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“Now you’re one of us.”

Colin leaned closer to me while Greg stood before John.

“He’ll be a problem,” Colin said.

“John sees use first. Risk second.”

Colin considered that and took another sip from his glass. “Leonard liked him.”

“Leonard liked results. And Greg gave him results.”

“Those men he removed from the Bayshore project,” Colin said. “That was cleaner than I expected from him.”

I glanced at him. “What did you expect?”

“I didn’t expect him to get initiated.”

“Men like him learn and adapt quickly.”

Colin’s eyes moved back to John. “Or someone taught him.”

John finished with Greg and dismissed him to the side of the room. Greg moved as instructed, ring closed inside his fist. He looked composed enough for a man who had crossed a line he could no longer uncross. His face gave little away, but his hand told the truth. He held the ring too tightly.

John approached me as Greg had been absorbed into the conversation of the room.

John studied me for a moment. “You are very calm for a son in mourning.”

“Would you prefer to see me shaking?”

Colin laughed under his breath.

John’s attention moved to him. “Something to add, Colin?”

“Not at all.”

John held his gaze for a moment. The room didn’t stop, but the tension around them simmered. Colin disliked being called out in front of me. John knew that and did it anyway.

John set one hand on the back of a chair and lowered his voice so only I could hear. “There are men here who knew your father for a long time. Some respected him. Some tolerated him. Some are relieved he is gone. You should know that before you decide how much of him you intend to keep.”

“I don’t intend to keep any of him.”

John’s eyes narrowed with interest.

I looked across the room at Greg Sinclair. He stood near the wall, ring still in his hand, listening while one of the masked men spoke to him.

“I intend to be better,” I said.

When I left the country club that night, the valet hurried to retrieve my car while I stood beneath the entrance lights and checked my watch. The valet brought my car around, and I tipped him well before driving away.

After the funeral, after the country club, after watching Greg Sinclair accept his place in The Collective, I understood the next stage of my life with complete clarity.

My parents had spent years trying to make me manageable.

They failed.

Now they were dead. Their money was mine. Their name was mine.

And the doors they guarded had begun opening without them.