Chapter 21
Chapter twenty-one
LIAM
Why the fuck did I fall in love with a hockey player?
I hate the goddamn cold. I hated Florida too, but I’d take that swamp-ass heat over bone-deep cold any day. Nashville’s not that bad, not like Detroit. I thought I was going to die during Beckett’s rookie season.
It’s forty-eight degrees. I know it’s not objectively cold. But that doesn’t keep me from cursing myself over choosing the wool peacoat instead of my Canada Goose parka.
I pull up the collar of the coat as the blacked-out SUV pulls into the gym’s parking lot. I feel like a cartoon character, lurking in the back alley where all crime in the city is done.
He slides in next to me, leaving one empty space between us. The passenger window rolls down, and Enzo steps out with a cigarette already between his lips. He pinches it between thumb and index finger.
“How you doing?” he asks, taking another drag. “Didn’t think we’d hear back from you. Good to know you’re considering our opportunity.”
This has bad life choices written all over it. “Let’s call it a trial run.”
“You come highly recommended.”
“I don’t know about that.”
I really don’t. I have no idea who’s been talking to Enzo Conti, one of the most mobbed-up guys in Nashville.
You wouldn’t think Nashville has a mob presence, what with country music and rednecks running the show.
I guess the mob is everywhere, like a pizza franchise.
I have no idea how the fuck they figured out who I was.
“You said you’d give more details face to face.”
“Right, right. So, we got a little situation, you see.” Enzo is just shy of the New York gangster stereotype. “We got a laundromat and a car wash. They’re important assets. But the nature of the business is changing. Moving more towards digital, away from cash.”
I raise my eyebrow.
“We want to modernize. Credit cards, customer service chatbots, membership clubs. I like my gadgets. But it’s harder to massage the numbers when the machines keep all the receipts.”
“Whoa, dude.” I throw my hands up. “If you’re looking for someone to commit credit card fraud, that’s not me. I know I can get numbers off the dark web, but I am not an expert in that.”
Enzo waves off the concern. “We know. That’s not your lane. If we wanted it, we got people for that.”
“Then what is my lane?”
“I like you. Straight to business.”
I’m tempted to make a show of checking my watch, but Enzo isn’t the kind of guy you want to piss off.
“A guy in the family, Giovanni Esposito, got popped a few years back. Dumped fake cash transactions on the last day of every month. It was obvious and sloppy.”
“And?”
“We need a little finesse. Cash transactions sprinkled throughout the books. Make it look…what’s the word the kids use now? Organic? Authentic? My nieces say that shit all the time.” He makes air quotes with just his lit cigarette.
That is a ridiculously easy problem to solve. There has to be a catch.
“So, you want randomized entries spread across the month, updated automatically into your books, mixing in cash transactions with your credit cards in a way that wouldn’t flag any audit. Weighted to match your traffic patterns, and accounting for the automatic systems.”
Enzo’s grin widens. “You see what I’m laying down.”
“And the payment?”
“An ongoing retainer. You’ll be taken care of.”
Fuck. I really did not want to be on the mob’s payroll.
But I need two things out of this conversation.
Beckett missing out on games and being fined is not a financial concern.
The gym is doing well. My consulting is doing well.
We have money. We have so much money. Beckett could retire tomorrow, and we’d live perfectly fine for the rest of our lives.
Unless we’re being blackmailed.
The new envelope crinkles in my pocket. It came in the mail this morning. And that is a fucking problem I have to solve.
I’m smart, but I don’t know if I’m smart enough to keep Beckett’s career out of this. Telling that first lie was the dumbest thing I’d ever done.
“You’re going to keep your shit together?” I propped Pierce up against the wall.
“I’m fine.” His words were slurred.
He’d been drunk for days. Randal Voss and a few of his buddies had been camped out in front of my place since it happened.
All I knew was Reed was dead, Pierce was convinced he did it, and the “grieving” father had everyone whipped up in town thinking we did it.
When they started taking potshots at the garden gnome in the yard, I waited till they fell asleep in their cars, and we bailed, driving like a bat out of hell to Detroit.
“You sure about this?” I asked.
“He’d want to know and…” Pierce sniffed and wiped his nose on his sleeve. “We’ll just stay a few days and figure something out. He said we could crash anytime.”
My teeth chattered. It was way too cold for a hoodie. Reed had started it, the joking about us moving to Detroit in our group chat with Beckett. Beckett was so on board. He was making plans, recommending neighborhoods.
Pierce tugged on his jacket and ran both hands through his hair. After one steady breath, he knocked on Beckett’s door. It took a while for him to answer.
“Oh my god,” was all he said before pulling Pierce through the doorway and kissing him. It was that hungry kind of kiss. He grabbed me by the neck of my hoodie, and when his lips hit mine, it took everything in me not to scream and break apart.
He let me go and ducked his head out the door. “Where’s Reed?”
Pierce had put his back against the wall in a last-ditch effort not to fall apart. He lost that battle and gravity won, pulling him all the way to the floor.
“He’s dead. I…” was all Pierce could get out.
“What?” Beckett sank to his knees next to Pierce.
Pierce looked at me, square in the eye, for the first time since I found him covered in Reed’s blood. Begging me to make it right.
“Car crash,” I spat out. “T-boned by a semi.”
“Oh god,” Beckett pulled Pierce to him.
I don’t really want to do this. It’s never a single favor for a man like Enzo. But I’m out of options.
“I can set up a system, monitor it for a while, and hand it off to one of your guys.” I’m not too sure about the ongoing retainer thing.
“You could find a really good place for yourself in the organization.” Enzo raises an eyebrow.
I ignore that. “What if I wanted to explore alternative forms of compensation?”
“What kind of trouble did you get yourself into, Liam boy?” Enzo’s voice is smooth, but there’s a warning in it. He’s a beta, but he’s the kind of beta who can have you found at the bottom of a river with a cinder block for company. I curl my lip, pretending I’m not nervous.
“What if I need someone found?” I say, keeping my voice even. “And then make sure nobody finds him again?”
Enzo takes a long drag, considering. “We’ll need a risk assessment, but that’s something we can discuss.
” He flicks the butt across the parking lot.
“Come down to Mama’s on Pico and 8th. We’ll get you keys, get you the codes to the cameras and the security system.
We’ll get you all set up with what you need for the laundromat and car wash. ”
I nod, then shake his hand and turn my back on him, praying this isn’t going to bite me in the ass.
I pull open the heavy door to the gym just as David Lee Roth tells me to “Jump”. The echo is such a bitch in this place that even if Van Halen wasn’t being cranked on the sound system, the HVAC would sound like a jet engine.
I stop dead, staring at Pierce in the middle of the boxing ring.
He’s sparring with a client I don’t recognize.
The kid is sloppy with his footwork, it’s too bouncy.
Every time Pierce throws a jab, the kid flinches and backpedals.
Great. He’s in the ring with some bonehead who shouldn’t have moved beyond mitt work.
Pierce is downright fucking delighted. He’s having the best time of his life. Which means he doesn’t like this kid and is using sparing as a cover to fuck him up.
Blake, our new trainer, slides up next to me with a fresh stack of towels in his arms.
“I thought Pierce didn’t spar anymore; he just does mitt work. This is a bad idea, isn’t it?”
“Yep.” The ring and Pierce are not good friends. He got into MMA hard in Detroit. Getting the guilt beat out of him was not smart.
“You fucknut!” I yell, cupping my hands around my mouth to cut through the 80s glam rock.
Pierce’s head snaps my way, and in that split second, a fist sneaks through his guard. It lands with a string of cuss words.
As I stalk across the gym, a pair of betas scatter and hide behind the squat racks. I push open the office door with my foot. There’s a pillow and blanket on the edge of the couch, his leather jacket thrown over the armrest. I snatch up the blanket and fold it with rough snaps.
I turn just as Pierce steps in from the hall. His sweaty tank is clinging to him, and he’s pinching the bridge of his nose like he’s about to break it off.
“You’re a fucking idiot. You’re going to have to get it reset.” I say.
He ignores me and closes the distance, his hands bracing my hips as he pushes me back against the filing cabinet. Even post-workout, Pierce smells good. My hands find his face, and I turn his head to get a better look at the black eyes that haven’t had time to fade.
Fuck Julius. He owes me and he does this to my packmate?
Next time I see him, I might suggest a little of my own blackmail.
“Nice little omega you got there. Be a shame if she finds out how we hacked her email and nuked all her clients.” I can’t pull off the Enzo accent though.
They’re happy now apparently, so I’m not going to fuck that up.
Pierce is practically vibrating with leftover adrenaline. He tugs at my belt and rips down my zipper, hand in my pants before I can even cuss him out again. His mouth finds mine, rougher than his hands.
He jerks back with a hiss when his busted nose bumps my cheek.
“Dumbass,” I say between panting breaths. And I’m about to ruin the mood. “We have to talk.”
“Later.” He shakes his head, trying to wedge my jeans over my hips.
I reach into my coat pocket and pull out the envelope, flashing it in front of his face. He bats it away, but I smack his nose with it.
“Fuck.” He winces and steps back, putting space between us. My dick is throbbing. Pierce, regardless of circumstance, has always had the power to take me from zero to sixty in two seconds.
He stalks around the room in a tight circle, shaking his arms out. He’s ditched the gloves, but his knuckles are still taped.
“So is the fucker just gonna taunt us with little love notes?”
I toss him the envelope. He catches it, rips it in half, and lets the pieces flutter to the ground.
“What did it say?” he asks.
“How’s the gym? I see business is good.”
He sighs and snatches up a towel, rubbing it over his head.
“Pierce, we have to tell Beckett.”
“We can find him, though, can’t we?”
“We’ve been over this. All electronic records for Randal Voss dropped off about a year ago. No tax records, no DMV, no property rental, nothing.”
“So, this little bitch is just going to keep sending us letters? Is there a point to all of this? Besides terrorizing us?”
That is the point. Pierce knows that. Reed’s father is just working us up to get to the big ask.
“We have to talk to Beckett.” I say again.
“And say what, exactly? Admit that we’ve been lying this whole time about what happened to Reed? You think he’s going to take that well?”
I straighten up and pull my pants back over my hips. Thank god I’m not wearing skin-tight jeans today. As I stuff myself back in and zip up, I try not to look at Pierce’s face.
“We’ll find him,” he says emphatically.
I sigh and open the laptop on the desk, skating my finger across the trackpad to wake it up.
“Regardless, we still have to tell Beckett.”
I sit at the desk and peel my arms out of my jacket. There’s a stack of bills to pay and invoices to process.
“Remember when we first got to Detroit? What the plan was?”
All the air gets trapped in my lungs. He can’t mean what I think he means.
“You’re the one who said we’d go if it got tricky for Beckett,” he says.
I stare at the screen. My fingers are shaking so badly I mistype my password.
“We’ll figure it out.” I can barely get the words out.
“I’m going to shower,” Pierce says, and I don’t watch him leave the office.