Enough to send my heart blasting into my throat, jackhammering inside my chest.
Royal doesn’t barrel into the two cars. He’s not here to wreck them the way he did Devlin’s old car. He has places to go this time, and nothing’s going to stop him. He spins the wheel, the tires biting into the shoulder as he tries to skirt the two cars before they can right themselves to face us head on.
The tires skid, sinking into the soft mud of the shoulder before the car slides to a stop. Royal curses and tries to gas the car, but the tires only spin in the melting earth.
“Let me the fuck out,” I yell again, grabbing the door handle and jerking so hard I think it will break off in my fingers.
Royal hits the button, and the locks release. I spill out into the rain, my whole body shaking, my heart racing, my mind numbed with panic. Royal was the one who always calmed me, but now he does the opposite. Now, I have to calm myself, and I haven’t mastered the art yet.
My twin gets out of the car, and I turn to him. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” I scream. “You would have sacrificed all of us for a taste of someone else’s revenge?”
I watch the conflicting emotions flicker across my brother’s face, lit by the headlights of the three cars. Anger. Defensiveness. Guilt.
“Baron said we were safe.”
“You didn’t know that,” I answer. “You don’t know what could have happened. You could have killed us all, Royal. I’m done. I’m so fucking done with all of this. With all of you.”
“Crystal…” he starts. But I never find out what he was going to say. A car door slams behind me, and Royal’s eyes snap to the road behind me. The cold, hardness returns to his face, and he straightens, glaring over my shoulder at the person approaching.
“You okay?” Devlin asks, moving up behind me and putting a protective arm around me.
Suddenly, everything in me breaks. I’m so relieved that he’s here that I can’t stop the tears from rising to my eyes. I just want the comfort of him, the safety of this boy who was once a threat and is now my refuge. I want to lie in bed with him on a Friday night and laugh and talk and love. His warm arms around me are everything I need right now, everything I’ve always needed. He may have hurt me before, but he is not the danger anymore.
I turn and bury my head in his shoulder.
“You’re okay,” he murmurs, this time not asking.
“Get your hands off our sister,” King growls behind me.
I want to hold onto Devlin, but I know I can’t right now. I have to be strong now, not fall apart, not let him do the dirty work for me. I force myself to lift my head, drawing strength from the firm certainty of his grip.
I turn back to the Rover, where King sits inside, the back door still open from when I jumped out. “Get back in the car, King,” I say. “You’re injured. You’re going to get yourself killed, and what good will you be then?”
The twins come around the front end, but I only look at King. I can’t see his injury, but even in the darkness, lit only by headlights and the occasional flicker of lightning, I can see that his face is stark white. I can see blood covering the hand that holds the sweater to his side. He starts to get out of the car, then grimaces, gripping the door and dropping his head to draw a breath.
Behind me, I hear two more car doors slam. My brothers were right. The Darling cousins came to meet us, to defend their territory from our invasion. This must be the last house, the one with the party. It strikes me then that they’re doing what the Darlings did twenty years ago. I heard it from the Dolce side that time. Now, I can see it with my own eyes. I can see that things aren’t so simple. I can only hope my brothers aren’t consumed by revenge for the rest of their lives. This has gone on long enough. It ends here, tonight.
“She’s right,” Baron says quietly to King. “Just sit tight for a minute, and we’ll get you home to clean that up.”
King nods, his lips pinched together so hard they’ve lost all color. I know it will kill him later, that he’ll consider it a weakness that he couldn’t fight. But he has the sense to know that he’d only get in the way, that he would put our brothers in danger if he tried to fight like that. He slides back on the seat, and Baron closes the door and turns to us.
And then it’s the seven of us.
Colt and Preston fall in on Devlin’s either side. I guess Colt’s a fighter when he has to be. Royal stands at the driver’s side door of the Range Rover. Duke and Baron stand next to him, my three brothers facing the Darlings.
And then there’s me, standing in the middle, not wanting a fight at all. It’s just as it’s been all year, but now it’s more than that, too. Now I know more. Now I am more.
“Stop fighting,” I say, raising my voice to be heard over the driving rain. “It doesn’t have to be this way.”
“But it is this way,” Preston says from my left.
“You heard my brother,” Royal says slowly. “Take your hands off our sister.”
“Whoa there,” Colt says behind me. “Guess it’s time to bring out the big guns.”
A second later, I see what he’s talking about. Royal lifts his hand slowly, and my heart lurches in my chest. The pistol points straight at my chest.
Devlin tries to move past me, but I grab his hand and step the same way, blocking him from Royal with my body.