19. Vuk
CHAPTER 19
Vuk
T he last bottle exploded into a shower of glass.
I’d beaten my record of hitting all twelve bottles in under a minute, but I didn’t get any satisfaction from it. I was still wound tight, my emotions swinging between fury and regret like some fucked-up pendulum.
It’d been six days since the bachelor party.
Six days of replaying the way Jordan kissed Ayana on the cheek and the way she’d smiled at him in response.
One hundred and thirty hours of remembering the way her body arched into mine.
Eight thousand-plus minutes of revisiting how she’d almost kissed me.
And an eternity of what-ifs over what would’ve happened had I not stopped her.
What the hell had she been playing at, doing that on the night of her bachelorette?
I didn’t believe for a second that Ayana would jeopardize her engagement to Jordan for no good reason. And I sure as hell didn’t believe she’d been so overcome by her sudden desire for me that she couldn’t help herself.
I set up a new row of bottles.
I was in no mood to socialize, so I’d retreated to my makeshift shooting range at home instead of visiting the one at Valhalla. After the bachelor party, I didn’t want to talk to anyone for at least two months.
I was about to start my second round of shooting when the door opened. Sean entered, his expression somber.
My staff had been avoiding me all week. They’d worked for me long enough to pick up on my foul moods, and they knew any human interaction would only piss me off more.
If Sean made it past Jeremiah, my butler and the ultimate authority over who got past the gates and who didn’t, it was important.
I pulled off my headset and waited.
“We found something.” Sean cut straight to the chase. “A SIM card in an abandoned garage uptown. We picked it up and traced it back to the point of purchase. The odds of it being helpful were slim, but we got a hit.” Satisfaction glinted behind his exhaustion. He’d been chasing the mystery Brother nonstop for weeks, and it’d taken a physical toll on him. “Devin Rhoades. An alias for a known member of the Brotherhood.”
The air stilled as every cell of my body locked on to that piece of information like a shark sensing blood in the water.
“This is everything we could dig up on him.” Sean handed me a file. “The man is a ghost, which is expected given his affiliation. But look at his last name.”
I opened the folder to a clear photo of the mystery Brother. He stared straight at the camera, his face a map of brutal planes and cold green eyes. Early thirties, American, Caucasian, last seen in New York City. He’d operated under multiple aliases, but the earliest name on file came from his foster care records.
Roman Davenport.
“Yes.” Sean accurately read my stunned silence. “ That Davenport. He and Dominic were assigned to the same foster home in Ohio when they were in their teens. Dominic went off to college, and Roman disappeared off the grid. The details of his Brotherhood recruitment and training are unknown, but he resurfaced about six years ago in France. Rumor has it he was responsible for the hit on a local crime lord there. Decapitation. It made quite a statement.”
I quietly digested the influx of information.
Roman and Dominic Davenport were foster brothers. The same Dominic I’d done business with, frequented events with, and exchanged civilities with at Valhalla.
Dominic never talked about his family or his pre-college years. My gut told me he wasn’t involved with the Brotherhood, but in situations like these, I couldn’t discount anything.
What’s Dominic and Roman’s current relationship like?
“Unclear,” Sean said. “As far as we can tell, they lost touch after Dominic left for college. However, these are our preliminary findings. We’ll have to do a deeper dive, but I wanted to notify you about our discovery right away.” He paused.
I cocked an eyebrow at his hesitation. It was unlike him. What else? Spit it out.
“Do you remember the Sunfolk scandal two years ago?” he asked.
I nodded.
The scandal was one of the biggest crime stories to hit mainstream news in recent years. A member of an unnamed mercenary organization had leaked a redacted contract between the Sunfolk Bank CEO and the mercenaries to get rid of Sunfolk’s competition by any means necessary (i.e. murder).
The contract had spread like wildfire online. Most of the details had been blacked out, but that didn’t stop rumors and conspiracy theories from flourishing. Sunfolk’s CEO had died under mysterious circumstances in prison, but someone else stepped in to buy the bank when it was flailing: Dominic.
The pieces fell into place. You think the Brotherhood is the organization from the contract.
“Yes. And I think Roman may be the one who leaked it.” Sean’s mouth pressed into a thin line. “I can’t confirm anything yet, but given the timeline and the players involved, it makes sense.”
It did, and fuck, I wish it didn’t.
Dominic’s involvement would add an extra layer of complication. We weren’t friends, but we ran in the same circles. I tried to keep my past and present separate, and he was too intertwined with my present life to have ties with my past one.
Pull on that thread. I want daily updates.
Sean nodded. “One more thing. As your Chief of Security, I would be remiss if I didn’t emphasize how important it is to increase protection measures both here and at your office. We’ve implemented the soft security upgrades as discussed, but if the Brotherhood is keeping an eye on you, they may already be privy to our search for Roman. They’ll know that you know they’re after you, which means another hit may be imminent.”
He was right. Again.
I hated having armed guards around me. The more people involved, the greater the chances of a leak and the greater the odds of betrayal. It’d take only one slip-up or one traitor to bring things crashing down. It didn’t matter how well they were vetted; most people could be bought. Unless I had an established history with them and they’d proved their loyalty, I didn’t trust anyone.
Fortunately, there were other ways to protect myself besides hired muscle.
No bodyguards. Enhance the other measures. I can take care of myself , I added when Sean opened his mouth to argue.
He sighed, but he didn’t press the issue. “Consider it done.”
After he left, I stayed at my makeshift shooting range and tried to connect the missing pieces of the puzzle.
Roman. Dominic. The Brotherhood. The Vault. What was the through line?
If Sean was right and Roman was the one who’d leaked the contract, he would be the organization’s number one target. Contract killers relied on their reputation for business; a leak of that magnitude would destroy their credibility. The public may not have a name, but those in the shadows had a way of sniffing out secrets.
If Roman was the organization’s target, why would he try to kill me on their behalf? Perhaps he’d gone rogue, but we’d never crossed paths before. He had no reason to personally want me dead.
Finally, there was that damn note. Find me before they do. Was the Brotherhood the “they” he was referring to?
My head pounded with open-ended questions and a thousand possibilities.
I couldn’t focus, so I cleaned up the range and went upstairs to my office. I kept my gun on me.
My wing of the house was separated from the main rooms by an enclosed walkway. Other than cleaning and maintenance, my staff left it alone unless I called them, which was exactly how I liked it. I’d bought this property on the Upper East Side specifically because the layout offered me more privacy than the penthouses and brownstones so many of my peers loved.
I stepped into my office, ready to tackle some of the actual work I’d been neglecting while I obsessed over the bachelor party, but the hairs on the back of my neck instantly stood up.
Something was wrong.
More specifically— someone was here .
The sixth sense that’d helped me survive multiple scrapes over the years kicked in before I even noticed the shadow on the wall, or the fact that the chair was turned the wrong way.
By the time the intruder spun to face me in my fucking chair, I’d already raised my gun and pointed it straight at him.
He settled deeper into the chestnut leather with a smirk. “That’s not a very polite way to greet your guests.”
I cocked the hammer.
“You could shoot me.” He sounded bored. “Or you could find out why I’d risk breaking into your house.”
“I prefer option one,” I growled.
I hated wasting words on dead men walking, but I sure as hell wasn’t going to lower my weapon. Talking was the only viable way to communicate in this situation.
“So he speaks.” His smile lacked humor. “I know you know who I am, which means you also know we have a mutual interest: the Brotherhood. Like I said, you could shoot me, or you could listen to what I have to say. I have a feeling it’ll answer quite a few questions you’ve had recently.” He slowly raised his hands. “No weapons. I just want to talk.”
My finger twitched. I was tempted to pull the trigger and shoot him anyway, the Brotherhood be damned. Hell, he could be a distraction. There could be other members in the house right now, storming the halls and terrorizing my staff while I was busy in here.
It was unlikely, given the utter lack of alarms raised, but it wasn’t impossible.
The fact he’d successfully broken in was not fucking good, but I would deal with the security breach later. I had more pressing matters at hand.
He stared back at me, unflinching.
Bastard . He held a trump card, and he knew it. He was my only active link to the Brothers at the moment, which meant the satisfaction of blowing his head off wasn’t worth the intel that would die with him.
I lowered the gun an inch and gestured for him to start talking.
“That’s what I thought.” Roman Davenport leaned forward, his eyes glittering in the dying afternoon light. “Before we get into the details, I have a proposition for you.”