Chapter 8 Ethan
ETHAN
I watched Bram and his friends disappear into the darkness and felt strangely impotent.
It was an unfamiliar feeling. That was the thing about having vast sums of wealth: you could do anything. No problem was unsolvable. Obstacles melted away like snow under the sun.
That was even more true when money was accompanied by information, and I had a lot of both. When money didn’t fix something, a call to any one of the powerful men who owed me favors, the men I had leverage over, did.
But the tunnels were a great equalizer. Here, there was no one to pay. No one to call.
I’d had to stand there, knowing Bram Montgomery and his friends were the only thing standing between the Haver girl and me, and do fuck all to stop it.
Needling the Butchers had felt good. It had also been a test.
I’d had a hunch about them, about the kind of men they were, but I hadn’t known if that hunch was right until I’d made the comment about bitches and seen Montgomery’s fists tighten at his sides.
He’d wanted to come for me then, would have come for me if they hadn’t been so intent on finding the girl.
I had no way of knowing if my comments were out of character for the men who usually wore the Ghost masks — Anton had set up our swap — but that was their problem.
“Think they knew?” Nick said at my side.
The kid was all youthful nervous energy. A mixed bag.
“If they’d known, we wouldn’t be alive right now.” I turned to double back the way we’d come. “This way. There’s another shortcut.”
Now that we’d run into the Butchers, I wanted to find the girl more than ever. It was a natural inclination: to hunt, to compete with other men.
That I could take something that belonged to them, that I could break something that mattered… well, that was just a bonus.