I shake my head. “No, we’re a team, Noah. A pack. We’re not just going to abandon you.”
“This isn’t a fight we can win, Henley. This isn’t high school. Anton has the power to really hurt us, and without Rivers here to back me up, we don’t stand a chance. Fuck, even with Rivers we don’t stand a chance.”
“I’m not leaving you to deal with this on your own,” I tell him.
“I’m with Henley,” Tully says. “You’re my brother and I’d never forgive myself if anything happened to you and I didn’t at least try.”
“Try how?” he demands, pushing up from the porch so he can turn to face us. “What are you going to do? What can you do? We’re ants in this little game.”
“I don’t know, Noah,” Tully yells back at him, pushing to her feet to get right in his face. “All I know is that you’re my brother and no matter what, I’m there.”
“I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if something happened to you,” he tells her. “This is too risky.”
“And I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if something happened to you,” she repeats.
Noah huffs as he watches his sister before stepping into her and pulling her into a tight hug. “Will you at least sleep here tonight so I can keep an eye on you?”
“Yeah, but what about mom and dad? I don’t want to risk Anton’s guys going back there and scaring them.”
Noah releases her and she steps back as his eyes flick across to me. “There’s a roll of cash in the top of my closet. Give them some of that and tell them to go spend the night in the city. They’re always talking about getting away for a night.”
“Ummmmm…roll of cash?” Tully questions, raising a suspicious brow.
“Seriously?” he grumbles. “I work for a guy like Anton for seven years and you don’t expect me to have rolls of cash lying around?”
“Rolls…like plural?” she grins. “Just how many rolls are we talking and where are they hiding?”
“Don’t even think about it,” he tells her. “You’re not stealing my cash so you can go on some ridiculous shopping spree. Besides, most of that is your college fund.”
Tully’s mouth drops open. “Excuse me?” she grunts. “What college fund? What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Really? All my secrets have to be out in the open but you’re going to stand there and pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about? Come on, Tullz. Me and Rivers worked out years ago that you want to be a florist and your personality alone tells me that you’re never going to work under someone else, so that leaves one option– you want your own fucking store. Be your own boss.”
She gapes at him for a moment. “Are you kidding me? I’ve gone to extraordinary lengths to hide this and you’ve known all along?”
“Yeah,” he grins.
Tully gapes a little more before turning to me. “Did you know about this?”
Damn it. Why did I have to be brought into this twin thing? “Kind of,” I cringe. “He mentioned a while ago that he knew and wanted to keep it quiet until you were ready to tell him yourself.”
“But…all this time?”
“Yeah.”
“Damn,” she looks back at her brother. “You’re not paying for me to go to college. Besides, I’ll be going to community college to get my business degree. It won’t be that expensive. I can work a part-time job and pay for it myself.”
“Only you’re not going to community college,” he says with a cringe. I guess this is where it all comes out. “I may have applied to BHU on your behalf.”
Tully shrieks. “You did what?”
Noah shrugs unapologetically as I groan. “Are you really that surprised?” I ask her. “I mean, he’s notorious for doing shit like this.”
“Yeah, I know, but usually I can guess when he’s up to something; but this…I mean, I’m completely blindsided.”
“That was the plan,” he tells her. “If you knew, you would have tried to stop me, and for the record, we should be hearing something from them soon. Now, can we stop talking about this shit and focus on the important stuff? I’m going to be really fucking pissed if my girl gets kidnapped out of her bed in the middle of the night because we were too busy talking shit to work out a plan.”
“Fine,” Tully says, dropping back down beside me. “But the ball’s in your court. You’re the closest with him. You know how he works, what makes him tick.”
“You see,” Noah murmurs. “That’s the problem. He doesn’t do his own dirty work. He would send me and Rivers to do it for him so I’m at a fucking loss. I have no idea how this is going to play out, who he’s going to send, and what games they’re going to play.”