Chapter 34
TOMMASO
“ Y ou know that I’m an adult, right?” I demanded.
Miranda crossed her arms, standing between me and the freedom of the rest of the house. “Paige was very clear. You stay in the room, if you won’t stay in bed.”
I scraped a hand through my hair. “I pay you, not her.”
She smirked. “She told me you are both on the accounts.”
I barely resisted the urge to stomp my foot like a toddler. I’d lain in bed all morning, very reasonably. I’d watched an episode of a shitty crime drama. I’d read at least three pages of a book. I had a syndicate to run, and I couldn’t very well do that from my goddamn bedroom!
Or could I?
I smiled sweetly. “I understand. Can you just bring me my laptop? I want to watch something I can’t get on the TV.”
She eyed me suspiciously. I focused all my energy on looking angelically innocent.
“Fine,” she said. “But I’m telling Paige it was your idea.”
“Deal.” I closed the door between us and hobbled back to bed to catch my breath. I might not be in the best shape of my life, but having a conversation certainly wouldn’t kill me. I grabbed my phone and texted a series of people.
Miranda opened the door. “Your laptop.”
I took it from her. “Can you knock next time? I might’ve been changing.”
She ran her gaze down my body. “Okay.”
I pushed all thoughts of her from my mind as she walked away.
My phone vibrated wildly with affirmatives.
I wandered to the closet, winced my way through putting on my most comfortable suit, then depressed one of the false stones in the floor.
It popped up to reveal the emergency ladder underneath.
With a small smile, I hefted the ladder, walked out onto the balcony, and hooked it to the railing.
Miranda could keep me in my room all she wanted. She just couldn’t keep anyone out.
When everything was set up, I sat on the couch at the foot of our bed and waited. Before long, Stan hoisted himself onto the balcony, puffing.
“What the fuck?” he wheezed. “If you’d included this in the job description, I’d have turned you down.”
I waved his complaints away and typed something else into my laptop. “I’m under room arrest. Paige’s orders.”
Stan guffawed. “Hell of a lady. I wouldn’t go toe-to-toe with her either.”
The rest of the men filtered in slowly, a combination of my top guys and the ones I’d left behind to hold down the fort. There wasn’t much sitting room, so they stood in clumps.
“Thank you all for coming,” I said when they’d all arrived. “And apologies for the setting. I want to get back to work as quickly as possible, and that means making some allowances.”
Stan smirked. Everybody else nodded.
“So.” I looked over the top of the laptop. “I’ve got the spreadsheets here, but I want it from the horses’ mouths. How are things?”
As I’d seen, the warehouses were all running smoothly.
We’d finally finished whittling out the crap partners left over from the fuckers we took the places from, so a shipment hadn’t even gone sideways in a while.
The training program I’d implemented before leaving caught on like wildfire, and our guys were in better shape than ever.
No one had tried to step on my territory.
“Uh, there is one thing,” Lyle said.
I turned to him.
“Well, people have been, you know, asking about the women from the Mansion.” He shrugged. “When they’re going on sale.”
I looked around the room. Nearly a dozen men, all of whom I’d trust with my life, stood before me telling me my business was running damn near perfect.
The biggest bastard who hurt Paige lay dead in Egyptian soil behind us.
The biggest bastard in this city lay dead in mundane Philly dirt. What the hell did I have to fear?
“Let them ask,” I said.
Murmurs of affirmation, of confidence, circled the room. They felt the same thing I did. Other syndicates needed to worry about us now.
“All right,” I said. “I’d offer you booze, but it mixes badly with my pain pills. So all I have for you is my hearty thanks and my promise you’ll be able to take stairs to the next meeting.”
My guys chuckled as they started to file out. On instinct, Stan, Carp, Teddy, and Lyle stayed behind. Just like I wanted.
“For you guys?” I blew out a long breath. “Is there a word bigger than thanks?”
Carp snorted. “I’ll take the booze, you fucking invalid.”
I shook my head. “Next time. I seriously can’t get up long enough to get you anything, and there’s a very small, professionally trained chef who may kill you—or me—if she figures out what I’ve done.”
Carp stood. “I can take a chef.”
“And if she doesn’t get you, Paige will,” I added.
He sat back down. “Noted. Next order of business?”
I laughed, pain searing through my lung. He was right to be scared of her. If she could take down Zahur, she could handle anyone.
“Well, I guess that depends,” I said. “Lyle, you got a new dirtbag for us?”
“Um, no,” he said. “I didn’t, you know, know for certain what I should be looking for.”
I blinked. “What? You thought we’d stop after Zahur?”
Lyle looked deliberately at my side.
Stan shrugged. “I didn’t know if we were doing this for Paige. I could see stopping now, if we were.”
My stomach churned. I’d trust these guys with my life, but for a dizzying second, I felt like they didn’t know me at all.
“This might have started for Paige,” I said slowly. “But I don’t know if I could go back to what I was before. Could you guys?”
“Nope,” Teddy said quickly.
Everybody turned to him.
“What?” he said. “Are you telling me you haven’t been changed by the shit we’ve seen? They’re not product; they’re people, and it makes me sick to think about what I used to handwave.”
I blinked. I’d known Teddy for a while now, but I’d never heard him make a speech that impassioned about anything other than the difference between C4 and TNT.
“Took the words right out my mouth,” Stan said after a moment. “I got back into the life because I thought the life needed me. With this work, I’m happy to admit I need it. Right a few wrongs.” He smiled. “Make a few new ones so the balance never settles.”
“I like that.” I grinned at my second.
“I’ll keep an eye.” Lyle typed something into his own laptop. “Once you’re off house arrest.”
I laughed until my chest ached, then shooed them out before Paige or Miranda could catch me out of bed.