Enforce(54)

She returned his smile with an innocent one of her own, making me immediately want to rush her out of the room. This was a bad idea, all of it, but there was no backing out now. Leaving would show Anthony she was worth something; staying was already doing enough damage. Hell, I’d just purposefully dropped her into my world; she would never escape, not now, not ever.

“I didn’t know they were big bills. My grandpa gave me some money before I was dropped off at school, and there was a fiasco with my uniform and bags and…”

“Fiasco?” Anthony’s brows lifted. “This I have to hear.”

“Anthony—” I tried to interrupt but was dismissed. Right. In public I was always dismissed because people would ask questions if I was the guy ordering around the man who was old enough to be my father.

“Make yourself useful, Nixon, and grab yourself a drink,” Anthony barked.

I muttered a curse and walked over to the bar, purposefully clanging the glasses as I made myself a drink.

“So, you were saying?” Anthony’s smooth voice was like nails on a chalkboard to me.

“I, uh… the people at school kind of drenched me in sugar water and raw eggs. My messenger bag suffered a very slow, sticky death.”

“The worst kind I’m sure,” Anthony agreed. Damn, I forgot how nice the man could be when he was curious… you know what they say about curiosity. Couldn’t he just make the account, do the background check that I’m already one–hundred-percent sure is going to come back positive and let us leave?

“Absolutely,” Trace agreed. “I guess technically, it’s my fault since I rejected that one’s rules on the first day.” I pointed at Nixon who narrowed his eyes. “But he did save me from social suicide. Not that I was already high on the popularity totem pole anyways… but yeah. Long story short, we went shopping. I busted out my money. Nixon almost had a stroke. Men in suits entered the grocery store with guns. Pretty sure I’m going to see that on the evening news, and… now we’re here.”

“Alright. Sounds like a normal day in the life of Nixon. Welcome to the family…” Shit, shit, shit. I leaned against the bar, my fingers digging into the granite countertop. Trace had no way of knowing what Anthony was really saying… it was more of an invitation to hell. By welcoming her in, he was saying she had no out. Only she didn’t know that; she probably assumed Anthony was teasing her about our relationship, when really, that should be the least of her worries at this point.

“Oh, no, no, no, no.” She let out a nervous laugh. “No, it’s not like… that.”

“I’ve known Nixon for a long time, and I can tell you one thing for sure. It is very much… like that.”

Hell, we were going to have words later. I cursed and turned around, leveling him with a glare.

“Now, an account... Do you have your social security number?” Anthony completely ignored me.

Trace tucked some hair behind her ear and shrugged. “Grandpa said it was lost in the move.” She was so damn innocent. Hadn’t she thought to ask her Grandpa how the hell he’d registered her for school without a social security number?

“The move?” Anthony repeated, walking around his desk and hitting a few keys on his computer. “Where did you move from?”

“Chicago.”

I had just taken a huge sip of my drink. The word Chicago startled me enough to spit its contents out onto the floor. What the hell was my problem? I knew who she was, but just hearing her confirm my suspicions, damn but it made my heart hammer in my chest, made me want to collapse into a sobbing mess at her feet. Bella, my Bella, the little girl I would have died to save, was standing right in front of me, and instead of saving her? I was throwing her back in with the wolves. Me, being the alpha… “Sorry, Uncle Tony.”

Tony shook his head in annoyance but said nothing. “So, you’re from Chicago. Why did you move? Your parents come with you?”

Trace’s eyebrows knit together in confusion. Shit, either she had no idea or she’d suppressed all horrible memories of her childhood, not that I could blame her.

I walked over to where she stood and grabbed her hand, giving it a little squeeze.

“My grandparents thought the city was too violent, I guess? I don’t know. My parents were killed in an accident when I was six so…”

“An accident?” Anthony repeated, while my heart damn-near ripped from my chest and threw itself onto the floor.

It was hard to breathe, hard to think.

“My sincere apologies for your loss.”

She shrugged. “I don’t remember much.” Thank God.