Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Sver
I watch Candy hug Angel and jealousy rips through me. I was playing it a little cool this morning. Keeping things light.
Killian and I…we’re on a crash course. And I don’t want to make too many promises. Popping open the trunk, I pull out a duffel bag and drop it on the ground.
“Angel.”
He looks up at me even as Candy disappears. “What’s in the bag?” He asks as he starts toward me.
I bend down, unzipping the bag and exposing the contents. “An insurance policy for Candy.”
I packed it early this morning while she was still sleeping.
Angel’s gaze is wary as he slows his pace, eyeing the bag. I get the problem. There isn’t much trust here and he’s afraid this is a trap. “I’ll empty the bag if it makes you feel better, but this is money for her just in case…”
“Just in case, what?”
I draw in a deep breath. “In case I don’t come back.”
“You’re that worried about Vinnie Morelli?” His brows lift.
I shake my head, scrubbing the back of my neck.
“Vinnie is the least of my problems.” I’m not dragging Angel into the fight between Killian and me.
Killian isn’t involving Angel either, and I respect that.
But just in case things go south… “But if I don’t come back, that’s for Candy. Can I count on you to keep her safe?”
Angel blows out a breath as he looks in the bag. “How much is in there?”
My eyes narrow. “Why?”
“My safe is only so big.” He bends down and zips up the bag, picking it up. “If something happens to you, I’ll send Candy to Vegas. She can get tons of work there, buy a house, and live under the watchful eye of the Smiths—”
“Not the Smiths.”
Angel cocks his head. “They have two of your daughters. Are you saying you don’t trust them?”
“With Sasha and Katarina, yes. With Candy? Absolutely not.” Like I said, I’m not putting Angel in the middle. “There is too much history.”
“I’ll ask Mason Kincaid then.”
“Thank you, Angel.” I turn back toward the car and then glance at Rock, who has been watching the entire time.
I know that Rock and Killian have spent time together. “I’m following Vinnie today. I’m almost certain he’s meeting with the Columbians. If Rock wants to come, he can give you a firsthand account of anything I discover.”
Angel’s eyes narrow. “Trust you with my brother?”
“Fuck you, Angel,” Rock spits. “You’re not my babysitter.”
But my answer is more direct. “Trust is the theme of the day.”
Angel’s nostrils flare. “You just gave me a bag of money. How much danger will my brother be in?”
I wave my hand. “No more than normal.” Then I look at Rock…
“Fuck it,” he says and walks over, opens the door and climbs into the passenger seat of the car.
With a salute, I turn toward the driver’s side.
Rock looks even more ridiculous than me in an Accord.
“Seat belt,” I mutter as I buckle mine.
“For fuck’s sake,” he grouses even as he buckles the belt.
“Pull your hood up. Our goal is not to be seen.”
Rock looks over at me then. I know he’s starting to understand. “Won’t the police be more suspicious with my hood on my head?”
“In an Accord? I doubt it. And no one else will recognize you either. Put on sunglasses. I have a spare pair in the glove box.”
“That’s why you drive this car?”
“Did Killian not explain? We want to escape everyone’s notice. Cops. Pedestrians. Criminals.”
He grunts. “But my GT3 rips. You’re telling me this thing is going to get you out of a jam?” Rock sneers at the plain dashboard.
I scoff. “How many times have you needed to make a high-speed getaway?”
He doesn’t answer.
“You drive that car for your vanity, and you justify to yourself that it’s for your own safety. But the truth is, this car will enter a stream of traffic and disappear. You don’t have to go fast. You go silent. Don’t lead with your ego and you will be amazed at how much more you can accomplish.”
He scratches at his jaw. “Killian says a lot of the same things.”
“Does he?”
“You two are a lot alike.” He clears his throat. “I thought I wanted to be a shadow, like you are, like he is, but I can’t seem to let some shit go…”
Deep down, Killian and I likely both started in the same place. Observers. “Do you like to watch first or hit first?”
“Watching makes me feel like shit.”
I turn to him as I pull out of the alley and into traffic. “What do you mean?”
He shrugs. “When I was a kid, I could feel people’s emotions like waves in the air. They made me weak.”
“Hmm,” I say, studying the man I thought I understood. “And now?”
Rock has real potential if what he says is true. He’s strong, he’s a good fighter, and he strikes the right notes of fear. But what I thought was emotional unawareness is actually masking. Can he pull the mask away and retain his toughness?
“Sometimes I let them back in. When I do, they overwhelm me still.”
I give a curt nod. I can sense movements but not feelings. Feeling other people’s fear, anxiety, sadness would be a tough tightrope to walk. “You have a gift if you can learn to use it.”
He looks over at me. “Killian said that too.”
I don’t actually need the reminder that Killian is a younger, maybe stronger version of me.
I focus back on Rock.
“What am I feeling right now?”
He frowns. “A little afraid. Fear is jagged. But you have a lot of the same waves as Angel. Big and round and…happy.”
“I’m happy?” That would be a first.
“Angel…” Rock draws in a breath. “He seems happier married than he’s ever been, even though most of what he does is driven by her needs, not his own.”
I draw in a deep breath as I consider those words. Maybe it’s the sex. But meeting Candy’s needs makes me feel more content than I’ve been in years.
I make the right turn toward where I know I’m likely to find Vinnie. He keeps a room at one of the clubs his father handed over to him.
Sure enough, as I park down the street near the end of the block, I see his entourage leaving through the front door.
“Fuck,” Rock mutters next to me. “Think he sees us?”
I turn to Rock. “Again. We are in a slightly dinged silver Honda Accord. This car is invisible.”
Rock grunts his acknowledgement. “I’ll find one this weekend and buy it in cash.”
“Good.”
One man opens the back door of a bright red Escalade with black rims for Vinnie and then closes it behind him.
Rock scoffs. “Who does he think he is? Angel runs an operation that’s now in the multimillions and he doesn’t require a butler.”
I don’t bother to say, the job is one of a chauffeur. “Vinnie wants all the trappings of the big boss. He just wants to take a giant shortcut to get there.”
“Against his own father?” Rock’s lips curl. “I’d rather burn alive than be that man.”
“A point in your favor.” I like Rock way more than I thought I would. Vinnie has all the markers of an entitled and spoiled man who has overinflated his own worth.
That doesn’t make him less dangerous. “Vinnie is a snake, which means he shouldn’t be underestimated.”
“Reptile brain.”
“Exactly,” I answer with a nod. “He slept with a woman he had every intention of killing. That’s some cold shit.”
Rock rubs his hands on his thighs. “Angel was going to do that to Promise.”
My brows lift. Interesting. “He didn’t, though.”
“No. He broke the other way. Like the completely opposite other way.”
I nod, even as Vinnie’s car pulls away from the curb. I put my car in gear and start slowly following. “You’re about to learn how easy it is to follow a flashy SUV.”
“But why did Angel break the other way? Why does he seem so happy living his life for her?” Rock asks, clearly working through something.
“For the same reason you’d rather burn than betray your family. Living for others makes us feel useful, important…satisfied.” But I’m realizing something too. “The benefit of living like that for a woman is that she rewards your efforts with—”
“Sex.”
I chuckle as I continue following Vinnie at a respectable distance.
“With the right woman, the best sex of your life. But even more than that, she’ll tie herself into knots to return all the happiness you’re not giving yourself. It’s this amazing symbiotic relationship.”
My girls, they don’t need me anymore.
And while I was a shit father, all of the things I’ve done, I did to protect them. And now I’ve got an opportunity to take care of a new woman. One who will reward me for every ounce of effort I pour into her.
The thought hardens the position I’ve been leaning into more and more with each passing day.
I could make my life Candy’s. She’d be more than worth it.
Vinnie’s car turns toward the west side of the island and my brow furrows. This is not territory that the Italians usually haunt.
Another turn and my gut gets heavy.
On the third turn, I’m hitting the Apple CarPlay. Because I know this street. I know who lives here and if that’s where Vinnie is heading, then we are all careening toward disaster. “Fuck.”
“What is it?” Rock asks, looking from me to the car.
But I don’t answer.
Instead, I hit a button on the CarPlay console.
As the call feature fires up, I growl into the speakers…
“Call Killian.”