It’s all her.
Notes. Numbers. Candid photos. Her alone. With Leon. With me. With her mam. A few newspaper clippings thrown in.
I snap it shut before she can see.
The wallet is simple. Driver’s license says his name was Reginald Cole. I rifle through the slots. One debit card, a few crumpled bills. Nothing else.
White hot ire burns my blood. I don’twantto feel anything for her. She ran off. Given five minutes with no interruption by a sick, sadistic fuck, she’d probably have gone hunting for Leon next.
I sit back against the seat. The air in the car is thick withtension, and if I reach for her, I’m not sure if I’m going to comfort her or devour her.
Better to get home and process all this.
Ithinkthe reason she’s in danger is lying dead in that park. He’s the stalker, that much is obvious. But I need to check his address and what’s on the USB, just to be sure.
Once I know for certain, I could let her go. Job done.
Except it isn’t. Not until I scrub the price off her head. Not until her name is clear of the truckyard. Not until I find her father.
And the bastard who tried to setmeup with the drugs.
Fuck, this is nowhere near done.
“Dec—”
“I wouldn’t talk right now if I were you,” I say.
We ride the rest of the way in silence.
At home, I send Mikey off and take one long look at Molly before changing. I order her to her room with strict instructions. I change my clothes, grab Arnold’s leash, and scoop up a whining Petal, wheeled harness and all.
I don’t trust Marlowe as far as I can throw the entire fucking house, so I’ve already made sure the place is locked down. No one comes in or goes out except for immediate family. That doesn’t include Marlowe. Brendan’s on watch across the street, cigarette in one hand, phone in the other, looking like some lad waiting for a date.
He’s one of several stationed around the place. Cal isn’t playing games with cartel-adjacent ghosts sniffing around us.
Neither am I.
I run, pounding the pavement, letting the anger bleed out of me with every stride. Arnold trots at my side. Petal bumps along in front of my chest, tucked into my hoodie like a furry grenade.
They think I’m the baby brother. The joker.Theshite-stirrer. It’s not wrong. Why be a stern prick when a cutting line or a well-timed joke can rock someone’s boat or ease tensions?
But there’s more to me than the lad who holds the seams together.
I’m not a fucking tailor. I don’t just patch up holes.
I want a piece of something real. My own territory. My own empire, however small it starts out.
I’m a sharp shooter, but not Torin-level. I’m not the main enforcer, though I can make a hundred grown men sob for their mammies if Cal points and says “go.”
Maybe the answer is somewhere in between. Something legit-looking that lets me walk both sides. A bodyguard service, proper and polished. A bridge job. Clients see the clean version. Behind that, we decide who’s visible and who never gets spotted.
Brendan is visible if you know the signs. Some of our boys aren’t. I want that power. To choose the shadows.
Mam talked about that in her own way. Not directly, never in front of Da or Cal, but with the other wives, our aunties. I listened. She has a softer touch. Hard lines, quiet hands. One foot in domestic life, one hand always on the gun.
Mam’s more dangerous than half the men in this family.
A proper protection business could be my way to thread that needle. Put my name on something that looks clean while staying filthy in all the right places.
