Familiar full lips, tanned skin, and coal eyes stared back at her, making her heart race with a thickened mixture of anger and fear.
“Oshun,” she heard Aesop’s voice calling through her loud heartbeats pounding in her ears. “This is Masaki, the leader of the Canarsie Yakuza family.”
She watched as Aesop extended a hand to the man, giving him a friendly dap before continuing his introduction. “Masaki, this is the leader of the Brownsville Council, Oshun.”
There was an awkward silence in the room. Neither of them saying a word, their eyes locked on one another, forgetting about their business companions who were now standing on either side of Oshun.
“Izzy, ‘Sop,” Masaki called to the two men standing beside her, but kept his eyes fixed on hers. “Please leave the lady and I to discuss things amongst ourselves.”
Aesop leaned down and whispered quietly in her ear, “You wit’ it?”
She nodded, giving him permission to take his leave. Aesop stood still next to her, looking back and forth between she and Masaki.
“I promise no harm will come to her in my company, ‘Sop.”
With that, Aesop took his leave. She remained standing in front of the table uncertain of what to say. She’d never wanted to find this, had given herself every excuse in the book for why Masaki’s company would be involved with the Yakuza. All the excuses except for the one answer sitting in front of her now.
“I guess I understand now why you gave me such a hard time about moving in.”
She yanked the chair out from under the table, and sat down in it.
“Was this a setup all along? Were you playing me this whole time? Was this just about taking over my community?”
He leaned forward quickly, planting his forearms on the table as he glared at her.
“If I had known who you were…,” his voice trailing off, leaving her to wonder what the other end of that thought was. Would he have walked away from her? Could he have? She’d been trying to loosen his hold on her since they’d met three months ago. Would it have been so easy for him to cut his losses and move on?
“This was not my doing, Oshun. I didn’t know, but I have a feeling you did. You’ve been jumpy as hell since I found you at the scene of the fire. You even attempted to cut me loose. Was it because you knew who I was?”
She shook her head. “I suspected you had some kind of involvement with the Yakuza when you told me you owned AAM. I thought they might be using you for a front. I didn’t think you were actually running the damn organization.”
They sat quietly in their chairs, both seeming at a loss for the right words to deal with this situation.
“What do we do now, Masaki? How do we move on from here?”
She was proud of the even control of her voice. It surprised her. If he could sense the tremors cresting and crashing on her insides, he’d have known how afraid she really was.
This man could ruin her and her community. The worst part was she’d given him the ammunition.
“I can’t let you destroy my community by bringing drugs and violence back into its borders.”
“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” he snapped. The sharp tone forced her to focus on him, instead of the mounting apprehension swirling in her gut. “I don’t deal in the drug trade. It’s too risky, and the officials I have in my pocket wouldn’t be able to remain loyal to me if I dealt in drugs.”
She assessed him carefully, hoping to see if she’d learned enough about him to know when he was lying or not. His eyes were focused steadily on hers, his words were direct, and his breath even.
He wasn’t lying.
Then what the hell is this all about?
“Oshun, drugs are not my family’s business.”
“What exactly is your family’s business then?” Her question drew a crooked smile from him, making her pulse quicken. Here they were, engaged in a conversation that could impact the lives of thousands, and he still found the time to be so damn sexy it made her blood bubble with desire.
“That’s something only family should know. Don't you think?”
She eased back in her chair, attempting to process the unfolding events. She’d somehow missed the fact that her lover was the head of an enemy faction, and now the reason she thought they were about to go to war seemed nonexistent. None of this made much sense.
“If I’m to be completely honest, Masaki,” she answered, “I don’t know what to think.”
