Chapter 8
EIGHT
I can still taste her on my tongue.
That delicious nectar could sate a thirsty man on the brink of dehydration in the desert. Bailey is perfect. A goddess. I’ll happily spend the rest of my life buried between her thighs if I can get away with it.
“Do you think she’ll be of use?” My father sits down at the head of the family table.
Sundays are meant for family. If you live under his roof, you attend lunch and dinner without question.
The world better have ended if it is missed.
Not that any of us would. The only person exempt from weekly family time is our mother, and good riddance to that.
Our sister Ava was thrilled about having a weekly family day since she was never allowed to linger with the Wards growing up. She’d been isolated most of her life before meeting Dashkov, and even now, I can sense that my sister still has the feeling of lingering isolation she is trying to shake.
Unfortunately, her being here also means that her Russian dick of a husband has to come too.
Just what we need.
“I doubt Bailey be giving us any insider secrets,” Kiernan admits, his voice pulling me from my thoughts. “But we can try to see what we can get out of her. Tell her what we know about him. Make her see that he’s not some knight in shining armor.”
“What if she already knows and is complicit?” My father raises a good point.
We know little about Bailey. It is possible she is in on what her adopted father does in the shadows.
“Her career choice in investigative reporting could be so that she can report back to him on what she finds. Make the charges stick? Maybe plant some false leads that lead to arrests. It would be a boon for Crowe to have something like that work on his side.”
“I don’t think so,” I tell him honestly. “Out of all the reporters we know, her articles are the least biased.”
“You should ask about her father’s involvement with Toph Eriksen.”
That comes out of left field.
“No one asked you, fucker,” Kiernan growls, earning a stern look from our father.
“Kiernan,” Ava hisses, but the Russian doesn’t seem perturbed. He is probably used to being insulted.
“Not polite to eavesdrop,” Kiernan snarls.
Matthias smirks, taking his seat next to Ava, whose place has become on our father’s left side. A place that would normally be reserved for our mother, but she hardly ever shows up at family dinners, and my father couldn’t care less if she comes.
“Your voice carries like a spoiled child begging his mother for candy at a grocery store. Trust me, there was no need to eavesdrop.”
Well, shit. Shots fired.
I can’t help but laugh while my brother glares at the man, his own lips twitching mildly, trying his best not to react.
“Whatever,” he mumbles petulantly and takes a sip of his beer, his eyes on the elevator.
We were both reluctant to leave Bailey with Dani.
Our cousin is an amazing doctor, top of her class in med school, but she is a bit rough around the edges.
Dani is used to dealing with Fuckers in the emergency room at Harborview Medical, and when she isn’t doing that, she is attending to the wives and girlfriends of our men, and that means she has to have a certain hardness to her.
Especially since she takes after her mother in the looks department. Most of the wives and girlfriends don’t want her anywhere near them because it means their husbands or boyfriends will see her.
Petty bitches.
Dani is also a mafia princess. Her grandfather was my grandfather’s brother, my father’s uncle, and that means she is royalty, and that pisses some wives off for sure.
She doesn’t have to earn her place or marry into it.
Whoever she marries will be below her in rank, since we don’t hold women to a lesser standard than men like the Bratva.
Most Bratvas.
Apparently, Dracula over there has a similar structure when it comes to females who serve under him.
Even allowing them to become enforcers and hold leadership positions.
We haven’t evolved that far yet. Women aren’t allowed near any type of enforcer positions, but they aren’t kept from the day-to-day dealings if that is what they want.
“What can you tell me about Eriksen’s relationship with the senator?” My father’s question drags me back to the conversation. He quietly orders a whiskey from one of the kitchen staff we employ on the housing level before turning back to Matthias.
The Russian wrinkles his nose like he’s caught a whiff of something sour.
Dashkov and Eriksen aren’t enemies, but like us, prior to Ava, they aren’t friends either.
Many people have a strong beef against my father in the underground, and Eriksen seems to be at the top of the list. What none of us can figure out is why.
If he is working with the senator, it could spell disaster.
“I’ve heard about your problems with both of them,” Matthias admits, nodding a thanks to the maid who hands him his drink. “I haven’t personally had any dealings with the man, but my little bird tells me he’s been seen meeting with several of Richard Crowe’s men.”
“I thought Crowe wanted the biker gangs and mafiosos out of the city?” Ava asks.
He and Elias would hold strategy meetings.
I thought it was Elias trying to become more political, but since I learned Matthias had him under his thumb, it makes more sense that he was trying to push them out of the city.
“The things you paid attention to astound me, malyshka.” Matthias holds up her hand and kisses the back of it. Kiernan gags at the show of affection.
“Ouch,” he hisses, then glares at our sister. “Did you just kick me like a five-year-old?”
Ava sticks out her tongue at him. “Don’t act like one, then.”
I can’t help but laugh at their sibling antics. Even my father is smiling, his eyes darting between the two.
"What I wonder is why the arranged marriage with Knight?” Matthias wonders.
“I heard rumors of it a few years ago, but not much since. It doesn’t seem to have a purpose, especially since Bailey isn’t the socialite her sister is.
She doesn’t even carry Crowe’s last name.
Besides a few random appearances here and there at social functions, she is practically a ghost. And why wait so long to get married?
It would have been more prudent to marry them when she turned eighteen, and she’s nearly twenty-six now. ”
“That does seem odd,” Kiernan agrees. “Knight has a huge amount of political capital, and if he backs Crowe in that election, he’s a shoo-in. Maybe that is why they waited. Stage the wedding right before the election. Voters would eat it up.”
“Crowe could have run for office years ago,” my father says. “Why wait?”
“It is unusual,” Matthias admits, tilting his head in agreement. “Maybe he is waiting for something.”
“Maybe she didn’t want to marry him.” Ava’s face twists, her nose wrinkling in distaste. If anyone has a reason to hate arranged marriages, it is Ava. Matthias forced her to marry him when he first took her as collateral against the man she thought was her father.
Our father had been livid when he found out but has since come to accept that despite how Matthias had forced Ava to marry him, she is safe with him, and for some off reason, she seems to care for the Russian potato.
Questionable taste, in my opinion.
“Bridgett says that Drew Knight has been trying to get out from under his father’s thumb,” Kiernan adds.
“That could have something to do with the delay,” Matthias muses.
“Maybe he is against the marriage and is trying to figure out a way to get out of whatever contract his father had with Crowe. He would have to do it just right, though. Everyone knows that daddy dearest has a tight leash on his son’s finances. ”
“Where did he get all the money to finance his startup, then?” Our father wonders.
Matthias shrugs. “I’m not sure,” he admits.
“When we got into the security game, we looked into every aspect of his business but couldn’t place where he had gotten the cash to fund everything.
He didn’t have any known investors in the first few years.
No doubt people would have been too afraid to cross his father.
But I do know that there was an influx in activity the past few weeks with Crowe.
Eriksen has been meeting up with Crowe’s men, and over the past twenty-four hours, Magnus has been panicking about something. ”
“Maybe because the arranged marriage he set up is about to come crumbling down,” I tell him, smirking.
Matthias’s forehead creases. “How would you know that?”
“Because I refuse to marry a cheating pig.”