No one answered.
That didn’t slow him.
“I have to say,” he went on, voice smooth, like this was a conversation and not a room full of guns aimed at his chest, “I expected better of you. All that talent, all that wasted potential.”
His voice grated. Too smooth. Too sure.
Boston snorted. “Oh, here we go.”
Voss didn’t even look at him.
“You don’t even realize it yet, do you?” Voss continued, gaze sliding back to Sage, then to Law. “This is the part where you stop fighting and start thinking. You’re good—better than most of what’s out there—but you’re working for the wrong side.”
“Pretty sure we’re doing just fine,” Boston shot back.
“You’re cornered,” Voss said, like Boston hadn’t spoken at all. “Every exit covered. My men have this place locked down from top to bottom. There’s nowhere left for you to go.”
Voss tapped a handgun once against his thigh, idle, like it was part of the conversation.
The soft tap cut through the quiet.
Sage didn’t move.
Didn’t blink.
Didn’t bother looking at anyone else.
Voss smiled wider, mistaking his stillness.
“But it doesn’t have to end like this,” he said. “You come with me, you walk out of here alive. I could use people like you. All of you.”
Boston barked a laugh. “Use us? Man, you couldn’t even keep track of your own guys.”
That got a flicker—brief, annoyed—but Voss pushed through it.
“Think bigger,” he said, voice sharpening just a touch. “Money, control, freedom. No oversight. No leash. You answer to me, and that’s it.”
“Hard pass,” Boston said. “You’re not exactly selling it.”
Voss’s eyes cut to him then, irritation finally breaking through. “You’d do well to know when to keep your mouth shut.”
Rip took one move forward, Voss stilled, suddenly taking the big man’s measure.
Boston tipped his head with a slow smirk. “You’d do well to know when to shut the fuck up.”
A couple of the other guys shifted—barely there, suppressed—but the edge was there now.
Tension pulled tight across the room.
Unfazed. Voss didn’t see it.
Didn’t feel it.
He kept going.
“Last chance,” he said, voice dropping, confidence settling back in like it had never left. “You don’t walk out of here without me. That’s not a threat—it’s just how this ends.”
Sage watched him.
