Chapter 20: Keane

“I got some intel on Eve.”
“Hello to you, too,” said Beau, raising the half-empty bottle of whisky to his lips for another drink as Teague emerged from the thick woods and into the cemetery clearing, where Beau and I had been enjoying a drink for the last hour. Beau held out the bottle to Teague, and he took it from him before taking a long swallow, making a face before handing it to me.
“What kind of intel?” I demanded, setting the bottle aside momentarily. “And when the hell did you see her?”
“I just left her room.”
Jealously clawed up my throat as my body tensed, preparing for battle, but I kept silent for a moment, waiting for Teague to explain.
“Nothing happened,” he assured me. “In fact, I was just surprised she wasn’t with you two after what happened to Kasey.”
“We tried,” said Beau with a shrug. “She basically told us to fuck off.”
“Yeah, that’s what she told me, too.” Teague took a seat on the grass, leaning up against a tree for support as he looked between Beau and me.
“Are you going to tell us about this secret intel?” I asked. “Or just fuck around until I beat it out of you?”
Teague snickered. He was proud of himself, I could tell, and I wanted to smash his face in for being so fucking smug about it.
“You’ll never guess who her stepfather is,” he said, and I glanced at Beau, who shrugged before looking back at Teague.
“Don’t keep us in suspense.”
“Jack Fucking Warrick.”
“Jack Warrick,” I repeated. “That shady ass politician turned criminal?”
“The very one.”
I rubbed a hand over my face angrily. I’d heard bad things about Jack Warrick. Who hadn’t, really? Not only was he shady, but he was also dangerous. An underground criminal who managed to get away with anything and everything because of the money, power, and status he held.
“Did she tell you anything else?” I demanded, pushing myself up off the headstone I’d been perched on. “Is he the reason she’s here?”
“She wouldn’t say,” said Teague. “She just got really defensive and kicked me out.”
The simmering rage below the surface boiled over as the image of a man like Jack Warrick hurting Eve in some way consumed me. I wheeled on my friends. “If he’s done something to her, if he’s hurt her, I’ll fucking kill him.” I heaved the bottle of whiskey at a tree, and it shattered, splattering the ground and littering the grass with glass.
“We don’t know anything yet, man,” Teague said with a shrug. “For all we know, Eve being here has nothing to do with Jack Warrick.”
“Fuck that.” An animalistic smile ripped from the bottom of my throat, and Beau raised his hands in the air as if to try to settle me.
“Teague’s right,” he said gently. “She’ll hate us more if we assume and get it wrong.”
“There’s no way she can be the stepdaughter of a man like Warrick and have it not be related,” I growled. “He’s done something to her. Something bad. And when I find out what, I’ll fucking rip his balls off and shove them down his fucking throat.”
“You know we’ll help,” said Beau softly. “But let’s find out the truth first, Keane.”
“The way she got all defensive when I said his name makes me think he is involved,” Teague said. “I just don’t know how.”
“Or maybe you’re wrong,” I mused, running a hand through my hair. “Maybe she is a psycho and belongs here.”
“Do you really believe that?” Beau asked, and I shrugged.
“People end up here for a reason,” I said. “Us included. Is it so far-fetched?”
My friends fell silent as we pondered this. I didn’t know what to believe, not really, and it didn’t help that Eve had no intention of telling us even a smidgen of the truth. I needed that from her, we all did, and the furious anger in me threatened to spill over, to rip the truth from her very soul.
“How is she?” I asked Teague, dropping back down on top of an old headstone. “After Kasey?”
“Not well. Shaken up. I don’t think she expected something like that to happen.”
“She’s in for a real surprise then,” muttered Beau. “It’s not all butterflies and rainbows here. I don’t think she gets that.”
“We need to keep an eye on her,” I said, wishing I hadn’t broken the liquor bottle against the tree. I felt like getting shit-faced suddenly. Anything to escape from this fucked up reality. “We don’t know what she’s capable of yet, or why she’s here. She could hurt herself, too.”
“She doesn’t want to be around us,” said Teague. “I don’t know what to do besides watch her from a distance.”
“Then that’s what we’ll do until she’s ready to come back to us,” I said with a shrug. “She can only stay cut off for so long. She needs support, someone to lean on.”
“I thought we’d had her.” Beau shook his head and got to his feet, starting to pace. “I thought after the night we had with her, she’d want to be here. With us.”
“She’s more stubborn than we anticipated,” I said with a shrug, and a smile rose to my lips. I licked them, imagining the sweet taste of Evelina on my tongue. “That just means we need to try harder, right?”
Beside me, Teague sighed heavily, folding his arms and shaking his head. “I don’t know, man,” he said, and I was surprised to hear the doubt in his voice. “Is she worth it? Is this girl worth all this time?”
“Worth it?” I turned to face Teague as the anger swelled inside my chest once more. “She’s more than worth it, brother. She’s exactly what the fuck we’ve been waiting for. And you fucking know it.”
Teague didn’t speak at once, and my fists balled at my sides. I turned to Beau. “What about you?” I asked. “Do you think she’s not worth it, either?”
Beau was quiet for a moment, wringing his hands together as he spoke. “She seems like a lot of trouble,” he said softly. “When was the last time we spent this much time and energy on fucking a girl, Keane?”
“Never.”
“Exactly.”
I smiled, trying to push the rage below the surface. “I promise you both,” I said. “Once she submits to us, you’ll understand why we tried so hard. There’s something different about this girl. I’m telling you. She belongs to us. And nothing, nothing at all, is going to stop me from having her.”