Flock (The Ravenhood)

Halfway through my first shift back at the plant, I get summoned over the PA system. Pausing our line, I feel the full weight of Melinda’s attention. It’s been hours of working in silence, it seems even she couldn’t ignore my need for solace, and she let me retreat inside myself during this shift, which only further alludes to the fact I look as broken as I feel. I feign ignorance of why I’m being called off the line, but we both know better.

I’m done playing games. I march down the corridor of the first floor into the secluded office at the end of the hall batting away the memories it dredges up—stolen kisses, lingering looks over private lunches, a late shift quickie with his hand clamped over my mouth while he thrust into me, whispering filthy words in my ear. Closing the door, I lean against it and keep my gaze averted. Eyes cast down, his tan boots come into view, and I exhale just as the scent of cedar threatens to cloud my judgment.

“Baby, please look at me.” His voice is hoarse, dragging nails across the rawness in my chest. “Baby, please, please look at me.”

I don’t.

“Cecelia, you are the secret.” This confession demands my attention, and I finally look up. He looks destroyed, his complexion gaunt, dark circles prominent beneath his eyes. I’ve never seen him so distraught. Empathy wins the war with my silent tongue. I love this man, even if falling for him was a mistake.

“What in the hell is going on?”

He steps forward and captures my face in his hands. “We didn’t mean it. You have to know that.”

I shrink away from his touch, and he curses.

“I don’t know anything.”

“You know a lot more than you think you do. But the first thing you need to know was that it was a knee-jerk decision to bring you in the day we met, but I just fucking couldn’t… God, the moment I laid eyes on you—”

He leans in and I turn my head. “Why am I the secret?”

He expels a breath. His obvious hesitation has me bracing myself against the door.

“We didn’t mean it, Cecelia.”

“Just tell me why you brought me in here.”

“Okay.” He nods solemnly. “Okay. Years ago, when Horner Technologies was mainly a chemical plant, two immigrants from France, a husband and wife, died in a fire in one of the testing labs.” He holds my stare as the implication of what he’s saying dawns on me. I gape at him, tears threatening when I realize who those immigrants were.

“Dominic’s parents?”

He nods.

“They’d fled from France in an attempt to escape her ex-husband, and because they were so desperate, they accepted an invitation from an estranged relative to start a new life here.”

“Delphine.”

He nods and continues. “So they came here, to this town, to work in this plant thinking they would be safer, that here they would thrive, start living the American dream and all that entailed. Instead, they were exploited by this company and its owner because of their social disadvantage and eventually perished in a fire no one is sure was accidental. We still haven’t pieced together exactly what happened, but it was fucked up and reeked of foul play from the way it was handled afterward. Your father covered it up, swept it under the rug. He did the bare minimum for Dominic and offered nothing but a formal letterhead addressed apology included in the settlement summary. A slap in the face after the fact, especially with the CEO being a local. The local news didn’t even cover it, Cecelia. There was nothing in the papers, either.”

“But why?”

“That’s what we’re trying to figure out. Delphine was outraged, but she was young, and at the time too afraid to go head to head with Roman. Something happened that night, and he buried it. And we’re determined to find out what.”

This rattles me to my core. “You’re saying my dad may have covered up a murder, two murders, here, at this plant?”

“Not sure, but Dom’s parents weren’t the first to ever question your father’s business practices. Your father has been pulling a lot of shit for a very, very long time and getting away with it.”

“So, you’re spying on him? Working here to find out the truth?”

“More than that,” Sean says warily. He gives me a telling stare, and I try to read between the lines.

“You’re going to hurt him?”

“We’re going to make him suffer. For everything he’s done and everything he took from Dom, and from every other family who’s worked for him since he opened this fucking plant. That’s why you need to stay away from us. You can’t be implicated in anything that goes down. It’s not safe.”

“What are you going to do?” He reads the budding fear in my eyes.

He shakes his head. “If we wanted him dead, he would be. That’s not who we are.”

“So, what’s to stop me from going to him right now and telling him everything?”

His shoulders bulge with tension. “Nothing. But there are other players in this, with a broader reach, and they know we have you.”

“Had me.”

“That’s what we were trying to convey, but when they saw us together, when they saw…”

“Saw what?”

He pinches the bridge of his nose. “That we fucked up and caught feelings, we had to end it, the way we did, to keep you out of it.”

“You’re telling me that was a performance?”

“To keep you safe. But now you’re on their radar. And I don’t know, baby. I don’t know.”

“So, wait. All of this started because of my dad? He owns a fucking technology manufacturing company. He makes calculators. Shady business practices do not make him a murderer.”

“He owns more than that. He owns Triple Falls and everyone in it, including the police. He’s run a monopoly on this city, and no one is willing to let him have it. Not anymore.”

“This isn’t happening. This…can’t be true.”

“I’m sorry, okay, I’m sorry, but it is. The man you’re living with is hiding as many secrets as we are. And he’s damn good at keeping them and at keeping his nose clean.”

He presses me against the door. “I want you far, far a-fucking-way because your dad has a lot of enemies, aside from us, for the shady shit he’s pulled over the years. You aren’t safe here.”

“Sean—”

“I miss you so much,” he murmurs, gripping my face in his hands, his eyes roaming over me. “I fucked up, we both did, but you weren’t something we saw coming.”

Mind racing, I realize my mother, her security, everything I’ve worked for will disappear if they see their plans through. But it’s my father’s eyes I see before I speak up. “And you’re sure they’re not going to hurt him?”

“We’re going to take back the town he stole and give it to the people who deserve it. It’s greed-coated money he’s stacking up. Their money.”

Roman’s words the day I confronted him run through my mind.

“He corrected their pay. It’s no longer an issue.”

Sean shakes his head. “That’s the kicker of seeing is believing. Any convincing devil worth a damn can look you in the eye and make you believe he doesn’t exist.”

I swallow.

“That still doesn’t explain why I’m the secret.”

“You are for more reasons than one. At first, you were the way to get in, infiltrate his house, aid in the search.”

It takes everything I have not to slap him. I jerk my face away and he forces it back. “Listen to me. At first, I mean early, when we first met, I thought it was a good idea to bring you in. You were a surprise. It started with me. This is on me, and it’s also why Dominic was such a prick to you in the beginning. He didn’t agree.”

Sean pulls me by the wrist to step away from the door before opening it and poking his head out into the hall. A second later, he closes it and exhales. “We can’t stay in here much longer.”

“What are the other reasons?”

Silence. That damning silence. “I would tell you if I could.”

“You bastard,” I swallow again, and again, his confessions have me circling back to the beginning. “That’s why you wouldn’t kiss me at first. That’s why you let me make the decision to sleep with you. It had to be my decision because you were using me. That’s so fucked up, Sean.”

“Look at me.” I do. His eyes cover me in a haze of regret. “I love you. And I’ve been in love with you since this started, Cecelia. And you fucking know it.”

They’re the most painful words I’ve ever heard and feel more like body blows at this point because I’m sure I’ll never know if they’re true.

“So, what, now you’re going to jeopardize your grand plans because you care about me?”

“Plans change. And we’ve got enough of them. With him, we’ve been patient.”

“And you really don’t think I’ll tell him?”

He presses his forehead to mine. “I know you won’t. Dom does too. It’s the others we can’t convince so easily. You are the target’s daughter.”

“He’s still my father!” I shake my head. “This isn’t real life.”

“Unfortunately, it is. Can you go back to your mother’s?”

“No. Sean, you know I’m here to take care of her. She’s still not well, and if I leave now, I forfeit my inheritance. If it were just about me, it would be different.”

“I’m going to do everything I can to make sure it goes down the way it’s supposed to. Arm the house, yourself, but don’t tell him.” The haunted look in his eyes is enough to tell me his fate if I can’t keep this secret.

“Why did you tell me?”

“I just told you. You’re my priority. Not only because of how I feel about you, but because I brought you into this, it’s my fucking fault.” He runs a hand through his hair before slapping it on the door next to me. “I swear to God. I thought it would be safer to bring you in. There’s too much going on to hash out today. Just know I fucked up, Dom and I fucked up, and we all need to…stay away from each other. The longer we aren’t seen together, the more it’ll look like…”

“Like you used me.”

He nods. “One day, I’ll beg you to forgive me, but for now, I need you to listen and hear me. This is real.”

“I don’t know what to say. I can’t believe you’re expecting me to trust you.”

“Trust your gut.” He leans in, in an attempt to kiss me and I turn my head. His exhale hits my neck. He rolls his forehead along the door next to me before pulling back, his eyes imploring mine. “One day, I’ll try and make this right. But right now, I’m begging you to believe me.”

“I don’t know what to think…” Tears fall as I think of Dominic and the way he looked at me yesterday. “Dom doesn’t hate me…” It comes out both question and statement.

“His issue is with your father.” He studies me carefully. “He got to you first?”

I nod.

“He’s been MIA since you got back. I’ve never seen him like this.”

A tear slips from me and he flinches at the sight of it. “You trust me, Cecelia, that’s the hardest part of all of this. I worked so hard to earn it, to try to earn you, though I was partly deceiving you, and…I’ll fucking hate myself forever for this.” He grips my face tightly in his palms. “I knew from the get-go you were more,” he murmurs. “Just think it all through, okay? Think it through. Think about everything I’ve told you. Push that night aside and believe me when I say that was all about protecting and distancing you, rather than hurting you. But I blew it. I blew it because I couldn’t stand to see you in so much pain.”

When he threw that punch at Dominic, that was his breaking point.

“Trust me and trust Dom, and no matter what happens from here on out. Don’t look for us. Don’t look for answers. I’ll find a way to work this out. I’ll find a way.”

“You’re scaring me.”

“I know. I’m sorry. You wanted to know, now you do. You wanted in. You’re in. It’s time to keep your secrets.” He grips my jaw, leaving no room for argument before his possessive lips claim mine. We both whimper into the other’s mouths as he invades—drinking, taking—his kiss going feather-soft before he pulls himself away in what feels a lot like goodbye.

Briefly, his eyes lift, shimmering with emotion. “I love you,” he whispers hoarsely before opening the door and walking out. It lingers open briefly, suspended behind him before clicking closed and detonating the bomb he just dropped.