7. Micah
“You made the paper, dickhead.” Felix stomps across the yard, a mug of coffee in one hand and a fresh newspaper, folded down the middle, in the other. He crushes grass beneath his heavy boots, steps around the mossy pond I dug by hand—years before Pastore mutilated my digits and left me in constant, annoying pain—and as Lix moves, his eyes are all for me.
I watch him from where I stand, by the rhododendrons I meticulously check every damn day to make sure they thrive, despite being nurtured in a yard not particularly suited for the species.
He stops three feet from me and shakes his head. “Front page. And you’re throwing hands with a chick half your size. It’s a bad look.”
“There’s something off about her.” I turn back to my garden and deadhead the spent purple blossoms to make room for more. “I’m not buying what she’s selling.”
He laughs, short and sharp and just irritating enough to make me scowl. “What’s she selling? Seems like she wants nothing to do with you. She didn’t give you the time of day inside CeCe’s, and according to the paper, she wasn’t fawning over you last night either. It would be one thing if she was up in your space, trying to take you to bed. But that’s not what’s going on here.”
“So she’s switching things up.” I snip off a dying shoot and drop the waste to the ground, making a note to come back later and rake up the mess. “Everyone tries the sex kitten thing; she’s smart enough to try something less obvious. That’s her whole game.”
“Dude.” He brings his coffee up and sips. “Women have traipsed in and out of this house for decades. Before last night, you have never held a blade to a dame’s throat.”
Shame bites at the back of mine. “Only because women are rarely a threat to us. We’ve spent our lives defending ourselves against our own father. And when not him, then Pastore or Mancino. They’re all gone now, sure, but you’re na?ve to think their absence guarantees peace for us.”
“And you’re too fucking tightly-strung for safety. Wilkes isn’t the threat you think he is, and that chick from the club is doomed to a lifetime of therapy because you were feeling antsy. Hey!” He grabs my wrist before I chop an entirely healthy chunk from my plant.
Dragging me around, his stare burns into mine. “I get it. For half our lives, it’s been me and you. After Arch and Tim left, it was us raising Cato and watching each other’s backs while our father fucked us over every chance he had. It has always been me and you. But now shit is changing. Our father is dead, and Arch got hitched. Cato moved to Copeland. Pastore is finally done. Now Christabelle is part of the family, and?—”
“This isn’t about Christabelle.” I step away and move toward the agapanthus border that damn near dies on me every winter. “She’s cool, Lix. I like her.”
“So what’s the problem? Why are you taking all your frustrations out on some chick you don’t even know? Of all us Malones, I gotta be honest: I’m surprised you’re the one acting a fool right now.”
“It’s called intuition.” I crouch to study the purple flowers that the aggies have on show. The deep green leaves, and the circle of color that declare summer every single year. “I’ve had to rely on it my whole life, Lix. To survive. To protect you and Cato. My fucking job is to make sure we live. So when I look into Tiia Hale’s eyes and I get that feeling in my stomach that says something is going on, then I gotta listen to it. Because if I don’t, chances are, someone who matters to me will pay the price.”
“Okay, well…” He remains standing, looking down at me, while thirty feet away, his oversized puppy gallops on the grass and leaves burn marks behind when he pees. “In a city of nearly nine million people, including enemies who would have us dead, and businesses who protect us, purely because of the protection our existence offers them… with all that noise around us and all those threats, you’ve zeroed in on this one woman. That’s what you’re telling me?”
“I’m not trying to zero in on her.” I dig the tip of my cutters into the base of an overcrowded agapanthus, split the whole thing in half, and gently tug the excess out of the spongy ground. “She was at CeCe’s on a Wednesday, when it’s reasonably common knowledge that I’m not at the club those nights, but that you often are. And your relationship with Cannon is still fresh enough that people are gonna try to find the chink in your armor. But you just want me to accept Hale’s little lost sheep act?”
I push up straight and gently set my agapanthus on the grass for transplant. “She’s no sheep, Lix. And she’s not afraid. She probably thinks she’s got me convinced, after coming at me last night, when really?—”
“Her brass balls only confirmed what you think you already know.” Again, he brings his coffee up and sips. “Yeah, I got you. But your theory comes with holes.”
I toss my pruners aside and pick up my trowel instead. “What holes?”
“Well… you say it’s common knowledge you’re not at the club on Wednesdays. But she came on a Wednesday. That hardly seems like an intentional meet-cute to me.”
“I doubt she was looking for my attention.” I move to an empty plot in my garden and dig the spade into the dirt to make room for the secondary aggie. “Like I said, Lix, you and Christabelle are fresh. Even ten years from now, when you’ve been wearing a wedding ring for a decade, brazen women are gonna try to step in and make a mess of what you have.”
“So you’re punishing Hale, not because you suspect she’s tricking you, but because you think I was her target? Do you think I’d fuck Christabelle over so easily?”
“No. I think Christabelle is endgame for you, and if you screw that up, she’ll end your life and toss you into the river before I even realize you’re in danger. But the outside world sees a pretty woman on your arm and assumes she’s just this month’s flavor.”
“You’re pitching that Tiia was coming for me? And that she continues her attack, despite having never spoken to me?”
“It’s as good a hypothesis as any.” I push moist soil aside and make a hole large enough for the root ball that’ll survive relocation, even if I’m rough. “Pretty slick, too. She makes all her interactions with our family look innocent, even causes a scene with me, coming nowhere near you. So when I tell you to be careful, you laugh in my face and say I’m wrong. It’s a whole new level of cunning.”
“Mm.” He drops into a crouch and pours his leftover coffee into the hole I just dug. “Maybe that feeling you have in your gut is right. Danger.”
“Which is what I said.”
“What if it’s not the kind you think? You’ve spent your whole life in fight mode, always on the front line to make sure the rest of us are okay. You wouldn’t even know the difference between love and war, because to you, they’re the same fuckin’ thing.”
“Love and war?” Turning from my clogged soil, I look to my brother. “Really?”
“Really. A woman piqued your interest. You’re mad because she’s pretty. She was in a vulnerable situation outside CeCe’s, and when you got her inside, she didn’t fall all over you in thanks, when you’re accustomed to a much more obvious, submissive type of female.”
“Yeah, well…” I force a toothy smirk, which makes my brother smile. “You bring enough of those types around the house.”
“I used to. But it was a catch-and-release system. Now, I have the fish I wanna keep. I know you like women, Micah, and I’m pretty fucking sure you take them to bed when you’re not busy following me around. But you never bring them to the house.” He sets his elbows on his knees and lets his empty coffee cup dangle from his finger. “I don’t remember the last time I even saw you with a woman. You haven’t talked about one you liked. But you’ve sure as shit never held a fuckin’ knife to a woman’s throat on a public street. As your older, much wiser brother, I’m wondering what it is about this chick that has you so worked up.”
“Like I said,” I grit out. “Intuition. You’re only adding to my argument that something is up with her.”
He claps my shoulder and uses me to push himself up straight again. “Might I suggest you fuck her before you kill her? Just to try out my theory. I’d hate to say I told you so once the deed is done and you’ve already screwed up.”
“You’re an ass.” I look to my soggy ground and inhale the rich scent of Colombian coffee. “Why the fuck did you pour that in here?”
“Figured the caffeine might help your plant grow.”
“Yeah, but the creamer isn’t gonna do shit.”
Chuckling, he spins on his heels and whistles. “Bastard! Come here.”
“You gotta call that dog something else, Lix. ‘Bastard’ isn’t it.”
“Well… his name started out as Bastion.” He reaches down and pats the fur of the oversized bitsa. “Ended up Bastard because he’s one of us now. And really, what are we if not bastards?”
“You’ve become sentimental. Getting a girlfriend has messed with you. Made you soft.”
“Nah.” He tosses his mug in an overhead lob that should have the damn thing smashing when it hits the ground. But it bounces off the spongy grass and becomes Bastard’s plaything.
The dog takes off, bounding to the white cup, and picks it up between his teeth, enamel audibly clanging off ceramic, even from thirty feet away.
“Christabelle has made me stronger. She’s made me invincible.” He sets his hands on his hips and beams, because the woman he speaks of strolls my garden in a cute summer dress and bare feet.
Her long, dark hair flitters in the gentle breeze, and her body, almost store-bought in how perfect it is, creates the ideal silhouette as the sun shines over her shoulder.
“I was so sure Arch was full of it,” Felix murmurs for my ears only. “When I found out he’d been stupid enough to get married, I thought it was all bullshit. But here I am, and I can’t help but believe that those who refuse love are the suckers. Idiots call it a weakness. But those of us lucky enough to have it, know it’s a strength.”
“Hey there, handsome.” Christabelle wanders closer and slips under her man’s arm when he reaches out for her. “And you too, Felix.”
I chuckle, a slow, relaxed smile stretching across my lips.
If Lix has to cohabitate with a woman, I can’t find it in my heart to be mad she’s the one he picked.
“Have you started on my yellow rose yet?” She snuggles into Felix’s chest, but speaks to me. “It would be pretty cool to see the graft take hold before Christmas.”
“You’re exceptionally demanding of a man who owes you nothing.” I push soil across to cover my aggie, and pat it all down. “You should be asking Felix for favors. Not me.”
“But to ask him for a special rose, propagated just for me, is like asking Santa for Easter chocolate.” She rests her cheek on his shoulder and smiles. “It could be done, I suppose. But mixing talents often leads to subpar results.”
“You flatter me.” I push up to stand, stepping back to make sure I didn’t mess with my edging while I worked. “And yes,” I sigh, “I’ve already made the graft. It’s in the greenhouse, where it’ll stay till at least next summer. If you’re still dating my brother by then, I guess you can have the rose.”
“‘Still dating,’” Felix scoffs. “She’ll be married and pregnant by next summer.” He grabs Christabelle’s face, trapping her when she’d rather pull back and smack him. Then he plops a kiss to her lips. “Consensually, of course.”
“Coercion is not consent.” Her words become distorted by squished cheeks and puckered lips. “And I haven’t agreed to the baby stuff, so cool your shit and behave.”
“Yeah, she’s not done mothering Cato yet.” I wipe my palms on the thighs of my jeans, and wink for the woman who already holds sister-in-law status, marriage certificate or no. “Spend enough time with Cato, and you might realize that releasing more Cannon/Malone kids into this world is detrimental to society. Now leave me alone. I’m done hanging out with you both today.” With a parting smirk, I pick up the paper Lix dropped, and start away from the pair.
Unfolding the unfamiliar publication, I get a view of me and Tiia Hale on the front fucking page. Her beautiful rage, bared teeth and fiery eyes; and me… looking almost bored.
But I recall with painful precision the lava that courses through my veins every time we’re in the same space.
Shaking off the memory of the sensation, I head toward my greenhouse, near the back corner of the garden, while scanning the headlines made up by someone neither of us knows.
A lovers’ quarrel: Is this unnamed woman the next Malone victim? All secrets revealed here.
“Stupid bullshit,” I mutter, walking into a growing space that can only be described as a whole other house.
The greenhouse covers three thousand square feet, all walled in glass, with sprinklers lining the ceiling. Growing lamps heat the space in the winter, and misters cool it in the summer. But all year long, humidity leaves the glass walls foggy, and the plants thriving.
The problem with Lix falling in love with the heiress to New York’s largest and most influential newspaper is that the Cannon Daily no longer writes shit about our family—a fact that is noticeable to anyone with eyes. And of course, when the masses crave one subject beyond the point of sanity, some entrepreneurial fuck will pick up where the previous supplier left off, and run with it.
Which is how my face is now on the front page of some shitty, small-time newspaper.
“It’s no secret that the Malone family brings with them a reputation of crime and passion. The latter, countless women have thrown themselves toward, in hopes of fulfilling their dirtiest, darkest desires. Christabelle Cannon, of course, is the latest example of this. Though, Ms. Cannon herself was penning damning front-page exposés on the family until just recently. Now she’s tight-lipped on the subject, which only breeds inquisition.
Why so silent, Ms. Cannon? Are you okay?
And who is this other woman, who has attracted the attention of the quieter Malone?
Miss: if you need help, speak up now before you’re silenced forever.”
“For fuck’s sake.” I slam the paper down in a tub of dirty water, drowning the image of us in the forgotten soil, fertilizer, and fuck knows what else that’s ended up in my catch-all drum, then I stalk across to the specimen Christabelle specifically asked me to cultivate: a cross between a chinensis viridiflora, symbolizing new beginnings, and a standard yellow kerria japonica, to represent the home she’s been welcomed into.
She wants to cross-create green and yellow, celebrate who she and Lix are together.
And they wonder why I worry they’ve become too soft for the world they command.
I don’t peel back the grafting tape I rolled on so recently. It’s not time. But I eyeball my work. I check for fungal diseases and unnecessary wilting. I search for signs of shock, fully prepared to restart the process. I’ll keep trying to bring Christabelle’s vision to life until Felix has enough stock to plant an entire garden for the woman he loves.
But thankfully, my experiment so far is a success—no restart necessary—so I grab my spray bottle and give the pot a little mist.
When I’m on edge, tending my garden is my first attempt to find calm. While Felix prefers to fuck away his frustrations, I propagate, with hands another family attempted to destroy. When that doesn’t work, I run. Tire myself out and hope to wipe the anger from my mind before my body gives up.
Anger like I’m feeling right now.
Irrationally irritated over the gossip article, I reach into my pocket and take out my phone. Scrolling the screen for only a moment, and smudging dirt onto the glass as I go, I hit dial on a name I’ve called too often in the last month. Then, bringing the device to my ear, I spritz water onto my roses and ignore the sweat that breaks out along my spine.
“Sir?” The line connects, and immediately, Harrison snaps to attention. “How can I help you?”
“Where is Ms. Hale today? Where did she go last night?”
“Uh…” He hesitates over which question to answer first. “Today, she’s at Colby’s Antiques, sir. Your new desk was collected this morning. I’ve had it placed in storage until you decide what you’d like to do with it. I didn’t think it prudent to have them ship it directly to the house.”
“Thank you. But now that the exchange has been made, go ahead and bring it here. I want it in my space.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And last night?”
“Last night, Ms. Hale left Biano’s with her friends. All three went to her apartment in the East Village.”
“And how was she behaving?” I set down my spray bottle and turn from my work, bringing my free hand up to run it through my slightly too-long hair. “Did she drop her scared act the moment I was gone?”
“Actually…” He audibly swallows. “No, sir. She seemed pretty shaken. Her guy friend, Roscoe, held her as the group walked the few blocks to her apartment. The pair seemed kind of… close.”
“Romantically?” I hate that my stomach tightens and churns in response. That my pulse quickens. “She and Roscoe are lovers?”
“I mean… maybe. I didn’t follow them into her apartment, but he didn’t let her go for the duration of the walk home. And when she wept, it was his chest she wept against.”
My heart comes to a painful stop. “She cried?”
“Little bit, yeah. She was holding on to her anger until you drove away, sir. Then she broke. Nosy folks were out taking pictures and shit, so her friends swept her up and led her home.”
“Fuck.” I fist my hair and glance up at the ceiling.
Is it possible she’s just a woman… just an innocent, bystanding, beautiful woman, who has unintentionally tripped my trigger and landed herself in trouble she never sought?
That option doesn’t seem likely to me. I have thirty-three years of experience of picking shady fuckers out of a crowd and making damn sure they stay away from my family. But then comes Tiia fucking Hale, getting in my way and setting off alarms that have never been wrong before.
“What has she got at her shop that I might wanna buy?” I ask gruffly.
Silence hangs for a beat before, “Sir?”
“I’m gonna go into Colby’s myself. Get a little closer. But I don’t know what I want from their inventory, and I don’t wanna drop a hundred grand on a twenty-dollar pen. She seems spiteful enough to make such a sale.”
“Well… uh… there was a chest there, sir, that caught my attention.”
“Like a blanket chest?”
“Basically. It belonged to a Mongol warrior. Soon after invading Syria and returning home to his family, he gifted this chest to the woman he believed would be his forever wife. It was a gesture of love and peace after devastation.”
“Believed to be his forever wife? She betrayed him?”
How fitting.
He snickers. “No. She was his beloved, sir. But the following year, this warrior went off to conquer Aleppo Damascus. He left his bride pregnant and healthy, and the fetus, approximately seven months in gestation. But while he was gone, the woman died giving birth. Their son lived, however. In fact, some articles say the child slept in this chest.”
“Oh…” I lean back against a span of the steel counter that crosses all three thousand square feet of my haven—a haven settled deep in the yard I once considered hell. “Well, that’s depressing as fuck. Jesus.”
“Depressing or not, the story is powerful. The chest comes with the creator’s seal, and documentation all the way through its existence, beginning with the love letter this Mongol soldier wrote to his beloved. The child grew to become a soldier, too, and he gifted the chest to his wife. Many generations, stretching directly from the original warrior, have owned and reared babies in that thing. Now, Jakeline Colby has possession of it.”
“What price is she asking?”
Like Felix tends to, Harrison lights a cigarette on his end of the call and drags a lungful down his throat. “Only seventy thousand.”
“Only? That’s not small money.”
“Generally, I would agree. But in this context, I think the chest probably belongs in a museum. It seems Ms. Colby isn’t aware of the treasure she holds, because she could ask significantly more.” He exhales again. “And she could get it. Easily. I bought a desk yesterday with someone else’s money, boss. If I had fluid cash like some others I know, I’d buy the chest in a fuckin’ heartbeat. Ms. Colby is a shrewd businesswoman, and prickly when you get too near. But she underprices her wares. I’m not sure I have the goodness in my heart to tell her so, but I would advise a better man not to share such information with others until he’s already acquired the treasures he wants from her shop.”
“Greedy.” I lower my hand and set it on the edge of the counter. “Alright. Anything else I need to know about my chest?”
“Your chest,” he chuckles, inhaling again. “No, boss. Though I wish I was going with you. I wanna see how she sells it.”
“Jakeline?”
“Ms. Hale. She has a flair for the romantic, and I suspect she does her job because she enjoys the artifacts, not necessarily because she admires Jakeline. But I like the story behind the chest. I wish it was me she was selling it to.”
“Don’t think about her and romance again.” I push off from the counter and charge across the greenhouse, past potted ferns and away from the article filled with vitriol. Shoving through the door and into the filthy heat outside, I enjoy the breeze my speed creates, the air bouncing off the sweat coating my skin to create an almost-cooling sensation. “I’ll call you later if I have questions.”
“Hey!” Felix shouts across the lawn as I pass and kill my call. “You look like you’re heading out to hurt someone.”
“I’m not.” I drop the phone into my pocket, and quickening my steps until I’m practically jogging, I burst into the house and head upstairs to shower off and clean up.
I know that by the time I get into the city and walk through the doors of Colby’s Antiques, it’ll be closing in on five o’clock. The end of the business day. But I’m determined to speak to Tiia. To get closer, and hopefully interact without the violence we’ve shared up to now.
I want to speak to her on her terms, on her turf. See how she handles herself when she’s expected to make a sale and remain professional.
I plan to put seventy grand in her boss’s pocket today. The least Ms. Hale can do is stay after hours and talk me through my purchase.