The crowd’s thin. Everyone keeps their back to the wall.
Then the room shifts.
Big Sam walks in — broad shoulders, expensive leather jacket, flanked by Keith and Callum. Keith gives me a leering look. I flip him off.
Sam heads straight for the red curtain behind the bar. The real room.
JJ jerks his chin. “Come on.”
Inside, one bulb swings over a round table. The room looks like a leftover setting from a bad action movie. Sam taps his ring against the table in a steady beat. His smile doesn’t reach his eyes. “Mike’s flipped. And loose ends don’t just tangle — they strangle. But I have no intention to get strangled.”
I slide into the empty chair next to Keith, already dreading whatever he’ll fire my way about Cole.
Sam looks around. “Someone tipped the cops about our last drop,” he adds. “Shipment barely left the yard.” Shipment. The word clicks — crates. The same kind Keller showed me.
Sam’s gaze sweeps the table, lands on me. “You trust him, JJ?”
JJ hesitates, then nods, almost reluctantly. “He’s solid. Took a beatin’ for my friend inside. From Willis.”
Callum flinches, almost sympathetic. Sam studies me and after a beat, nods.
Then the door opens and Sheriff Willard steps in. Out of uniform, but still wearing that smug authority. His eyes find me and darken. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”
I touch the brim of my cap. “Evening, Sheriff.”
“You sure about him, Sam?”
Willard’s not looking at Sam like the others around me. He’s looking at him like they’re equals.
Sam raises an eyebrow. “I check my people.”
Willard scoffs. “You trust too easy. You checked his shoes?”
JJ bristles. “You think we were born yesterday?”
Willard cuts him down with a look, then leans toward Sam, voice low. “We still need that last load cleared before the heat gets closer.”
Sam’s voice is calm. “Keith’s got it covered.”
We stand to leave soon after that.
Willard steps just enough to block me, the menace radiating from every pore.“Your father thought he was smarter than me, too.”
The words are a blade.
I walk past without a flinch, fists tight all the way into the night.
You’re going down, you bastard.
COLE
Summer Activity Standard Premium Deluxe Package for preschoolers has one actually useful class: Henry’s photography workshop.
A dozen kids are clutching disposable cameras while Henry stands at the front with his usual calm, sounding less like an instructor and more like a monk leading meditation.
“See how the sun hits the window?” he says, pointing at the way light spills in a rectangle across the floor. “That’s your free spotlight. Watch how it changes what you see.”
Noah is crouched under a chair, taking a close-up of someone’s sneakers. Another kid gleefully documents the trash can.
