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“Good.” I walked to the dresser, found a pair of boxer briefs and a plain white undershirt, and pulled them on.
“Dante,” she said.
I looked up at her. “What?”
“Something happened last night.”
I frowned. “I fucked you until you fell asleep. Or don’t you remember having the best sex of your life?”
She blushed a little. “That’s not what I meant. Before you showed up. Something happened. You had… blood on your shirt.”
My eyes flicked over to the red-stained shirt lying on the floor. “Damn,” I said softly. “I’ll have to get rid of that.”
“What happened?” she pushed.
I walked to the wardrobe pressed against the far wall. It was large and oak, an antique thing made a hundred years ago in this city. It cost a goddamn fortune, but I loved the stupid thing. I opened the doors and smelled the wood a I picked out a suit and began to pull it on.
She just kept watching me. I put my slacks on, buttoned up my shirt, tucked it in. I turned to her as I adjusted my cuffs and tilted my head.
“You really want to know my business?”
“I think it has something to do with me. Or else you wouldn’t have…” She trailed off.
I snorted. “I don’t need an excuse to fuck you, Aida.”
“No, but you were angry. I think you were taking something out on me.” She bit her lip. “Not that I’m complaining. But what happened?”
I watched her for a long moment. I thought back to that club, the black light, the men on the ground. I could feel my gun smash against that fuck’s teeth again. I could see the bottles shake and fall over as my boys threw those dumb fucks over the bar.
“I hit Vlas back,” I said.
She nodded, not surprised. “What happened?”
I stepped toward her then sat down on the end of the bed. She moved over to me, the sheet dropping away to reveal one beautiful breast, her pink nipple hard again. I tilted my head toward her. “We hit the strip club your dad robbed,” I said.
She frowned and ran a hand along the sheets, smoothing them out. “Why?” she asked.
“Wanted to send a message,” I said. “Let Vlas know that nothing was safe, even a spot he knew we might come after again.”
“Did it work?”
“No,” I said. “It didn’t. He knew we’d be there. I don’t know how, but he knew.”
She looked up and her hair spilled over one shoulder as she adjusted the sheet to cover herself again. “How do you know?”
“He had a picture of you, probably from your Instagram profile. It was pinned to his desk with a knife. And his safes were all empty, no cash at all.”
She stared at me and her face morphed into horror. I stared at her, keeping my face calm and neutral. I didn’t want to scare her, but if she really wanted to be a part of my business, she was going to have to get used to things like this.
“Did you… did you kill someone?” Her voice sounded light and distant, like she was afraid to speak too loudly, or else her question would come true.
“No,” I said. “Nobody there was worth killing. I’m not stupid enough to spark off a full-scale war just because Vlas got one over on me. No, I roughed some motherfucker up, gave him a fat dental bill, but nobody died.”
She nodded once and looked relieved. “What are you going to do?”
“I’m not sure.” I hesitated and leaned toward her. “I’m afraid I have a rat in my gang.”
She bit her lip and narrowed her eyes. “That can’t be true. Your guys… They’re all loyal, aren’t they?”
“I thought so. But how else would Vlas know we’d be there?”
“I don’t know.” She took a sharp breath. “Maybe he just… guessed. And left that picture there for days, hoping you’d show.”
I nodded slightly. That was my guess as well, and it was good to hear it come from her. I didn’t want to rule out the possibility of a rat just because it was distasteful. I couldn’t pretend like that sort of shit didn’t happen from time to time.
But my boys, I’d grown up with a lot of them, and the ones that I hadn’t, I brought up myself. They were my soldiers, hand-picked and trusted, men I’d treated well. They did our business, set up our drug deals, kept shit flowing across the neighborhoods. I kept them safe and paid them in fat, heavy stacks of cash every week. I kept them all happy.
The idea that any one of them would turn on me for Vlas made my skin crawl.
“Come on,” I said. “Get up.”
“Where are we going?” she asked.
“Downstairs. You need coffee and I want to watch you walk across the room.” I smirked and stood, moving back over to my wardrobe.
