“He’s not coming,” Cam said, sensing where my thoughts had gone. “Crows look like they’re moving out to make a run. We need eyes on that too.”
“That makes sense. Their increased operation needs funding. Perhaps they are moving product on their newly claimed roads.”
“We need to ask Sambini. They have more intelligence on that than we do.”
“When do we leave?”
“Ten minutes.”
It was enough time for me to check in with the injured chaplain. I left Cam and slipped inside, taking the noisy staircase to the residence.
Embry’s door was open and he was awake, standing at the window, his stance and complexion a world away from when I’d seen him last.
I propped a shoulder on the doorframe. “You are feeling better?”
He nodded. “Thanks for helping me. I’m sorry I told Cam to go fuck himself.”
“Why apologise to me about that? He was not upset.”
“You would’ve been if you’d seen his face.”
“Perhaps that was more about how it felt to see you in pain. He is not a thin-skinned man.”
Embry moved away from the window, revealing a pane of cracked glass behind him, the frame bowed by the force of whatever had hit it. “Mateo,” Embry said. “I took my frustration out on him until he lost his shit. Then I told him to go fuck himself too.”
“This does not sound like the man I have learned you to be.”
“Maybe I can’t always be the man Itaught myselfto be.” Embry’s hands balled into fists. “Mateo is more honest than me. For a moment, I forgot how important that is.”
He was telling me a story without the plot, and I was intrigued, but I didn’t have time for much more.
I gestured for Embry to show me the stitched wounds on his abdomen and laid my cold hands on his warm skin. “The medication I gave you, I have it in tablet form. If you feel that kind of pain manifesting again, you need to take the drugs quickly so it does not get so bad.”
“Is it fucked up that I thought I needed that pain to think straight?”
“Yes. But we are all a little fucked up, no?”
Embry let his shirt drop and stepped back before I could. His gaze drifted to the window again. “Maybe that’s why you’re so good for them both. Because you see the world from hell and still manage to love them so much.”
This was how I knew this brother was different from the rest, his ability to verbalise thoughts and emotions with such eloquence. It was a shame that he could not turn his watchful nature inwards and dissect himself. “I need to leave. The Sambini meet is happening tonight.”
“Is it?”
“You did not know?”
Embry’s expression flattened. “No one is talking business where I can hear them.”
“They want you to get better.”
“Then they shouldn’t aggravate me.”
I tilted my head. “And what is it that aggravates you? Revenge?”
“It’s not that simple.”
“Of course it is not. Tell me what complicates it for you.”
Embry’s gaze grew distant. “I feel like that blade is still inside me. Not literally—or maybe it is. I don’t know. It’s just... unfinished, and it’s making my skin crawl, like there’s eyes on me all the time, you know? And not the good kind. Not my brothers.”
