Page 67 of Wicked Brutal

“Absolutely.”

“Danny.”

“Getting ambitious.”

“Iz laughed.”

“Iz laughs when people threaten him with weapons. That’s not personal.”

She smiles. Then it fades. “I don’t want to do this for months.”

“We won’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

I look at our hands. “No. I don’t.”

She shifts closer. “I’m scared.”

I pull her against me — not across the console this time, just close enough that her head rests against my shoulder. “I know.”

“What if we don’t find enough?”

“We will.”

“What if we don’t?”

I want to give her the easy answer. The Ryan answer. Then I’ll burn the world down. But Tobias is six. Arthur can’t take I’ll burn the world down into family court. So I tell her the truth. “Then we keep looking.”

She closes her eyes. “And if Dad figures it out first?”

My arm tightens around her. “He won’t.”

“Ryan.”

“I don’t know.” There. I fucking hate saying it. But I’m done promising her deadlines I can’t control. “I don’t know what happens next. I don’t know how long Arthur needs. I don’t know what Roman knows.” I turn my face into her hair. “But I know we’re not leaving Tobias behind. I know I’m not letting Tremblay have you. And I know you’re not doing any of this alone.”

Her fingers curl into my shirt. “I wish we could go back to the lake.”

The words hit me somewhere deep. Last summer. Tobias and his frogs. Ally in that black-and-white gingham bikini. Before I knew how ugly everything behind her front door really was. Before she was pregnant. Before we had to pretend.

“We will.”

“When?”

“I don’t know.” She tilts her face toward mine. I brush a strand of hair away from her cheek. “But we’ll go.”

“With Tobias?”

“Obviously.”

“Your parents?”

“My dad apparently needs to finish his leprechaun engineering degree.”

That gets another laugh. “He’s so cute with Tobias.”

“Don’t ever tell Walter Harrington you called him cute.”