Chapter 25
“I’m going to sell my property in Colombia,” I tell Beau.
He didn’t warn me he was coming to New York. We’re meeting in the office of one of the Hazard branches, the nightclub chain that, if everything goes as planned, will soon be mine. But first, I have to kill the bastard who’s hunting me.
“It’s already been very useful to us,” he says, and I nod, remembering what he’s referring to.
A few years ago, the wife of one of the Pakhan’s underbosses was kidnapped and taken to South America. Beau used my property as the base for the rescue operation.
“There’s no point in keeping it if I’m getting married. I doubt Jackie would want to go there.”
“How did she take your proposal?”
“It wasn’t exactly a proposal.”
“You’ve already started a war before she even said yes?”
“She’s already said yes. Well, maybe not in so many words, but she agreed to the marriage.”
I’ve already arranged for my lawyers to rush the paperwork so we can get married as soon as possible.
“Did you at least buy a ring?”
“A ring?”
“For fuck’s sake, Lucifer, that’s not something you just forget! Women care about those details.”
“Not Jackie. She doesn’t give a damn.”
“How do you know? Have you ever given her jewelry?”
“I gave her an apartment. I kept her safe.”
“Noble of you, but that’s something a brother would do, not a lover.”
I stare at him, trying to think of a subtle way to bring up what I want to ask, but I don’t see one, so I get straight to the point.
“How do you get connection with a woman?”
“What?”
“You’ve been married for years. You must be connected to Amber, whatever the hell that means.”
I’ve never seen Beau laugh in all the time I’ve known him, but right now, he throws his head back and lets out a laugh.
“Gonna gloat?”
“It was the way you said it,” he says, trying to keep a straight face and failing. “To answer your question, yes, I’m definitely connected to my Amber.”
“So how did you get that?”
“I’m not sure I understand your question.”
“Jackie said yesterday she wanted connection, and not to feel used.”
“She doesn’t just want to fuck. She wants the after.”
“The after what?”
“Jesus, you’re even more clueless about love than I was. When you hook up with a woman who just wants sex, only sex, do you think about her the next day?”
“Only if I want to fuck her again, yeah, but that’s rare.”
“Connection is when you want to fuck her again and again, but you also want to make her smile. You want to protect and take care of her.”
“Then I’m definitely connected to Jackie.”
Just without the sex, for now, I mutter to myself.
“She seems to think otherwise.”
“Because she’s upset. I crushed her dreams about having a real marriage. Since she was a girl, she’s said she wanted to marry and live in a beach house. A home full of kids. The only thing I have to offer her is good fucks and protection.”
“And still—she wanted you.”
“I didn’t give her a choice.”
“Women make choices for themselves when they don’t want something, Lucifer.”
“What exactly does that mean?”
“If Jackie didn’t want you, you could lay out every risk in the world, and she’d never agree to marry you.”
“She had no choice.”
“Keep telling yourself that. How long do you plan to stay married?”
“I told her we’d have a five-year contract.”
“Why?”
“It seemed reasonable.”
“I’d bet it won’t take us more than a year to find whoever’s after you, Lucifer. Right now I have my best men tracking your enemy, and Ruslan has assigned his people to the search too. I imagine you’re moving your own pieces on this chessboard as well.”
“Yes. I hired someone to hunt him down, just in case we’re missing something.”
“A mercenary hiring another?”
I shrug.
“The priority is keeping Jackie alive.”
“Who is he?”
“Tur Zubarevich.”
“I know him. Former Army Special Forces. He’s worked for my brother-in-law, Amos.”
“Yes, I know.”
“Maybe along those lines, you should put a few more men like Tur on your enemy’s trail. You’d kill two birds with one stone. On one hand, you’d increase your chances of catching him, and on the other, you’d avoid them being hired to try to kill you.”
“As good as Tur, I only know two: Abaddon Hatzis[10] and Jack Hudak, but Hudak works exclusively with the Irish mob.”
“Abaddon would be worth a try, at least.”
“I’ll reach out to him. Even with all the precautions we’re taking, and with Ruslan’s idea of marrying Jackie to shield her, I think, as we’ve discussed before, that would only work if the enemy came from the mafia or was another contract killer like me.”
“But you don’t believe that?”
“No. I think it’s personal, though I can’t imagine who it could be. Every enemy I’ve ever had, I’ve already eliminated.”
He looks at me, and I know what he’s going to say before he even opens his mouth.
“Speaking of the past, do you plan to tell her someday?” he asks.
“Yes. At the end of the five years, I’ll tell her everything. I’ll be ready to face her hatred by then, but not now. Not yet.”