at my men. “I’m loyal to a fault, aren’t I?”

“You’re one of us,” Rafe says sharply. He holds my gaze till I feel his words.

“Aye,” Bayne’s low Scottish rumble filling the space. “My clan is the same way.

My men and I are loyal to one another. To death do us part. If I didn’t see the same in you, Lucian, I wouldn’t be here.”

We haven’t even put the pieces together of how Caleb fits into this whole thing, or how Carlos infiltrated the Village. And I want to ask Isobel what Carlos told her that was so vile that she’d turn on me, too.

Asking feels like a betrayal to Erin. I can’t think straight. I feel like I’m starting to go mad.

I’m relieved when there’s the sound of a thick fist pounding the wood door of the library.

Mack opens the door. “Time to go.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

ERIN

Moving should havethe decency to arrive at midnight under a storm, with thunder and ominous music and enough warning for everyone to run. Instead, it comes while Ryan is playing with plastic dinosaurs in a cardboard castle in the living room.

Cass is in the kitchen trying a new recipe for lemon bars, arguing with Gregory about what ingredients self-rising flour contains, and I am trying to convince Lucian that toast counts as a meal if one is emotionally exhausted.

“You need protein,” he says.

I stare at the plate he has placed in front of me.

Eggs. Fruit. Some expensive-looking ham. Toast cut diagonally because apparently even mafia kings have sandwich aesthetics.

“I need coffee and no more drama before bed.”

Across the kitchen, Cass lifts her mug. “Seconded.”