Three to Fall (Saint View Slayers vs. Sinners #3)

5. Grayson

5

GRAYSON

“ A nd then I cut off each of his fingers…but only the tips. Because I’m not a monster. Guy needs to be able to jack off, after all.”

I paused with my hand still on the doorknob and wondered why I was even surprised to find my apartment a mess and five big guys sprawled out in various positions around the room.

X, the considerate one who’d left his last victim with most of his digits, waved a lazy hand from the rug where he was laid out amongst empty pizza boxes. “Hey, Gray!”

Ace and Torch nodded in my direction from the card game they were playing at the kitchen counter, but then went back to it like it was any other Tuesday.

Whip glanced at his watch, and then out the floor-to-ceiling windows, blinking when he noticed the time. “Shit, Gray. Sorry.” He kicked X. “Help me clean up. This place is trashed.”

X rolled his eyes. “Do I look like I do buckets and mops?”

Whip didn’t miss a beat. “Do I look like I’ll think twice about putting my size twelve up your ass? Don’t be a fucking pig.”

X grumbled but flipped onto his stomach and pushed up onto his feet. He picked up a pizza box, and when it gave the telltale noise of a single piece sliding around, he flipped it open. “Ooh! Pineapple! Mine!”

Whip cringed, watching X shove the entire piece of cold, fruity pizza in his mouth. “Yours because pineapple on pizza is nasty and nobody else would touch that with a ten-foot pole.”

X winked at him, shoving more into his mouth. “Trig agrees with me, don’t you, Trig?”

My brother sat on the couch, arms spread across the back of it as if he owned the place, knees widespread and posture relaxed.

Like twenty-four hours earlier we hadn’t been in a standoff, Whip’s belt around my neck, his noose around Kara’s. Like he hadn’t confessed to killing my wife.

Like he hadn’t revealed every truth about her life, and mine, and ripped me out of the false sense of security I’d built up around myself for years.

“Gray eats pineapple on pizza too.” Trig watched me carefully, his sharp eyes focused, despite the table full of empty beer bottles in front of him.

Despite pretending to do other things, my murder squad were all watching me, waiting to see how I reacted. It was clear they’d quickly forgiven Trigger and had spent the last day catching up with him.

Now they were waiting to see where I stood.

“Used to,” I corrected, sitting beside him. “Don’t eat pizza at all anymore.”

Trig raised an eyebrow. “No shit? Why not?”

“Became a doctor. Saw what food like that does to your heart. Would prefer not to go out like that.”

Trig leaned forward and plucked his beer from the coffee table; despite the fact it wasn’t even ten in the morning. He took a slow swallow. “Some of us probably ain’t gonna live long enough for that to be a problem.” He tipped the bottle in my direction. “But good for you. You always were the smart one.” He pointed to the cooler at his feet. “You want one?”

I stared at the man I hadn’t seen in five years. I’d spent so long blaming him. So long hating him. Used those feelings to hide the truth of who my wife had been and the unspeakable things she’d done.

I’d accepted Trig’s story as truth so easily that I knew, from a psychiatric perspective, some part of me had known all along. I’d ignored the middle-of-the-night phone calls and hushed conversations with her sister. I’d ignored the money rolling in, which was way too much for a legitimate startup business. I’d ignored the way she could never look me in the eye.

I might not have known exactly what she was doing, but that was only because I hadn’t wanted to know.

I wasn’t the smart one.

Trig had seen through my wife’s lies and deceptions all along. He’d been the one brave enough to do something about it, even though it had cost him. He’d lost five years of his life. His friends.

His brother.

I dropped my keys and phone into a bowl on the table. “Give me a beer.”

Trig grinned and flipped the lid on the cooler, plucking a cold can from the watery ice inside. He handed it to me, and I cracked the tab, the beer fizzing softly.

Trig eyed me, wiping water off his hands on his jeans. “So you want to tell your big brother all about this woman you’re so willing to die for?”

Things weren’t fixed between us. That could only happen with time and patience and learning to trust each other again. But that could only start by making an effort. By wanting it to happen.

In Trig’s eyes, I could see the hope. He thought he was hiding it, but I knew him better than anyone.

I took a sip of the beer. “Her name is Kara.”

“You’re in love with her.” It wasn’t a question. It was a statement of fact.

“Yes.”

“You know I’m going to run a full background check on her, right? Dig into every little skeleton in her closet.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t expect anything less. But you’ll be surprised by what you find.”

He eyed me. “In a good way?”

I shrugged, swallowing down another mouthful of cold liquid, even though what I really wanted was a bowl of cereal and a coffee. “Cults. A kid. Two other boyfriends.”

The room suddenly went as silent as a tomb.

Whip stared over at me like I’d grown a second head. “What the fuck?”

A sharp knock on the door had all five pulling weapons and pointing them at the peephole.

I frowned and waved a hand at all of them as I put the beer down and stood. “We’re going to need to talk about knee-jerk reactions to stressful situations. And drinking as a way of coping with negative feelings. You’re all triggered. Put those away. It’s probably my neighbor, asking for a cup of sugar, and you’ve all got guns and knives out like you want to make chop suey out of her.”

“A cup of sugar? Seriously? Who fucking bakes at this time of the morning?” Ace grumbled, lowering his gun half an inch.

X spun his knife between two fingers. “You do know most bakers actually start at like two in the morning, right?”

Ace gaped at him. “That’s the middle of the night. Why the fuck do they start so early?”

X launched into an explanation of how to bake sourdough with a starter that nobody had asked for. I just shook my head and went to the peephole.

Hawk and Hayden stood on the other side.

I glanced over at the guys. “It’s not my neighbor. But I know them.”

I paused, not having any idea how to introduce the two of them to the men who’d taken over my apartment.

This is my brother and his psychopath friends. Don’t worry about them. They’re harmless…unless they’re out stalking men from their hit list. Don’t worry. You’re probably not on it…

Shit. Maybe I should check that.

Trig waved his hand around impatiently. “Just open the door, Gray. We aren’t going to hurt your little friends.”

Someone calling the ex-leader of the Sinners street gang and the vice prez of a notorious MC my “little friends” would have been completely and utterly laughable…had it come from anyone but the five men in this room.

Hawk and Hayden might have taken a life or two. They might have run guns or drugs. Gotten in fights. Even done a stint or two in prison.

But neither of them was a psychopath.

The men in this room had done and seen things that Hawk and Hayden couldn’t even dream of.

I knew, because they told me everything, and even I found some of it hard to stomach. The murder squad made the Slayers and the Sinners look like boys playing make-believe.

I shot Trigger a look. “Be nice, okay? You fucking owe me, and they’re important to me.”

I opened the door.

Hayden and Hawk both stiffened on the other side, surveying the men in the room.

Hawk’s hand hovered toward his hip where I knew he kept his gun.

Hayden elbowed him sharply and cleared his throat. “Bad time?”

I gave them both a smile. “Nope. Great time. Come in. You can meet my…friends.” I turned to the guys. “This is Hayden and Hawk. They’re my…”

I glanced at the two of them for help, ’cause fucked if I’d know what we were to each other. I wouldn’t exactly class us as friends, considering this was the first time I’d ever seen either of them without Kara around.

But I wanted them to be. They loved Kara. And so did I. That was only going to work if the three of us could get along as well.

X widened his eyes. “Wait. Wait. Are these your lovers, Gray?” He rushed to shake Hawk’s hand, literally lifting it from his side and pumping it up and down. “Bro! I am an LGBTQ+ ally. I just want you to know that. I put a rainbow flag in my window every pride month and I’m on the lookout for a gay best friend. You could be it!” He slung his arm around Hawk’s shoulders. “BFFs! BFFs!”

Hawk did a double take and gave me a “what the fuck?” look as X dragged him into the room.

I just shrugged. “Just roll with it. He’s harmless.”

Sort of.

“Come in,” I told Hayden, making room for him to step inside so I could shut the door behind him. “Don’t let X scare you. He’s overexcitable. Like a golden retriever.”

Except golden retrievers didn’t generally kill you slowly and painfully. But that conversation could probably wait for another day.

X had already gotten distracted taking ingredients from my cupboard because apparently the talk of fresh bread had made him feel like baking. Hawk and Hayden did the rounds, shaking hands with the other guys and introducing themselves before perching on the couch facing me.

Hayden smoothed his hands over his jeans. “We just wanted to come by and make sure you were okay. You left before we could catch up.”

I rubbed a hand across my throat absentmindedly. “Nothing but a few bruises. I’ll be fine.”

Hawk cleared his throat. “Kara didn’t tell me what happened exactly. Just said you saved her life.”

I could feel Trigger watching on, his body tense.

But Kara hadn’t said anything to Hawk and Hayden about who her attacker had been. And I suspected that considering Trig hadn’t actually hurt Kara, that maybe it was better if Hawk and Hayden never knew exactly what had gone down in this room twenty-four hours earlier.

I’d only just gotten my brother back. I didn’t want to lose him again because Hawk kept trying to kill him. Especially because there was a very good chance it wouldn’t be Hawk who won that fight if it ever came down to it.

I couldn’t imagine anyone taking on the murder squad and living to tell the tale.

Kara had been smart not to say anything. It was for their own safety.

And so Trigger and I had a shot at being brothers once more.

God, I loved that woman.

I swallowed hard. “I love her. I’d do anything for her.”

I waited for Hawk’s expression to cloud over. For his fingers to bunch into fists. For him to take a swing at my face.

But all that happened was he shrugged. “Yeah, well. I think she loves you too. So that’s probably a good thing.”

I really fucking hoped so.

X watched the interaction with interest, his head swiveling back and forth between us like we were at a tennis match. “So all three of you are poking that Kara chick? I mean, I get it. She’s got a banging body. All tits and ass…”

Hawk, Hayden, and I all turned to stare at him. Hawk’s low, protective growl was all Doberman to X’s golden retriever energy.

Whip clamped a hand on the back of X’s neck. “You know what? I just remembered we left a man tied to a table at my house! Time to go back there and see if he’s still alive! Right, X?”

X propped his chin up on two hands, elbows resting on the countertop, and shrugged Whip off. “Not yet! I want to hear more about Gray’s boyfriends.”

Whip shoved him toward the door, nodding for the others to join them. “Come on. The guy on the table at my place still had his eyeballs. You can remove them. You know you love that.”

X perked up at that and trotted down the hallway after the others, leaving me, Hawk, and Hayden staring after them.

I grimaced at the two men. “So…that’s my friends…”

Hawk cocked his head to one side. “Have you introduced them to Scythe and Vincent? I think they’d have a lot in common.”