EIGHTEEN HOURS EARLIER
Ihad a lot of names in my short, sorry life. All the children of Niall Black had them, like badges of a family where we were constantly pitted against each other.
Brendan, the oldest, was The Black Prince. The heartless heir destined to take over Blackguard Holding once our father stepped down.
Owen was The Spare, the black sheep, a.k.a. the resentful hothead who could be played like a fiddle because of his naked desire to best Brendan.
Shea was the baby, the brat, The Princess who would be treated like a child until the day she died.
And then there was me, the nonessential third son. The jester. The fuck-up. And, to a select few, The Fixer.
Little-known fact: being a perennial disappointment to the family is excellent camouflage for doubling as its executioner. No one expects the one with all the jokes to have the least to joke about.
“Ten minutes out.”
Brady MacNamara, otherwise known as Mac, former Navy SEAL and current head of the family’s personal security, was as abrupt and affectless as ever. I liked that about Mac. The man had zero interest in small talk, moral philosophy, or literally any conversation that couldn’t be solved with a firearm or hand-to-hand combat. I didn’t have to make jokes because Mac didn’t have a sense of humor.
Didn’t stop me from trying, though.
“Ten whole minutes? You could finish at least twice by then, Mac Daddy.”
Not even a twitch of a smile.
The Vegas skyline rose on the horizon, the lights forbidding the desert sky from showing the stars. Once I’d enjoyed coming here. As long as I did his dirty work first, my father had never cared how I indulged the special brands of oblivion Vegas offered, whether that meant losing millions at a craps table just for the rush, snorting more unidentifiable powders than an amateur baker, or seeing just how many people I could fall into bed with before the sun came up.
I wasn’t picky about my vices. Whatever made me forget the “jobs” that had to be done first.
Like the one I was currently on my way to do.
The Rover pulled onto The Strip, heading toward the Minoan, the Greek-themed casino and hotel that used to be a Blackguard asset. Though I’d lost the remainder of our stake a few years back in a three-day bender, I still found it in my best interest to feed the current owners, an Albanian crime family, a steady influx of under-the-table financing.
The ugly truth was that success in the business world still required connections that couldn’t be found in boardrooms or country clubs. Blackguard Holding kept footholds like this in Montecarlo, Monaco, Vegas, St. Bart’s, Miami. The playgroundsof the rich and very rich, intersections where one could schmooze board members and investors on the golf course by day, then acquire darker means of persuasion by night.
Ever get a photo of a senator snorting blow off a stripper’s ass?
I’d saved three on my phone last month alone.
Very handy thing, blackmail. Almost as useful as deserted canyons were for hiding bodies or a mountain of debt was for forcing signatures.
Such is capitalism.
“Run me through it again,” I said. “Who’s this guy Brendan wants so badly?”
“Billy Richards. Age forty-two. Former military, dishonorably discharged.” Mac’s jaw tightened, the only sign of judgment. “Been working private security for the Huntingtons for the last three years. Fled Vermont approximately sixteen hours ago, right after the incident.”
The incident.That was one way to describe Brendan’s fake fiancée getting kidnapped by Ezra Huntington, the son of a business rival in the Northeast, and Brendan turning into John Wick to get her back. From what I’d pieced together early this morning—Brendan had been irritatingly tight-lipped about the whole clusterfuck—Ezra and one of his goons were dead, Vermont law enforcement was involved, and Brendan needed me to track down Billy and make sure this third goon didn’t open his mouth.
Which meant Billy Richards had something to tell.
I didn’t know any more details about what, exactly, my brother had done to protect his Vermont milkmaid. I didn’t need to know. That wasn’t the point.
Someone in my family had made a mess, and when that happened, I got the call to clean it up.
“Flight records?” I prompted.
“Direct to Harry Reid on Southwest. Paid cash for the ticket at the gate. No checked bags. Spotted at the Minoan three hours ago.”
“So he’s running scared, the dumb fuck. Thinks because the Huntingtons got in bed with the Antonis last year, we don’t have a stake with them too. Or that Lis won’t fold like a napkin for the right price.” I shook my head. “God, they’re all the same.”
