Cole used to live for reactions. Used to walk into a room, daring someone to blink first.
I rub the back of my neck. “He’s pacing himself. That’s what I don’t like.”
Zane leans back against the counter, arms folding across his chest. “He was never patient.”
“He is when he thinks it’ll hurt more,” I say.
Ryder’s gaze shifts to me. “You think this is about pain.”
“I think this is about ego,” I correct. “Pain’s just the delivery method.”
“Marcus would’ve walked.”
Zane nods. “Marcus would’ve listened.”
Marcus had been the one who said the deal felt wrong. The one who wanted to back off when the other club started pushing for territory that wasn’t theirs.
Cole said backing off would make us look weak.
Marcus said escalating would get someone killed.
He was right.
Just not about who.
I can still see that warehouse in my head. The echo of boots. The metallic tang in the air. Cole with that look in his eyes. To him, insanity was clarity.
“He pushed that meet,” I say quietly. “You wanted to renegotiate. Cole wanted to make a statement.”
Ryder’s jaw hardens. “I told him to stand down.”
“He didn’t,” Zane says.
No emotion in it. Just a fact.
Cole took Marcus and two others anyway. Told them it was a show of strength. Told them Ryder would back it once it was done.
But it wasn’t done.
It turned into an ambush.
Marcus caught the worst of it.
And when we got there, Cole was still swinging.
“He couldn’t accept that we’d miscalculated,” I say. “So he doubled down.”
Ryder is controlled, but there’s iron under it. “He valued pride over lives.”
“And you didn’t,” Zane says.
That’s where the split really started.
Marcus’s funeral wasn’t loud.
And afterward, Ryder pulled contracts. Shut down the dirtiest suppliers. Told the club we were done answering disrespect with blood.
Cole called it weakness.
