Chapter 21 – Greyson
We took one car with Cameron hog-tied and stuffed into the trunk and didn’t split up until we got to the Celestine. Nate and Dominic took our prisoner to the basement, while Mari and I took the elevator to the top floors.
“Do you think she’s here?” Mari whispered as we got closer to Aislynn’s apartment. It would never be Cameron’s again.
I didn’t, but knowing Mari wouldn’t rest until she tried, I simply shrugged.
The door at the end of the hall seemed innocuous, plain even, but not knowing what lay behind it made it all the more sinister. What had our friend been through with her husband? What had he done to her besides make her fall for a lie?
I didn’t know that either, and it roiled my stomach.
“Won’t know until we try.” Mari drew in a deep breath and knocked.
No response.
After a minute, she knocked again.
Still nothing.
“Do I keep pounding on the door until she opens up, or do I give her space?”
Mari sagged against me, and I tucked her into my chest. When she hurt, I hurt, and she was fucking hurting. “I can’t answer that, reina.” I ran a hand over her hair, loving how she leaned into the comfort—if only for a minute before steeling her spine.
“We’ll keep checking on her. Text Moore and Tennessee. We need them to keep an eye out. Have them let me know when she comes back, if she’s left at all.”
Nodding, I steered her to the elevator with one hand and relayed the message with the other while we rode down in silence.
With one step out of the doors, cold air seeped into us from the underground basement. Part of me wanted to grab a jacket for Mari, and the other embraced it, knowing we wouldn’t be cold for long. Interrogating warmed the body fast, even if I wasn’t the one doing it.
In the time it had taken us to run our errand, Nate and Dominic had strung Cameron up, suspending him with chains wrapped around one of the ceiling’s steel beams. His legs barely held him, and the grimace of pain told me he was still suffering from the injuries he’d sustained in the fire.
Now that I thought about it, had the fire been part of the plan all along to throw us off the scent, or had Cash gone off book? Thinking back, I recalled Cameron had been enraged at the situation. He’d nearly died—his wife had nearly died—but knowing that Ash’s safety was more for his image than anything else, I could see how the rage had been manufactured in places. I was nearly feral at the idea of Mari getting caught in that fire.
Dominic, Nate, and I took our places behind Mari. This was her show; we were just the silent supporters.
The two cousins silently watched each other. I wondered what Mari saw when she looked at her cousin’s face. Was it the boy she’d grown up with—or the man who’d betrayed her? Maybe she was one of the unlucky ones, and it was both. How would she handle the punishment in that case?
A glance at Nate and Dominic showed the same worries on their faces, but before I could sink too far into the concern, Mari spoke. “I figured it out, you know.”
Cameron just watched her. He didn’t fight the chains or try to defend himself. He knew he’d been caught. He knew it was over. When Mari took the knife Nate handed her, Cameron didn’t even flinch.
She stepped up, slicing the shirt off his chest with careful motions as she talked. “I had Moore look into your comings and goings over the last year, though I’m sure it was longer. Honestly, I’m surprised I missed the signs, but when we knew what to look for, we found everything I needed. Going out late, sneaking around, showing up places you shouldn’t have been. Not to mention all the fuckups that made things difficult. The people trying to rob Gilded—hell, even the raid on the club—was your doing. You scanned your ID card less than an hour before the cops showed up and slipped out the back before anyone noticed.”
Her fingers clenched with anger, and I wondered if she was fighting the urge to hit him. Shara had been in jail, in danger, because of him. That rankled Mari. Her pride was tightly tethered to keeping her people safe, and he’d preyed on that.
The first swipe of the knife was shallow, barely enough to draw blood, but paper cuts always stung something fierce, didn’t they? Cameron still didn’t react, and I saw how much it pissed her off in the tension of her shoulders.
“Mari.” I wasn’t going to let her cousin goad her into killing him.
She was too far gone to listen, though.
She swiped again, this time cutting deep enough for rivulets of blood to leak down his chest. Cameron’s only reaction was a soft hiss.
“All those nights you said you were following your father, you were really meeting Cash. Nate said the compound was one big party. It’s always easier to get people to agree with you when they’re drunk and high, living the good life, right?”
Another swipe, this one from hip to hip. She was close enough to his pelvis that he tensed automatically, but he still didn’t respond, and I felt Mari’s satisfaction like my own.
“Joaquin was a good scapegoat,” she admitted, and for the first time, a flicker of something flashed on Cameron’s face.
Guilt.
He felt guilty that his father had died in his place. It was almost gratifying to know he wasn’t a robot. I knew Mari felt the same on some level, but even if she hadn’t killed Joaquin for supposedly working for Cash, he would have died eventually. Mari wouldn’t have been safe as long as he was alive, but it would take her time to see that side of things. She would, though. We’d make sure of it.
Tapping the knife on her leg, she paced. “What I keep racking my brain trying to figure out is what you possibly could have wanted that I didn’t give you. You had power, prestige, and more money than God. Beyond that, you had the ear of the queen of this city, and you had a beautiful, kind wife who loved you. Yet you went behind my back. For what? What was so damn important that you had to throw away thirty years of memories and every ounce of trust I’ve ever given you?”
“Are you sure you wanna know?” Cameron asked, though it was more tired than taunting. “It won’t make things easier for you. It won’t make any of it better.”
“Nothing will make it better, but I deserve to know,” Mari countered.
Cameron sagged in the chains, but I kept my narrowed gaze on him. He was too good of an actor for me to believe he had any remorse. When he lifted his head and forced those rage-filled eyes on Mari, I knew I was right.
“It should have been mine.”
Mari paused. “What?”
“Everything. After Antoni died, it all should have gone to me, but it didn’t. Rey never wanted to lead. He was always content in second place. I wanted what was rightfully mine.” Cameron shook his head, that rage morphing into something deep and ugly as he spoke.
“At first, I let it go, thinking either you would fuck up and they’d kill you, or you’d give up and they’d hand the city over. Then you fought back. You kept fighting, and when you settled into your skin as you did, I realized it was over. You would do whatever it took to keep what was now yours: the city, the power, the money, the throne. I thought I could accept you because you were so much better at everything than I’d expected, but the anger just kept growing. How could they bow to you when I was right here? When Cash made me an offer, it was easy to take it.”
Easy to betray a lifelong bond. For power.
The saying was true; absolute powercorruptsabsolutely. Except in Cameron’s case, it was the thoughtof it that turned him against his family. Disgusting.
There was another edge to the jealousy that I couldn’t quite pinpoint, but it wasn’t my place to ask. This was Mari’s show, her need for closure and clarity. I was just a witness. I could only see a sliver of her profile, but the tension in her jaw was hard to miss. “What about Aislynn? Why manipulate her?”
“It’s like I said, she’s mine to protect. I hated you for giving her to me at first. I didn’t want another spoiled mafia princess, and there were times when I genuinely thought about wringing her neck. Then I realized that, with her, I could take the O’Bannon territory too. All it would take was a little engineered luck.”
The implication slithered under my skin. Holy shit.
Mari stared at him, but I could tell she wasn’t really seeing him. She was seeing the monster she hadn’t realized he was.
“You were trying to get her pregnant.” It was the first time I’d spoken, but it had to be said. The evil had to be purged before any of us could move on.
Cameron tried to shrug, but his position made it impossible. “She’s my wife. Babies are part of the deal.”
“She loved you, and you used her.” Mari’s voice held a graveyard of memories, the destruction of the last good thing she’d ever thought about her cousin laid at her feet.
Cameron huffed. “If she does, then she’s a fool.”
“No, you are. She would have given you everything, and you spat in her face.”
He grinned at her, and I finally saw how unhinged he was. “All’s fair in love and war, Mari.”
“Are we at war, cousin?”
“We’ve always been at war,” he spat.
“Why is that?”
This was it, the real truth of why he’d done it, and I had no idea what he’d say.
That hatred was there, desperate to break free, clawing its way out in the vitriol of his words. “Because since the moment you were born, you have taken things from me. Men who should’ve been my allies willingly swore to you instead—my brother, my cousin, even Greyson.”
Shock rocked me, though I fought not to show it. I was his excuse, but why? He’d never been interested in my friendship. Or maybe he had, but my bond with Mari and Antoni was too tight from the beginning. Maybe that was why he’d lost himself.
“When you walk into a room, people gravitate toward you like you’re the sun, and everything else gets blotted out by your presence. Perfect, precious Mari. Rey knew it. Antoni knew it too. Hell, Nate nearly died trying to get back to you because he knew it. You are a force to be reckoned with, and for so long, I haven’t had the power to fight back.”
“And now you do.” Mari’s voice was cold. Empty.
“Now I do.”
“You went to Cash out of jealousy. You sided with him like a child desperate to cling to his toys.” Mari scoffed, twisting around like she couldn’t stand to look at him anymore. “You would’ve made a pathetic king.”
He’d kept cool the whole time, but his eyes flared at her scathing remark. “I sided with Cash because I wanted my birthright. The one that you stole straight from my waiting, bleeding hands. You’re too soft to rule, Mari.”
“I’ve held the city for nearly a decade, but that’s not enough.” My love laughed, and the sound was so bitter and acrid, it stung my throat. “I shot your father in the head, and you’re telling me I’m too soft.”
“You’re weak, Mari. You’ve always been weak. You want bonds and loyalty and respect. You want family, but that’s not meant for this world. Not when it breeds selfishness and greed.”
“You’re right. I have been weak. It’s time to rectify that.”
Before he could even blink, she twisted and sent a hard kick to his ribs. The crack echoed through the room and dug its way into my brain. My wife looked fierce and formidable, all that sadness buried deep behind the queen she was.
She took out every bit of her frustration on her cousin until she was shaking with adrenaline, soaked in sweat, knuckles and knife dripping blood. Cameron looked almost unrecognizable as he sagged on his chains. Only when his eyes closed did she step back and walk away without a word. I nodded to Dominic and Nate, knowing they would sort out a watch schedule for Cameron. Until Mari decided his true punishment, every breath he took would be monitored.
She waited for me in front of the elevator, her fists and jaw clenched so tightly, her body shook. Even with all that anger, she said nothing until she was sure we were alone.
“He’s right.”
“About what?”
“That I’m weak.”
“Mari—”
“I don’t know if I can kill him, Greyson.” She said it so quietly, I almost couldn’t hear, but I did and it broke my heart. So much grief in those few words. So much agony.
So much self-hatred.
“So, don’t.”
Her head jerked up, and she looked at me through clouded eyes. “I can’t let him live, Grey.”
“Says who?”
“If the family finds out?—”
“You are the family,” I told her, trapping her face in my hands when she tried to look away. “No, listen to me. You have been so worried about the uncles for so long that you have been tiptoeing around them. This is your family, Mari. You are the queen. You make the decisions. If you decide that he lives, he lives. End of story.”
Anyone who had another opinion could form a line, and Dominic, Nate, and I would take care of it. We would be her soldiers, protecting her will with our lives.
“What am I supposed to do, just stick him in a hole somewhere and watch him rot?”
“Why not? Cameron’s done, Mari. If he escapes, the family will hunt him down. If not, he’ll die alone. It’s a lose-lose for him, regardless.”
She shook her head, but I could see the idea worming its way into her brain. Exile didn’t have to mean mercy. “If he dies, that gives Ash closure, a way for her to move on.”
“He doesn’t need to die for her to live again,” I said. “Start with divorce papers. If she needs more than that, we can reevaluate. There’s no need to rush.”
Mari leaned into me, pressing a kiss to my jaw. “Thank you.”
“I’ll always have your back, reina.”
We were inside the penthouse, though we hadn’t moved beyond the foyer. She slipped her phone from her pocket and made the call.
“Donnaghal and Sons. How can I help you?”
“This is Marianna Marcosa. Get me Laidan.”
“Of course.”
In less than ten seconds, Laidan answered. “Ms. Marcosa.”
“I need you to draft divorce papers and have them delivered within the hour.”
“For you?”
“My cousin, Cameron, and his wife, Aislynn. They have no children and no shared assets, so you can use a basic divorce decree, as long as Cameron walks away with nothing.”
There was a pause during which I wondered if Laidan would ask the questions she was obviously thinking, but I should’ve known better. She had been trained by the best, and Ronan would never ask anything that wasn’t necessary. “I’ll have them for you in twenty minutes.”
After hanging up, Mari held the phone out to me. “I need a shower, and then we’re going to start making things right.”
Twenty minutes later, Mari was clean, and the divorce papers were in hand. Thirty minutes later, we were back in the basement.
Nate and Dominic had given Cameron a cursory first aid check for the worst of the damage, but beyond that and the cage he’d been shoved into, he was otherwise exactly as we’d left him.
He lifted dull eyes up to Mari as she nodded for Nate to open the door. Dominic stood close, ready to end Cameron if he went for our woman.
“Back again so soon?” Cameron taunted, but he’d already lost his spark. Hard to stay confident when you’re bleeding out on your knees in a dog cage.
Mari smiled. “I decided I want one more thing from you before I’m done for the night.”
She tossed the manila envelope by his knees, but he didn’t pick it up. “What’s this?”
“Divorce papers.”
His eyes shifted subtly, but I saw the menace in them. “I won’t sign them.”
Mari shrugged. “Either you sign them of your own free will or I force you to, but either way, I’m giving Aislynn what she wants.”
Cameron cocked his head. “She asked for this?”
“She wants to be free of you.”
His hand slid carefully to the envelope, and he stared down at it. The papers crinkled. His hands clenched. I darted forward, but Mari was faster, plucking his hand from the envelope and anchoring it to the floor with her knife before he could do the damage he so obviously wanted.
Cameron clenched his teeth, hissing through them, but that was the only sound.
Mari leaned closer, putting pressure on the knife. “Sign the papers, or I start cutting off body parts.”
“How will I sign if you take my fingers?”
“You only need one hand to write, and we’re all here as witnesses. I’ll make it work.”
The knife wiggled farther into his hand, and Cameron sneered at her. “Why not just forge my signature? You wouldn’t even have to fight me on it.”
“Making you sign it is part of the fun. You think that Ash is yours, just another piece of property to add to your extensive list. So, I’m going to make you sign over everything you’ve earned to her.” He flushed with anger as Mari’s smile grew. “She’ll get every car, every house, every red, bloodied cent you’ve ever made. She’ll be free to leave the country, to disappear off the face of the map. To remarry and shower her new husband with all the riches her former one gave her. You’ll give her the freedom she’s always wanted, exactly as a good starter husband should, and you’ll do it right in front of me.”
By the time she was done, her cousin vibrated with anger, and Mari obviously enjoyed getting to poke at him. “Sign, Cameron.”
“I’m going to make you regret this.”
This time, when Mari laughed, it was light and carefree. “You have no power to do anything but take what I give you. Now, sign.”
He took the pen she held out carefully, signing so hard he nearly ripped the paper. After checking that he had every signature and initial required, Cameron shoved the papers away.
Mari grabbed them, stopping only to hand them back to me before standing. Dominic stepped closer, waiting for Cameron to retaliate, but he didn’t. He just watched her with hatred until she was nearly to the door.
“She’ll never be free of me, you know. Not where it counts.”
Mari looked over her shoulder as Nate locked her cousin back up. “Maybe not, but this is a good start.”
Then we left him there to rot, alone in the mess he’d made.