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"True And my taxes were reduced after the takeover"

"Is that why you had

"No We were devastated and lonely Our house had been full of four energetic and boisterous boys and thenall gone So quiet Your mother didn’t think she’d conceive, but Zeb was born four years after the takeover, then the twins three years later" He rubbed a hand over his face "When their ht you’d show up and"

"Here I aht we lost therief haunted his expression More than any one person should be asked to bear But that was the problerief No one ever asked for it It arrived with its bags already packed for an extended stay It settled into your best guest roo, and when it finally shuffled out the door, it left behind permanent scratches on your furniture

Valek wished to ease his father’s pain "They’ll besafer in Sitia I’ll make sure they learn how to protect the to eat"

"No thanks I belong here with the dead" Valek pointed to the unree"

"That’s not yours It’s for that da Mooch The tere so upset when he died Made et around to carving his na?"

As we’ve had, that da about it or they’d get upset"

"Which explains why it rehed a deep chuckle "You alere a quick study of people I’m sure it helps with your job"

"It does"

His father scuffed his boots in the dirt "I’ve thought about you every day, too, wondering if you’d ever come home" A pause "If you hadn’t run into the twins, would you have returned?"

"Youin anger that you regretted later? Never uttered the wrong thing when you were out of your rief?"

Cracks appeared in Valek’s cal threatened by a butcher knife hadn’t affected him at all, yet his father’s words had the same effect as a blow to his head, followed by a punch to his solar plexus, leaving him dazed and unable to suck in a proper breath

"Assassins learn to shut off their emotions," Valek finally said

"That’s bullshit If that was the case, then you wouldn’t let the twins stay overnight, you wouldn’t be here by your brothers’ graves, you wouldn’t have a heart o on?"

"No You’ve made your point"

"Then what’s the answer to my question? Would you have returned?"