57. Levi
FIFTY-SEVEN
levi
A room full of Forsaken Fucks.
On a good day, it’d be my sort of shit. Fist fights, a few stray bullets aimed in their direction, and some threats and promises thrown their way.
But, as of late, my secret is out. To the individuals who aren’t supposed to know and don’t owe me any favors to keep it safe.
However, if they spill it, I’m draining them of blood and any future headaches.
So, I’m forced to sit through some pow-wow boy band meeting with three assholes I’d like to pummel with my fists while my silent cousin just stands there and watches it unfold.
I’m already on my last nerve.
Especially since I found Stanton fucking Bay in this very kitchen. And Baby Wildes is sitting on my fucking Titan seat.
“We’ll make this short and sweet,” Cairo announces to my left, sitting across from Bay. “Obviously, we all know about your little plan, but not what you intended to fully do with it.”
“You might know I’m alive, Black,” I surmise evenly, not giving a full fuck that he feels left out. “But that doesn’t mean you get an exclusive pass to what I have in mind.”
“I’ve told you a million times to get on the same page,” he retorts with annoyance. That haughty-ass Black bullshit that expects things to be done his way and his way alone. “We’re on the same side.”
“I don’t like you.”
“And I don’t give a flying fuck,” he shoots back, and it dawns on me I get under his skin by just being here. “We all share common interests here. So, stop acting like a martyr, and pull your head out of your ass.”
My lips part with my own shitty comment, but Bay’s fingers wrap gingerly around my forearm and keep it from leaving.
She’s the only one who can do that. The only one who can get through to me like this.
And if she doesn’t want me to have a verbal sparring match with Black, I already know I can take him. I don’t need to keep going back and forth while wasting my time.
“I think what Cairo is trying to say,” Bay surmises, “is that if something big is moving, he just wants to be prepared, is all.”
I feel Baby Wildes’s eyes on us, and I revel in the attention. He’s finally being set fucking straight about me and her.
But in case he was confused, my fingers hook with hers, and I lace them together, running my thumb up and down her flesh like I’ve tasted it before.
“We need to locate De Leon again first,” I tell her, keeping my eyes locked on those lucid blues of hers. “Then, we don’t miss. And if I need them ”—I jerk my head over to Cairo—“I’ll let him know.”
“And what about Ramsey?” Cairo solicits, clearly not reading the room when I just said I’m not telling him shit.
Regardless, I’ll feed him a bone.
“If you’re concerned about the Titan fight,” I emit. “That’s never going to happen.”
“And, if you knew shit about my brother,” Torin chimes in, his voice strained. “Then you’d already know he’s going to spring it on her. It’s not going to be planned the right way.”
“He can’t?—”
“He doesn’t care,” Cairo cuts in. “Technically, the only people who matter are him and her.”
I steer my attention to both of them, sitting side by side, obviously more concerned about the where and how than I am.
Cairo meets me head-on.
Torin is too busy glaring at Bay’s and my joined hands.
“Do I need to handle him, too?” I ask, half sarcastically, half serious. “Because I have no issues killing a Wildes.”
“No,” Torin mutters, loud enough for us all to hear. “You just suck at it.”
The little bitch has me there.
Luck has always been on Torin’s side, and I’ve never been able to get my hands fully on him in the way I’ve always wanted to.
Reaching for my waistband with my free hand, I drop my Glock aimlessly to the wooden table with a pledging thud of what I could do. “There’s no time like the present, is there, Baby Wildes?”
Torin’s light brown eyes slice over to me, but he’s anything but concerned or scared. “I’m game whenever you are.”
“Levi,” Bay starts, her tone peaceful and calm. “He saved your life.”
Ouch.
Talk about loyalty and never bringing that up again.
“I really wish he hadn’t,” I grind out, hating the fact that, at the end of the day, I owe this motherfucker something. “I’m not going to have this hovering over my head my whole life.”
Torin lips coil into a shitty smirk. “I think a quick thank you is in order, and we’ll move on.”
“I’d rather choke.”
“I mean”—Reeve leans back in his chair, extending his arm over the back of Bay’s chair, and I’m about to rip it out of his socket when he begins playing with a lock of her hair—“I can think of something you could choke on.”
Yep.
I’m going to have zero regrets killing all of them.
However, Bay is going to feel different about it, and the last thing she needs to do is mourn anybody else.
“Reeve,” Bay lightly chides, not bothering to acknowledge him when she says it. “Shut the hell up.”
“I’ll handle Ramsey.” All eyes fall on Baby Wildes, and I’m less than impressed with the announcement. “He won’t kill me.”
“That’s a shame,” I deadpan, but he ignores me and continues.
“Regardless of how we’ve moved differently, my brother has always had this weird thing with me where he’s always wanted to show me the way but didn’t push the bar too hard. Thought I would always come around.”
“We can’t have you do that,” Bay retorts flatly. “It’s your brother.”
“Let the man talk,” I tell her. “If he wants to grow up, he has to do grown-up shit.”
“That’s his brother ,” she stresses, exposing her soft spot for him, even though shit isn’t right between them, and I can’t figure out why. I haven’t spent too much time worrying about it either. Just one less asshole to deal with so it works for me. “He’s already dealt with Emilio?—”
“Something he should’ve done years ago.”
Bay narrows her gaze. “He’s blood related. Emilio was a stand-in.”
“I can handle it,” Torin states confidently. “He’s not going to get his hands on Bay, and he’s in the way. He’s not going to disappear in the night. He’s already called her out and took a side.”
“And it’s not with us,” Cairo adds. “There’s no time for empathy anymore.”
“There shouldn’t have been in the first place,” I retort. “He’s only been Emilio’s lackey for years.”
“You’ve got a lot of balls, Wallace, to talk your shit. I didn’t see you coming up with a master plan to finish all this.”
I roll my eyes at Cairo. “You think I’m stupid enough to waltz into The Landings and handle business and hope you three babies don’t get into your feelings about it? I would’ve rather made it look like a hit without it being traced back to me before I openly did it myself.”
“Who else would it be?” Torin grumbles back. “You’re the only dickhead with a vendetta.”
“And you’re not?”
“The difference between you and me is that I can’t kill you.” Baby Wildes points at Bay. “She’d fucking kill me .”
I like that he knows that.
And I hate he likes her enough to consider her feelings.
It’s the only thing we have in common.
“Do us a favor, McQueen,” Reeve’s voice slithers in, suddenly leaning up against Bay’s side and too fucking close. “Let us handle the older brother, and keep your boy preoccupied so that he doesn’t have an aneurysm. I’m sure he’d love a little lesson in the backseat of a car. Just like you had one with us, yeah?”
Well…if I didn’t have Torin’s attention before, I sure do now.
I can feel the intense hatred beaming off his stare, and I bet he regrets taking those bullets for me now. However, I don’t miss the subliminal that she’s fucked these assholes in a backseat before.
“Reevie,” Bay says, steel laced in her tone. She cranes her head over to him, and there’s a hint of her about to fuck him up if he doesn’t sit there and shut his mouth. “Too soon.”
He smiles at her, obviously not giving a flying shit. “Whatever you say, McQueen.”
“What the fuck is going on here?” Torin shoots out, ping-ponging his focus from Reeve, Bay, and then, finally, me. “I’m gone for two seconds, Reeve is fucked up for several weeks, and now?—”
“Another time,” Cairo cuts in, clearly only wanting to discuss business. “My father wants to meet.” He looks at me. “I appreciate you getting him out of that truck and getting him medical assistance.”
I lift my shoulders because I didn’t need the appreciation, but it’s given, nonetheless. “He’s lucky I was there.”
“I still appreciate it. I’ve arranged for the girls to be homeschooled, if that’s okay with Bay, until this shit is figured out. My father knows you are alive and wants to discuss the next steps.”
“I’m not telling you anything. Why would I tell him shit?”
“Because you took Roger’s place, which means you speak to him like Roger did. I don’t have to tell you they had a bond, Wallace. Unless you didn’t read the assignment.”
I did.
Never fully understood why Roger trusted him so much, but he’s never fucked us over before.
“When?” I grind out because this isn’t going to go away and I’m slightly curious about what he wants to say. “And where?”
“His house. We’ll keep it so you can slip through and not be seen by anyone.”
“That’s a problem, isn’t it?” I deadpan flatly.
“Never had issues with my men before.”
“I don’t trust your men.”
“That seems like a personal problem.”
“Not mine,” I retort simply. “It’s yours. How did you end up getting taken by Vivian Muncy again?”
His face skews into an immediate glower, but he doesn’t answer me on that feat. “My father isn’t moving around so well. Shot three times and all. Meanwhile, Ellie and Mae will stay with us.”
That has Bay rigid and suddenly sliding her hand out of mine. “Excuse me?”
“I didn’t stutter, Little T.”
“You must’ve,” she carps back, clutching her fingers together. “Because I thought I heard you say my sisters were leaving South Shore.”
“It’s safer.”
“It’s not.”
“We have two fuckin’ men running around, trying to take us all out. And you’re worried about your South Shore bullshit and where you belong?”
“You’re not my keeper .” Her cheeks brighten with irritation, and I revel in the fact she still doesn’t back down from any of them.
Cairo steers those dark and dangerous eyes to her, clearly unaffected by her attitude. At least he picked that up quickly. “I am your keeper. I’m also the one who takes care of all those needs of yours, too. We made a pact; you don’t break one of those. Until one of us dies, of course. So, if you want to get a jump start on that, you know what room I’m in. Unless you want to kill me another way.”
My nostrils flare at his innuendo. The way he wants to rub it in my face and broadcast it to the world he finally fucked my girl, too.
“Alright, stop,” Torin interjects, sounding exhausted, fingers rubbing at his temple, and he appears weak as fuck right now or like he hasn’t been getting any sleep. “We get it, Cairo. You’ve claimed South Shore.”
Didn’t need that fuckin’ reminder.
Using my palms, I slowly push myself up. Every single one of my stitches begging me not to fucking move. Good news is I wasn’t bleeding after I fucked the shit out of Astor.
Bad news, I’m sore as fuck, and I felt lightheaded.
“She stays in South Shore,” Ozzy states before I can say anything, putting his foot down through this whole conversation as he stands behind myself and Bay. “So do the girls and Wallace.”
“That’s cute, cuz,” I grind out. “But I’m not looking to be kept, and this is my fucking town.”
“Calm your shit down,” Torin orders, as if that’s going to hold any weight. “No one’s concerned about you. And since you don’t have a pot to piss in right now, I suggest you let the grown-ups figure shit out.”
I glance over at him. My power must’ve gone to his damn head. “Are you looking for another assassination attempt on your ass? You’re not supposed to be sitting on anything.”
“Levi,” Bay mutters and reaches for my hand again. “Cool it. We need to figure shit out and we need to do it together.”
“Before or after Baby Wildes’s death?” She squeezes my hand again, prompting another plea for me to focus on what’s important and not my beef with the Forsaken fucktards. “Matteo is down, obviously, and with one less arm thanks to your husband .” I spit out the last word because, even though I agreed, it’s still slightly annoying. “You need to be what I always told you to be, and that’s careful. When he’s back up and running, he’s going to be desperate. His first pick is going to be Ozzy.” Said man scoffs a bit at that, and I slice my focus over to him. “You’re not a dumbass, or are you? You know he has your number now.”
“I can handle my own,” he replies nonchalantly, and I don’t doubt him. However, I don’t know all the plays here on their end.
“Cairo or Baby Wildes is next,” I continue. “I’m throwing my money on the latter because no one believes he will last in South Shore for more than a month.”
“Should I correct him, Wildfire?” he prompts evenly. “Or did you want to do that?”
“Shut up, Torin,” she launches out with zero emotion, still staring at me and whatever it is I have to say.
“You’re not doing the Titan fight,” I state. “You don’t leave without someone with you.”
“He hasn’t scheduled it yet,” she replies. “And I thought?—”
“It could be a private affair.”
She flicks her focus over to Cairo. “Why was yours like a damn prime event feature, then?”
“Because De Leon likes attention.”
She tsks and looks back at me. “So I have Ramsey on the verge of kidnapping me and a bunch of guys so we can play some fucked up Russian Roulette.”
I frown because that’s exactly how I see it going down.
She’s not safe.
Ramsey isn’t a show-off, and she’s going to die if he gets his hands on her. He needs twelve guys, six from his side and six from hers, to witness the event.
He might not shoot her point blank and call it a day, but he’ll make sure he wins—one way or another.
And he wouldn’t necessarily need to be alive to do that.
“I got you, Astor,” I hedge in between the silence. “Nothing is going to happen to you.”
“Matteo,” Ozzy adds on, reminding me that Torin’s older brother isn’t the only problem, as though I still needed the reminder.
“I expect you’ll handle that,” I convey, looking up at him over Bay’s head. “You can move in a wider circle than I can right now.”
He nods, which gives me some relief.
“You get caught, you’re dead.”
“I understand?—”
“Wha— No ,” Bay shoots out, shoving her chair back and almost hitting Ozzy with it. She turns on him, meeting his stoic features. “This works both ways. You don’t go anywhere without taking someone with you.”
“Bay,” Cairo starts, but she doesn’t listen, getting right into Ozzy’s space, and I expect him to take a step back, but he stands there looking down at her like she’s some sort of crazed maniac.
“Promise me,” she announces gruffly.
He doesn’t respond, so I force it.
“You move, you tell someone where you’re going,” I order, and that’s the only way we’re doing this. “The last thing I need is for her to start following you.”
He doesn’t pry his blue eyes off Bay but raises his palm upward to where Bay promptly pushes hers into his.
The fuck is that?
Cairo releases one of those full-body sighs before saying, “You’re gonna need to keep us in the loop, Wallace. Not some half-ass bullshit of you reigning from afar.”
“Oh, don’t worry,” I consent, as Bay comes to my side, and I take the opportunity to run my palm over her hip, meeting Cairo’s heated glower. “I’m sure you and Torin will try to fit in my shoes and waddle your way in to try to guide her. But you’ll never be South Shore. And you’ll never be me.”