I Have Five Kick-Ass Brothers – Episode 18
Raina returned to the Lincoln house alone and stood in the narrow living room, seeing it differently for the first time. The worn sofa had no true wear beneath its carefully chosen cover. The family photographs avoided workplaces and public events. Even the cheap clock on the wall hung beside an original painting she now recognized as valuable.
Her parents entered with the five brothers behind them. No one attempted another excuse. Noah closed the door and asked Raina to sit, but she remained standing. “Tell me who you are,” she said.
Mr. Lincoln began with an apology. The family was not poor, the house was not their only property, and Noah was not a construction worker. The words came slowly, each one removing a piece of the life Raina believed she had chosen.
Noah admitted he was chief executive of Lincoln Group. Henry was an Oscar-winning actor, Joshua a decorated sergeant major, Luke an international esports champion, and Mathew the head of a global business network. Their parents controlled a fortune greater than the Smiths could imagine.
Raina listened without interrupting. Memories rearranged themselves: Theo calling Noah famous, Henry’s familiar smile, Joshua’s command of trained men, and the phone call that stopped her arrest. She had ignored every inconsistency because she wanted desperately to trust them.
“Why?” she asked. Her voice hurt more than anger would have. Mrs. Lincoln explained how Coco abandoned them after discovering the Smiths’ apparent wealth. They feared Raina might also want money rather than family, so they created a test.
“And did I pass?” Raina asked. Noah said she had passed the first night, perhaps the first minute. That answer made the deception worse. They had known her heart and continued performing poverty while she exhausted herself trying to support them.
Mrs. Lincoln reached for her. Raina stepped back, tears brightening her eyes. “I counted grocery money while all of you watched. I worried Noah would be injured at work. I thought Henry depended on delivery tips. Was any of it real?”
“Our love is real,” her father said. “The fear was real too.” He did not ask her to forgive them immediately. Some harms came from understandable motives and still remained harms.
Raina went to her room and packed the same suitcase she had carried from the Smith mansion. The sight terrified the Lincolns. Noah blocked the front door, then moved aside when she asked whether he intended to imprison her after testing her.
Theo arrived as she stepped onto the porch. He took in the suitcase and the devastated family behind her. Raina asked whether he had known. Theo admitted he knew Noah’s position but not the full extent of the test until recently.
“Everyone knew pieces of my life except me,” she said. Theo offered her a safe apartment with no conditions, then corrected himself. He would arrange any place she chose, including a hotel where neither family could reach her.
Raina refused his money but accepted a ride. She needed distance, not another powerful protector deciding her future. Theo honored the distinction and drove her to a modest hotel she selected herself.
Meanwhile, Coco gathered cash and jewelry from the Smith mansion. Her blackmailer demanded a meeting at an abandoned warehouse near the river. She could not ask her parents for half a million dollars without explaining why.
Asher discovered her leaving and offered help. Coco told him only that someone was threatening the Smith family. His loyalty made him follow without understanding how deeply she was involved.
At the warehouse, the missing employee displayed the original medical page and a copy of surveillance showing Coco’s car near the stand before the fire. He wanted money and passage out of Brookfield. Coco offered the jewelry, far short of his demand.
Their argument grew violent. Asher stepped from hiding when the man grabbed Coco, and a struggle sent the evidence folder scattering across the floor. One page slid beneath a loading door into the rain outside.
Luke’s digital search had traced the blackmail message to the same warehouse. The Lincoln brothers arrived with Theo minutes later, but Coco and Asher escaped through a rear exit before they were seen.
Noah recovered the surveillance drive. Theo found the medical page in a puddle, ink bleeding across most of its lines. One handwritten note remained legible: the injured girl had been wearing a silver star necklace.
At the hotel, Raina opened the small pouch of belongings she had carried from the Smiths. Beneath old photographs lay a broken silver chain with an empty clasp. Someone knocked before she could examine it—and through the peephole she saw Coco standing alone in the hallway.
