“Drew?” Jedd asked, stepping forward. My head snapped in his direction, and I found myself looking around all my brothers once more. My face creased up with quiet hurt as I stared each one in the eye, unable to imagine any of them could be the man to stick that blunt knife in my back—in their brothers’ backs.
Swallowing again, my body felt limp, my head barely staying attached to my neck, as it seemed to sway loosely as I looked back at Jedd.
“Go inside,” I told him quietly.
He frowned. He was the VP. He expected answers. “It looks like you need us.”
“I don’t need nobody anymore,” I whispered, my eyes turning cold on him.
He took another step but then froze, something in him recognizing he needed to give me the space I demanded. Jedd looked down at Eric, then at Ayda, before his gaze returned to me.
With a nod of acceptance, he stared straight into my eyes. “We’ll be inside. You know where we are if you do decide you need us.”
All I could do was watch as Jedd gathered the rest of them and ushered their confused-as-fuck faces back inside The Hut. Slater looked hurt and pissed when he glanced over his shoulder at me. Deeks just let his shoulders sag and his head drop. Kenny didn’t want to move. He wanted to stay. Was that loyalty he was showing or was it a need to know if he’d been found out? Whatever it was, they all eventually went back inside, leaving me to turn back to Eric.
Crouching down, I rested a limp arm between my partedlegs and looked straight into his eyes.
“How long have you known?”
Eric stretched out his mouth, cracked his neck from side to side, and drew in a breath before he allowed himself to look up at me. “A while.”
“Answers. I want answers. Specifics. No more riddles and half-ass truths.”
“About a year.”
“What?” I hissed, my voice breaking as my eyes widened and I stared at him in disbelief.
Eric glanced up at Ayda.
Ayda met his glance head on, her eyebrows lifting in a challenge. She wasn’t planning on going anywhere.
With a sigh, Eric ran a hand through his hair and fell to the ground until he was on his ass, legs bent in front of him, his arms wrapped around his knees and his back pressed against the brick wall. His head fell back, and he looked up at the sky.
“Harry suspected something while you were still serving time. He had no proof, but the men would go riding out, and suddenly The Emps would be close by. No matter where they went, no matter how late the decision to ride, they’d bump into them at every turn. Cortez took pleasure in reeling the boys in and setting them free, telling them how he was going to fuck you up when you got out. Telling them how he knew men on the inside who’d enjoyed nothing more than breaking your ribs and busting you open.” He let his head fall back down, and he looked straight through me, the memories flooding back to him. “Harry warned the men not to mention any of it to you when you got out. He told them it was all talk. Just a show for Cortez to put on for his men that would piss our MCoff.”
I frowned as I watched him. “Harry knew…” It was the only thought repeating over and over in my mind.
“Hesuspected.Big difference. He started calling me, asking me questions about the men, if I knew if they had any connections with people outside of Babylon. I knew every man’s history. Harry knew that. When I asked him what was going on, he said he had a feeling something was off. He just didn’t know what. So he started watching everyone here, making notes, keeping diaries. Didn’t you notice how Harry seemed to be everywhere when you got out? How he seemed to know everything that was happening, even before you did? How he wanted you to stop fucking around, step up, and be the leader he knew you could be?”
He was right. Harry had been everywhere, and he’d never been harder on me than he had since my release from Huntsville.
“He knew you had to be at your best to handle this,” Eric added quietly.
“He should have told me,” I muttered quietly.
“And if he had, what would you have done?”
“Killed the fucker betraying us.”
“And if we got that fucker wrong? If we’d got the wrong man? One of your brothers would be dead.”
“Plenty of my brothers are already dead thanks to this bastard.” I snarled.
“Which is why Harry didn’t want any more bloodshed within these walls. Not until he knew for damn certain who was responsible.”
“And did he? Did he know?” I dared myself to ask.
Eric’s shoulders fell, his body sagging as he staredright at me. I knew then, in that very moment, that he cared. That he gave a shit. There was concern shining back at me. Disappointment, too.