Everyone ignores me, which is perfect. I sip my beer, occasionally checking my phone for texts, but there’s nothing new. I’m not anxious, exactly, but I’m definitely thinking about my next steps.
Like whether I’ll get bloody tonight or not.
I should’ve stopped home earlier today. Guilt flutters in my toes but I push it away. Regan knows this life, she understands what I’m doing is important. I mentioned lunch, but that didn’t happen. I’ll make it up to her later.
This is what happens when I get tangled in relationships.
I need to keep my word. When I make a promise, I keep it, even if that means getting hurt in the process. But the fewer entanglements I have, the less likely it is that I’ll have to go back on something I said. Keep myself easy and free, that’s how it’s always been.
There’s nothing easy about Regan.
And in some ways, maybe that’s what I like about her.
She demands things of me. And not killing, thieving, fighting. She demands me, my attention, my time.
I want to give her all that and more.
Only right now Finn needs me, and I have to come through.
I finish my beer and order another. I keep waiting another twenty minutes before he shows, coming through the crowd with an uncomfortable, squirrelly look on his face. I didn’t think he’d come, but then again, he’s not the type to disobey an order.
He doesn’t even look twice at me. Dark hair, handsome kid, but soft-looking. It always shocks me every time I see the guy, how doughy he seems, how supremely weak. This is the man Regan was going to marry? He’s the guy her father thought was going to rise in the ranks?
Fucking absurd.
Kieren walks past me. He doesn’t notice as he goes back toward the bathrooms. I take a moment, finish off the second beer, and push back from the bar. I amble after him, hands shoved in my pockets. No eyes track me. I’m another local getting a drink.
Good thing too, because I’m deep in enemy territory right now.
Kieren’s waiting near the men’s room. There’s an ancient cigarette vending machine. It’s a dying breed, a sign of the old times. He’s leaning against it, glaring at his phone, probably re-reading the text I sent an hour ago. I pause for a moment, make sure nobody’s around, before I approach.
“You’re running late. You always keep your bosses waiting?”
Kieren looks up sharply. His jaw tightens and he opens his mouth to snap something nasty. I see the anger flash across his face. I know that anger all too well, I’ve seen it a thousand times in a hundred other assholes just like him. But when he gazes into my eyes, the protest dies, replaced by confusion.
“Do I know you?”
“Not really.”
“Then what do you need?”
“You’re here to talk to me, Kieren.”
His eyebrows knit tighter. “That can’t be right. Are you with the Baranovs?”
“Not exactly.” I get closer, tightening the distance between us. “You sure you don’t recognize me?”
“I don’t think…” He trails off, twitching backwards. His back bumps into the vending machine and it rattles. “Wait, hold on a second. I got a text from… but you’re…”
“Go ahead, take your time. Let the gears turn.”
His face pales. “You’re that guy Regan married.”
“There it is.”
Kieren looks at his phone in horror. Now he’s starting to get it. Earlier, a text showed up from a number he knows is linked with the Baranov Bratva, instructing him to come to this bar and to stand by this exact vending machine. He probably figured it was some kind of shady family business and didn’t bother running it past anyone else, considering it came directly from a phone he recognized.
He jerks sideways, trying to put space between us, and bolts toward the door.
