“She was Aela’s sister.”
“Your brother’s fiancée?”
I nod. “Sheila was her older sister. We weren’t - I don’t know. We were young, and figuring shit out and just decided to figure it out together, even if we knew it was probably a bad idea. Sheila had a lot of problems.”
I look away.
“Actually problems isn’t the word.”
‘Problems’ is your parents getting divorced, or not getting into your first choice of college, or getting busted for drinking or some shit.
“She was bright and beautiful, and full of - fuck, I don’t know. She was one of those consummately happy, bubbly people, until…”
Sierra bites her lip, like she wants to know, but isn’t sure if she really does. Like she wants to ask but is afraid of what the answer might be.
“Until Mick.”
Something like ice slides through my heart just uttering his fucking name out loud.
“Mick worked for her dad. He was Jack’s top captain actually - a sort of family friend.”
My jaw clenches, and I turn to stare a hole through the wall.
“She was young when it started.”
I glance at Sierra as her face falls, her hand coming to cover her mouth.
“He-” my voice chokes. “He kept her quiet with threats at first - that he’d tell her dad what she was doing even though he was the one forcing her to do it. That he’d tell her sister or her friends and ruin her reputation. After that, he got precise with his control of her.”
I look away.
“We were eighteen when Mick gave her first taste of heroin, and after that, it was just a slow fade. After that, she was his.”
I take a shaking breath.
“What-” Sierra’s face is white, her eyes wide and horrified. “What happened to-”
“She OD’d and she died, eight years and three days ago”
Tears start to trace their way down Sierra’s face, and I can feel that icy hand on my heart squeeze just a little tighter.
“That’s who Sheila was,” I say softly. “That’s my skeleton in the closet.”
I turn to look away, but Sierra suddenly steps into me, her hand slipping into mine.
“I’m- look, this is all… I guess this isn’t exactly what I’m used to, and-”
“I know,” I say quietly, turning back to her.
“I shouldn’t have brought it up.”
“What did bring it up?”
She chews her lip, worry across her face as she takes a shaky breath.
“Back at your loft, when I went to check my phone…” she looks down. “Someone was there.”
I bristle. “What?”
“I was talking to my brother on the phone in your car, and this FBI agent was just there. Agent-”
“Marlow.”
She nods, her eyes flitting over my face, full of worry, and fear.
Fear of me, I suppose.
It’s the reason I don’t even bother asking why she didn’t tell me before because I already know the answer.
Because she’s scared of me. Or was and then wasn’t, but then I’m sure Marlow scared the fuck out of her about me and told her all sorts of shit to freak her out.
“Of course he fed you Sheila,” I growl. “He did it to fuck with me.”
I look at the white look on her face, the way her eyes look everywhere but my eyes.
“He scared you, didn’t he.”
She nods.
“Told you a bunch of stuff about me.”
Sierra nods again.
“Showed you pictures of horrible shit?”
She nods again, her lip trembling.
“Are you scared of me?”
She swallows, still not looking me in the eye.
“No.”
“Liar.”
She smiles quietly, her eyes flickering to mine for just a second. “Maybe a little. Is it- I mean, did you-”
“Do those things?”
I shake my head.
“Some of them, probably.”
Her face goes ashen.
“Look at me.”
She shuts her eyes, shaking her head. My hands go to her shoulders, and when she flinches, something pains inside of me.
“Sierra,” I say quietly, my hands stroking her shoulders. “Look at me.”
She opens her eyes.
“I do what I do because the Saints are my family. Your own family - do you love them?”
“Of course.”
“Would you kill for them?”
Her brow shoots up. “I- I don’t know?”
“Okay, how about, if someone was going to kill them, would you kill to protect them?”
“Yes,” she whispers.
She says it without hesitancy. I like that.
“Well, in my life, it’s not always a hypothetical question. I’m not a monster, Sierra. I don’t go off wantonly killing or doing fucking drive-by’s or gangster movie shit like that. I fix problems. I sweep the dirt under the rug, and I make the bad stuff go away however I deem it necessary.”