Someone mutters, “Morning, boss,” near the fridge.
Another, younger voice adds, “Morning, Val,” with genuine warmth, then falls quickly quiet.
There’s too much awareness. Too much pressure. Too much of everything.
The mole is a girl.
That bit of information slipped out two nights ago, and it’s been eating through the house like acid ever since. Too many men suddenly trying to remember every conversation they’ve had with a woman in the last month. Too many women suddenlyaware that when someone says “we’ve got a leak,” what they really mean is “we’re looking in your direction.”
Cassandra.
Jackie.
Talia.
And, though no one has said it aloud, me.
I reach the coffee pot and pour myself a mug, trying to keep my hand steady. The black liquid streams in a thin arc. A tiny tremor runs through my fingers anyway. It feels like everyone can see it.
“Milk?” a voice asks behind me.
I look up. One of the older women—Lupe, who’s been here since before I knew what the Raiders even were—holds out the carton. Her eyes are kind, but there’s a searching quality there, too, like she’s trying to match the girl she’s seeing to the leader she’s been told exists.
“Thanks,” I say, taking it. “You doing okay?”
“Could be worse.” She shrugs one rounded shoulder and glances toward the hall. “Could be better. That’s how it always is.”
Her expression tells me she’s talking about more than breakfast.
I hand the milk back and turn toward the long table.
Zay’s already there, sprawled in a chair like he’s been poured into it, long legs kicked out, one arm slung over the back. There’s an empty plate in front of him and a half-eaten piece of toast in his hand. He looks like he owns the room and doesn’t care enough to command it, and people respond to that in a way they never did with Xavier. Or with me.
When I reach him, he hooks his foot around the chair beside him and drags it out, nudging the seat with his knee.
“Sit,” he says quietly.
I do. Not because he told me to, but because my knees wobble more than I’d like.
Around us, conversations start to slowly resume. The initial tension loosens, but it doesn’t disappear. Some of the young guys down the table drift into a discussion about last night’s game, voices rising and falling in an imitation of normalcy. A pair of older council members argue softly over numbers, gesturing toward a phone screen.
Behind me, I hear one of the prospects say, “Look, I’m just saying—Isaiah understands us. You see the way he handled that Riverside shit? And Asher? People respect him. He doesn’t have to raise his voice. He just walks into a room and people shut up.”
His friend mutters something I can’t make out, but I catch the end of it.
“…been different if Zay or Asher were in charge before. Maybe… I don’t know. We’d be less of a target.”
My spine goes rigid.
Zay’s jaw ticks once. He doesn’t turn around. Doesn’t call them on it. He just chews his toast and stares into the middle distance as if he’s thinking about something else entirely. He has to hear them. I know he hears them.
I’m not sure what hurts more—that they’re saying it, or that I almost agree.
Asher isn’t in the kitchen. He’s never here for the morning gossip. He’s usually in the gym or on the phone or outside checking the perimeter before anyone else has wiped sleep from their eyes. People would follow him into a burning building without question. They already do; they just call it a Tuesday.
Zay is different. He slips into people’s lungs. Into their laughs. Into their stories. He has charm Xavier never learned and I never wanted. Men who used to side-eye, and wish death upon Xavier are suddenly talking about how they’d follow Isaiah if push came to shove, because he “gets it,” because he’s “one of us.”
I sip my coffee and try not to choke on the way that feels.
