by Kate Stewart
“Your father is dead. Who else could it have been?”
“Theo.”
“You said only a Knight—”
“My father trusted Theo with more than just his life. It was a mistake that cost him his life.”
A mistake I had no intention of repeating.
I saw Lucas flinch and knew he knew exactly what I left unsaid.
I didn’t have the patience to assuage his feelings or sense of security regarding our friendship right now. He was my brother. I’d die for him but not by his hand. Not like my father.
He trusted the wrong man.
History would not repeat itself.
He sighed and locked his gaze with mine. “So, this is your plan?”
“We make her think she’s safe and then we take it all away.”
“What about her father?”
“He’s in prison. He can’t protect her.” He’d already done a shit job at it anyway if he was behind last night.
“Do you think she knows why Theo killed pops?”
“Her presence here last night gave me a pretty good clue.”
Lucas’s nostrils flared. “Art’s death by Theo’s hand never added up. When we take her, I have no intention of letting her keep secrets,” he warned. I stroked the light scruff on my chin and considered his threat.
He wanted Theo dead.
I wanted him to suffer.
My father taught me that gratification was appreciated more when taken slowly.
“Trust me, brother. Theo’s kid won’t be taking anything to her grave but her corpse.”
He still didn’t look convinced, and I was quickly losing my patience. Mian had no power over me anymore. “You two have history. You practically raised her. You think you can put her down when it’s time?”
“There’s nothing left protecting her except for mercy, and I have none when it comes to her.”
Lucas’s lips twisted. “Are you’re sure nothing happened between you two?”
“She was a fucking kid.”
“She still is.” His grin was slow. “Then again with that body, I’m not so sure.”
The appreciation in his gaze twisted my gut, and I didn’t like it one bit.
“You saying you want to fuck her?” A switch flipped in my brain giving me the okay to kill this motherfucker if he tried.
“I know at least one of us in this room does, and it’s not just me,” he shot back. “You want her so bad, brother—you’re practically shaking with it. It’s been three years since you’ve seen her. That’s some serious backed up tension. When the two of you are finally in the same room again, you just might spontaneously combust.”
“Are you done yet?”
“You may kill her, but that doesn’t mean you can’t have fun with her first.”
“She couldn’t handle me.”
“That’s because you remember a kid. I,” he pointed to his chest, “saw a woman.”
“I don’t want her.”
Lie.
“Maaaan,” he drawled. “Who are you trying to fool? Yourself or me? Because you’d have better luck fooling me than yourself.”
“Is there a point to this conversation?”
“No point. I just need to know when and where you need me.”
“I have a flight to Florida in a couple of hours. While I’m gone, I want you to get this place ready so we can extend an invitation this time.”
“Your stepson, Mr. Castro.” I glared at their butler nearly cracking my molars to keep from correcting him. Marrying my mother after my father’s death didn’t make Victor my stepfather, it made him an opportunist.
And a dead one as soon as my mother came to her senses.
“Angeles?” My father’s childhood friend and bookkeeper pulled me into a hug as soon as I was within arm’s reach. I allowed the embrace, but I refused to return it. Victor was Cuban with average height, receding hair line, and a bushy grey mustache. “I wasn’t expecting you.”
“Is it going to be a problem?”
I was pissed when he married my mother, but that was nothing compared to the storm I brought down on him when I learned he was moving her all the way out to Florida.
Away from the life she had with my father.
Away from me.
He chuckled and patted me on the back even when his eyes didn’t share his amusement. “You, my son, are very much like your father.”
Unfortunately, for him, it was true.
Unfortunately, for me, my high was blown as soon as my flight touched down, so I wasn’t equipped to be pleasant. My habit of using weed to mellow me started after meeting Lucas and Z. They introduced me, and I never looked back.
I haven’t talked to her since she snuck away and married this prick.
I missed her.
However, loyalty to my father’s memory wouldn’t allow me to forgive her. If he were alive, Victor would never have had a chance with my mother, and my father would have killed him for even thinking so. Victor exploited her vulnerability, and now she believed she loved him.
Despite what would have been, I respected my mother’s wishes, as my father would have wanted, and left him breathing.
“Your mother was beginning to think you’d forgotten about her. She never stops worrying, you know?” I followed him onto the terrace where he had come from. On the table where he sat was a crime novel beside a bowl of grapes.
“I see you are enjoying retirement.”
“Forced retirement,” he reminded with a smile.
“You married my mother.”
“Son—”
“No.” I shook my head and stared at the waves crashing in the distant. “I don’t want to hear it.”
“Very well.” We sat in silence. Victor plucked a few grapes from the bowl while I tried to get my temper under control.
“Where is she?” I asked when the urge to kill him wasn’t as strong.
“Having tea with a friend. She’ll be sad she missed you.” I didn’t miss the fact that he didn’t offer to notify her of my presence.
“Doesn’t matter. I’m here to see you.”
His bushy eyebrows reached for his receding hairline. “What do I owe the pleasure of your visit?” He plucked another grape from the bowl.
“The book is gone.”
The book was many things.
It was a black book of clients who paid us to give them what they didn’t earn or make their problems disappear. It was a contact list of people paid off to keep their mouth shut and look the other way. It was also a history book of every job taken, tracing back six generations. It was a legacy inherited by every generation of Bandit, and it incriminated not only the Knights but also everyone we serviced, fucked over or used. It was insurance for our clients but also blackmail to keep them in line.
His hand froze from tossing a grape in his mouth. “How could it be gone?”
“We underestimated Theo’s reach. He sent his kid.”
“Mian?”
“Does he have a bastard I don’t know about?”
He ignored my snarky question and leaned back. “When?”
“Last night. Lucas and Z caught her hiding in my father’s estate. She said she was after something that belongs to her father.”
“Where is she now?”
“Not important.” I didn’t trust Victor with the information. “We let her go.”
“Why?”
“I never considered her knowing about the book. She had nothing on her when we released her.”
“So she has a partner.”
“I’m sure of it.”
“She needs to be disposed of. What are you planning to do about it?”
“We watch her, for now, to see where she goes and who she knows.”
“She may have already sold it. What about this partner?”
“They have to meet again to either sell or collect. I don’t give a shit, but I want them both.”
“It’s not a fail-safe plan.” His lazy regard for my abiliti
es pissed me off, but I kept silent. “Your father wouldn’t like you being this stupid.”
My fingers gripped the arm of the chair to keep from doing the same to his neck. I watched as he arrogantly picked another grape from the stem and popped it in his mouth. I didn’t like him talking about my father after he decided to fuck and marry his wife.
I would say that our rocky association was a love lost since he’d been my father’s oldest friend, but I never felt close to him even when I was just a kid. Theo had been the one who was like a second father to me.
It was all so fucked up.
“My father would want me to be smart. This isn’t some random person off the street or even a rival. She was family.”
“And now she’s just the daughter of your father’s murderer. Don’t forget that.”
“I haven’t,” I pushed through clenched teeth.
“We’ll see.”
Fucking A…
I’m going to kill this prick.
“Once she makes a move, I will take her. Not. Before.” I leaned forward and locked gazes. “And I won’t hesitate.”
“Good.” He chomped on another grape. I considered filling his airway with the entire bowl and watching him choke to death.
“I came here because I need information, some kind of leverage over her. I was hoping you might have something. I can see that I’m wasting my time.” I stood to leave.
“Wait.” I ignored him and moved for the exit. “Son.”
I froze and counted to five so I wouldn’t remind him that while he may have married my mom, I would never be his son. I’d seen what having a father like Victor would eventually do. Eliana Castro was a gold digging bitch with scales like her father. Not only that. Once upon a time, Victor entertained the idea of me marrying his daughter. My father refused the idea of an arranged marriage, which put an invisible strain on their relationship.
“I was out of line. Your father would be proud of you.”
I wasn’t surprised by his quickness to apologize. Victor had always gone out of his way to stay in my good graces, even if it meant ignoring his own daughter.
Victor looked up expectantly. He waited for me to accept his apology.
Not going to happen.
“I didn’t come here to talk about my father.” I’d never be comfortable with a man who would sleep with his friend’s wife before his body was even cold in the ground.
“I’m sorry for that, too.” An uncomfortable silence followed another apology I wouldn’t accept. “Look, Ross’s kid needs to be dealt with. If she was after anything, it would have to be the book.”
It didn’t add up.
None of it did.
“How would she know the combination to the safe?”
“Your father trusted Theo—more than anyone.” He grunted. My gaze narrowed on his face. Was the resentment I just witnessed real or imagined? The hard glint in his eyes was gone as quickly as it appeared.
“And?”
“And it’s possible Theo relayed this information to his daughter.”
“For what reason?” I grilled even though I’d already considered the possibility. “He’s locked up, and Mian is no thief.”
“Are you sure about that? She got into your father’s estate, didn’t she? He’d obviously taught her enough. He could have groomed her just as your father intended to groom you.”
“Impossible. The last thing Theo wanted was for his kid to follow in his footsteps. He did everything he could to keep her interest at bay.”
“Impressionists are good at making you see only what you wish, too.”
The wheels controlling reason turned furiously. My mind raced to find another explanation. “It doesn’t make sense.”
“It doesn’t always have to make sense to be the truth. Your father was powerful, but he was also feared. That book—your family’s legacy— was the key to Chicago. He owned it, possessed it, and controlled it. Whoever controls it, takes the city… and any city of their choosing.”
“She’s not some aspiring crime lord.”
“But what she needs is money, I imagine. She’s a young, single mother in a dangerous city. With her father’s guidance, she could sell it to the right buyer. I didn’t hear anything after that.
She’s a young, single mother…
Single mother…
Mother…
Mian had a kid?
Rage, pain, and jealousy—each fighting for dominance.
She had a fucking kid.
Even when jealousy still questioned how it could even be possible, my conscience had already accepted the fault.
I. Let. Her. Go.
When her father murdered mine, I made myself forget her. I beat my heart black and blue until I was convinced she had never been.
I’d known she’d always choose him over me, so I made her pay for her father’s betrayal by forgetting.
“How old is the kid?” I choked. It was clear he had been keeping tabs.
“Not even a year old. The kid’s date of birth escapes me.” He fluttered his fingers as if it was of little importance. Perhaps to a man who’d never fantasized about the day he’d own her mind, body, and soul, it was a blip.
But to a man who possessed those thoughts every single day for six fucking years…
I was nothing other than tormented.
Was she married?
Were they a happy fucking family?
No.
She was too young.
Damn it. She was mine.
“Use the boy.”
I blinked to clear the fog telling me to murder. “Come again?”
“Her son. Use him.”
I felt like I was being strangled. If it showed, he didn’t let on. He continued to talk and eat those damn grapes.
“You saying I should hurt her kid?” I’d much rather hurt the prick who fathered him.
“You don’t have to.”
If you can’t.
It was the real meaning he’d left unsaid.
Son of a bitch.
“Maybe I just need to make her think I will.”
Chapter 8
MIAN
“So he just let you go?”
Anna showed up to see if I needed her to babysit about ten minutes after I rolled out of bed. If I hadn’t been so afraid of who might have been standing on the other side of the door, I would have cried at her thoughtfulness. Last night hadn’t gone as planned.
Scratch that.
Last night, I’d made the second biggest mistake of my life.
“He let me go,” I confirmed. When Anna noticed how spooked I was when I opened the door, the confession of my first and last job poured out of me.
She didn’t sound as if she believed I had gained my freedom so easily. She wasn’t the only one who found it strange. I was just glad I didn’t have to add paranoid to my list of faults. It would have gone right under moronic.
“What do you think he meant by seeing you soon? I mean it’s so spooky. Do you think he’ll come after you?”
“I don’t know.” He’s stayed away all this time. A part of me was hoping last night wouldn’t change that. The other part—the moronic one—was curious. It’s been three years since I’ve seen him. What kind of man was he now?
His errand boy insisted on seeing me home safely. So, not only did Angel have reason to come after me, he now had access to me. During the ride back to the city, I just knew he was taking me somewhere private to dump my body after silencing me forever. But then he asked for my address and actually drove me home.
“But what if he does?” Anna whispered as if Angel could hear her. “Maybe you should call the cops. He basically threatened you, right?”
“He’s not going to kill me. He’s probably just blowing smoke.” No matter what our fathers did to each other, we were the innocent bystanders. Surely, he knew that?
Maybe he did before you broke into his house and stole from him.
My worry shifted to the expensive watch burnin
g a hole in my hoodie. There was no way Z missed the watch when he searched me. He had to know I lifted it yet he let me get away with it.
“But didn’t you say your father killed his? What if he wants revenge?”
“He would have come looking for it long before I broke into his father’s home.” After his father was dead and mine was imprisoned for it, he’d forgotten all about the stupid kid with a crush.
“Just be careful. You’re the only friend I’ve got,” she pouted.
“I promise. I don’t plan on ever seeing Angel Knight again, and there’s nothing he can do to change that.”
She laughed, making her eyes bright again. “Well, good. Just as long as we’re clear on that.”
I stared at Caylen sleeping on a blanket a few feet away but felt her watching me. “What?”
“How did you get all the way out there anyway?”
“Borrowed a car.”
“Whose?”
“Joey’s.”
She groaned probably guessing what that meant. “Mian,” she whined.
“I’m sorry, but I promised him.”
“I’m still not interested.”
I smiled sheepishly. “He just asked for me to talk you into catching a movie with him.”
“Mian!”
“Honestly, I don’t see what the big deal is. Joey’s sweet.”
“Yeah, you’d think so because he doesn’t drool all over you.”
“Please? Would you just consider it? One date. That’s it. You’ll never know for sure until you give it a try.”
“Oh, I’m pretty sure. Joey doesn’t do it for me. He doesn’t give me butterflies. There’s no electricity.”
“Ok. I need to confiscate your library card. You really need to cut down on the corny romance novels.”
“You should give it a try. You never know until you give it a try,” she mimicked. She made a face, and I laughed.
“Tell you what… you go on one date with him, and I’ll read one of your embarrassing obsessions.” She seemed to mull it over but didn’t seem convinced. “Ok, I’ll suffer through two books, and I’ll even discuss them with you.”
“Deal.”
My nails bit into my palm, and I welcomed the pain. I read Jerry’s sign a second time. He was the neighborhood pawnbroker, sometimes loan shark, and it appeared he’d chosen to indulge in the holiday festivities.