Page 12 of Forever Golden
“And as bad as I know you want to give him shit about it, West… you can’t,” she adds.
My glare hardens. “He can’t keep doing this shit. If I don’t make it dead-ass clear to him that—”
“He said he’d hurt Scar.”
Those words cut off my train of thought, taking whatever I was going to say right out of my head. When she said he threatened her, I assumed that meant he’d try to get her kicked out of school or some shit like that.
“His exact words were that he’d have her taken from me,” Southside explains, meeting my gaze with desperation in her eyes. “But West… he made it abundantly clear how easy it would be to make herdisappear—make usbothdisappear—if I don’t cooperate,” she adds in that same shaken tone.
“Cooperate?”
“Yes.” There’s tangible fear in her eyes and I don’t miss it.
“What the hell does that even mean?”
Trying not to go off the rails, I breathe through another of those long pauses when she takes forever to answer.
“West, honestly, I shouldn’t even be telling youthismuch. If he finds out—”
“I’d never do anything to put youorScar in danger,” I cut in. “Whatever you don’t want him to know, he won’t know. You have my word on that.”
She studies me a moment. That’s when a tear finally slips down her cheek, making it impossible to not feel the weight of what she has yet to say.
“I told you some of it, the part about him wanting you as far away from me as possible, but he was more specific than that,” she finally admits. “His instructions were to not only break your heart. He said to breakyou.”
I’m stunned, but probably shouldn’t be, considering we’re talking about Vin. Pushing a hand through my hair I try to wrap my head around this shit.
I can tell you what Idoknow—it’s the last fucking straw.
It’s not just that he’d try to force Southside out of my life, but that he’d threaten endangerment of hers and Scar’s to get it done. I’ve never been one of Vin’s biggest fans, but this more than solidifies the fact that I hate that asshole.
With every-fucking-thing in me.
“I didn’t just pack my bags because I’m scared shitless,” she confesses. “It was also because leaving would be easier than hurting you, making you hate me.”
It feels like there’s a knife twisting in my chest. It’s one thing to know my father’s a grade-A deadbeat when it comes to being any kind of father to us, but it’s something altogether different knowing he’d actively try to destroy my life, knowing he’d physically harm someone.
“I only have two months to make a clean break,” she adds, raising my heartrate even more.
I’m seeing red, fighting the urge to spiral into a full rage. “Is that everything?”
“The important parts, but there was just something about the whole thing that made me certain his threats were anything but empty. Especially the part about making me and Scar disappear. He hinted at there being people interested in bidding on us and, I have to be honest, West, the only thing I could think about was all these missing girls. What if he’s involved with that?” she asks. “I’m probably not supposed to know anything about this, but when I was with Ricky earlier at the diner, he said something—a word that stuck out to me.”
“What was it?”
She fidgets a little, like she’d rather not say.
“He mentioned hearing the term‘cargo’being tossed around. What if that’s code for the girls they’ve been moving in and out of Cypress Pointe? What if that’s what he plans to do to Scar? To me?”
I grab hold of her when her voice shakes.
“That won’t happen.”
“But how do you know? There’s no wayeitherof us can say for sure he won’t make good on his promise if I don’t make good on mine,” she fires off. “I can’t take that risk, West. I absolutely could not live with myself if something happens to her.”
Holding her is the only comfort I can offer, because with how tight these two are, I know there’s nothing I can say to ease her mind.
I’m rifling through my thoughts, putting pieces together now that I know the specifics of Vin’s threat, now that I hear out loud what she thinks he’s involved in. There are still a ton of missing pieces, but I fully believe Vin’s capable of the shady-ass shit Southside just accused him of. But what he’s definitely not banking on is that he’ll have to get through me if he intends to get to her.