He tries to push me off of him. “You have no idea what you’ve done. You’ve already compromised your position, sleeping with her–”
“Finish that sentence, and I’ll break your jaw.”
His jaw tightens, but instead of doing what’s smart, he keeps talking.
Douglass breathes hard through his nose. “You think you’ve won something? You haven’t. They will find out what you’ve done, and when they do–”
Before he can finish, I fail to hold my rage back any longer. I snap.
My fist connects with his face. Bone cracks under my knuckles, and blood coats my fist. His head whips sideways, stumbling back into the bar cart with a grunt, knocking over the whiskey decanter as blood spills from his mouth down the front of his shirt.
He cries out, clutching his jaw with both hands, gasping through it.
“You want my niece's estate, is that it?” He grunts, blood pooling from his mouth, “It’s mine! God, you’re an idiot, just like my nephews. Good riddance to them.” He spits blood out onto the ground, showing me the first bit of the menacing asshole I knew he was capable of being.
I go to lean forward to hit him again–
That’s when I hear it.
The cock of a gun behind me, and I think for the first time how Archie's flakiness has finally caught up with me. The guards, both of them, are now in the doorway, weapons drawn. One has his stance locked, the other’s hand is shaking. I don’t even flinch, but I know with certainty I am more than outnumbered. I expected this to be my one clean shot to take Douglass out, but it seems tonight all I have left are threats.
Douglass wheezes, trying to speak, but it comes out broken. “God dammit, my jaw, ”
I step toward the nearest guard without looking away from Douglass. “Lower it.”
“Don’t move,” the man barks, voice cracking just slightly.
I stop, hands still loose at my sides. “You know who I am?”
Silence.
“You would be wise to put your fucking guns away. I’m too important to the Brotherhood for any of you to survive this. Archibald Franklin has directives upon my disappearance to kill you. He’ll enjoy it. It will be so sloppily done with his bare hands that your family won’t even get a closed casket. There’ll barely be anything left of you.”
Their eyes flicker to each other, knowing the power I also hold. Unsure of what to do. They’re desperate to be recruited by the Brotherhood. Fucking with me would ruin that for them, and they know it.
I turn back to Douglass, who's slumped against the wall, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth onto his collar.
I force myself to calm down. The urge to draw my knife and drive it into his chest claws at me, but I shove it aside, trading impulse for the long game. Success matters more.
“You talk too much,” I say. “And you’re going to regret it.”
He tries to speak again, jaw wobbling. I don't give him the chance. I need to drill my final point home. I need him to know that his life is in my hands.
She doesn’t need the Estate. I have more money than God, and there won’t be a day she doesn’t have the world handed to her on a silver tray, because I’ll make sure of it. That’s not the point. It’s the principle. A man threatening what’s mine won’t continue to see the light of day. My mouthy little brat doesn’t get to be threatened by anyone but me.
The moment I decided to take her, I knew her uncle would be a problem. That kind of entitlement, old money arrogance, clinging to power like it’s a birthright, makes men reckless. They think they’re owed loyalty, owed control, owed obedience, just because their name is carved into some family crest. But what they forget is this: it takes work to keep power. Dirty work. Work I’ve never been afraid to do with my own hands.
When the twins came to me with the idea of killing their father, they didn’t realize how perfect their timing was. I’d always intended to take her, and somewhere along the way, they’d started to sense it. My obsession. My claim. Martine is mine. After two years of orchestrating every move, every inch of proximity, I finally got her.
But watching her be stripped down, broken by circumstance, not by me? That was the gift I didn’t expect to receive.
Ford and I have always gotten along. Dex and I shared a mutual respect. We’ve bled together, earned our trust the hard way through the Brotherhood. So when they saw my obsession with her, they didn’t try to stop it. They saw the advantage—the inevitability. Smart men.
“You’re going to leave the property,” I say, calm now, composed again. “You're going to keep Martine’s name out of your mouth. You’re going to stay the fuck out of her life. Because if I hear a whisper, if I so much as feel your shadow anywhere near her, I'll make sure no Brotherhood protection can save you.”
One of the guards speaks up now, voice unsure. “Sir, should we call–”
I turn to him with a look that halts the sentence in its tracks.
