Alexei shot me a dry look, then considered Embry again. “Chaplain, go on. Explain your position. I am not as immovable as you think.”
“Aren’t you?”
“If I was, I would not be here.”
Embry heaved a quiet sigh, but Cam’d had enough.
He rapped his knuckles on the table. “Viktor’s motivations aren’t relevant unless we take the war to Lorenzo first and we’re not in a position to do that either. All our money is tied up in the yard and we made promises to people and ourselves to stay clean.”
“So you do nothing?” Alexei released Embry from his laser stare and turned it back on Cam. “That is your plan?”
“It’s mysuggestion. We can vote on it when the others have said their piece.”
Alexei rolled his eyes and pointed at Nash. “Speak.”
“I haven’t got much to say.” Nash lit a cigarette and angled himself away from Saint, the smoke heading my way instead. “Cam’s right. And you’re right too. We can’t afford a war, but we’re idiots if we wait to get hit.”
“I’m with Cam,” Rubi stated. “Got nothing he hasn’t said already.”
It made sense. Rubi was as tough as they came, but he didn’t live for the fight. He’d rather smoke a joint and call someone a diabolical cunt than punch them.
Saint was another story. We had a lot in common, but he was unpredictable. He didn’t think like anyone else, and he kept his less obvious priorities to himself. In fact, today he’d kept everything to himself. Every fucking word, and one look at him told me that wasn’t gonna change.
Saint shook his head.
Then he pushed his chair back and walked away.
Cam flinched as the door swung shut behind him.
Alexei fell into Saint’s vacant seat with a sigh. “That man is tired.”
“Too tired for a fucking war,” Cam snapped.
“Is why we should end it before it starts.”
“So we lose you instead?”
“You think I am inefficient?”
“No, I think you belong here.”
Cam spoke with finality and turned his gaze to me. Jabbed his finger in the air. “You ain’t said shit. I got other people for that. What’s on your mind, brother?”
I had no cigarettes. And no Embry as he remained by the window. I took a measured breath and stretched my legs out. My fucking back was still killing me, but I liked the fresh bruises on my spine. Liked feeling them twinge when I moved.
What I didn’t like?
Being the casting vote at a table of brothers with far bigger brains than me. It was why I always spoke up first. Ploughed in with my temper instead of facts. I didn’t mind being wrong, but the perception that I mattered, that my voice should be heard, felt twisted somehow.Deceptive.
If I thought about it too hard, I became a man these men didn’t know.
Through the window, I watched Saint stride across the yard and throw a leg over his bike. He was keyed up and frustrated. My gut told me he wanted to fight, but he loved Cam more, and I fucking felt that. There had to be another way.
I drummed my fingers on the table. “You said they’re coming for us. Who? How? Sambini has men on the ground here, but they work for Gianni Sambini, not Lorenzo. That’s the cousin, right? The one Alexei kidnapped?”
What a sentence to say.
Nash acknowledged it with a wry nod. Then considered the rest. “Lorenzo is using old Crows. He’s been rounding them up this whole time. Building a force and offering them a shit ton of cash to do their dirty work. If it doesn’t pan out, they’ll send the real squad, but until then it’s the same bullshit we’ve been dealing with as long as I’ve been alive.”
