by Eden Butler
“You didn’t?” Dimitri asked, folding his arms.
“It was…dangerous, and I had Makayla to think about. If I was gone, her family couldn’t protect her.”
“She’s not wrong,” Kat said, glancing over her shoulder at Dimitri. “They had contingency plans. Shane had her followed everywhere she went. I knew enough about that from hacking into his laptop. He would have killed her and anyone she cared about if he knew she was talking to the feds.”
“So what changed your mind?” I asked her, trying hard not to look at the bruised shining on her cheek.
“Liam…I heard him talking about bringing a new…cast. That’s what he called the girls. Like it was a damn show, this sick shit they were doing. But this group, they weren’t going to be like the others I’d seen. He…he called them lollipops. They were children…some as young as what Makayla was then and she was barely out of diapers. I couldn’t let that happen. What kind of person could stand for that?”
Next to me, Dimitri cursed, turning away from Ava to kick the small table next to the door.
“Easy,” Dante told Dimitri, patting his back. To Ava, he said, “you should have done that shit sooner. Even before the kids…”
“Shut up, Dante,” Kat told him, her glare sharp. “You have no idea what it was like for any of us. She was just as trapped as we all were.”
“She left you…” he started and stepped back as Kat turned toward him.
“And what the hell were you doing that whole time, huh? Running drugs for that asshole. Then stealing Liam’s damn money?” Kat pushed on his chest, and I started to understand what the big falling out was between them that Dante never wanted to discuss anytime we asked why he and Kat had stopped hanging out. “Did you know about the girls?”
“No way,” Dimitri said, moving to Kat’s side. “Because even this little asshole isn’t stupid enough to let innocent people get bought and sold under his fucking nose.” He grabbed Dante’s shoulder, giving it a squeeze like our kid brother didn’t have a good twenty pounds on him. “That right, little brother? You weren’t that stupid, were you?”
“What? Hell no!” He glared at Dimitri, jerking his hand away before he curled his top lip, looking ready to scream his head off at Kat when he frowned at her. “What kind of asshole do you think I am?”
Kat glared at him, her cheeks turning red. “The kind that would sell smack out of his brother’s club and then let that same brother take the wrap for it.”
Dante shut his eyes, glancing away from her. “I didn’t…that’s not…
“It’s over,” I told him, shaking my head when Kat opened her mouth like she wasn’t done making my kid brother feel like an asshole. “Let it go.”
“It was the club,” Ava said, bringing our attention back to her. “When Pope told Liam that Alex and his team were planning to raid the warehouse, he contacted a friend of his at the DEA. They diverted the warehouse raid on the intel Pope gave them. He convinced him the trafficking accusation at the warehouse was a distraction for the drugs being run through Dario’s club.” She brushed a curl of hair from her forehead, sitting on the edge of her chair. “He was pissed about the money Dante took from him. He went on and on about it, but I swear, I didn’t know about the raid. Neither did Alex until the last minute.”
“But I heard you,” Kat accused, some of her anger returning. “That night. I heard you telling Liam you were glad the raid was happening at Dario’s club and not your father’s warehouse.”
Ava shook her head, ignoring the look Dimitri gave her when she stood. “Of course I did. Pope told Liam there was someone inside his circle that fed intel to Alex. I couldn’t admit anything to him. I had Makayla to consider. I would have said that and worse to keep her safe.” She glanced my way, finally looking at me fully before looking back at Kat. “The second I knew about the raid on Dario’s bar, I called Wes and asked him to get you out. Alex was already on his way to meet me. But Liam heard me talking to Wes. In one phone call a year of planning to get me into WITSEC was gone.”
She watched me again and there was something in her eyes that told me this was the truth. There were flashes of the woman I knew, hints and glimpses in her expression that promised I hadn’t been played completely by her.
“I swear, if I’d known that Wes was killed, that Kat got left, if…” She stepped toward me but went still when I looked away from her. “If I knew it was your bar…you who had saved me that night…”
“What happened after that?” Dimitri asked, distracting her. “What did the fed do with you?”
“Put me in hiding. First California, then Canada for a while. Alex kept moving me while he tracked down Emma.” She stretched her neck, looking worried but invigorated now. “But Liam found me. I don’t know how, but he did, and I ran. I thought he knew where I was at all times. I left the program but checked in with Alex here and there. He hated me being on my own, but I wouldn’t take the risk. Anyone associated with me could be targeted by them. I wouldn’t have that.
“Then, about a year ago Emma escaped. Slipped away just like I had and tracked Alex down. She gave him information on the business Liam was running. She played them, had them believing she could help with the new girls. But the whole time she was gathering info. When Alex got to her, she was able to give him the MO they employed, how they used these handsome, charming assholes to lure the girls in and then took them once the girls trusted the guys they used. Emma knew what cities they were targeting and the schedule of priming them for the trade.” Sighing, Ava cleared her throat before she moved back to her chair. “Alex has been tracking a group in Brazil that Emma told him about. He suggested find an ally, but I doubt he figured I’d come here.”
“Why did you?” Dimitri asked her, his voice curious, not as angry.
Ava’s gaze shifted from my brother, slowly moving to me and I caught the answer in her expression before she had a chance to speak it. It probably wasn’t the only reason, but our first meeting might have made her believe my family wasn’t like her in-laws.
Some sick, self-flatulating part of me wanted to believe she came to our town to seek me out. Because I’d promised her I’d have her back if she needed me. Another wiser, more cynical part of my brain thought she was looking for a more powerful family to take down her ex and his family.
I wasn’t sure which was true.
Ava shook her head, watching Kat, then Dimitri as they waited for an answer. “Your family has a certain…reputation. I guess I was hopeful that meant you’d be interested in what I had to offer you.”
“Which is?” Dimitri asked, still seeming unconvinced.
“A way to take down those assholes.”
“You think you can provide that?” Dimitri laughed, looking at me, spotting the frown on my face before he glanced back at Ava. “What do you have?”
“Information,” she said, motioning to the chair near the door. “Take a seat, and we can discuss it.”
“You didn’t even try to fit in when you got here,” Dimitri said, frowning at Dante when he pulled the chair over. My big brother sat, though he didn’t look happy about it.
“I had to know if I could trust you. When you insisted on the community fee it didn’t sit well with me.” Ava crossed her legs, her attention on Dimitri. “Liam and McKinney pulled the same shit on the businesses renting out their buildings. They took nearly sixty percent of the profits from those people and if they didn’t pay, their shops got robbed or mysteriously ransacked. I had no idea about you, Smoke. And I’d only had a twenty-minute conversation with Dario six years ago. I couldn’t trust any of you. Not at first and then…things got…complicated.”
“You should have told us…everything.” Dimitri frowned, but it wasn’t severe.
“I meant to. I was going to…but those complications—” She waved a hand, inhaling like she needed a second to clear her thoughts. “I was scared.”
Dimitri considered her, leaning his elbows on his knees, his fingers interlocked as he w
atched Ava’s beautiful face. I cursed myself, trying to remember what she’d kept from me. She knew what had happened to me and why. Hell, she’d known this entire time and never told me the truth. I didn’t know what to do with that info.
I didn’t know how to feel about any of this bullshit now.
“You got anymore issues you want sorted?” Dimitri asked Kat, looking to his left to watch her reaction.
She was quiet, keeping her attention on Ava’s face, meeting the look she gave Kat like it was a challenge. “Wes was a good man,” Kat said.
Kat nodded when Ava muttered a low, “He was.”
“And the intel you have, does it require any of my…skills?”
“You’re the best,” Ava said. “At least that’s what everyone has been saying.” She gestured to Dimitri.
Kat’s mouth stretched into a proud, half smile that dropped when Dante stood next to her. “Well, I am…”
“One of the best,” Dante said, frowning when Kat waved him off. “What?”
“I taught you.” She held up her hand, silencing him. “If this shit means I can get back at Liam and McKinney, then sign me the hell up.”
“Good,” Ava said, scooting her chair closer to Dimitri. She paused when I pushed off the wall, moving toward the door.
“Where you going?” Dimitri asked me, his expression curious.
“Checking on Luca. You got this handled.”
My skin prickled as I moved toward the door, and I swear I felt the heat from her stare licking across my back. I didn’t turn. Wasn’t sure I wanted to. Wasn’t sure of anything at all.
“Alright,” I heard my big brother start as I grabbed the doorknob. “Give me details and tell me your plan.”
“Okay,” Ava said, her tone distracted. “I’m gonna need a little cooperation.”
24
Ava
Mickey O’Halloran had owned a distillery, and like ten generations of O’Halloran’s before him, he worked that place until his fingers were thin, bloody sticks. Like his father, he’d been a good, hardworking man. But unlike those good O’Halloran men, Mickey’s kid, Little Mick had gotten shortened on the stuff that made his father and grandfather great.
It was Little Mick and his compulsions that brought him to my father’s attention.
One bad bet became ten, and soon Little Mick was squandering the legacy his ancestors had created.
Two years it took to destroy that legacy.
Two years of bad luck bets, and my father owned it all.
The place hadn’t changed much since I’d last seen it. The red brick exterior was dingier now, and the paint had begun to peel from the O’Halloran Distilling sign that ran nearly the entire length of the front façade. And as I approached, driving my secondhand Audi through the wrought iron gates and around the back, a rush of memory and dread crept into my stomach.
This wasn’t something I wanted to do.
Anything could go wrong and likely would.
A tall, white-haired guard with pink-rimmed eyes smirked at me as I drove in front of the loading dock and that sensation in my stomach thickened.
“Snowflake.” My father’s most loyal, most obnoxious man sucked on his bottom lip as I put the Audi in park. He watched me for the two minutes I took not moving, willing my fingers to quit shaking and the knot in my throat to lessen.
The man jerked his head, tilting it in a gesture that was more demand than request, and I followed it, not bothering to acknowledge him as I killed the motor and opened the door.
The plan was set but I was not steady as I moved out of the car. Standing frozen next to it, I willed the night to end. I willed myself to not wreck everything that had been set in motion. But guilt hung on me like a wool cloak; heavy and unwieldy. I hated the sensation but knew it was something I’d created myself.
A heavy whine of creaking metal moaned against the small sounds of Snowflake’s heels under the gravel, and I held my breath as my father lumbered through the large, back distillery door.
“Better have what he wants, pet,” Snowflake said, that broken wheeze of an accent like a screech ringing in my ears.
He didn’t stare so much as leer, but as my father approached, most of his heavy bulk weighted onto the cane he held, I forgot about Snowflake and his warnings.
“Reagan,” my father said, the mock affection thick in his tone. He made to lift his hand, probably to force me into his embrace, but dropped it when I glared at him.
To Snowflake, he motioned toward me, and the man didn’t hesitate, his fingers groping, slow and heavy around me as he patted me down.
A cough of air puffed from the asshole’s mouth when he lingered his touch on the underside of my breast and I shot my elbow into his gut.
“Back off,” I told him, my jaw clenching when he lunged for me.
“Enough of that now,” my father told his man. “Leave her be if she’s unarmed.”
“She is,” Snowflake said, his look long and slow as he stepped back, pushing his thin lips into a mocking kiss as he moved away.
“Well?” Rory said, his cane sinking into the gravel as he came toward me. He appraised me with a slow gaze, like he wasn’t sure he could make out what was different about me and what was the same. “You’ve stayed away a long time, love.”
I didn’t respond, deciding all the loud, filthy things I wanted to call the man would do nothing to help me get out of here alive.
“Nothing to say?” he asked, reaching for my face, twisting it up and down like he was judging the soundness of a horse he wanted to buy.
He stood too close, his breath thick with cigarette smoke, and my stomach coiled. “Plenty,” I said. I couldn’t stand it, him, being this close and slapped his hand away before I stepped back.
My father considered me for half a second, then released a guttural laugh, head back as he waved toward his men. “She’s the same fire in her belly her sweet mum had…” The men joined in his laugh, going quiet when Rory stopped near the Audi’s trunk. “Go on then.” He waved to the car, beckoning me. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”
Three, no four, I thought, taking in the beefy assholes who surrounded my father. Snowflake was tall and wiry, but not very strong. Two men I didn’t know at all, both nearly as heavy as my father, though their bulk was made up of muscle, not fat. A third man I loathed almost as much as Snowflake. He was Remy Jilani, Wes’s brother and by the look he gave me, the hatred and venom the man sent my way in one hard, even glare, I understood he blamed me for his brother’s death. That much, I couldn’t argue with, but it didn’t make me want to lower my guard or let Remy get any kind of retribution for Wes’s sake.
My guilt would do nothing but hinder the plan and that wouldn’t help anyone but my father, something I’d die rather than doing.
The Audi’s trunk released with a whine; the yellow light within made Dario look even more pale than he had been a week before when they’d returned from the warehouse raid.
“Look at this asshole,” Snowflake said, disregarding my father’s glancing stare.
“Well, well.” Rory sounded pleased as he elbowed next to me. “Not the first prize, but a good start, isn’t it now?”
Dario lay unconscious, his hands bound in front of him by zip ties. He wore pajama bottoms and no shoes, and his face was darkened with blood under his crooked nose. That silver lip ring was bloody as well and heavy purple bruises appeared below his left eye.
“Jaysus,” my father started, his voice heavy with laughter. “What in Mary’s name did you do to the poor bastard?”
My insides were frozen, my lungs clogged with dread as I looked down at him. I couldn’t stand seeing him like this, and I couldn’t stomach the idea that he was here, looking the way he did because of me.
“Just…take him,” I urged my father, stepping back when Snowflake and Remy reached inside to pull Dario out.
“That’s my girl.” A shudder ran up my spine when Rory clapped my back. “Knew you had it in you.”
/> “Like you gave me a choice.” I stepped away from him as we watched his men pull Dario toward the distillery. “He’s a good man.” A wind picked up around us and I swore I caught the hint of baked bread and whiskey that wasn’t coming from the building in front of me. “Wes was a good man too.”
“Don’t you go getting sentimental.” My father stood in front of me, pulling out a cigarette from his breast pocket. “This is business, love.” My eyes burned when he lit the smoke and it thickened and coiled between us.
“I don’t give a shit about your business.” They almost had Dario to the back entrance. I glanced at my father, putting my hands into my jacket pocket. “We’re even now. I walk away, and you get a Carelli.”
“Ah,” he said, taking another drag of his cigarette. “I’m ’fraid that isn’t how this will go, will it now?”
Glancing to his left, I stepped back, hitting the car. “We had a deal—”
“You’re me daughter, Reagan. I need to make no deals with you.” With a bob of his head, the two men behind him moved, one each flanking me and taking hold of my arms as my father watched on with a dispassionate frown. “You’ve a lot to answer for, and Liam’s your husband. It’s time you go home to him.”
Remy had Dario slumped over his shoulder while Snowflake looked down at his phone. Tweedledumb and Tweedledumber were facing me, their thick fingers clamped down on my arms as Rory shook his head, more interested in his cigarette and shaming me than what might be happening around him.
From the darkness, a few forms slinked around the distillery. The motion detectors were off, thanks to Kat’s skills and the streetlights on the other side of the main gate flickered.