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She looks bewildered at the sudden change, letting her wander alone and unsupervised.
Something in me knows she will be here, waiting for me, when I get back. Trust. I don’t remember the last time I trusted anyone that wasn’t Marcel.
“It’s not dangerous?”
“I think you’ll be alright, going right there.”
She finally nods. She doesn’t let us part without a kiss. She walks up the stairs, watching me until we are out of each other’s sight.
I take Leo for the trip into the city. The drive feels shorter than usual, how it always does when you dread your destination. Noctus, like most of our foot soldiers, lives in our territory—an easy enough commute for the usual stomping grounds. Leo posts up outside the door as I knock. I don’t know if Noctus will answer. There’s a selfish part of me that hopes he doesn’t. There’s another part of me that expects him to be on the other side of that door with a gun.
The bolt slides back.
He throws the door open and drags his feet through a pile of junk mail piled up at the threshold.
He barely looks at me. The apartment is dim as I enter. A fan rattles loudly in the corner. It almost sounds like laughter.
“Didn’t think you’d have the balls to show up,” Noctus says. He keeps sniffing, but it’s not from tears, one nostril bloody. He paces near the kitchen. Neither of us sit.
“You know why I’m here. It’s awful, what happened to Lance—”
“Don’t give me the fucking song and dance, Sal. You put him on that fucking tower. You were fucking punishing him, because he got to what you wanted first—”
“Noctus—”
“And now my little brother is fucking dead—”
The coffee table goes flying, along with every beer bottle and pizza box and razor blade on top of it.
“—because of some fucking bitch! Let me tell you something, Sal, that better be the best pussy in the fucking world. Grade A fucking princess pussy! Hell, maybe I’ll get a taste of it myself—”
He goes down in a single punch, too wired to even try putting his hands up and defending himself.
The pain cracks through my knuckles, flaring up the injury. I clench my fist and bury it somewhere deep, turning all that rage toward the man at my feet.
I knew Noctus would see it this way. Lance was always distracted at the club, always pushing limits, running off to drink and dance, like he wasn’t there to work. Contessa was just the last straw in a fucking haystack. Convenient, how all that gets forgotten now. I didn’t put Lance on that tower to die. I put him there to behave.
Noctus snarls at my feet but pulls himself up. I’m ready for him to come up swinging, but he just teeters in front of me, his pupils shot.
“You open your mouth again, you better think twice about what comes out of it,” I warn him.
Noctus swipes his tongue against his lip.
“I’ve done my thinking. About how a lot of us ended up here. Me. Nick. Half the men I run with aren’t related to you. Hell, they’re not related to nobody. It must be so easy for you, pulling kids nobody wants out of the system. Giving them all the shit they don’t got. Money.
Opportunity. Family. You got the soldier secret formula working for you, Sal. You talk this big game about the family, about blood—hell, your family don’t even do half the hard work.”
“Family is who I say it is,” I cut across, “And you are family—”
“Bullshit—”
“We don’t get to choose who’s born into the family, Noctus. I reward talent where I find it, and I found it in you. I gave you a choice. The rest of us, it doesn’t matter if we’re suited for this life or not.
We’re in it whether we like it or not, and we adapt to it or it destroys us. That’s it. You made a choice to be with us, and I try to reward you for that choice every day.”
He paces again, putting distance between us a second time. He doesn’t want to hear it, but I make him hear it, closing the distance and shoving him back against the wall.
“I take the same risks as every one of you. When we go after the ones who did this to Lance, I’ll be right there with you. Won’t I? Have I ever sent you anywhere that I wouldn’t go myself?”
