Cason
My uncle’s office reminds me a lot of my father’s with its bookcases filled with books, but unlike my father, Ryker runs his part of the family so different that it’s like he and Victor couldn’t possibly be related. As he jokes with Kane about some job he sent one of us on, I can’t imagine how the two brothers could come from the same parents.
It’s likely because Ryker is so much younger than my father. Just a few years older than me, my uncle seems to have gotten all the happiness his mother and father had and less of the cruelty so ingrained in the Varens line.
“Everything okay, Cason?”
I shake my head to get rid of my thoughts about my family and smile. “All good. Just waiting for your command.”
Kane laughs at my soldierly way, as he likes to call it, and shakes his head. “Your brother obviously runs a much tighter ship than you do, Ryker. This one is so serious I wonder if I’d survive a minute there.”
From behind his skull mask, my uncle chuckles. “You and Victor would knock heads from the second you got there. My brother thinks running this family should be done like a dictatorship. I’m more about benevolent despotism, myself.”
“Like Catherine the Great?” I ask, remembering a documentary I watched a few nights ago.
Before Ryker can answer, Kane throws his head back and laughs. “Isn’t she the one who fucked a horse?”
My uncle rolls his eyes and shakes his head at me. “I’d say more like Frederick the Great, but you’re on the right track. Your father, on the other hand, thinks that’s too generous and likes to rule with an iron hand. I guess it suits his personality more.”
I don’t answer, even though I have the sense that after all these months working for Ryker that I could and not suffer any punishment. He’s not wrong, so I wouldn’t try to disagree with him. My father is a dictator in every way. From the way he got rid of my mother and forced me to work for him to the way he treats everyone around him, he rules with that iron hand Ryker mentioned.
Kane walks out after making another joke about Catherine the Great fucking a horse, leaving just the two of us in the office. Neither of us say a word for a long time, which allows me to let my mind drift off again but not to my father.
Like I do every night, I think about Lily.
From that day at the seedy motel until now, I’ve never seen her again. Jaxon promised to watch over her and let me know if my father ever made a move toward her, but every time I’ve asked, all he’s told me is she’s fine.
“You know, Cason, none of us approved of what your father did with your mother or you,” Ryker says in a low voice, tearing me from my thoughts again.
I don’t know what to say to that. Ever since her death, I’ve wondered if anyone tried to stop Victor from murdering her. Did even one of my uncles ever say a word to let him know it wasn’t right to kill her while I lay in my bed in the room right down the hall from hers?
My silence seems to encourage him to go on, so he continues, “I think in some ways Jaxon was luckier than you, Cason. I would never say I wished my brother Maxim dead, but when he was killed, his son became a son to all of us. That didn’t happen with you. I’m sorry for that.”
What he says makes me angry and sad, threatening to make my emotions overwhelm me. This is the first time anyone in my family has ever said a word about what my father did to my mother and me. I’ve waited all these years to hear this, and now that Ryker has said it, it’s almost too much to bear.
Looking away, I clear my throat. “You didn’t do anything wrong. It was my father who’s to blame. Not anyone else.”
“I think I benefited from the distance I got from having this home left to me,” Ryker says with a sigh. “What happened with my brothers stayed far enough away that I felt like I didn’t have to deal with it. When you showed up here that day last year, I thought maybe I finally had the chance to make up for what I never did for you.”
I force a smile and pretend what he’s saying isn’t affecting me. “I appreciate what you’ve done for me, Ryker. All of it. I couldn’t go back there. I don’t think I ever can. He won’t forgive, so I can’t return. It’s probably for the best, though.”
What I leave unsaid is that my father has his favorite son, so he’ll be fine. As long as Michael lives, Victor Varens will be happy.
“Do you ever wonder what life would be like if we didn’t live in our family and didn’t do the things we do?” I ask, almost like thinking aloud something I’ve thought of so many times over the past year.
I glance over at Ryker to see him nodding. “Yes. More since Kaia came into my life, but even before I thought about it.”
Just hearing that he has thought about what life would be like away from the family and all that entails makes me feel better. I’ve never told him about Lily, but I think like Kaia, it’s because of her that I wonder about living a different life away from all the Varens family business and my part in it.
“You know, your father never thinks anything we do limits him. Wives, girlfriends, whatever he wants, he has. I get the feeling you’re more like me, though, Cason. This life of ours puts limits we aren’t sure we want.”
I nod my agreement to that. So much of this life feels like it’s trapped me forever now.
“You finally gave up being a bachelor, though,” I say to him with a smile. “Maybe we’ve been thinking about this stuff all wrong?”
His eyes show he smiles at the reference to Kaia, but that disappears after only a few seconds and he sighs heavily. “I wish that was the case, but it isn’t. I can’t have everything I wish I could with her. And she gave up a lot to be with me. I still don’t know if that’s fair.”
My momentary happiness is dashed by his answer to my question. So much for being able to live as a Varens and still have a normal life.
Ryker leans back in his chair and folds his arms behind his head. “Jaxon told me something about a girl a few months ago. Is this about her?”
I take a deep breath in and let it out slowly as I try to figure out the honest truth about that. I’d thought about wanting to leave the life of a killer before I met Lily, so maybe I’ve always felt like I wanted something else. It’s just that being with her made it all feel so much more urgent, as if the universe had finally sent me a real life answer to my questions.
“Yes and no. It’s all for nothing anyway since the minute I leave here my father is going to put that target on my back again, so it’s not like I can just go off and live happily ever after with her or anyone else.”
And that right there is the truth neither Ryker nor I can deny. While I’ve been here, Victor has let me live in peace, but the moment I’m not working for his brother, I’ll return to being public enemy number one. Fuck the fact that I’m his flesh and fucking blood. Nope. I’ll just be a man with a huge fucking target on his back courtesy of his own father.
“He wouldn’t do that to you, Cason. I wouldn’t let him, and your Uncle Joseph wouldn’t let him either. I know he likes to rant and rave, but Victor Varens believes in one thing above all else. Family. We were brought up to believe that family is the most important thing in the world.”
I can’t stop the chuckle from escaping on that one. “Even if it’s a son he doesn’t give a fuck about anymore?”
“Even if it’s a son who reminds him every day of what he did. Your father is a lot of things, but we’re all sons of Dmitri Varens, and I swear to you your grandfather would come back and haunt Victor if he followed through on his threats with you.”
“So it’s perfectly okay to kill an ex-wife you have no use for anymore but not a son?”
Ryker shrugs at my sharp question. “Believe it or not, yes. Your great-grandfather was that type of man, even if your grandfather wasn’t, and Victor’s the same way. Most women mean nothing to them, but family, especially sons, well, that’s a different story entirely.”
At least there’s one good thing to being born a male in the Varens family.
A knock on my door rips me out of my thoughts about Lily, irritating me that whoever it is has interrupted me. I fling open the door to see Jaxon standing in front of me wearing a shit-eating grin like he’s some damn Cheshire cat.
“Busy? Mind if I come in?” he asks as he marches past me without waiting for my answer.
I slam the door and follow him in to see he’s already begun to make himself comfortable in my favorite chair. “Make yourself at home, Jax. It’s not like I was doing anything.”
He rolls his eyes and puts his feet up on my coffee table. “You weren’t doing anything, so don’t bother fucking lying to me. You were just sitting here doing your best vegetable impression while you watch some stupid documentary.”
“I guess the fact that I felt like being alone tonight means nothing to you,” I mumble as I kick his feet off my table.
Jaxon shrugs in his usual whatever way. “Hey, you live your life as you see fit. Who am I to say you should do more than hide out here every night?”
“Don’t you have a girlfriend or something to occupy your time? Or did she end it with you finally?” I snap at him, knowing my words will hurt.
He winces and then shakes his head like he hopes that will make the thought of her disappear. “Why do you have to bring Tia into this? And for your information, she didn’t end anything, thank you. Anyway, who’s to say I won’t be driving down there later tonight to see her? You, on the other hand, choose to live your life like a fucking monk and sit in your room alone night after night.”
“I’m not alone. You’re here,” I say with a smile, pleased with how pissed I’ve made him. Misery does love company.
He rolls his eyes again. “Nice way to treat your favorite cousin.”
“Why are you here again?”
“Business, Cason. Unfortunately, business.”
I shake my head at the sound of that word. “Whose business?”
“Family business.”
“Ryker would have called if he needed something. He wouldn’t have sent you up here to tell me he needs me.”
Jaxon’s face turns stony. “Not Ryker. Your father.”
“I have nothing to do with his business anymore. Whatever’s going on, I’m not part of that, and you know it.”
He holds his hand up like he wants me to stop, but he needs to understand that world isn’t my world anymore.
“I get that you’re staying in with him, and that’s fine, Jaxon. I’m not, though.”
My cousin nods and gives me a sheepish look. “I know. Things have changed, though. Something’s happened.”
“What? What could have happened that I’m suddenly so fucking important to my father? I lived ninety-percent of my life being looked at like I’m some goddamned red-headed stepchild, and now all of a sudden, the world can’t do without me? Why?”
“There are enemies, Cason. Our enemies. You know that as well as I do. And when they strike, we have to strike back.”
What the fuck is he talking about? Who struck at us? No, it’s not us anymore. I need to stop thinking of the world like that. There is no us. I may still be a Varens, but I’m not part of that side of the family business anymore.
“It can’t be anything life threatening if you’re able to sit here and get in my face about what the fuck I do with myself every night” I say, already wishing Jaxon would leave and not involve me in family business, no matter what it is.
Leaning forward, he levels his gaze on my face and frowns. “Duke and your father have been at war for months now. He pops one of us. We get one of them. He pinches something of ours. We grab something of theirs. Victor thinks we need to strike hard and end this shit once and for all. He wants you with us when we do that.”
I shake my head, hating every word he utters. “No. I can’t help him or you or anyone with this strike. That’s not my life anymore. I get to work for the other brother. You know, the sane one.”
Jaxon nods, but I know what he’s thinking. You can’t separate our family. Maybe that’s true, but I’m damn well going to try.
“I get what you’re saying, Cason, but this is about family.”
The way he says that, like I’m not understanding how important family is, makes something inside me go off. Barely able to contain my rage, I storm over to him.
“Family? Is this the same fucking family that watched as my father had my mother killed because he didn’t want to have to bother with his ex-wife anymore? A woman who simply wanted to live in peace out at the house she loved and wasn’t even allowed to do that because it upset my father’s new wife. You know, the same family that stood by as he fucking discarded me because he liked her and their son better? You got to be taken care of because your father died for the family. I got shit because my father did the killing and no one dared to fucking say a word to him about it. I worked for that family since you and I were teenagers, and what the fuck did I get for it? A target on my goddamned back when I killed a useless security guard because he was trying to rape Lily. Fuck the family! And you can tell Victor that for me. Fuck him and fuck all of you who think I owe our family anything.”
My outburst doesn’t surprise him, but then again, it shouldn’t since I’ve said much of this before to him. The closest thing I have to a real brother since that fuck Michael is nothing to me, Jaxon knows all too well what I’ve had to endure because of Victor. I don’t know why he thought he should come here tonight and lay all that family bullshit on me, but he knows better.
“Your father thinks you came here to Ryker because of her, you know.”
He says those words so calmly, but beneath each one is the thinly veiled belief that if it wasn’t for Lily that I’d still want to be my father’s killer and henchman. How can I be related to these people and be so different from them?
“You tell him to leave her out of this. She has nothing to do with why I don’t want to be back in his part of the world again, and he knows that.”
Once more, Jaxon nods. “So is that your final word on all of this?”
My heartbeat pounds in my ears as rage courses through me. There are a million other things I want to say to my father, but they will have to wait for another time.
“That and don’t send one of the few members of the Varens family I like here with that shit again. You know you’re like my brother, Jaxon, but there’s nothing you can say to change my mind. I’m out of his life. You either accept that or you don’t. That’s your choice, but it doesn’t change mine.”
He sighs and then stands up so we’re eye-to-eye. “I get it. All of it. I just had a job to do, and now I’ve done it. Stay safe, Cason, and stop sitting here in this room getting stuck in your damn head, man.”
“Yeah, yeah. Go find your girlfriend and let me be. And next time you come by, leave my father’s business nonsense somewhere else.”
“Got it.”
Jaxon chucks me on the shoulder and pushes past me on his way to the door, yelling back, “Remember what I said. Get out sometime. Don’t be a jackass all your life.”
Just before he leaves, I ask the question I always ask when he comes to see me. “How is she? Is she okay?”
But unlike all the other times, he hesitates before answering, “She’s fine, Cason. Now that her father’s dead, she moved out to the country to a nice house. There’s no guy, though, so don’t sit here and torture yourself that she got married or anything like that. Her father must have left her some money because she doesn’t work. She just stays in that house. You two are like two fucking peas in a pod, now that I think of it.”
I watch him slam the door behind him and smile. Lily’s okay and there’s no one in her life. Even better, her father finally did the right thing with those damn plates.
Two lonely peas in a pod.
