Stolen Crown by S. Massery
Gemma
Delia comesto see me off. Aunt Mary has packed her bags and will be returning with me, while Aunt Margaret plans on staying with everyone else. I’ve decided to tell Aiden the truth about what I discovered, and then I’ll judge for myself his intentions. If he was as blind as I was about Wilder’s fake death.
Whether he decides to help me or not is another story entirely.
Aunt Mary will act as a liaison between the women here in Bitterwood and the rest of us back in New York. She and Delia both argued yesterday that I needed support. Someone who has been in the family for decades. A person to bounce my ideas off of, and to potentially stop me from doing something stupid.
Although, Dalton pointed out that even Aunt Mary couldn’t stop me if I really wanted something done.
“Just don’t paint the streets red,” he joked.
Now, he clasps my shoulder and thrusts a box of ammunition into my hands.
“What’s this for?”
“That handgun in your car,” he replies.
I stare at him.
He shrugs, nonchalant. “I don’t like unknowns. But you know how to use it—it’s the same as the one we practiced with after dinner.”
Extra shooting practice. The sort of information I could’ve absorbed over a month or six, crammed into less than twenty-four hours. After firearm basics, he had Grace go over some self-defense moves with me. Surprisingly, a few other cousins joined in. We were all sweaty and panting by the time she was done with us. And it helped my confidence—exactly what the lesson was intended to do.
I shake his hand. “Thank you, Dalton. I appreciate everything you’re doing here. Bitterwood is lucky to have Safe Haven.”
“Good luck with everything, Gemma.” He glances back at Grace. “Hear that? The name is sticking.”
She rolls her eyes, then hugs me. I squeeze her tight.
“Stay safe,” she says.
Delia is next, clasping my hand. “Screw being safe. Take risks—just make sure your priorities are straight.”
I nod. They are: I’m focused on my family. I try to pull away, but she holds me tighter.
“Your current goals don’t have to take priority,” she adds. “I thought my priority was taking down my family, but in the end…”
She told me her story yesterday. Her fight—and the way she ended up closer to the guy who helped her succeed. Her now-husband. She fought for him, and isn’t that exactly what she’s telling me to do?
“It can be the scariest thing in the world to trust another person with your heart.”
“Thank you,” I tell her.
Aunt Mary waits by my—Amelie’s—car. She climbs into the passenger seat, easily lifting the gun and setting it on her lap. My face heats, but she doesn’t say anything. I give Shooter one last ear rub before joining my aunt and firing up the engine.
Driving away isn’t as hard as I thought it would be. It doesn’t feel like I’m leaving pieces of my family behind—I am, but they’re safe here. It feels more like I’m heading back to where I belong.
“Your father made the right decision, you know.”
I wince. “Which one? He made a lot of bad decisions, too.”
She waves her hand. “Putting you in charge. Colin is too young. Too angry. Look what happened at the mall? Senseless death.”
I glance at her. “Do you blame him for Kai?”
“It could’ve been avoided.”
We go quiet after that, because it’s true—it was unnecessary.
“I was flounced around like bait,” I admit. “And I was too dense to even see it until it was too late.”
“Your brother should’ve seen it,” Aunt Mary says. “And he didn’t. He rushed in to try and save you, regardless of the fact that it was your choice—and your father’s—to give yourself up. You were brave, dear. Don’t forget that.”
We get on the highway and lapse into silence. I’m bone-tired. I wish I had time to actually have a conversation with my father. I wish I knew he believed in me enough to leave me everything, instead of just assuming I was the spare child. The castaway because of my gender.
“When did he change his will?” I ask her.
She adjusts herself, then fiddles with the temperature control. “Not too long ago,” she says. “He did warn me about it in one of the conversations, but it was already done.”
The sun is creeping up over the horizon.
I glance over again. There’s more gray in her hair than the last time I saw her. Her light hair is pulled back into a braid today, almost completely silvery-gray at the temples and streaked through the twisted tail down her back.
Something occurs to me suddenly—something at odds with everything she’s said today. It washes away the positive feeling, leaving only a cold ache in the center of my chest.
“When I first arrived yesterday, you said you were happy that I joined you. That I wasn’t meant for this life.” I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from saying more.
She sighs. “I did. I assumed your father wanted you far from danger. Naïve of me, in the face of my last conversation with him. If the war was escalating and you weren’t with the DeSantises, he probably should’ve sent you here in the first place. Your mother would’ve haunted him from Heaven if she knew you were still in the city while they were targeting Wests. And you’re one of the most valuable Wests.”
I don’t know that I believe that.
“But…” She makes a noise in the back of her throat. “If you decide to do something with your life that takes you outside of New York, I would still be proud to call you my niece.”
I tighten my grip on the steering wheel. “You think I’d leave the city?”
There’s still too much to do.
“Calm yourself,” she chides. “I think you should not tie your fate to the family’s. It isn’t a be-all and end-all.”
Interesting.
“It’s your world, though,” I point out. When has Aunt Mary—and the rest of the family—not lived like family is the most important thing?
“And your parents did everything in their power to shield you from it.”
For a reason?
I chew on that.
Soon enough, we’re back in Brooklyn. Traffic clogs, and it’s slow going the rest of the way to the house. My mind zooms back to Aiden. He had texted the address to the number I called him from—Dalton’s phone. Dalton didn’t even notice it was missing. At least, he didn’t say anything to me about it.
I just replaced it on the kitchen counter in the middle of the night and slunk back to bed.
Easy.
The address of Aiden’s house is on the back of a receipt I found and tucked in my sock, and I keep one eye on the clock. I’ll have to leave Brooklyn again, traveling as if I were going toward Hillshire County. That’s where Aunt Mary’s house was, and Jameson’s large estate.
“I have somewhere I need to be,” I tell my aunt. I make the turn onto our street. “Colin might…”
“Throw a fit?” She chuckles. “You didn’t tell him you were going, hmm?”
“It’s a long story,” I mutter. My bitterness rankles. “Besides, do I owe him that?”
She tsks. “Common curtesy for your younger brother. Manners, Gemma. We raised you better than that.”
We, like a group effort. And I guess it was. In a way.
“Just stave him off for a bit,” I plead.
She relents as I stop in front of the house. “Fine, but help me with my bags.”
I leave the engine running and step out, circling to the trunk. She packed enough bags to completely fill the space in the back. Xavier comes out of the house, bounding down the steps, and grabs my wrist.
“What the fuck?” he barks.
I freeze, my gaze going from his grip to his eyes.
“Get your hand off me,” I manage as calmly as possible. Inside, I’m boiling. No one touches me. My fingers twitch.
He slowly releases me, but his gaze is just as dark as mine. “You ask us to protect you, then you vanish—”
“I asked you to protect the Wests,” I interrupt. “I don’t need a personal bodyguard—or worse, someone who thinks they deserve to know where I am and who I’m with.”
He sneers. “I’m not a groupie, Gemma.”
“You’re Rob’s son.” Aunt Mary appraises him. “An Eldridge.”
Xavier’s shock has him stepping back. “You knew my father?”
“And mother,” she says evenly. “Don’t expect me to give you free information, though. Especially after manhandling my niece.”
He scowls. “She left a mess in her wake.”
“She has been gone for a day and a half,” I retort. “Tell Colin I’ll catch up with him later.” I shove Aunt Mary’s bags into Xavier’s arms and climb back in Amelie’s car.
“What’s the plan?” he calls. “Still hiding?”
I roll down the window. “No. Things are changing. Tonight.”
He nods, immobile in my rearview mirror as I drive away. I shiver, his gaze still following me until I’ve rounded the turn and disappeared from sight.
A thrill of excitement chases through me, and I sit up straighter. I grow more restless the farther out of the city I get, heading the way I’d go to Aunt Mary’s old house. And then Amelie’s car’s GPS beeps, warning me of the upcoming exit, and I find myself in a quiet, forest-shrouded town not unlike Bitterwood.
A gate bars access. I roll to a stop beside the speaker. It has a call box with a sign that says to dial the house number, then the pound key. There’s another keypad, too, without instructions.
I type in Aiden’s house number, and it crackles with static. A moment later, his deep voice says, “You made good time.”
I frown. “How did you know it was me?”
“Anyone else I might be expecting would know the code. Come in. Pull into the garage.”
For privacy? In the most private neighborhood I’ve ever seen this close to Manhattan? I shrug it off and navigate through the now-open gate and locate his house. The garage door is sliding open, revealing his battered motorcycle against the far wall and my car parked perfectly on one side. There’s enough space for me to navigate in, and then I climb out.
I exhale.
What am I doing?
Nerves bounce through me. I cast another glance around, surprised at how much stuff is in here. Shelves of tools and plastic bins, neatly labeled with black marker. Aiden’s helmet, plus the additional one, are balanced on the seat of the bike. Unbidden, I walk forward and run my hand along the scraped paint. That was us, too. My skin is still scabbed from sliding across the asphalt, although it looks a lot better than it did.
The door into the house opens, revealing Aiden.
I step forward, then freeze. I can’t just throw myself at him—again. His eyes are dark, and he takes me in quickly, from my borrowed leggings and shirt up to my hair piled on top of my head. In an effort to be anything other than awkward, I hook my thumb back at my car.
“Glad to see she’s still in one piece.”
He nods once, then gestures for me to enter.
I slip past him without touching and kick off my shoes in the little laundry-slash-mud room.
“Not planning on using those boots as weapons again?” His voice sounds right behind me, his warm breath raising goosebumps on the back of my neck.
“Not this time,” I manage.
“Knife?”
“In the car.” Along with the gun.
I go through the kitchen and into the open living room. The house is beautiful, and so much more of Aiden than I expected.
“My office is upstairs,” he says.
I turn back to him. His stance could trick someone else into thinking he’s relaxed—legs widespread, hands in his pockets—but the tension is practically pouring off him.
“You want me upstairs?”
He inclines his chin. “Easier to keep you here.”
I scoff.
He circles me without touching, and I have to fight to suppress my sudden shiver. “No knife, no phone. No boots to crush into my feet, even.”
There’s a grin in his voice, even if I can’t see it—because I’m too busy focusing on my breathing.
“Are you privy to your father’s plans?” I ask, in an effort to stop this whole thing from being derailed. It’s either that or I give in to my temptation and kiss him—or worse.
I am on a mission.
Of course, this wasn’t part of the strategy Aunt Mary and I talked about with Delia…
“I try not to know everything.” He stops in front of me. “And before Wilder died, I just followed orders to protect my family.”
From us, among others.
I shudder and back away. “How am I supposed to tell you the hardest thing I’ve ever had to admit?”
“Why is it hard?” His brows furrow.
“Because if you don’t believe me, I don’t… I don’t know what I’ll do.” My back hits the wall, and there I stop. “But I think it’s something that you don’t know—I believe that much.”
He tilts his head. “You thought I knew this piece of information already.”
I jerk my head up and down.
“Okay, Gem. Time to spit it out.”
Rip off the Band-Aid.
I take a deep breath. What the hell, right? I don’t know why this is worse than telling my family. Maybe because I knew they’d share my reactions: the shock and horror of it. Aiden is the wild card.
“Wilder is alive.” I press my lips together as soon as the words are out, trying like hell to read his mind.
He doesn’t move for a moment, like what I just said is still trying to sink in.
“That’s what I discovered in Jameson’s office. Proof that he’s alive. And…” He’d never asked. He’d dragged me down to the DeSantis brothel and tried to scare some sense into me, but he’d never asked if I’d found anything.
“Gemma.”
I shake my head and look away. “Please, if you don’t believe me, don’t say anything. I’ll just walk out of here—”
“Stop.” He catches my chin in his fingers, redirecting my gaze back to him. “I…”
I close my eyes for a moment.
“What’s the proof?” He kisses my temple. “Don’t try to hide from me. We’ve been through this. What proof do you have? Show me.”
I grimace. “Actually, you’ve been holding it for me.” I slip out of his grip and go back into the garage, popping the trunk of my car. He’d closed the garage door after I arrived, and it seems almost too quiet in here. Just my nervous breathing and the click of the trunk’s lock disengaging.
Aiden follows me into the garage and steps up beside me. He’s about to find my secret hiding place—but I trust him with it.
Weird, right?
Still, I glance at him carefully. He shows no indication that this is affecting him negatively… just a wrinkle between his brows as he waits for my evidence.
I shove the door up and pull out the emergency bag—filled with random tools if my car ever decided to break—and a beach towel. Some sand falls out of it. I haven’t been to the beach in ages, though.
Finally, with a small pile of mismatched belongings at my feet, the trunk is empty. The bottom panel lifts, revealing the spare tire. I rotate the stiff board around. There’s a slit in the scratchy fabric. And when I slip out a yellow envelope, he chuckles.
“Clever.”
I can’t hide my smile, but then it drops off. In my hands is the clear evidence that Aiden’s brother isn’t dead, like he was led to believe. Like we were all led to believe.
I mean, Amelie’s whole life got tipped upside down because of this. Luca’s. Aiden’s. Mine. Kai and my father are dead because of it.
“Can I…”
I nod once. “It was in his locked drawer,” I say softly, handing it over.
“Sneaky little devil.” Aiden flips it open and scans the pages.
It’s an email conversation between the chief medical examiner in Manhattan and Jameson. It starts with Jameson’s request for Wilder’s death certificate. The medical examiner replies that it’s hard to forge those documents, and it would take time.
Jameson offers more money, and the man agrees—also saying he has a John Doe body that’s been scheduled for cremation that would work for Wilder’s urn, in case anyone asked questions.
I wait, tense, while Aiden reads through the exchanges.
It ends with one last email from the medical examiner, and the death certificate attached. Cause of death: major traumatic injuries. Believable, I suppose.
“Why did he even need a death certificate?” I muse. “Most people won’t ask. And if it’s a sham, then they’d want a way for it to be reversible.”
Aiden’s gripping the papers so hard, they tremble like leaves in a hurricane.
I reach out and steady him, my hand on his wrist.
“Because of Amelie,” he says under his breath.
His gaze sears into mine.
“Huh?”
“Before the wedding, Amelie and Wilder signed their marriage license. Her father sent it in—I don’t think Dad thought he’d move as quick as he did, or maybe my father thought he’d wait until the following Monday. I don’t know. Either way, the office processed their marriage, and it couldn’t be dissolved until Wilder’s death certificate was produced.” He sets the envelope on the hood of Amelie’s car and grabs my hands. “It’s enough proof. I believe you.”
A weight lifts off my shoulders. “Thank fuck.”
He crushes me into him, his hand cradling the back of my head. I wrap my arms around his waist and hold on tightly, blinking away sudden, intrusive tears. Dear Lord, I didn’t realize how much I needed him to believe me. And it’s more than that, too—I just told him that his brother is alive. There’s so much more to process than just a secret his father has been keeping from him.
There’s the grief and months of agony to unpack, too.
His hands slide down my back and under my ass, lifting me. I wrap my legs around his waist, and then we’re face-to-face.
“Hi.” He brushes a loose strand of hair from my temple, tucking it behind my ear.
My cheeks heat. “Hi.”
“I’m going to take you upstairs, and we’re going to forget about this shit for a few hours.” He grins. “And then, when we come back to reality, we can think about what to do next.”
I nod my agreement, ducking forward to kiss him. I believe him—and that in itself is a lightness I wasn’t expecting. He didn’t know about Wilder. He was following revenge blindly, and his family, too.
It’s Wilder and Jameson who have to pay.
He carries me into the house, but the rumble of the garage door opening stops us. He sets me down carefully and snags my hand, placing a kiss on my knuckles.
“Stay here.”
And then he leaves me alone.
