Captive Audience (The Beasts of Belfast #1)

Chapter 1

ROOK

My penthouse on the twenty-third floor of the Lynch Continental had a commanding view of the Philadelphia skyline, but most nights, I preferred the view inside my study.

A wall of screens lit up the dark room, each feed stitched into the Beasts of Belfast empire: warehouses, bars, clubs, Aidan’s MMA gym, the hotels and casinos that washed our money clean. I watched our rivals, too. Their clubhouses, hangouts, and the homes of key members.

But none of them mattered tonight. Only one feed held my attention.

The apartment of Asha Sparks.

Or, as her growing horde of followers called her, Inferno. My favorite little red-haired true-crime podcaster, host of Captive Audience.

I switched the cameras until her living room filled the center screen.

“There you are,” I said, and took a slow sip of aged Macallan.

In the corner, Asha adjusted her phone on a tripod, pointing it toward an armchair. Good. I’d made it back in time to watch her tease her devoted cult with tales of murder and misery.

Wait. I shot forward in my seat. What the fuck was she wearing?

Fishnets beneath tiny black shorts that barely covered her arse, boots with dangerously high heels, and a tight black crop top stamped with Introverted but willing to talk about serial killers. Her long red waves bounced with her every movement.

Christ. Was Asha using sex sells to attract a new audience? Or just trying to drive me insane while every bastard on the internet jerked off to her?

When I’d first learned of a local true-crime podcast, I’d listened to Captive Audience and been impressed with Inferno’s intellect and dogged tenacity. Something about her had called to me, and I’d needed to know who the person behind the modulator-disguised voice was.

I hadn’t realized how much that decision would change me.

Asha dimmed the lights and dropped into the chair, then crossed one leg over the other. Casual but sexy as fuck. She tugged a black mask over the lower half of her face and pulled a ball cap low over her forehead.

She thought the disguise made her untouchable, a mystery. But she couldn’t hide from me. One phone call had given me everything I needed. Her name, her address, her whole life wrapped in a neat little file.

The first time I’d seen her, I’d followed. Couldn’t fucking help myself. She’d been kitted out in activewear and headphones, and her ponytail had swished with each quick step.

Red hair, green eyes, the curves of a goddess.

Breathtaking.

Even then, the urge to be close enough to know her scent, to count every freckle across her cheeks, had been undeniable.

Asha’s walk had taken her onto the winding paths of Laurel Hill Cemetery, straight past my brother’s tombstone.

I’d been begging for a sign from Niall, for him to send me something to dig me out of the murky depths I’d been drowning in since his murder.

Asha was his message from the grave. A beacon of pure radiance in my sea of darkness.

My Wildfire.

I wondered how pissed she’d be if she found out we’d been in a one-sided relationship for the past three hundred and seventy-eight days.

Every time I thought of Niall rotting in the ground, it gutted me all over again. But watching Asha sparked something I hadn’t felt since the day he died.

Curiosity. Hunger. A reason to breathe.

As tempting as it was to manufacture an introduction, I didn’t. What was the point? Asha would sooner leap from a bridge than breathe the same air as a bastard like me, a criminal little better than the murderers she devoted her podcast to exposing.

And it was best I remained in the shadows. Her world was safe, clean, and principled. Mine was merciless, brutal, and carried a short expiry date. I wouldn’t expose her to that.

Instead, I’d sworn an oath: Protect her at all costs.

Even from myself.

Asha raised a tiny mic to her lips. “Listen up, Captees. The next episode of Captive Audience drops Saturday. Tune in to hear my interview with criminology professor Dr. Celia Ward, where we talk killers. Are they born or made? And find out the latest on my investigation into missing teenager Sierra Witkowski. Hope you can join me.”

She did three takes and edited the audio to disguise her voice before smiling to herself.

I left the study to pour another whiskey, and by the time I got back, her TikTok post was already blowing up, racking up likes and comments faster than usual.

Can’t wait.

Girl, your new look is

You need a new chair. I’ve got something you can sit on.

I clenched the cut-crystal tumbler, and the whiskey sloshed.

Getting mad wouldn’t solve anything, so I shot my tech guy a message asking for everything he could find on @Big_Daddy_69. Name, photo, location. That was all I needed. Then we’d see how funny the wanker was when choking on his own balls.

My phone rang. Torin. The boss of the Philadelphia Irish Mob, who had become like a brother to me since I’d lost my own.

I answered and put him on speaker. “Tor.”

“Can you talk?”

“Aye.”

“I got a call from Brandon Lewis today. He wanted to share some intel his Zulu mercs uncovered during an interrogation.”

I didn’t know Brandon well, had only met him once, but I knew that if he called, you listened. The guy was some genius-level ex–black ops hacker.

Four years ago, he and a few others had toppled the Wolf Street Mafia. With the top seat vacant, the Beasts of Belfast had a clear path to take control of Philly. That hadn’t been Brandon’s intent, but we’d made the most of the Italian Mob’s bad fortune.

Now, Brandon ran Team Zulu, a crew of ex–special ops mercenaries that brought down human trafficking rings all around the world.

The Beasts had an alliance with them—of sorts.

Zulu didn’t upset our operations as long as we kept the skin trade out of our territory.

Fine by us. We weren’t interested in profiting from the misery of women and children.

Torin hesitated, which wasn’t like him at all. “Listen, Rook, there’s no easy way to say this. It’s about Niall.”

Niall? My brother had been dead for two years, killed here in Philly by the Albanians while I’d still been part of the Belfast crew. What news could there possibly be, and why the fuck was Tor tiptoeing around it as if he’d found himself in the cave of a sleeping bear?

“I’m listening,” I said.

His deep exhale came over the speaker. “The Albanians didn’t order his hit.”

No. That was impossible.

Niall’s murder had been textbook Albanian. A bullet to the temple and their calling card—an X carved deep into his chest.

As soon as the news had reached me, I’d flown from Belfast to Philly to hunt down the bastards responsible.

It hadn’t been hard to trace it to Altin Zeqiri.

The prick hadn’t even denied it when I’d ordered him to his knees and pressed my pistol to his forehead.

In Zeqiri’s last moments, he’d stared me right in the eyes and laughed, like it was all some big fucking joke and I was the punch line.

I’d shut the bastard up by pulling the trigger.

The Albanians had known that taking out a high-ranking Beast would lead to one thing: war.

And that was what we had given them.

They’d been ready for us, too. But after months of fighting, we’d decimated the Albanian crew. The few who’d survived had fled the country.

I rose to pace the room. “What are you talking about?”

“Brandon’s team found an Albanian working with Los Cuervos Cartel in Jalisco. Besnik Shehu. You know him?”

“Aye.” I vaguely remembered him as short, mid-forties, with a weathered face. Ran weapons for the Albanians.

“They interrogated him. Turns out that before our trouble with them, an outsider was pulling the Albanians’ strings. Shehu claims this guy made big promises if they did his bidding. The first thing he ordered was Niall’s hit.”

My pulse hammered, and my lungs locked tight as the edges of my vision darkened. Two years I’d grieved Niall, my only solace that I’d avenged him, but the bastard who’d planned it all still breathed. I’d failed my brother twice.

“Who?” I demanded.

“Shehu only called him the Soul Collector.”

“What the fuck kind of name is that?”

Tor grunted. “The kind that’s making a statement. I’m just not sure what it is yet.”

I swallowed down the fury that clawed at my throat. “I’ll find him.”

I’d tear this city apart piece by piece if I had to, then I’d gut the son of a bitch and hang his corpse from the Ben Franklin Bridge by the entrails. Let Philly’s underworld know what happened if they crossed us.

After a loaded pause, Torin said, “No, you won’t. I can’t have you killing everyone you question. You’re too emotional to tackle this objectively.”

“Too emotional?” A muscle twitched at the corner of my eye. “The person who had my brother killed is still breathing and, for all I know, living a blessed life. Tell me, Tor, how the fuck is that supposed to make me feel?”

“And you have every right to want vengeance. But we can’t have bodies littering the streets if you don’t get the answers you want.”

I sneered. “Would that be so bad?”

I wasn’t a patient person. I was a man who got what he wanted when he wanted it. Especially revenge.

“It won’t bring him back, Rook.”

My chest burned as if a knife pierced my lungs, reopening old wounds that had never fully healed.

I was the one who’d gotten my little brother involved with the Beasts. I should’ve been here to watch over him, to keep him safe.

“Fine.” I gritted my teeth. “I promise to keep the body count to a minimum.”

“Like when you stepped off the airplane from Belfast? Rook, searching for Zeqiri you killed three Albanians and put two more in intensive care.”

“They weren’t cooperating.”

“Do they ever?” Tor let the silence hang heavy before letting out a weary sigh. “We all miss Niall, and I want payback as much as you. But we need to be smart about finding this…Soul Collector. Discreet. We can’t assume anyone is in the clear. Not even our own. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

He thought we might have a rat. It wasn’t a crazy suggestion. It’d happened before.

I dragged my hands through my hair. “If not me, then who’s going to find the bastard?”

“I want fresh eyes on this, someone with a sharp mind and no biases. Bring in a third party.”

I stopped pacing. Blinked. “I’m sorry. Did you just ask me to involve an outsider in highly sensitive Beasts business?”

Tor had lost the fucking plot.

“Aye. Like I said. Apart from you, Aidan, and Orla, we don’t know who we can trust. Besides, I’ve seen you keep hard-arse criminals in line. I’m sure you can convince a PI to behave and keep his mouth shut.”

Just fucking grand. I’d have to babysit some useless shite while he poked around in my business, asking dumb questions.

Movement on the wall of screens caught my attention. Asha crossed her living room to fill a glass with water.

Then it hit me like a sledgehammer.

My Wildfire was the smartest, most observant person I knew.

She’d honed her investigative skills as a journalist and now used them to solve crimes on her podcast. Just last month, she’d looked into a suicide case and exposed it for what it really was: a murder covered up by a rich kid’s parents.

She didn’t just chase stories; she hunted the truth, and nothing slipped past her instincts.

Suddenly, it all made sense.

Niall had sent Asha to me, and now, I needed someone to find out who’d had him murdered.

My heart took up a frantic beat inside my rib cage.

I knew what I had to do.

“I get to choose who does the investigation?” I asked.

“Aye. Pick wisely.”

I couldn’t help the small smile that tugged at my mouth. “I have just the person in mind.”

We were going to get along famously.