Ember nods, her brows lowering further and further by the second, trying to follow along to every little piece of information.
“Anyway,” I continue, “the tradition is that an heir should be male. So when I was born without a big swinging dick, all hell broke loose. The ‘bad side’ conspired against my parents. They couldn’t handle the idea of a female taking over and becoming their leader, so Carver’s father took it upon himself to murder my parents in their sleep and attempted to take my life along with it. Only he failed.”
Ember sucks in a breath, her eyes wide as she swings her head toward Carver. “The fuck? Your father is a murderer?”
“Was,” he grunts, clearly still a little dirty on the whole topic. “Winter here took revenge into her own hands.”
Ember’s head swings right back to mine, her mouth dropped wide and looking like one of those creepy clowns that swallows balls at a shitty carnival. “YOU KILLED SOMEONE?” she shrieks.
I shrug my shoulder. “What was I supposed to do? He stood over me and admitted it like he was discussing the weather. The knife was already in my hands. I can’t help that my self-control needs a little work.”
“A little work?” Carver scoffs.
“You’re one to talk, asshole.”
“Umm … no,” Ember cuts in, stealing my attention right back. “You’re not about to get lost in some bullshit argument with Carver. Get on with it. Explain.”
“Wait. You’re not freaked out that I killed his dad?”
“I mean, I’m definitely concerned, but not surprised. You kinda give off the ‘don’t fuck with me’ vibe, and you know, there were all those accusations about you killing Kurt not that long ago, and then you just sort of got let off, which was definitely strange. It’s kinda the reason I started snooping in the first place,” she admits. “It was too easy. No one gets let off murder charges like that, so I kinda figured that Dynasty had something to do with it, but I was just guessing. Though, don’t get me wrong, I definitely want to know what’s up with that too.”
I roll my eyes and let out another huff. “Alright,” I tell her. “I’ll explain all of that too.”
“Dynasty first,” she says. “What happened after you killed his dickhead father?”
“Hey,” Carver cuts in.
We both ignore him and I continue my recap of my past few weeks. “So, I kinda killed the guy during my initiation ceremony and everyone saw. So, I was thrown into a cell for a few days, which were those few days that I kinda went missing and you’d asked me where I’d been.”
“You gave me some bullshit excuse.”
“Yeah, sorry about that. I didn’t exactly know how to tell you that I’d just done time for killing some asshole.”
“Okay, we’ll come back to this, but what happened next?”
“Everything happened,” I tell her. “I’ve had all the other people who supported Carver’s dad trying to come after me. Like that attack by my pool the other week. That wasn’t just a random break in like we’d told you. That was a planned attack, and what you didn’t know was that after knocking you out, he drowned me in the pool. I was just lucky that Grayson knows a thing or two about resuscitation.”
“Are you kidding me?” she gasps, wide-eyed. “I fucking knew it. Break-ins just don’t happen like that. I knew there was more to the story. Holy fuck. So was that like some kind of assassin?”
“A hitman,” King grumbles from across the room. “And you were fucking lucky. Had he hit you just a little bit harder, you would have been dead.”
Ember just gapes. “That’s … fuck. I have no words.”
“That’s a first,” Grayson mutters, earning a hard stare from me, though as he stares back, I’m instantly reminded of the way he just fucked me on that table and my cheeks flush the brightest red, something that King and Cruz are all too familiar with. My thighs clench and just as I’d requested of Grayson, I can feel exactly where he’d been. Though judging by the heated look in his eyes, he knows exactly what I’m thinking.
I turn back to Ember, desperately needing to get back on track. “That’s not the only attack we’ve had. Do you remember my stupid BDSM party the boys threw for me?”
“Holy fuck, how could a girl forget? That was the party of the year.”
“For you maybe,” I grumble. “For me, it ended with a shoot-out in the woods that we were lucky to escape.”
“Fuck me in the ass sideways,” Ember breathes. “Are you shitting me? This bullshit is like … a normal occurrence for you. These guys are seriously trying to kill you, but I just … I don’t get it. You’re awesome. They should be happy to have you as their leader, at least, I know I would be.”