“And why did you break up in the first place if he was so terrible? How did he let you leave him?”
She lifts her chin. “He cheated. It gave me an out. He was bored and I was the one boring him.”
I don’t react to those words. “You wanted to train me and Lele after all that?” That seems suspect.
She frowns, her brows knitting together. “You think I’d hold the sins of your uncle against you? If that were the case, I wouldn’t have any clients. They’re all stained.”
That’s probably true. “You think he had bad drugs sold to my brother and hoped… What? It’d kill him? That’s a stretch, and a gamble. He could’ve found a more violent and definitive method.” I have to think of this objectively, because the moment I imagine Lele shaking in my arms, I want to throw up, thinking my uncle—who gave me everything I needed to put myself where I’m at—was the reason behind it.
Was it a warning? To get him in line? Lele parties. His vices are all the usuals: Sex, drugs, cash. But he shows up when he needs to. Besides, he’s not inheriting the throne. Lynx knows I’ve proven well enough it should beme.There’s no need to try and whip my brother into shape.
Eve still has her arms crossed. But there’s a distant look in her eyes, like even though she’s here, she’s thinking about when she wasthere,with Lynx.
I don’t know what I feel when I think of him. In my world, you measure a person’s goodness by a strange yardstick. If I’m going against the worst thing that’s ever happened to me, the stories I’ve heard of what’s happened to other people around me, Lynx is a fucking saint.
Eve is staring right at me but she’s not really seeing me. “I don’t know,” she says quietly in answer to my question. “But I thought I’d mention it to you. In case you hadn’t thought of that angle.”
No. I certainly had not fucking thought ofthat angle.
“Why wouldn’t you tell me any of this before?”
Eve smiles at me, but there’s no warmth in it. It’s a reminder she’s not someone to taunt. “Do you know the power your uncle has?”
I narrow my gaze. “And you think I have none?”
“Sometimes you seem grown, Lydia James. But then I remember you have so much more to learn.”
I don’t like her fucking tone. “So did you decide to stop being a little bitch when Lele ended up in the hospital or is there something you want from me Lynx won’t give you?”
A muscle in her jaw hardens. “I suppose in some ways you are just like him, aren’t you?” The dig lands and I don’t know why the rage grows so hot. Is it a compliment?Not from her.
My phone buzzes from its perch on the edge of the ring and I snap my gaze to it. Eve starts to walk toward it but I’m already upand moving. I beat her there and snatch the phone up, my heart in my throat when I see it’s Fox calling. I answer the call and wait without saying a word, the screen pressed to my ear. If it’s my uncle, he’s dead. And that’s going to put me in a world of shit with his network because it extends into my territory too. We overlap. Usually, our empire is one and the same. They wouldn’t follow me like they follow him. But no one fucks with Lele.
“The Learys.” Fox’s voice is calm and precise. I think he’s driving; there’s a hum in the background. He must be on his way here to Rector’s.
The Learys.
Storm.
But no. The son can’t be who he means.
Hawthorn and Cassia.
Husband and wife but word is after decades of marriage, they’re together for business purposes only. Business being bodies. Not sex trafficking; death dealing. Which means I doubt their scope is drugs, so I wait for Fox to keep talking. Besides, as Lynx told me after the funeral, we have a truce and that family is off limits. Something I never needed to concern myself with.
Fox needs to hurry up his fucking preamble.
“Their…son.” My bodyguard sounds hesitant. He knows some things. But he wasn’t at the funeral when I was a teenager. He doesn’t know about the hands and bruises in the dark. Blue eyes I’ve never once forgotten.
My blood runs cold.
I let Fox keep talking.
“He’s twenty-two, twenty-three, somewhere around your age. Anyway, they’ve done a good job keeping his records obscure.”
I close my eyes tight.
“He’s a dealer around Ely. Works with a chemist named Grey. If we’re being technical, Grey’s girlfriend is who gave it toLele. She stole it from Grey, under his nose, and the Leary kid is the one who gave him the orders to make it and test it. A teaser to see how the street likes it. Grey was being fucked over by this girlfriend fucking Lele so I don’t think we should hold the girl or the chemist responsible but that’s on you, Lyd.”
