17. Chapter Seventeen

Istopped laughing and stared in wide-eyed horror at nothing, unable to look up at her on my monitor.

I only had one secret.

"You didn't treat your own injuries last year," she continued. "You went to see Heath. When you left his home, you were running. Look at how Heath treats you, little sister. His love and devotion are clear."

I took a long, ragged breath.

How does she know that?

"Who are you going to tell?" I asked softly.

"No one," she said simply. "Not a soul. Not even my twin."

"Why?" I looked up at her again, stunned yet still fearful.

"Because I'm having a child with an Immortal. Really, Jacky…I'm not going to tell anyone. The heart is the heart. That has been made very clear to me recently." She turned and smiled. Lifting a hand, she beckoned for someone to join her without needing to say a word.

The man who walked onto the screen had a swagger that couldn't be denied. He was covered in scars, but not ugly because of it. Once, he would have been a heart-stopping, good-looking man. Now, he was definitely a man who had seen more battles than I could comprehend.

"This is Kushim," she introduced. "The bandit who very effectively stole my heart."

"My queen, I do believe you gave it to me," he murmured, leaning down to kiss her. It was so tender. When he looked at the camera, he waved. "I've heard about you, Jacky Leon, through the grapevine, not just from your sister. An old friend of mine runs the Mygi thing."

Zuri practically rolled her eyes. "Hospital. He runs Mygi Hospital. Most people call him Director Johannsson."

"Yeah, he and I met," I said, clicking my tongue on my teeth. They hadn't been pleasant phone calls.

"If you and Heath decide to go public, you have two allies in us," she said with her signature smile. That smile said, ‘I rule this world, and I get what I want.' "Or if you two decide to end it without ever going public or decide you don't have a future together, I'll be here with a child for you to cuddle and play with to ease the bruised heart. But I won't out your relationship. This…" She pointed at Kushim, then patted her baby bump. "This has changed me."

"You could have outed me beforehand," I pointed out. "Why didn't you?"

"I wanted more evidence and decided I was just going to avoid the situation entirely. I didn't want to unleash drama on the family after what had happened to you with Lani and the other rogues, but I did give you a warning last year. I meant it. You needed to distance yourself from Heath. When you didn't and everything with your human family had settled, I decided I wanted to go on vacation. Give you more time and a break from the pressure and give myself time to think. I was tired. Sadly, now there's so much other stuff happening."

"Yeah," I agreed with a huff. "Um…since you know about Heath and me…the BSA might have evidence of it, too." It felt wonderful to get that off my chest. It was even better to know I had a friend in the family who would protect us. Finally, I wasn't keeping a dark secret. My sister knew, and she didn't just want to keep the secret for me, she decided to trust me with her own.

Except, that feeling ended with Zuri's response. I didn't exactly give her good news.

She straightened her back and frowned. "Explain."

"They didn't send me a video of anything about it, but I know the day they had to have put their surveillance in. Heath and I were meeting every Saturday night at my house, a pattern we had already established because he would come to Kick Shot for a drink every Saturday. It's how we got so close, I guess. The full moon was on Sunday night. The timeline means they would have recorded Heath coming and leaving my house."

"You need to ask for that footage," Zuri said, more worried than she had been. "They don't know how bad it is, right? Have you said anything to them about our kinds being enemies?"

"No, and I don't think any werewolves have mentioned it, either," I confirmed.

"Don't. Don't ever mention it. The moment they know, they'll know they have something to use to blackmail you. That's bad. This is bad. This is worse than I assumed. From what I've been told, everything was smoothed over for the werecats about you being found out by a human government, but…I don't think we could smooth over you being with a werewolf yet. Not at the same time. That's something we need to do in a controlled release, and only once the family knows." She took a deep breath. "I'll continue to think about this. Don't fret. You can trust me to do everything in my power to protect you."

"Don't put yourself at risk for me again," I pleaded. I remembered the rebar in her chest. It could have killed her. It should have killed her.

"Unless our own family tries to kill me, I won't be at risk of anything," she reminded me.

"And me?" I asked honestly. It had been one of my biggest concerns. I could never truthfully guess one way or the other if my own family would turn on me for being with Heath.

"I wouldn't let them even if they tried," she said, full of a conviction that made me love her. "And really, there's only…" She counted on her fingers, probably weighing and measuring each of our siblings and parents. "Davor, Jabari, and Mischa would be the problems. Niko would die for you, die to protect this life you're building. He's wanted peace between the races since I met him. Hisao would find the killing in war needless, and he might be angry with you but silently. He doesn't raise his hand against family…under any circumstance. I mean, if you tried to kill him, he would fight back, but he would then leave you for one of us to deal with. It's a rule he has, something Mother taught him when he was young. Mother and Father…Mother isn't an issue at all."

"You told her, didn't you? I mean, she probably heard us."

"I didn't need to tell her," Zuri said with a flat stare. "I was telling her about your adventures, and she asked when you fell in love with the wolf and how no one else has realized it."

"I hadn't even met her!" I was incredibly uncomfortable with that.

"She's like that," Zuri said, just as unamused as I was. "Father…Father keeps his own counsel on you and Heath. He loves you and wants you happy and safe like the rest of us. Heath isn't safe for you, but Father also hasn't forced you to kick those werewolves out. He's protective of you when the rest of us become too, well…us. You didn't have the easiest start in the family, and he blames himself."

"Maybe if he stood up to Davor—"

"He knows Davor is his fault. He's trying. He is. If he can't get Davor in line and I can't, I'm going to ask Mother."

"Why is Davor his fault?"

"What kind of example does it set when a man who lost his daughter decides to abandon all of his responsibilities and hide for a century? Sure, Father was grieving, but it was selfish grieving. None of us spoke to him much for those years until he Changed you. Davor, having been in love with Liza, got to see that as an example and thinks he can behave however he wants because he's grieving. It's been over a century. This family has dealt with loss before, and we've never tolerated someone to behave as Davor has for this long. I blame Father for disappearing and allowing Davor to spin out of control. Davor never listens to us unless it was an area of our expertise, but he listens to Father without question. Father needs to pull the trigger on our brother. He needs to go in and take his territory if Davor can't finally clean himself up, especially when we're dealing with something this big." Zuri was huffing and furious again. I remembered the threat Zuri was mentioning and the shock it had sent through the family to hear it.

Kushim knelt next to her and rubbed her thigh. Definitely, a man trying to calm down his pregnant lover. It was affectionate and sweet.

They fell in love quickly.

"You promised your mother," he reminded her.

She took several deep breaths. "I did, I know. I should go lie down."

"Maybe," he said, smiling a little, twisting the scars on his face.

I felt like the third wheel.

Nodding, she stood slowly, Kushim standing with her. He was tall, Hasan or Jabari tall.

"Jacky, email me when you hear back from the humans about another meeting. Keep me updated. I won't get on family calls, and I can't come to you because of this,"—she gestured to the baby bump—"but I'm here for anything I can do."

"Do you think I can do this?" I wanted her reassurance.

Zuri tilted her head to her side, frowning. "Of course, I do. I know you're willing to do whatever is necessary. I saw it with my own two eyes, the dedication you have. I was there when you fought and executed Lani for her betrayal. And while my twin is an idiot, he believes it, too. As do Mischa and Hisao, who saw you go across the world to rescue your human family. And Niko, who saw you overcome one barrier he never could and become friends with the werewolves, the people of his first family. We're a rough family and are unaccustomed to being proven wrong or being forced to accept change, but you have our support in this. If they have all forgotten to say it, I'm sorry."

"I just wanted to hear it from you. You would be so much better at this than me."

"Would I?" She shrugged. "I'm an ancient, withdrawn from humanity, and I come off that way. I think the instincts of our family…no, your instincts for this are good. Maybe what humanity needs to see is someone like them…someone like you. Someone modern who best understands the world they live in and ours." She smirked. "I couldn't have picked a worse time to get pregnant, though. Sitting in on those meetings would have been a good course of action for me. We could have worked together, maybe."

"Not that we picked this," Kushim said, coughing softly. "Or that I mind the situation. You're fucking gorgeous as a pregnant woman." He reached out and touched the bump gently, smiling. "And I did this."

"Don't get it into your head, we're going to do this again," she said, looking down at his hands.

"Why not? The making was certainly one of the best things I've done," he countered, pulling her closer.

"Don't make me kill you again," she said, both warning and joking. She didn't elaborate as Kushim started to laugh. She reached out, and the moment her fingers touched the keyboard, the video call disconnected.

I was left staring at a black square.

Don't make me kill you again? What?

"Well, that was something," I declared, promising myself I would unpack every detail I could about that conversation the moment my head was clear enough to try—witches, an Immortal, and a baby.

I couldn't honestly decide what was most surprising, but I was happy for Zuri. Leaning on my desk, I thought about her story about her first son and how that had turned out. She deserved a bit of happiness, and she looked happy. Kushim wasn't the sort of man I ever thought she would be with, but there was a wonderful duality to them. My mind had a million trains of thought, all trying to go at the same time, so focusing on the cute new relationship my oldest sister found herself seemed the easiest.

Queen and bandit. That's cute. Will the baby be a little royal like Zuri or a dangerous little criminal like him?

I'm going to be an aunt. I wonder how Hasan is as a grandfather.

Zuri is a witch, and Hasan doesn't know. That's pretty crazy. I can't believe she told me.

She knows about me and Heath. I need to tell him.

That last thought made me feel more urgent than necessary. She didn't plan to out me, but letting Heath know about this massive revelation was important. I grabbed a light leather jacket and walked out of my office. Oliver poked his head out of his office as I passed.

"I'm heading out, running some errands, and I need to talk to Heath. Dirk isn't around, so you're on your own."

"I'll lock your office for you," he said.

"Text me if you need anything from the store or anything else," I said, looking back at him before going down the stairs. I saw his wave and knew he heard me, feeling confident he could manage the bar on his own. Slipping out the back, I got in my car, then texted Heath, telling him there was something important I needed to tell him.

I don't need to go there, but I need to get out of this bar. I can't keep living like this, only going home for a ten-minute shower and sleeping in my office. When was the last time I left to buy groceries or anything else? I have to somehow reclaim that feeling of security.

I had to wait for nearly five minutes to get out of my own parking lot, thanks to a rush of people driving by. It happened. Sometimes, there were no cars on the highway where I had built Kick Shot, and sometimes, there were too many. I looked at the time. It was six, and it all made sense. People were still trying to get home from a long day of work and responsibilities.

As I waited, two trucks pulled up behind me. One honked for me to hurry up, so I stuck my hand out the window and flipped him the bird, getting him to honk louder.

"Wait a fucking minute, asshole," I yelled out the window. "I own this fucking parking lot!"

The honking stopped.

It was another minute before there was a gap to get out of Kick Shot's parking lot. The honking truck hit the gas, too, causing the tires to squeal as the truck stayed on my bumper.